I Just Read About That…

SOUNDTRACK: GIVĒON–Tiny Desk (Home) Concert #166 (January 28, 2021).

GIVĒON is a pretty classic R&B crooner.  He seems pretty grateful to have gotten where he is.

“Just bear with me while I just enjoy this and soak in it,” GIVĒON admits with a laugh.

He plays three songs.

“The Beach” opens with gentle guitar chords from James Murray and a slow bass line from Ivan Chatman.  Then GIVĒON and RaVaughn Brown sing together.

After the song, he says he’s pretty excited to play in February.

“Any moment to do this would be special,” he says between songs, “but I think Black History Month … just celebrating Black culture for this month, I’m really excited to get to do this on this platform.”

He also notes that he is a Pisces.  “Pisces are emotional, maybe that’s why I make songs like this.”  “Like I Want You” opens with a simple drum intro from Andre Montgomery and a slow bass line.  Deondre Ellis plays a keyboard melody that matches the vocal melody at the beginning each line–it’s a nice touch.  Murray plays a pretty ripping guitar solo, too.

Before the final song, “Stuck on You,” he says, “I can’t wait to watch this with my mom and see what she thinks because she likes to nitpick sometimes.”  It’s a bit of a faster song and when there’s about a minute left, GIVĒON walks off to let the band jam out the set.  The mark of an old school singer already.

[READ: February 20, 2021] Goliath

The final book of this trilogy was as exciting as the rest of the series.

Everyone is back aboard the Leviathan and they are heading toward the Arctic.  They have an exciting and dangerous mission up ahead–they are going to lower Leviathan as low as she can go so that they can retrieve some cargo from the back of a polar bear beastie.

Deryn and Newkirk are on a small platform swinging madly through the air as they try to secure this very large parcel from the back of a moving bear.  It’s something that’s been done before, but never with something this large (usually just mail bags).  This is a massive time saver, but if they miss, it means a several hours before they can turn around an try again.

The package is a huge amount of supplies both for the Leviathan and for the special guest who they are going to meet in the Wilderness. Things don’t go as smoothly as promised because the package weighs more than was promised–the danger is pretty great and the scene is very exciting.

When they open up the packages in the ships hold, they discover that in addition to the various supplies there is a massive Clanker gadget that needs assembling.  It is good that Alek and his men are on board to help assemble the Clanker contraption.  He’s also happy to have gainful employ for a time–it’s the happiest he’s been in a while.

The device proves to be a portable metal detector–a powerful one designed to be used almost like a giant magnet. But there’s no explanation for why it’s here.

The ship continues on its mission further up towards Greenland.  Then the watchman sends a message: Trees All Down Ahead.  It doesn’t make sense until they see a clearing up ahead and indeed all of the trees are destroyed–knocked over as of by the world’s largest hurricane. Worse yet, there are gigantic bones littering the place–as if a whale beastie was eaten.

They get closer and see one of the problems–a host of wild fighting bear beasties.  They are staving and deranged.  The Leviathan is as good a food source as any.  That’s when part of the mysterious parcel comes in handy.  In the packages was several tons of beef, which they drop to lure that bears away from the location where they are headed.

The location is a secluded house with all kinds of equipment and a number of men working there. There’s also one man who looks very different–fancy and formal and above everyone else.  He shows Deryn and the others that the place is surrounded by an electric fence–an invention of his own.  For this man is Nikola Tesla,

Tesla worked for the Clankers–he was on their side until they destroyed Serbia, his home land, and now he has switched over the the Darwinists side.

Tesla wanted that metal detector thing to find some pieces of metal under  the ground in Greenland.  In Tunguska.  Tesla believes that the explosion that happened there was the result of his doing.  He has been creating a device that could throw electricity across the globe.  He believes that from New York, he was able to flatten the trees in Greenland through his magic ray.  He calls this ray Goliath–and he believes the threat of this explosion will ensure world peace.

Dr Barlow, the lady boffin, suggests that Deryn and Alek might like to know a little bit more about what Tesla is up to.  When they tested out the magnet machine it suggests that he had something large and magnetic in his quarters.  Deryn was able to sneak in and take a scraping of the metal thing under Tesla’s bed in hopes of getting it analyzed.

But while Deryn is trying to get this piece, Alek has figured out her big secret–clues in a newspaper gave it away and when he called her Deryn, she answered like nothing.

I was worried that this betrayal was going to send the story in an ugly direction, but Alek winds up being mad on for a short time because he genuinely enjoys Dylan/Deryn’s company. And then he realized that the way Deryn had been acting that she was in love with him.

The ship continues its journey–essentially transporting Tesla to New York.  They go East to get there.  In Japan they witness the Japanese beasties called kappa which are alligator-like creatures that attack ships from underneath.

They land in japan which is a fun and new experience for all of them. Alek and Deryn have made up and enjoy a meal together.  But the real reason for landing in Japan is for Tesla to demonstrate his gigantic machine.

Once back aboard the Leviathan, Tesla wants to use the ship as a large broadcasting resource by stretching a large antenna across the top of the ship.  But something goes wrong and it’s up to Deryn to repair it.  On top of the ship.  While traveling at high speeds. Yikes!

Alek goes on top with her–she’ll need another body up there since it’s too dangerous for one person alone.  He does wind up saving her at the cost of a small concussion to him.  It’s also a moment for them to be alone together to figure out what they mean to each other.

But there’s no real time for that because California looms.  They are all feted by William Randolph Hearst–who proves to be a less than noble fellow.  Indeed, it’s his doing that causes them to make an emergency landing in Mexico (this book is really quite globetrotting).

The Mexico scenes are cool because the Mexican generals all have clanker weapons which turn out to be robotic cameras for Mexican films that Hearst is financing in some way. Mexico also allows Deryn one more opportunity to do a crazy stunt (and almost get outed as a woman).

The last leg of the journey is to go to New York to watch Tesla’s display of might.  They have some new passengers–reporters–who are looking to get a scoop–any scoop.  One is Eddie Malone from book 2; the second is Adela Rogers who works for Hearst and is aghast to realize that Malone works for Pulitzer.

Miss Rogers proves to be a real pain as she tries to get any kind of story she can out of Deryn.  [The blurb at the end says that her real life biography, The Honeycomb, is very interesting].

As the ship heads into New York, Dr Barlow offers Dylan a job.  She reasons that since he has injured his leg he may not be as useful on the ship.  But he could work for her as her personal assistant.

But when Deryn reveals the truth (I love Barlow’s reaction) it really does change things.   She is very impressed with Deryn’s skill at disguise. But when Deryn reveals that Malone is going to write about her in the paper–well, that’s the end of that.  It’s also the en of her time in the service because the Captain will be publicly humiliated that she fooled them all.

As the ship pulls into New York there’s much going on.

Deryn is concerned that Tesla is actually crazy and that Alek has fallen under his spell.  Everyone is concerned that the reporters will reveal so many secrets.  And of course Alek is staying on with Tesla and is soon to become King.  But Deryn and the Leviathan are sailing on to their next task.

But things could never end like that, not when there are German ships coming in to destroy everything!

The Afterword tells what’s real and what’s not (always a good thing in alternative fiction).

He mentions the 1908 meteorite landing in Tunguska.  But people didn’t really know much about it (and still aren’t 100% certain) so theories abounded about what caused it–aliens, black holes and even experiments from Tesla.  I like that Tesla is portrayed as a loose cannon–a really crazy guy who could easily do a lot more harm than good.  In reality, he was indeed working on a death ray that he thought would make war impossible.

This book also ends the war a lot sooner than it did in reality (by drawing the U.S. into the war years earlier than they did in the real world).

I’m going to have to read more from Westerfeld.