spookshow's review
3.0
This was my first introduction to the Wild Cards series. I came across it in a bookshop and the cover caught my eye. After reading the blurb I was intrigued by the whole concept of jokers and aces as well as the spirit that protects the Natchez.
I didn't realise that the stories were all intertwined at first, the first two short stories seemed to have no connection to me, but as I continued to read I realised that the stories are in fact all connected, which I thoroughly enjoyed.
Some stories were more interesting than others but as a whole I enjoyed the story. I loved the brief insights into each of the characters as well as their involvement in others tales.
I think this has made me want to try the first wild cards book to see if it's something I will enjoy.
I didn't realise that the stories were all intertwined at first, the first two short stories seemed to have no connection to me, but as I continued to read I realised that the stories are in fact all connected, which I thoroughly enjoyed.
Some stories were more interesting than others but as a whole I enjoyed the story. I loved the brief insights into each of the characters as well as their involvement in others tales.
I think this has made me want to try the first wild cards book to see if it's something I will enjoy.
chukg's review
4.0
Nice 'break' from the world-saving stories of the last book or two, introduced some interesting new characters and had a couple old ones reappear.
buildhergender's review
4.0
Mississippi Roll: A Wild Cards Novel edited by George R. R. Martin
I love the wild cards universe, although so far, I have only been able to read a few of the stories. Basically, an alien race in the 40’s sent a virus to Earth to test it for side effects before using it in battle. It resulted in a lot of people dying horrible deaths, and then some people ending up as wildcards. Wildcards are people who the virus doesn’t kill but does change in some way, and after it’s dispersal it became part of the human genome and can be passed down generation to generation. People who get a useful power are called Aces, those who get benign powers are called blanks, those who get end up deformed from it are called Jokers. There is a bit of leeway between what is an Ace and a Joker but it generally seems that if your disease makes you ugly that you get called a Joker, even if the power is useful.
This book is called a Wild Cards Novel, but it is actually one main story with a few side stories mixed in throughout the narrative. The stories call back to each other and have some relations but a few of them could actually be removed and with a few changes be used as a stand-alone story in the series.
In the Shadow of Tall Stacks by Stephen Leigh (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_Leigh)
This is the main narrative tale of the book and composes the first and last chapters of the book as well as a chapter between each of the other short stories. Wilbur Leathers is the owner of a riverboat the Natchez. In 1951 he is married, expecting a child, and heavily in debt to some loan sharks. It’s hard not to feel bad for him as he is only in debt because business is down and not from any gambling or other reasons that novels seem to have for people to borrow from loan sharks. One night an enforcer comes aboard his ship and an argument starts up. The enforcer shoots Wilbur dead, however, rather than staying dead Wilbur finds himself as a noncorporeal being that can use hot steam to take the shape of his old form. He can enter into people and control them, get some feelings of their thoughts and ideas, and if full of the steam burn people or lift and move light objects.
Being new to this body it is by accident that he kills the enforcer. He then finds that he can not talk audibly and that unless full of steam, no one can see him. In addition, he is unable to leave his boat. This turns out bad for him because his wife, thinking he is fully dead, leaves the boat and he cannot follow her. In the present time, where most of the story and the other stories take place, it is bad news because the steamboat has been sold to a company that has decided to dock the boat and turn it into a floating casino. Once docked the boilers will be removed and William will find himself trapped in a boat that goes nowhere and with no way of interacting with people.
There is a secondary plotline going on in the story where a bunch of Jokers from a foreign country are beached in a decrepit boat on the side of the Mississippi. The US Government does not want them in the US and plans on deporting them. During the events of Wingless Angel they escape and some are taken into the Natchez by a man who arranged to get them to safety.
Despite being from the fifties William has slowly started to evolve in his thinking and rather than view the hidden jokers as illegals that need to be sent away he has pity on them and works to help them keep hidden. Using his power of steam at one point to convince an ICE agent that a room is full of hot steam from a broken pipe rather than people. Another time scaring away some cameramen, and ruining their footage, who got too close to the stateroom the Jokers are hiding in. In return one of the children Jokers touches William and gives him the ability to talk. Later, despite the risk of being burned, he does it again and William finds that he can leave the boat.
The boat is heading up to Cincinnati where it will participate in a steamboat race but William discovers that there is a plan by the owners to blow up the ship, get the money it is insured for and money for the crew which he has insured without their knowledge. The sabotage was to have the boilers overheat and explode during the race, but William takes all the steam into him and walks off into the river to explode. Hours later he wakes up and finds that he is still “alive” and with his new abilities, he has a reunion with his wife and the son he never meets and becomes part of the crew of the ship he saved.
It is never stated for certain whether he is a ghost or his noncorporeal state is a result of the Wild Card Virus, the release of which he was there for.
Wingless Angel by John Jos. Miller (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_J._Miller_(author))
I did a little research on this one as the characters seemed to have a backstory and established relationships that seemed too fleshed out for this story. They apparently were part of some other stories in the Wild Card universe.
Billy Ray is a government agent in charge of liaison between the government and people who have developed issues because of the Wildcard Virus. He himself has great strength from it, his partner and wife is Midnight Angel. They are tasked with going to the MS Gustav Schroder, a boat that has run aground full of refugee wildcards.
He and his wife are recovering from their last mission, one in which Angel was gravely injured. Since the last mission, Angel has begun to withdraw inside herself and he is afraid she might fully retract from the world. The current mission is complicated when they learn that one of the people in charge of the ship is the Joker that hurt Angel.
The team also consists of Moon, think of a female beast boy but with only the canine family to choose from, a man who can make it snow if he really concentrates hard on it, and two twins who each have an eye that the other can see out of. They arrive to find a boat full of starving people who just want safety, something that Billy wants to give to them, but he is hampered by a Ms. Evangelique Jones of the ICE. It becomes pretty apparent that she has a sore spot for jokers and is actively working to make sure they get deported. She even objects when Billy decides to buy food and water for the occupants of the boat but is eventually convinced to allow him to do it.
At night the team sneaks aboard the boat and learn that while it is under the charge of a snake-like Joker, the same who hurt Angel, there is no real hidden agenda. He just wants to get his people to a safe place. It is also revealed that he was being controlled by some mental powers during their last encounter and he offers sincere apologies for the damage he did to the Angel. This is enough to pull Angel out of her funk and she begins to help. The first problem they need to solve is that some mercenaries that he had hired to get them off the boat actually only plan on taking women they can sell and kill the rest. After they solve this they discover that the occupants of the boats already know the most likely outcome, the government will probably offer sanctuary to the few people who have powers they can use and the rest will be exported to a British Island that is being used as a prison camp sanctuary for unwanted Jokers.
The next day the team helps create a diversion and the ship which had been set back to drift is rammed into the bank of the Mississippi. All the jokers jump aground or into the water and in the confusion some of them are slipped into the Natchez to be taken to true sanctuary cities.
A Big Break in the Small Time by Carrie Vaughn (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carrie_Vaughn)
Andrew is a joker who is part of a lounge act on the Natchez, along with his wife, Sylvia. He is described as looking like the fox from Robin Hood and his wife has a definite feline appearance. She has an extremely good singing voice, while he has an adequate one, but he is able to project illusions that look real until someone touches them. Their show consists of singing, light comedy and the use of his power to add special effects to it, something they can only do in person because cameras can not pick up his illusions.
All is going well until during one show Andrew spies a man pouring something into a woman’s drink at the bar. He takes a break and then approaches the man with an illusion making it appear that he is a large muscular man. There is an argument but Andrew manages to convince the woman that her drink is drugged. The man gets upset and takes a swing at Andrew which ruins his illusion and gives him a black eye. A retired cop steps in and takes the man down.
Andrew is pleased with being able to help people and starts to feel wistful for the younger days when he had been on American Hero. It is a show sort of like American Idol, but the winner gets a job with the government as a quasi-superhero. He had washed out early on and never tried again, instead after meeting Sylvia he started up the lounge act. Now he starts to regret that he didn’t try harder or keep pursuing it and decides to be a hero. Using his power to appear as others, or even invisible he quickly stops three crooks, a cheat at the casino, a pickpocket, and another.
However, the captain of the boat warns him to stop doing this for his own safety, and she is worried he will find out about the refugees that are on board. He agrees to stop and starts to head to the lounge to get ready for the show when he is confronted by the three people he fingered. They grab him and plan on throwing him into the wheel of the boat but are ultimately stopped by William when he possesses one of them.
This is enough for Andrew and he gives up crime fighting for good.
Death on the Water by Cherie Priest (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cherie_Priest)
This is another couple story. Leo and Wanda are private investigators investigating a death that happened on the Natchez. A young woman working in the lounge was found dead on a deck and the death ruled an accident. The insurance company has a few questions and they send the couple to check on it. They decide to treat it as a delayed honeymoon. Leo is a retired cop who is also a joker, he has horns on his head. They soon find that there are a few suspects among the crew of the boat. Most notable her manager who was seen arguing with her on the deck shortly before her death and a stalker who wanted to be her boyfriend. Thrown into the story, more to pad it out and add some characterization is a group of ghost hunters recording for their TV show. Eventually, the couple realizes that the killer is neither of the suspects but instead the dead girl’s best friend, one of the riverboat drivers. She is a joker who has a body covered with fur, which she hid behind long sleeves, pants, coats, and sunglasses. The night of the murder her best friend accidentally found out the driver’s secret and in a panic she killed her.
Find the Lady by Kevin Andrew Murphy (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kevin_Andrew_Murphy)
A nice romance story. Roger was a member of an all Joker band that had a few hits back a few years. However, after the real creative talent left the band, the band lost its popularity and now the only two surviving members are reduced to performing on the riverboat. Besides music Roger is a magician and he combines the two with a trained raven to for his show. Roger has a secret, and it is that he is not really a Joker. He grew up in an orphanage a child left orphaned by the wild card virus and with the potential of the virus developing in his blood. Everyone else in the orphanage had their card turned, the phrase for the virus activating, and to stop from being the one “normie” he sought a joker who used his power to fuse some horns into his head and started to wear one jet black contact. The raven in his show is quite well trained and will repeat a lot of phrases on cue, so it is a surprise when during one of the shows it flies off. Roger eventually finds it inside the stateroom where the refugees are hiding. It is sitting on the shoulder of a woman who can not talk but whose Joker ability allows her to speak through birds that can do mimicry. She is in tears as she used to have a parrot that helped her in life, but it died during the war and since then she has been unable to communicate. Rather than take the bird back Roger takes her on as a side act as a magician’s apprentice. He falls for the woman and she falls for him and they decide to get married. However, some trouble approaches as at one of the stops an ICE agent comes aboard with a tip that the refugees are hiding in the stateroom. Using sleight of hand and illusions provided by Andrew, the fox-faced illusion caster from a previous story, he manages to convince the ICE agent that the room is empty and that the girl is his wife. After the agent leaves he realizes the stress of the moment has trigged the virus, a moment he has dreaded as besides the more likely probability of being a joker, death is a real possibility, but the virus only makes his horns real and his eye jet black without needing a contact.
Under the Arch by David D. Levine (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_D._Levine)
Jack is a bartender and the refugees contact on the Natchez. He is also 70 years old and gay and has given up the hope of ever having love. During the trip, he makes friends with one of the refugees and starts to learn about their life and customs. At one stop he finds out that there is a young couple who have fallen in love, however, the father of the girl has forbidden it. The couple has disappeared and Jack goes around the ship to find them. He and his friend find them just as the father does and fight breaks out. During the chaos, the couple escapes the boat and hide in the city's sewers, with the father in pursuit. Jack and his friend give chase and during the sewer search another fight takes place, but this time Jack reveals that he is a wildcard and that his power is to turn into an alligator. The fight eventually culminates in the death of the father and Jack reverting naked back into human form in his friend's arms. And based on the response from his friend they realize they both are gay. The story ends with Jake planning on a marriage.
I love the wild cards universe, although so far, I have only been able to read a few of the stories. Basically, an alien race in the 40’s sent a virus to Earth to test it for side effects before using it in battle. It resulted in a lot of people dying horrible deaths, and then some people ending up as wildcards. Wildcards are people who the virus doesn’t kill but does change in some way, and after it’s dispersal it became part of the human genome and can be passed down generation to generation. People who get a useful power are called Aces, those who get benign powers are called blanks, those who get end up deformed from it are called Jokers. There is a bit of leeway between what is an Ace and a Joker but it generally seems that if your disease makes you ugly that you get called a Joker, even if the power is useful.
This book is called a Wild Cards Novel, but it is actually one main story with a few side stories mixed in throughout the narrative. The stories call back to each other and have some relations but a few of them could actually be removed and with a few changes be used as a stand-alone story in the series.
In the Shadow of Tall Stacks by Stephen Leigh (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_Leigh)
This is the main narrative tale of the book and composes the first and last chapters of the book as well as a chapter between each of the other short stories. Wilbur Leathers is the owner of a riverboat the Natchez. In 1951 he is married, expecting a child, and heavily in debt to some loan sharks. It’s hard not to feel bad for him as he is only in debt because business is down and not from any gambling or other reasons that novels seem to have for people to borrow from loan sharks. One night an enforcer comes aboard his ship and an argument starts up. The enforcer shoots Wilbur dead, however, rather than staying dead Wilbur finds himself as a noncorporeal being that can use hot steam to take the shape of his old form. He can enter into people and control them, get some feelings of their thoughts and ideas, and if full of the steam burn people or lift and move light objects.
Being new to this body it is by accident that he kills the enforcer. He then finds that he can not talk audibly and that unless full of steam, no one can see him. In addition, he is unable to leave his boat. This turns out bad for him because his wife, thinking he is fully dead, leaves the boat and he cannot follow her. In the present time, where most of the story and the other stories take place, it is bad news because the steamboat has been sold to a company that has decided to dock the boat and turn it into a floating casino. Once docked the boilers will be removed and William will find himself trapped in a boat that goes nowhere and with no way of interacting with people.
There is a secondary plotline going on in the story where a bunch of Jokers from a foreign country are beached in a decrepit boat on the side of the Mississippi. The US Government does not want them in the US and plans on deporting them. During the events of Wingless Angel they escape and some are taken into the Natchez by a man who arranged to get them to safety.
Despite being from the fifties William has slowly started to evolve in his thinking and rather than view the hidden jokers as illegals that need to be sent away he has pity on them and works to help them keep hidden. Using his power of steam at one point to convince an ICE agent that a room is full of hot steam from a broken pipe rather than people. Another time scaring away some cameramen, and ruining their footage, who got too close to the stateroom the Jokers are hiding in. In return one of the children Jokers touches William and gives him the ability to talk. Later, despite the risk of being burned, he does it again and William finds that he can leave the boat.
The boat is heading up to Cincinnati where it will participate in a steamboat race but William discovers that there is a plan by the owners to blow up the ship, get the money it is insured for and money for the crew which he has insured without their knowledge. The sabotage was to have the boilers overheat and explode during the race, but William takes all the steam into him and walks off into the river to explode. Hours later he wakes up and finds that he is still “alive” and with his new abilities, he has a reunion with his wife and the son he never meets and becomes part of the crew of the ship he saved.
It is never stated for certain whether he is a ghost or his noncorporeal state is a result of the Wild Card Virus, the release of which he was there for.
Wingless Angel by John Jos. Miller (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_J._Miller_(author))
I did a little research on this one as the characters seemed to have a backstory and established relationships that seemed too fleshed out for this story. They apparently were part of some other stories in the Wild Card universe.
Billy Ray is a government agent in charge of liaison between the government and people who have developed issues because of the Wildcard Virus. He himself has great strength from it, his partner and wife is Midnight Angel. They are tasked with going to the MS Gustav Schroder, a boat that has run aground full of refugee wildcards.
He and his wife are recovering from their last mission, one in which Angel was gravely injured. Since the last mission, Angel has begun to withdraw inside herself and he is afraid she might fully retract from the world. The current mission is complicated when they learn that one of the people in charge of the ship is the Joker that hurt Angel.
The team also consists of Moon, think of a female beast boy but with only the canine family to choose from, a man who can make it snow if he really concentrates hard on it, and two twins who each have an eye that the other can see out of. They arrive to find a boat full of starving people who just want safety, something that Billy wants to give to them, but he is hampered by a Ms. Evangelique Jones of the ICE. It becomes pretty apparent that she has a sore spot for jokers and is actively working to make sure they get deported. She even objects when Billy decides to buy food and water for the occupants of the boat but is eventually convinced to allow him to do it.
At night the team sneaks aboard the boat and learn that while it is under the charge of a snake-like Joker, the same who hurt Angel, there is no real hidden agenda. He just wants to get his people to a safe place. It is also revealed that he was being controlled by some mental powers during their last encounter and he offers sincere apologies for the damage he did to the Angel. This is enough to pull Angel out of her funk and she begins to help. The first problem they need to solve is that some mercenaries that he had hired to get them off the boat actually only plan on taking women they can sell and kill the rest. After they solve this they discover that the occupants of the boats already know the most likely outcome, the government will probably offer sanctuary to the few people who have powers they can use and the rest will be exported to a British Island that is being used as a prison camp sanctuary for unwanted Jokers.
The next day the team helps create a diversion and the ship which had been set back to drift is rammed into the bank of the Mississippi. All the jokers jump aground or into the water and in the confusion some of them are slipped into the Natchez to be taken to true sanctuary cities.
A Big Break in the Small Time by Carrie Vaughn (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carrie_Vaughn)
Andrew is a joker who is part of a lounge act on the Natchez, along with his wife, Sylvia. He is described as looking like the fox from Robin Hood and his wife has a definite feline appearance. She has an extremely good singing voice, while he has an adequate one, but he is able to project illusions that look real until someone touches them. Their show consists of singing, light comedy and the use of his power to add special effects to it, something they can only do in person because cameras can not pick up his illusions.
All is going well until during one show Andrew spies a man pouring something into a woman’s drink at the bar. He takes a break and then approaches the man with an illusion making it appear that he is a large muscular man. There is an argument but Andrew manages to convince the woman that her drink is drugged. The man gets upset and takes a swing at Andrew which ruins his illusion and gives him a black eye. A retired cop steps in and takes the man down.
Andrew is pleased with being able to help people and starts to feel wistful for the younger days when he had been on American Hero. It is a show sort of like American Idol, but the winner gets a job with the government as a quasi-superhero. He had washed out early on and never tried again, instead after meeting Sylvia he started up the lounge act. Now he starts to regret that he didn’t try harder or keep pursuing it and decides to be a hero. Using his power to appear as others, or even invisible he quickly stops three crooks, a cheat at the casino, a pickpocket, and another.
However, the captain of the boat warns him to stop doing this for his own safety, and she is worried he will find out about the refugees that are on board. He agrees to stop and starts to head to the lounge to get ready for the show when he is confronted by the three people he fingered. They grab him and plan on throwing him into the wheel of the boat but are ultimately stopped by William when he possesses one of them.
This is enough for Andrew and he gives up crime fighting for good.
Death on the Water by Cherie Priest (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cherie_Priest)
This is another couple story. Leo and Wanda are private investigators investigating a death that happened on the Natchez. A young woman working in the lounge was found dead on a deck and the death ruled an accident. The insurance company has a few questions and they send the couple to check on it. They decide to treat it as a delayed honeymoon. Leo is a retired cop who is also a joker, he has horns on his head. They soon find that there are a few suspects among the crew of the boat. Most notable her manager who was seen arguing with her on the deck shortly before her death and a stalker who wanted to be her boyfriend. Thrown into the story, more to pad it out and add some characterization is a group of ghost hunters recording for their TV show. Eventually, the couple realizes that the killer is neither of the suspects but instead the dead girl’s best friend, one of the riverboat drivers. She is a joker who has a body covered with fur, which she hid behind long sleeves, pants, coats, and sunglasses. The night of the murder her best friend accidentally found out the driver’s secret and in a panic she killed her.
Find the Lady by Kevin Andrew Murphy (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kevin_Andrew_Murphy)
A nice romance story. Roger was a member of an all Joker band that had a few hits back a few years. However, after the real creative talent left the band, the band lost its popularity and now the only two surviving members are reduced to performing on the riverboat. Besides music Roger is a magician and he combines the two with a trained raven to for his show. Roger has a secret, and it is that he is not really a Joker. He grew up in an orphanage a child left orphaned by the wild card virus and with the potential of the virus developing in his blood. Everyone else in the orphanage had their card turned, the phrase for the virus activating, and to stop from being the one “normie” he sought a joker who used his power to fuse some horns into his head and started to wear one jet black contact. The raven in his show is quite well trained and will repeat a lot of phrases on cue, so it is a surprise when during one of the shows it flies off. Roger eventually finds it inside the stateroom where the refugees are hiding. It is sitting on the shoulder of a woman who can not talk but whose Joker ability allows her to speak through birds that can do mimicry. She is in tears as she used to have a parrot that helped her in life, but it died during the war and since then she has been unable to communicate. Rather than take the bird back Roger takes her on as a side act as a magician’s apprentice. He falls for the woman and she falls for him and they decide to get married. However, some trouble approaches as at one of the stops an ICE agent comes aboard with a tip that the refugees are hiding in the stateroom. Using sleight of hand and illusions provided by Andrew, the fox-faced illusion caster from a previous story, he manages to convince the ICE agent that the room is empty and that the girl is his wife. After the agent leaves he realizes the stress of the moment has trigged the virus, a moment he has dreaded as besides the more likely probability of being a joker, death is a real possibility, but the virus only makes his horns real and his eye jet black without needing a contact.
Under the Arch by David D. Levine (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_D._Levine)
Jack is a bartender and the refugees contact on the Natchez. He is also 70 years old and gay and has given up the hope of ever having love. During the trip, he makes friends with one of the refugees and starts to learn about their life and customs. At one stop he finds out that there is a young couple who have fallen in love, however, the father of the girl has forbidden it. The couple has disappeared and Jack goes around the ship to find them. He and his friend find them just as the father does and fight breaks out. During the chaos, the couple escapes the boat and hide in the city's sewers, with the father in pursuit. Jack and his friend give chase and during the sewer search another fight takes place, but this time Jack reveals that he is a wildcard and that his power is to turn into an alligator. The fight eventually culminates in the death of the father and Jack reverting naked back into human form in his friend's arms. And based on the response from his friend they realize they both are gay. The story ends with Jake planning on a marriage.
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