METALLIC REALMS, "elegiac, sweet-talking mourning raga" for a world that dared to disappoint Himself

METALLIC REALMS
LINCOLN MICHEL
Atria Books (non-affiliate Amazon link)
$14.99 ebook, available tomorrow

Rating: 4.5* of five

The Publisher Says: A wildly inventive and entertaining novel about a sci-fi writing group whose fictional universe and personal dramas begin to collide and collapse from the critically acclaimed author of the “timeless and original” (The New York Times) The Body Scout.

Perennially single, socially awkward, and drowning in debt, Michael Lincoln’s life has turned out nothing like the intergalactic pulp heroes of his youth. But these are pedestrian concerns—he has a greater calling, and that is to preserve for all posterity the greatest series in the history of the written The Star Rot Chronicles. Written collectively by Michael’s best (and perhaps only) friend Taras K. Castle and his misfit sci-fi writing group, the Orb 4, the stories follow Captain Baldwin and his fearless crew on their mind-bending adventures across the Metallic Realms, from solar whales swallowing suns at the edge of spacetime to interstellar love triangles. These masterpieces have gone tragically unpublished—until now.

But the most urgent story Michael must tell takes place in the more intimate (if no less dramatic) confines of literary Brooklyn. Behind the greatest multiverse ever created, there are the all-too-mortal people who wrote it. As Michael chronicles the personal melodramas of the Orb 4 as well as the funhouse reflections in their fiction, the line between real and unreal becomes dangerously thin, and the true reasons for the group’s fallout begin to emerge. As he labors away in hiding, Michael has just one to bring the Metallic Realms to the world. No matter the cost.

Metallic Realms is a genre-breaking ode to golden-age science fiction, friendship, creativity, and the power and perils of storytelling.

I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA NETGALLEY. THANK YOU.

My Review: Michael Lincoln is NOT Lincoln Michel. He tells you so. Orb 4, to a writer, agrees. It's about all they agree on.

Are you at all involved in geekdom, fandom, nerdery online? Are you vaguely aware of the idea roman à clef? Do you need something to make you laugh before it makes your ego say, "hey! wait a minute!", and rub its thumped nose?

Here's you a book.

Since reading Upright Beasts some years ago, then falling under the sway of what I called "{w}hat would happen if Gattaca and Moneyball had a bastard love-child" aka The Body Scout a while back, I've quite fancied my trips into Author Michel's head. He's facetious, rowdy, and disrespectful. I'd spank him if I met him in person, or maybe not since I think he'd like it, but on the page this is really fun stuff.

I'll assume you've read the synopsis. It's accurate as far as it goes. Lincoln Michel's a caustic and sarcastic soul, so it's not one bit of a surprise that Michael Lincoln is, as well. You think *I* say hurtful things? I'm the Canadian Ambassador to the Court of St. James's by comparison to this guy! No quarter is offered, no opportunity for a well-phrased dig is passed up. Think Dorothy Parker without the waspish edge, replaced by a cruel condescension.

Why, given all that, did I rate this 4.5 stars? Because he's unkind but he's not wrong. The beady eye in the scope is gonna shoot a vital part but he won't miss because he's seen the anatomy too close-up to mistake his aim by so much as a millimeter. And by Grabthar's Hammer, he really is funny.

Will you like it? Are you a Trekkie? A Tolkien/"high fantasy" fan? Then no. Are you exasperated by clever-clever satirical stuff? Avoid like it gots the cooties. A deeply-dyed AO3 lover? This way plagueships lie.

I had moments of stiffened-spine outrage (Ca'Raan? Really? That's where you're expending firepower?), but all's fair etc etc and being a whiny li'l bitch would only make the Big Bad Bully glow with satisfaction. So not gonna make some PC case with less than half my heart. Laugh at yourself, look at how your detractors portray you, because it's how they see you. No one knows they need a comb until they're told. He's telling us.

But get it from the library, no sense handing him your money to get insulted.