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Space Unicorn Blues
A misfit crew race across the galaxy to prevent the genocide of magical creatures, in this unique science fiction debut.
Having magical powers makes you less than human, a resource to be exploited. Half-unicorn Gary Cobalt is sick of slavery, captivity, and his horn being ground down to power faster-than-light travel. When he's finally free, all he wants is to run away in his ancestors' stone ship. Instead, Captain Jenny Perata steals the ship out from under him, so she can make an urgent delivery. But Jenny held him captive for a decade, and then Gary murdered her best friend... who was also the wife of her co-pilot, Cowboy Jim. What could possibly go right?
File Under: Science Fiction [ Rocks in Space - Stand Up to Reason - The Human Experiment - Last Unicorn ]
Having magical powers makes you less than human, a resource to be exploited. Half-unicorn Gary Cobalt is sick of slavery, captivity, and his horn being ground down to power faster-than-light travel. When he's finally free, all he wants is to run away in his ancestors' stone ship. Instead, Captain Jenny Perata steals the ship out from under him, so she can make an urgent delivery. But Jenny held him captive for a decade, and then Gary murdered her best friend... who was also the wife of her co-pilot, Cowboy Jim. What could possibly go right?
File Under: Science Fiction [ Rocks in Space - Stand Up to Reason - The Human Experiment - Last Unicorn ]
400 pages, Paperback
First published July 3, 2018
49 people are currently reading
4162 people want to read
About the author
T.J. Berry
5 books109 followersTJ Berry has been a political blogger, bakery owner, and spent a disastrous two weeks working in a razor blade factory. She now writes science fiction, fantasy, and horror from Los Angeles with considerably fewer on-the-job injuries. She's the author of Space Unicorn Blues and Five Unicorn Flush from Angry Robot Books. Find her on Twitter @TJaneBerry.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 187 reviews
October 6, 2021
I’m going to leave it at 2 stars for now. I’m totally undecided. There were parts that were good and others I just couldn’t get into. Now this could be my mood so I’m open to try it again someday!
Mel 🖤🐶🐺🐾
October 11, 2021
💀 DNF at 71%.
Yet another Wonderfully Wonderful Buddy Read (WWBR™) courtesy of the MacHalos! We sure know how to pick them! Go us and stuff!
This book, being a great cure for insomnia, was pretty painful to read and I don’t want to spend the next 12546 hours writing a crappy non-review for it, so let’s just go for a quick Good/Bad thingie, shall we?
① The world is uniquely original, originally unique, and bloody shrimping cool.
② The cast of characters is one of the most scrumptiously diverse ever, thank you very much. LGBTQ characters! BIPOC characters! Disabled characters! Anything-you-can-think-of characters!
③ A world populated by the most wonderful array of delicious creatures! (Sorry, I meant sentient beings.) There are unicorns (duh)! There are centaurs! There are fauns! There are dwarves! There are dryads (and gay ones at that!) There are elves! There are pixies! Anything-you-can-think-of
① BLAH BLAH BLAH BLAH BLAH. The author obviously needs to follow Glen Cook’s Crash Course on Fast-Forwarding. I mean, it takes her 5 bloody shrimping chapters to get through the first scene. FIVE WHOLE, VERY LONG CHAPTERS. Please kill me somebody and stuff.
② The characters are unlikeable as fish. Which is a shame given how potentially tasty and gloriously diverse they are. I badly wanted to care about this cast but didn’t give a stinking shrimp about any of them. Okay, so I did care about Boges the dwarf (who shines in the 1.245 pages she is featured in). Oh, and the spaceship-that-is-a-biome has a pretty cool personality, too.
③ Those dialogues 🥱🥱. Need I say more? Didn't think so.
④ I might have mentioned it before, but 😴😴😴.
The end and stuff.
[Pre-review nonsense]
This could have been a bloody shrimping cool story. Only that it wasn't.
➽ Review to come and stuff.
[June 2018]
Unicorns in space. A misfit crew. Need I say more? Didn't think so.
July 13, 2021
Re-read July 2021:
Gave the audio a try, but it wasn't for me.
The narrator didn't put the panache into the characters that my inner monologue does.
Just means my paperback will get more love on future re-reads.
Original Review October 2018:
This book was AH-MAZING!!!!!!!
The world building is crazy, I mean the Jaggery stone ship was a self sustaining work of art in itself. Then we have all the cool new species of Balas and planets and whatnot. You should really read this!
The band of merry "heroes" are hella fun, like this weird dysfunctional family that isn't related and all kinda hate each other.
Sooooooooo entertaining to read about.
It ends on a cliffhanger.
But don't fear the author has already gotten the green light from her publisher to get the next book released in 2019.
I'M SO FREAKING EXCITED!!!!!!!
Gave the audio a try, but it wasn't for me.
The narrator didn't put the panache into the characters that my inner monologue does.
Just means my paperback will get more love on future re-reads.
Original Review October 2018:
This book was AH-MAZING!!!!!!!
The world building is crazy, I mean the Jaggery stone ship was a self sustaining work of art in itself. Then we have all the cool new species of Balas and planets and whatnot. You should really read this!
The band of merry "heroes" are hella fun, like this weird dysfunctional family that isn't related and all kinda hate each other.
Sooooooooo entertaining to read about.
It ends on a cliffhanger.
But don't fear the author has already gotten the green light from her publisher to get the next book released in 2019.
I'M SO FREAKING EXCITED!!!!!!!
August 7, 2023
Space Unicorn Blues is a fascinating blend of science fiction with fantasy elements! This is the kind of story you can read and think you understand it all but then you re-read it and find nuances that you missed the first time around. There was a wonderful play of tensions in this story and I enjoyed that I was able to understand each character’s root grievances with each other and themselves. There was nothing superficial in this story. There were also many portions of this story that would make you sad, especially to see how the humans in this story treated the alien Bala’s, but there was a lot of humor and wins as well. I also adored that there was a host of supernatural creatures in this story. I especially loved how Gary was written because he did not conform to human emotions. He would have been absolutely justified in taking his revenge on any number of characters in this story but he took the higher road always. Space Unicorn Blues was an exciting adventure that tugged at my heart as often as it tickled my funny bone!
This review is based on a complimentary book I received from Edelweiss+. It is an honest and voluntary review. The complimentary receipt of it in no way affected my review or rating.
This review is based on a complimentary book I received from Edelweiss+. It is an honest and voluntary review. The complimentary receipt of it in no way affected my review or rating.
July 6, 2018
3 Stars
Review:
*I received an ecopy of this book via NetGalley. This has not influenced my review.*
There were a lot of things to love about this book. An uncommon paranormal creature! Unlikely allies! LGBT+ characters! A disabled character! POC characters! Space adventure! But it ended up being not right for me.
I think the biggest problem was that I was expecting a fun, action-packed space adventure full of shenanigans and misfits, but this was slow-paced for most of the story and more serious and harsh than fun.
Then there were the characters. The blurb makes it sound like Gary is the protagonist, but it felt like Jenny's story. It seemed like most of the book was her POV, she had the most development, and she was the one who drove the story forward. Unfortunately, I didn't like her. I couldn't bring myself to like anyone, aside from Gary and Boges (a dwarf who lived on his ship). The things they had done were too terrible and selfish. Jenny was eventually sorry, but it took her until the end of the book. And although I liked Gary, I never got a feel for his personality. I get that he was disenchanted and traumatized, but I needed something. I never even knew what emotions he was feeling. To be fair though, it is realistic for people to not be sorry, to avoid emotions that make them uncomfortable, to get so beaten down that they just let things happen to them, etc., so while the characters may not have been likeable to me, they were still believable.
I will also give the book credit---if ever there were a team of unlikely allies, this was it. This was as unlikely as unlikely allies can get. But they were maybe too unlikely for me? Jenny and Jim spent years keeping Gary captive and torturing him. I was frustrated with how, upon getting back on his ship with them, he just kind of let them boss him around again and was even willing to put his own safety and freedom at risk to help/save them. And honestly I wasn't comfortable with Gary becoming friends with Jenny after everything she did to him, even if she had changed.
But hey, something positive now! I liked the half-unicorn aspect! And he was literally half unicorn. He had the upper body of a human, but the legs of a unicorn, plus a horn (or rather, a space on his head where a horn should've been, since his was cut off). Unicorns also had their own beliefs and ways of life, and little inclusions of those things were interesting.
I also loved the diversity/inclusivity. Gary was asexual and Indian on his mother's side. Jenny was a lesbian and used a wheelchair. Ricky was trans. It all seemed like good rep. And although the characters on the ship didn't always get along, they did respect each other in regards to these things (aside from Jim, who was supposed to be a jerk). Also, the prejudice against the non-human species was a continued theme throughout the book.
Another great thing was the world-building. The areas of space, the planets, the different species, the way way the ship worked, the backstory for how things got to be the way they were, etc. were well thought-out. The stoneship, and how it was a living thing, was especially creative. I also liked that all the alien species weren't too human-like. Even little details about different types of drinks made the world more interesting.
The writing was good too. I have no complaints there.
I also want to mention that this is the first in a series, so there are story threads left open to continue in future books.
So overall, this didn't end up being the fun, action-packed book I thought it would be, and it wasn't quite right for me, but I did like the unicorn aspect, the inclusivity, and the world-building, and I think other people might enjoy it more than I did.
Recommended For:
Anyone who likes uncommon paranormal creatures, space/sci-fi world-building, LGBT+/disabled/POC characters, slow-paced stories, and space adventures with a somewhat serious tone.
Original Review @ Metaphors and Moonlight
Review:
*I received an ecopy of this book via NetGalley. This has not influenced my review.*
There were a lot of things to love about this book. An uncommon paranormal creature! Unlikely allies! LGBT+ characters! A disabled character! POC characters! Space adventure! But it ended up being not right for me.
I think the biggest problem was that I was expecting a fun, action-packed space adventure full of shenanigans and misfits, but this was slow-paced for most of the story and more serious and harsh than fun.
Then there were the characters. The blurb makes it sound like Gary is the protagonist, but it felt like Jenny's story. It seemed like most of the book was her POV, she had the most development, and she was the one who drove the story forward. Unfortunately, I didn't like her. I couldn't bring myself to like anyone, aside from Gary and Boges (a dwarf who lived on his ship). The things they had done were too terrible and selfish. Jenny was eventually sorry, but it took her until the end of the book. And although I liked Gary, I never got a feel for his personality. I get that he was disenchanted and traumatized, but I needed something. I never even knew what emotions he was feeling. To be fair though, it is realistic for people to not be sorry, to avoid emotions that make them uncomfortable, to get so beaten down that they just let things happen to them, etc., so while the characters may not have been likeable to me, they were still believable.
I will also give the book credit---if ever there were a team of unlikely allies, this was it. This was as unlikely as unlikely allies can get. But they were maybe too unlikely for me? Jenny and Jim spent years keeping Gary captive and torturing him. I was frustrated with how, upon getting back on his ship with them, he just kind of let them boss him around again and was even willing to put his own safety and freedom at risk to help/save them. And honestly I wasn't comfortable with Gary becoming friends with Jenny after everything she did to him, even if she had changed.
But hey, something positive now! I liked the half-unicorn aspect! And he was literally half unicorn. He had the upper body of a human, but the legs of a unicorn, plus a horn (or rather, a space on his head where a horn should've been, since his was cut off). Unicorns also had their own beliefs and ways of life, and little inclusions of those things were interesting.
I also loved the diversity/inclusivity. Gary was asexual and Indian on his mother's side. Jenny was a lesbian and used a wheelchair. Ricky was trans. It all seemed like good rep. And although the characters on the ship didn't always get along, they did respect each other in regards to these things (aside from Jim, who was supposed to be a jerk). Also, the prejudice against the non-human species was a continued theme throughout the book.
Another great thing was the world-building. The areas of space, the planets, the different species, the way way the ship worked, the backstory for how things got to be the way they were, etc. were well thought-out. The stoneship, and how it was a living thing, was especially creative. I also liked that all the alien species weren't too human-like. Even little details about different types of drinks made the world more interesting.
The writing was good too. I have no complaints there.
I also want to mention that this is the first in a series, so there are story threads left open to continue in future books.
So overall, this didn't end up being the fun, action-packed book I thought it would be, and it wasn't quite right for me, but I did like the unicorn aspect, the inclusivity, and the world-building, and I think other people might enjoy it more than I did.
Recommended For:
Anyone who likes uncommon paranormal creatures, space/sci-fi world-building, LGBT+/disabled/POC characters, slow-paced stories, and space adventures with a somewhat serious tone.
Original Review @ Metaphors and Moonlight
July 8, 2018
Originally published on The Nerd Daily | Review by Carolyn Percy
When humanity finally left Earth behind for the outer reaches of space, they might’ve expected to encounter little green men but certainly not unicorns, pixies or elves. Known collectively as the Bala, they are a group of species who take the forms of just about any mythological creature you can think of. Despite having observed and even visited humanity over the centuries, they extended the hand of friendship, offering to help them adapt to their new lives in space. Did humanity accept the gesture in the spirit it was intended?
Well, with our track record in meeting new cultures, what do you think? A century passes, and the Bala have been hunted, enslaved and exploited with near fanatical zeal, especially once it was found out that individual Bala parts had useful properties. Gary Cobalt is half-unicorn and has just been released from prison. With their horns that enable faster-than-light travel, unicorns have had it particularly rough. No longer incarcerated but still not free, Gary’s first goal upon being released is to try to reclaim what was taken from him—his ship. Unfortunately, he almost immediately runs into the two people he never wanted to see again: Captain Jenny Perata, the woman who took his ship and imprisoned him, and her co-pilot Cowboy Jim, the man whose wife Gary was imprisoned for murdering…
With an important summit on the horizon, the fate of both humanity and Bala seems to rest in the hands of a group of misfits who may kill each other before they can learn to work together.
As you can probably tell from the above synopsis, this book is completely and utterly bonkers. And it’s brilliant. The story hits the ground running with Gary taking part in a rigged game to win back his ship—a game that involves challenges such as risking the gaze of a parrot that will show you your own death, and surviving a bite of ‘singularity pie’, the heaviest dessert in the universe—and it doesn’t let up from there. The story is essentially a romp: Jenny and Gavin have been employed by a mysterious Order to deliver a package to the Century Summit where humanity will be judged by the Pymmie, the race of immortal omnipotent aliens and judging by their physical description, Mulder and Scully would probably recognise, who enforced the truce between humanity and the Bala in the first place. It’s time sensitive and they only have 24 hours to make the delivery. Cue obstacles strewn in their path at every turn, each more potentially dangerous than the last.
But Space Unicorn Blues is more than just a superficial adventure story, there’s a real emotional core to the story and depth to the world and its inhabitants. Everyone is flawed. Some, like Jenny, recognise their mistakes and are desperately trying to make up for them; others, like Jim, refuse to even acknowledge them and just double down—with potentially disastrous consequences. Humanity doesn’t come off particularly well. They are largely represented by a government ironically known as the “Reason”, whose reasoning is the old colonial ideology of “Manifest Destiny” which has even, rather chillingly, been turned into something of an affirmative. They regard the Bala purely as property to exploit and harvest, and so the parallels to things such as big game hunting and the ivory trade as well as colonial slavery are obvious, but they emerge naturally from the text, with little to no sledgehammering.
It’s also not just physical mistreatment they’re subjected to but cultural mistreatment as well. Gary’s stoneship (think an organic Death Star), the Jaggery, for example, is in actuality a complex biome, full of flora and fauna that work together to make the ship run, with controls that are as organic and intuitive as the rest of the ship. When Jenny first took over, this was all cleared away to make it more like a human space craft (something that, we find, the ship has suffered for) and even now still tries to operate it through a jerry-rigged human technological interface.
However, there are some seeds of hope. Half Bala like Gary and relationships like the one between Jenny and her dryad wife show that there’s a possibility humanity and the Bala could one day coexist. Where the story leaves us at the end of the book shows us that day is still a long way off. Whilst the narrative objective is achieved, there are enough unanswered questions and tantalising loose ends that it’s obvious this story is not yet finished.
Combining the character diversity and interaction of Firefly and the absurdity of The Hitchhiker’s Guide To The Galaxy, Space Unicorn Blues is a brilliantly original sci-fi novel, with enough to make you think as well as being thoroughly entertaining. It also contains the best weather-forecaster-oral-sex joke ever—it may actually be the only one, but it’s still the best! Roll on the next instalment!
Space Unicorn Blues has been published by Angry Robot, and will be available from Amazon, Book Depository, and other good book retailers. Thank you to Angry Robot for providing The Nerd Daily with a copy in exchange for an honest review.
When humanity finally left Earth behind for the outer reaches of space, they might’ve expected to encounter little green men but certainly not unicorns, pixies or elves. Known collectively as the Bala, they are a group of species who take the forms of just about any mythological creature you can think of. Despite having observed and even visited humanity over the centuries, they extended the hand of friendship, offering to help them adapt to their new lives in space. Did humanity accept the gesture in the spirit it was intended?
Well, with our track record in meeting new cultures, what do you think? A century passes, and the Bala have been hunted, enslaved and exploited with near fanatical zeal, especially once it was found out that individual Bala parts had useful properties. Gary Cobalt is half-unicorn and has just been released from prison. With their horns that enable faster-than-light travel, unicorns have had it particularly rough. No longer incarcerated but still not free, Gary’s first goal upon being released is to try to reclaim what was taken from him—his ship. Unfortunately, he almost immediately runs into the two people he never wanted to see again: Captain Jenny Perata, the woman who took his ship and imprisoned him, and her co-pilot Cowboy Jim, the man whose wife Gary was imprisoned for murdering…
With an important summit on the horizon, the fate of both humanity and Bala seems to rest in the hands of a group of misfits who may kill each other before they can learn to work together.
As you can probably tell from the above synopsis, this book is completely and utterly bonkers. And it’s brilliant. The story hits the ground running with Gary taking part in a rigged game to win back his ship—a game that involves challenges such as risking the gaze of a parrot that will show you your own death, and surviving a bite of ‘singularity pie’, the heaviest dessert in the universe—and it doesn’t let up from there. The story is essentially a romp: Jenny and Gavin have been employed by a mysterious Order to deliver a package to the Century Summit where humanity will be judged by the Pymmie, the race of immortal omnipotent aliens and judging by their physical description, Mulder and Scully would probably recognise, who enforced the truce between humanity and the Bala in the first place. It’s time sensitive and they only have 24 hours to make the delivery. Cue obstacles strewn in their path at every turn, each more potentially dangerous than the last.
But Space Unicorn Blues is more than just a superficial adventure story, there’s a real emotional core to the story and depth to the world and its inhabitants. Everyone is flawed. Some, like Jenny, recognise their mistakes and are desperately trying to make up for them; others, like Jim, refuse to even acknowledge them and just double down—with potentially disastrous consequences. Humanity doesn’t come off particularly well. They are largely represented by a government ironically known as the “Reason”, whose reasoning is the old colonial ideology of “Manifest Destiny” which has even, rather chillingly, been turned into something of an affirmative. They regard the Bala purely as property to exploit and harvest, and so the parallels to things such as big game hunting and the ivory trade as well as colonial slavery are obvious, but they emerge naturally from the text, with little to no sledgehammering.
It’s also not just physical mistreatment they’re subjected to but cultural mistreatment as well. Gary’s stoneship (think an organic Death Star), the Jaggery, for example, is in actuality a complex biome, full of flora and fauna that work together to make the ship run, with controls that are as organic and intuitive as the rest of the ship. When Jenny first took over, this was all cleared away to make it more like a human space craft (something that, we find, the ship has suffered for) and even now still tries to operate it through a jerry-rigged human technological interface.
However, there are some seeds of hope. Half Bala like Gary and relationships like the one between Jenny and her dryad wife show that there’s a possibility humanity and the Bala could one day coexist. Where the story leaves us at the end of the book shows us that day is still a long way off. Whilst the narrative objective is achieved, there are enough unanswered questions and tantalising loose ends that it’s obvious this story is not yet finished.
Combining the character diversity and interaction of Firefly and the absurdity of The Hitchhiker’s Guide To The Galaxy, Space Unicorn Blues is a brilliantly original sci-fi novel, with enough to make you think as well as being thoroughly entertaining. It also contains the best weather-forecaster-oral-sex joke ever—it may actually be the only one, but it’s still the best! Roll on the next instalment!
Space Unicorn Blues has been published by Angry Robot, and will be available from Amazon, Book Depository, and other good book retailers. Thank you to Angry Robot for providing The Nerd Daily with a copy in exchange for an honest review.
September 22, 2018
To understand the plot and characters, the world building has to come first for this one. Humans set out a few centuries ago from Earth after global warming makes it an almost uninhabitable wasteland. There were some people left behind, those who were too sick, or too poor to get aboard one of the generation ships that set off into space.
The humans were having a rough time of it when the least expected thing happened - a race of unicorns showed up to try and save them. They wanted to offer assistance in building their new home away from home. But, of course, it ends up with a war instead that lasted for 100 years. The unicorns belong to the Bala races, races that humanity is familiar with through myth and legend. Turns out fairies, elves, dwarves, unicorns, tree spirits, etc were all real, they were just aliens that came to visit and left.
Despite their setbacks, the humans eventually started dominating certain areas of space that previously belonged to the Bala, and the coalition of humans called themselves Reason, and live by the code of "manifest destiny". It's left the Bala races in ruins as they were bombed out of their homes and now they are started to be imprisoned and harvested for their magical parts - unicorns, in particular, have it bad since their horns can power spaceships and their blood can heal almost any wound. They are saught after relentlessly in the search for more power for spaceships. The humans have been too vigorous in their hunting of unicorns, however, and with the supply of horn depleted, shipping lanes and interstellar travel are getting more difficult and expensive.
Enter Gary, the half unicorn and half human dude who just spent 10 years in a prison for a murder. Now, he did commit the murder but it wasn't under normal circumstances, Gary feels terrible about it and it haunts him throughout the whole novel. He was just released from prison, and in less than an hour, he's trying to find a way off the planet and as far away from Reason space as possible. The problem is, his stone ship (which is like an asteroid with a living ecosystem inside) is currently in the hands of a woman known as Ricky, and she's not in the mind to give it up. Ricky is known for her gambling games, and how they're always rigged. Ricky tells him that she'll give him back his ship if he completes three challenges, despite knowing it's a trap, Gary doesn't know what else to do other than to agree. The challenges are brutal, lethal, and psychologically damaging - one of the challenges was to stare into the eyes of a parrot that makes you live your own death. If you die drowning, you feel yourself choking, if you die getting run through with a knife you feel that too. Gary watches/lives his own death, eats something that should kill him, then moves onto the last challenge to "take off his hat". That sounds like a simple request until you realize that if he takes off his hat, he'll reveal his unicorn horn stub, and be the instant prize to everyone in the bar. There's no one on that planet that wouldn't capture or murder him to sell off his parts. Long story short, the bar burns down and Gary flees the planet with a few other people who make his escape a deeply awkward experience.
On the ship with him now are Jenny, the person who tortured him for 2 years trying to extract as much horn from him as possible. Jim, whose wife was the one Gary killed and ate, and Ricky, the person who just made him almost kill himself trying to get his own ship back. To make matters worse, Gary isn't even the ships captain anymore, and he's subjected to other peoples rules and regulations. From here a lot of hijinks ensue and it's basically nonstop action all the way through, there's always something going on.
I liked Gary, he just keeps getting himself into bad situations even though his intentions are always to do the right thing. Despite not getting off on the right foot with Jenny, I began to like her too as the book went on. You do get POV's from Jenny and you come to understand why she did what she did, she was the best friend of the woman that Gary killed and it was still very raw when everything happened. Although these two should hate each other and treat each other like shit, they were surprisingly kind to one another, especially Gary.
There was a LOT of fantasy stuff in here so I think it's accurate to call this a science-fantasy. Dwarves live inside the stone ship and keep it maintained, and they have an undying loyalty to Gary. Unicorns have to eat chitinous or bone material to grow their horns, typically they eat space-beetles but that doesn't mean they can't eat a person.
Overall I liked this more than I thought I would, it took a while to get going for me, the first 18% of the book is Gary getting out of jail and getting his ship back so it started a bit slower. Then once they get off the planet things really started to speed up and I read it all in one sitting.
Audience:
science-fantasy
non human povs
immortal povs
elves, dwarves, faires in space
lots of action/fast paced (after first 1/5)
LGBT character
character in a wheelchair
Ratings:
Plot: 12.5/15
Character: 12.5/15
World Building: 13/15
Writing: 12/15
Pacing: 11/15
Originality: 13.5/15
Personal Enjoyment: 8/10
Final Score: 82.5/100 - 4.12 stars recommended!
The humans were having a rough time of it when the least expected thing happened - a race of unicorns showed up to try and save them. They wanted to offer assistance in building their new home away from home. But, of course, it ends up with a war instead that lasted for 100 years. The unicorns belong to the Bala races, races that humanity is familiar with through myth and legend. Turns out fairies, elves, dwarves, unicorns, tree spirits, etc were all real, they were just aliens that came to visit and left.
Despite their setbacks, the humans eventually started dominating certain areas of space that previously belonged to the Bala, and the coalition of humans called themselves Reason, and live by the code of "manifest destiny". It's left the Bala races in ruins as they were bombed out of their homes and now they are started to be imprisoned and harvested for their magical parts - unicorns, in particular, have it bad since their horns can power spaceships and their blood can heal almost any wound. They are saught after relentlessly in the search for more power for spaceships. The humans have been too vigorous in their hunting of unicorns, however, and with the supply of horn depleted, shipping lanes and interstellar travel are getting more difficult and expensive.
Enter Gary, the half unicorn and half human dude who just spent 10 years in a prison for a murder. Now, he did commit the murder but it wasn't under normal circumstances, Gary feels terrible about it and it haunts him throughout the whole novel. He was just released from prison, and in less than an hour, he's trying to find a way off the planet and as far away from Reason space as possible. The problem is, his stone ship (which is like an asteroid with a living ecosystem inside) is currently in the hands of a woman known as Ricky, and she's not in the mind to give it up. Ricky is known for her gambling games, and how they're always rigged. Ricky tells him that she'll give him back his ship if he completes three challenges, despite knowing it's a trap, Gary doesn't know what else to do other than to agree. The challenges are brutal, lethal, and psychologically damaging - one of the challenges was to stare into the eyes of a parrot that makes you live your own death. If you die drowning, you feel yourself choking, if you die getting run through with a knife you feel that too. Gary watches/lives his own death, eats something that should kill him, then moves onto the last challenge to "take off his hat". That sounds like a simple request until you realize that if he takes off his hat, he'll reveal his unicorn horn stub, and be the instant prize to everyone in the bar. There's no one on that planet that wouldn't capture or murder him to sell off his parts. Long story short, the bar burns down and Gary flees the planet with a few other people who make his escape a deeply awkward experience.
On the ship with him now are Jenny, the person who tortured him for 2 years trying to extract as much horn from him as possible. Jim, whose wife was the one Gary killed and ate, and Ricky, the person who just made him almost kill himself trying to get his own ship back. To make matters worse, Gary isn't even the ships captain anymore, and he's subjected to other peoples rules and regulations. From here a lot of hijinks ensue and it's basically nonstop action all the way through, there's always something going on.
I liked Gary, he just keeps getting himself into bad situations even though his intentions are always to do the right thing. Despite not getting off on the right foot with Jenny, I began to like her too as the book went on. You do get POV's from Jenny and you come to understand why she did what she did, she was the best friend of the woman that Gary killed and it was still very raw when everything happened. Although these two should hate each other and treat each other like shit, they were surprisingly kind to one another, especially Gary.
There was a LOT of fantasy stuff in here so I think it's accurate to call this a science-fantasy. Dwarves live inside the stone ship and keep it maintained, and they have an undying loyalty to Gary. Unicorns have to eat chitinous or bone material to grow their horns, typically they eat space-beetles but that doesn't mean they can't eat a person.
Overall I liked this more than I thought I would, it took a while to get going for me, the first 18% of the book is Gary getting out of jail and getting his ship back so it started a bit slower. Then once they get off the planet things really started to speed up and I read it all in one sitting.
Audience:
science-fantasy
non human povs
immortal povs
elves, dwarves, faires in space
lots of action/fast paced (after first 1/5)
LGBT character
character in a wheelchair
Ratings:
Plot: 12.5/15
Character: 12.5/15
World Building: 13/15
Writing: 12/15
Pacing: 11/15
Originality: 13.5/15
Personal Enjoyment: 8/10
Final Score: 82.5/100 - 4.12 stars recommended!
dnf
May 16, 2018Thank you to netgalley and the publisher for the review copy in exchange for an honest review.
Space Unicorn Blues is a unique spin on sci-fi that mixes in supernatural creatures. Unfortunately however I quickly realized that this was not for me. I would like to say upfront that this had nothing to do with the writing style in itself. I thought what I had read was very well written. The one thing that appealed to me beyond that was that our main character was a half-unicorn who was also asexual. There was also a character in a weelchair.
The story however was making less sense to me, I was very confused and I had to make myself pick it up to read it. I also was not feeling our main character having to return to his abuser as that is what the story seemed to be suggesting. It would have continued to be a struggle and that would not have bode well for my review at the end. As I leave it now I am still interested in picking up a book by this author in the future.
Space Unicorn Blues is a unique spin on sci-fi that mixes in supernatural creatures. Unfortunately however I quickly realized that this was not for me. I would like to say upfront that this had nothing to do with the writing style in itself. I thought what I had read was very well written. The one thing that appealed to me beyond that was that our main character was a half-unicorn who was also asexual. There was also a character in a weelchair.
The story however was making less sense to me, I was very confused and I had to make myself pick it up to read it. I also was not feeling our main character having to return to his abuser as that is what the story seemed to be suggesting. It would have continued to be a struggle and that would not have bode well for my review at the end. As I leave it now I am still interested in picking up a book by this author in the future.
August 4, 2019
This was so much fun. I want to reread it because I missed some stuff at the beginning of the audiobook and there are words I couldn't understand even though I replayed it like five times. 😂 But I loved the rest and can't wait to read more about these characters. The last hour was a joy to listen to. 😍
August 1, 2018
This book, THIS book, THIS BOOK. What do you get when you cross Star Trek with Terry Pratchett's Discworld, a splash of Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy and any three of your favorite fantasy series? You get Space Unicorn Blues. Humorous and fun with a splash of commentary on human nature. You will LOVE these characters and hate these characters. I cheered and sobbed (literally) while reading about the aftermath of a war between humans and magical creatures (in space!).
..and I have it on good authority that this is the start of a new series (YAY!).
A review copy was provided by the publisher.
..and I have it on good authority that this is the start of a new series (YAY!).
A review copy was provided by the publisher.
October 13, 2021
MacHalo Buddy Read Because, that's how we roll.
Space unicorn, UP UP AND AWAY!
[image error]
This one wasn't a big hit with the MacHalos. Fussy bunch of girls we are.
I didn't think it was all THAT bad. Wasn't all that good, either. T.J. Berry had some good ideas for the plot and some pretty funny stuff. If the story would have ended at the 62% mark, I would have given it 3 stars. The writing was not an attention grabber. I would be overcome by a feeling similar to waiting for a fly to land. You know...that in between moment where you're waiting to swat that fly so you can get on with your day.
I also wasn't too keen on how Jim and humans were portrayed. T.J. Berry worked too hard in making Jim and humans assholes that it was overdone. Overdone assholes HA! *ending joke*
Space unicorn, UP UP AND AWAY!
[image error]
This one wasn't a big hit with the MacHalos. Fussy bunch of girls we are.
I didn't think it was all THAT bad. Wasn't all that good, either. T.J. Berry had some good ideas for the plot and some pretty funny stuff. If the story would have ended at the 62% mark, I would have given it 3 stars. The writing was not an attention grabber. I would be overcome by a feeling similar to waiting for a fly to land. You know...that in between moment where you're waiting to swat that fly so you can get on with your day.
I also wasn't too keen on how Jim and humans were portrayed. T.J. Berry worked too hard in making Jim and humans assholes that it was overdone. Overdone assholes HA! *ending joke*
July 25, 2018
Wow. Pratchett & Gaiman head to the stars to rewrite Firefly. With unicorns. Pretty much.🤗
May 25, 2018
Space Unicorn Blues is a wonderfully crazy ride through space with a crew and adventures worthy of Buckaroo Banzai or Arthur Dent. The book opens with Gary, the half-unicorn protagonist, released from prison and setting out to reclaim his FTL spaceship. The diversity of characters he meets and the series of bizarre challenges Gary undertakes in Ricky Tang’s bar are a perfect preview of the wild ride in store for both the characters and the reader.
Gary has a capacity for patience and forgiveness that stretch credulity for me a bit, and I occasionally questioned the motivations that circled him, Jenny, and Cowboy Jim as frequently as the captaincy of the stoneship they pilot through space. Berry has smooth and easy writing style though, which pulled me along in her wake through the wacky universe she populated with her unique and imaginative characters.
I received an advanced copy in exchange for an honest review.
Gary has a capacity for patience and forgiveness that stretch credulity for me a bit, and I occasionally questioned the motivations that circled him, Jenny, and Cowboy Jim as frequently as the captaincy of the stoneship they pilot through space. Berry has smooth and easy writing style though, which pulled me along in her wake through the wacky universe she populated with her unique and imaginative characters.
I received an advanced copy in exchange for an honest review.
July 27, 2019
After recently reading a couple of heavyweight novels—John Steinbeck's monumental East of Eden and Jeffrey Eugenides' award-winning and astonishingly sensitive novel Middlesex, to be specific—I was ready for something much lighter, and T.J. Berry's debut novel fits that bill, at least. Unfortunately, Space Unicorn Blues also turns out to be more like a typical sketch from Saturday Night Live—despite a killer premise, it draws things out way too long.
That premise is both awesome and gruesome: humans discover, as they venture into space, that unicorns exist, and that they really are magical creatures—specifically, that the horn of a unicorn can be used to power faster-than-light starship drives.
The unicorn's permission is not required. Nor is the presence of any other part of the unicorn.
Believe it or not, human beings unite (under a government calling itself "the Reason," forsooth) to exploit unicorn horns—as well as the special properties of the other magical creatures who are collectively called the Bala, like elves and fairies and dwarves. The Reason has exercised its power over the Bala without mercy, to the point that unicorns have almost become extinct. As far as Gary Cobalt knows, he's the only unicorn left alive—and he's only half-unicorn at that; the other half is human.
As Space Unicorn Blues begins, Gary has just been released from ten years of captivity in a human prison—ten slow, painful years during which his horn was shaven off every time even a tiny bit of it regenerated. Gary's in disguise and on the run ... so of course one of the first people he encounters is Jenny Peralta, the cheerfully amoral space captain who got him imprisoned in the first place.
Unfortunately for Gary, Captain Peralta happens to be his only chance of getting control of his own living starship, the Jaggery, back from the Reason.
None of this seems likely to end well.
In fact, Space Unicorn Blues doesn't really end at all. A few plot threads get tied off, but the story is otherwise left almost entirely open-ended, obviously written with at least one sequel in mind. Not that this gets mentioned on the cover, mind... which is, I'll admit, something I really dislike.
Your mileage, as they say, may vary... but Space Unicorn Blues just didn't gel for me.
That premise is both awesome and gruesome: humans discover, as they venture into space, that unicorns exist, and that they really are magical creatures—specifically, that the horn of a unicorn can be used to power faster-than-light starship drives.
The unicorn's permission is not required. Nor is the presence of any other part of the unicorn.
Passing in any crowd are secret people whose hidden response to beauty is the desire to tear it into bleeding meat.
—James Tiptree, Jr. (Alice B. Sheldon)
Believe it or not, human beings unite (under a government calling itself "the Reason," forsooth) to exploit unicorn horns—as well as the special properties of the other magical creatures who are collectively called the Bala, like elves and fairies and dwarves. The Reason has exercised its power over the Bala without mercy, to the point that unicorns have almost become extinct. As far as Gary Cobalt knows, he's the only unicorn left alive—and he's only half-unicorn at that; the other half is human.
What made it special
Made it dangerous
So I bury it
And forget...
—"Cloudbusting," by Kate Bush
As Space Unicorn Blues begins, Gary has just been released from ten years of captivity in a human prison—ten slow, painful years during which his horn was shaven off every time even a tiny bit of it regenerated. Gary's in disguise and on the run ... so of course one of the first people he encounters is Jenny Peralta, the cheerfully amoral space captain who got him imprisoned in the first place.
Unfortunately for Gary, Captain Peralta happens to be his only chance of getting control of his own living starship, the Jaggery, back from the Reason.
None of this seems likely to end well.
In fact, Space Unicorn Blues doesn't really end at all. A few plot threads get tied off, but the story is otherwise left almost entirely open-ended, obviously written with at least one sequel in mind. Not that this gets mentioned on the cover, mind... which is, I'll admit, something I really dislike.
Your mileage, as they say, may vary... but Space Unicorn Blues just didn't gel for me.
June 11, 2018
Full review is here, on my blog!~
I don’t actually think I even checked the reviews or whatnot on this book before I was all up in NetGalley’s request button.
Unicorns. In. Space. Guys. I mean, the title of this book itself sounds like a Cowboy Bebop episode, FFS. Who doesn’t immediately request that?!
Certainly not me. :D
This one was interesting right out the gate. This book takes place in the future of our own universe, but it turns out that the first aliens that humanity ever met was a species, or a group of species called the Bala. They are, more or less, unicorns, elves, fairies, dryads, centaurs, and so on. This is an absolutely brilliant way of incorporating all kinds of fairy tale and fantasy creatures into this sci-fi world. Even the stereotypical little grey aliens with huge black eyes and probey tendencies aren’t missing from this story. But, the Bala can apparently interbreed with humans, or at least some of them can, so we get things like half unicorns, which are a little like fauns – human-esque with two equine legs, and, of course, the horn.
Many of the Bala, unicorns at the very least, are quite technologically advanced. Unicorn ships are giant living asteroids with an entire ecosystem inside of it. Unicorn horns are used to power faster-than-light travel, as are a few other things, but nothing does it quite as well. And so, of course, humanity… is humanity. A coalition of humans called the Reason have pretty much taken over most of colonized space, and since a lot of the Bala have parts that are useful for anything from healing to the whole faster-than-light travel thing, the humans of Reason harvest the Bala for whatever is useful. Unicorns in particular, are routinely kept prisoner on ships as a source of fuel, their horns ground down or dug out as they grow them. Unicorns are referred to as ‘it’ – as in ‘it is a source of fuel and we claim it for the Reason.’
Gary Cobalt, our titular space unicorn (or half-unicorn in his case), is no exception to this. He was kept prisoner by a small group of humans consisting of Jenny Perata, a veteran Reason soldier, James ‘Cowboy Jim’ Bryant, a pilot with an obsession for grilled cheese, and Cheryl Ann, Cowboy Jim’s wife… and then ended up going to actual prison over what happened with them. Now he’s just been released from prison, and has come to claim his ship when it’s basically sold out from under him by Ricky Tang, the local gambling den owner… to Jenny Perata, of all the actual people in the universe.
It all goes a bit south(er?) from there, when Gary ends up on the ship with them… less a prisoner this time, but still fleeing from the Reason, trying desperately to make a delivery on time, as those were the terms set by Jenny for him to get his ship back. Help us make this one delivery, and you can have your ship. Ricky ends up tagging along as well, as they did kind of get her bar set on fire… So here Gary is, on his own ship that currently isn’t his, with the woman who tortured him, the man who hates him for killing his wife, and the gambling den owner who sold his ship from under him. Oh, and a whole bunch of dwarves who run the ship from behind the scenes, and are loyal to none but him. So at least he has that, I guess.
Gary is, admittedly, not what I thought he’d be. I expected this gruff, ex-con sort of character, but he really isn’t. He’s a good dude, just in a situation that really sucks. He’s quite nice, and often polite, especially to other Bala, but he’s even rather nice to Jenny, which was unexpected, at first, but not out of character, as it turns out. I like who Gary is. He does what is right. That’s exactly what I’d hope a unicorn would do. What is good and right. Even against people who are phenomenally deserving of less than what is good and right from this guy. Unicorns would be forgiving (to a point, which I would have reached lightyears before he did). I rooted hard for Gary, and I wanted him to win all the things.
I also wasn’t expecting to get my feels jostled as I read (though, I mean I should have known from the ‘Blues’ part of the title), but the more we learn about what happened between Gary, Jenny, Cowboy Jim, and Cheryl Ann, the more sorry I felt for Gary. As we see how humans in this world treat the Bala… man. Right in the godsdamned feels. Unicorns have it the worst, but other Bala get harvested for their parts by humans too. This story shows a future that is gritty, unjust, and sad AF at times, but also not devoid of hope, and laughter, and love. Could humans live harmoniously with another species who were literally made of stuff that the humans wanted? Well…. I truly hope that the future finds humans at peace with each other at least… but I’m not holding my breath.
I thought this story was wonderfully well written, and it was paced really well. There was always something going on that made it hard to put down, and so I ended up reading it much faster than I anticipated. Well into the wee hours of the night, and well past the end of my lunch break at work. There is a really fantastic spectrum of characters of all kinds of genders, sexualities, races, cultures, and species, each with their own abilities and disabilities, personalities, and quirks. The ending left me wanting more, and I really hope that there will be further stories in this world to get my grubby little mitts on. The whole book is unlike anything I’ve ever read before, and I loved it!
Thanks to Angry Robot books via NetGalley for the review copy!
I don’t actually think I even checked the reviews or whatnot on this book before I was all up in NetGalley’s request button.
Unicorns. In. Space. Guys. I mean, the title of this book itself sounds like a Cowboy Bebop episode, FFS. Who doesn’t immediately request that?!
Certainly not me. :D
This one was interesting right out the gate. This book takes place in the future of our own universe, but it turns out that the first aliens that humanity ever met was a species, or a group of species called the Bala. They are, more or less, unicorns, elves, fairies, dryads, centaurs, and so on. This is an absolutely brilliant way of incorporating all kinds of fairy tale and fantasy creatures into this sci-fi world. Even the stereotypical little grey aliens with huge black eyes and probey tendencies aren’t missing from this story. But, the Bala can apparently interbreed with humans, or at least some of them can, so we get things like half unicorns, which are a little like fauns – human-esque with two equine legs, and, of course, the horn.
Many of the Bala, unicorns at the very least, are quite technologically advanced. Unicorn ships are giant living asteroids with an entire ecosystem inside of it. Unicorn horns are used to power faster-than-light travel, as are a few other things, but nothing does it quite as well. And so, of course, humanity… is humanity. A coalition of humans called the Reason have pretty much taken over most of colonized space, and since a lot of the Bala have parts that are useful for anything from healing to the whole faster-than-light travel thing, the humans of Reason harvest the Bala for whatever is useful. Unicorns in particular, are routinely kept prisoner on ships as a source of fuel, their horns ground down or dug out as they grow them. Unicorns are referred to as ‘it’ – as in ‘it is a source of fuel and we claim it for the Reason.’
Gary Cobalt, our titular space unicorn (or half-unicorn in his case), is no exception to this. He was kept prisoner by a small group of humans consisting of Jenny Perata, a veteran Reason soldier, James ‘Cowboy Jim’ Bryant, a pilot with an obsession for grilled cheese, and Cheryl Ann, Cowboy Jim’s wife… and then ended up going to actual prison over what happened with them. Now he’s just been released from prison, and has come to claim his ship when it’s basically sold out from under him by Ricky Tang, the local gambling den owner… to Jenny Perata, of all the actual people in the universe.
It all goes a bit south(er?) from there, when Gary ends up on the ship with them… less a prisoner this time, but still fleeing from the Reason, trying desperately to make a delivery on time, as those were the terms set by Jenny for him to get his ship back. Help us make this one delivery, and you can have your ship. Ricky ends up tagging along as well, as they did kind of get her bar set on fire… So here Gary is, on his own ship that currently isn’t his, with the woman who tortured him, the man who hates him for killing his wife, and the gambling den owner who sold his ship from under him. Oh, and a whole bunch of dwarves who run the ship from behind the scenes, and are loyal to none but him. So at least he has that, I guess.
Gary is, admittedly, not what I thought he’d be. I expected this gruff, ex-con sort of character, but he really isn’t. He’s a good dude, just in a situation that really sucks. He’s quite nice, and often polite, especially to other Bala, but he’s even rather nice to Jenny, which was unexpected, at first, but not out of character, as it turns out. I like who Gary is. He does what is right. That’s exactly what I’d hope a unicorn would do. What is good and right. Even against people who are phenomenally deserving of less than what is good and right from this guy. Unicorns would be forgiving (to a point, which I would have reached lightyears before he did). I rooted hard for Gary, and I wanted him to win all the things.
I also wasn’t expecting to get my feels jostled as I read (though, I mean I should have known from the ‘Blues’ part of the title), but the more we learn about what happened between Gary, Jenny, Cowboy Jim, and Cheryl Ann, the more sorry I felt for Gary. As we see how humans in this world treat the Bala… man. Right in the godsdamned feels. Unicorns have it the worst, but other Bala get harvested for their parts by humans too. This story shows a future that is gritty, unjust, and sad AF at times, but also not devoid of hope, and laughter, and love. Could humans live harmoniously with another species who were literally made of stuff that the humans wanted? Well…. I truly hope that the future finds humans at peace with each other at least… but I’m not holding my breath.
I thought this story was wonderfully well written, and it was paced really well. There was always something going on that made it hard to put down, and so I ended up reading it much faster than I anticipated. Well into the wee hours of the night, and well past the end of my lunch break at work. There is a really fantastic spectrum of characters of all kinds of genders, sexualities, races, cultures, and species, each with their own abilities and disabilities, personalities, and quirks. The ending left me wanting more, and I really hope that there will be further stories in this world to get my grubby little mitts on. The whole book is unlike anything I’ve ever read before, and I loved it!
Thanks to Angry Robot books via NetGalley for the review copy!
October 12, 2018
A misfit crew race across the galaxy to prevent the genocide of magical creatures, in this unique science fiction debut.
Having magical powers makes you less than human, a resource to be exploited. Half-unicorn Gary Cobalt is sick of slavery, captivity, and his horn being ground down to power faster-than-light travel. When he's finally free, all he wants is to run away in his ancestors' stone ship. Instead, Captain Jenny Perata steals the ship out from under him, so she can make an urgent delivery. But Jenny held him captive for a decade, and then Gary murdered her best friend... who was also the wife of her co-pilot, Cowboy Jim. What could possibly go right?
Review:
So this book gave me a weird vibe. It is extremely well written IMO, but I wonder if at times my reading differed wildly from what the author wanted to convey.
" When the murderer Gary Cobalt trotted into a Bitter Blossom, he nearly gave himself as half- unicorn within thirty seconds. His prison-issued pants were hiked up so high that his hooves stuck out the bottom, chopping across the title, calling all sorts of attention. He'd hoped people would mistake him for a common faun, but the bartender let him know that he wasn't fooled".
This is how the book starts and very soon we learned that Gary spent ten years in Quag (prison) for the murder which he may or may not have been committed.
We also learn ( without dreaded info dump) that Humanity some time ago left a dying Earth and went to space where they met aliens Bala and quickly decided to colonize Bala's planets, treat them like complete crap, then get into war with them and basically be complete assholes to the beings who may not have looked like humans, but who met the starving colonists with nothing but kindness.
"It didn't matter that the alien Bala had familiar shapes known to humans through centuries of myth and legend; unicorns, faeries and elves. Or that they offered to use their magic to help the colonists survive in their new home. The humans fired the opening shots in what would become a hundred years of war between the humans and the Bala."
Now a lot of Bala planets are colonized and a lot of Bala are treated like slaves or worse. Unicorns are almost extinct and their horns are used as a fuel for the space ships and their blood has healing properties.
Before his imprisonment Gary and Jenny had been on the different sides of the war. After the battle of Copernica ( or maybe a little later on but not much later) Jenny and couple other friends of hers caught Gary and his ship and treated him and the ship very horribly. As blurb tells you Gary was tortured for two years and then Jenny made sure Gary was arrested for murder ( I cannot tell you what was the deal with the murder because spoilers).
Now Gary is out, comes to the certain Bar and attempts to win his Ship back from the owner of the said Bar. Due to the certain events he is almost captured again and then miraculously this same Jenny and her team mate help him to get out and basically Jenny asks him to help make a certain delivery in space and then she would give him his ship back. She is sorry you see.
Gary takes her up on her offer and off they go. What follows is a suspenseful space opera with our heroes being constantly in danger before they reach their goal.
So what felt weird? First and foremost while I thought that the story injected some humor in very appropriate places, Gary as half unicorn made me giggle in some not very appropriate places. Moreover, I fully admit that mention of their parents as human and unicorn making a baby did not portray the very pleasant picture in my head. I understand that the author probably wanted to push the readers' comfort zones in portraying the beings who look different, but still sentinent beings who often deserve more respect than humans and that is fine, but then unicorns are apparently asexual and baby was made with Bala's magic.
But this was a small personal squick. More importantly, the reason why I bought this book in the first place was because I read author's essay in the "Big idea' on John Scalzi's blog and that essay made me think that how hard it is to forgive and actually apologize would be one of the main themes of the story.
I didn't feel that way at all. Oh Jenny clearly struggles with what she did and I believed that her awkward words at the end were the result of a soul searching and all. Gary on the other hand just decides to accept the offer from his torturer and all is forgiven? What the actual heck?
So basically them being together on the ship, which happened early in the book was enjoyable and fun, but then the premise for this did not ring true to me .
C+
Having magical powers makes you less than human, a resource to be exploited. Half-unicorn Gary Cobalt is sick of slavery, captivity, and his horn being ground down to power faster-than-light travel. When he's finally free, all he wants is to run away in his ancestors' stone ship. Instead, Captain Jenny Perata steals the ship out from under him, so she can make an urgent delivery. But Jenny held him captive for a decade, and then Gary murdered her best friend... who was also the wife of her co-pilot, Cowboy Jim. What could possibly go right?
Review:
So this book gave me a weird vibe. It is extremely well written IMO, but I wonder if at times my reading differed wildly from what the author wanted to convey.
" When the murderer Gary Cobalt trotted into a Bitter Blossom, he nearly gave himself as half- unicorn within thirty seconds. His prison-issued pants were hiked up so high that his hooves stuck out the bottom, chopping across the title, calling all sorts of attention. He'd hoped people would mistake him for a common faun, but the bartender let him know that he wasn't fooled".
This is how the book starts and very soon we learned that Gary spent ten years in Quag (prison) for the murder which he may or may not have been committed.
We also learn ( without dreaded info dump) that Humanity some time ago left a dying Earth and went to space where they met aliens Bala and quickly decided to colonize Bala's planets, treat them like complete crap, then get into war with them and basically be complete assholes to the beings who may not have looked like humans, but who met the starving colonists with nothing but kindness.
"It didn't matter that the alien Bala had familiar shapes known to humans through centuries of myth and legend; unicorns, faeries and elves. Or that they offered to use their magic to help the colonists survive in their new home. The humans fired the opening shots in what would become a hundred years of war between the humans and the Bala."
Now a lot of Bala planets are colonized and a lot of Bala are treated like slaves or worse. Unicorns are almost extinct and their horns are used as a fuel for the space ships and their blood has healing properties.
Before his imprisonment Gary and Jenny had been on the different sides of the war. After the battle of Copernica ( or maybe a little later on but not much later) Jenny and couple other friends of hers caught Gary and his ship and treated him and the ship very horribly. As blurb tells you Gary was tortured for two years and then Jenny made sure Gary was arrested for murder ( I cannot tell you what was the deal with the murder because spoilers).
Now Gary is out, comes to the certain Bar and attempts to win his Ship back from the owner of the said Bar. Due to the certain events he is almost captured again and then miraculously this same Jenny and her team mate help him to get out and basically Jenny asks him to help make a certain delivery in space and then she would give him his ship back. She is sorry you see.
Gary takes her up on her offer and off they go. What follows is a suspenseful space opera with our heroes being constantly in danger before they reach their goal.
So what felt weird? First and foremost while I thought that the story injected some humor in very appropriate places, Gary as half unicorn made me giggle in some not very appropriate places. Moreover, I fully admit that mention of their parents as human and unicorn making a baby did not portray the very pleasant picture in my head. I understand that the author probably wanted to push the readers' comfort zones in portraying the beings who look different, but still sentinent beings who often deserve more respect than humans and that is fine, but then unicorns are apparently asexual and baby was made with Bala's magic.
But this was a small personal squick. More importantly, the reason why I bought this book in the first place was because I read author's essay in the "Big idea' on John Scalzi's blog and that essay made me think that how hard it is to forgive and actually apologize would be one of the main themes of the story.
I didn't feel that way at all. Oh Jenny clearly struggles with what she did and I believed that her awkward words at the end were the result of a soul searching and all. Gary on the other hand just decides to accept the offer from his torturer and all is forgiven? What the actual heck?
So basically them being together on the ship, which happened early in the book was enjoyable and fun, but then the premise for this did not ring true to me .
C+
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
March 31, 2024
How the hell do you rate a book as crazy and ridiculous as this? I genuinely don’t know. “Space Unicorn Blues” is the kind of book where you just know when the author was little, their kindergarten teacher’s report said something like “T.J. has a very active imagination” and left out the “and it’s totally bonkers” part. Ultimately I split the difference and gave it 2 stars—it was so crazy that I had fun with it, but such a mess that I can’t in good conscience give it a passing grade.
What I will say in this book’s favor is that it’s not as completely incomprehensible as, say, “Deadmen Walking,” but that truly is damning by faint praise. There IS a plot here, and there ARE characters, and there’s no mid-story switch that makes you feel like you universe-hopped without warning. This is one of those stories that drops big exposition chunks whenever it needs to, the characters’ motivations are paper-thin and changeable as the tide, and everything feels so slapped together that the tone is akin to a Lisa Frank explosion on a spaceship going through a trash compactor.
The book is also clearly part one of a longer story, so it feels unfair to knock it for unanswered questions or unresolved plotlines. But I’m still left wondering what the point of this story is. Why does it exist? Why did the author feel the urge to write it? The ultimate message seems to be that humans are universally awful and don’t deserve any leeway, will intentionally misunderstand clear instructions for their own benefit, and basically have nothing to offer the world except their insistence on their own superiority (the takedown of American expansionist ideals is particularly unsubtle—“manifest destiny,” indeed). Which … fair, I guess, but kind of a downer in a story this patently silly. It’s hard to make a cogent point when everything in the book is an incoherent muddle.
But at the end of the day, I did not read this book for witty discourse or thoughtful plot or compelling characters. I read it because it seemed utterly batshit, and it did not disappoint on that front. At the end of the day, I’m glad I live in a world where something this zany can be published and even find an audience, no matter how small.
What I will say in this book’s favor is that it’s not as completely incomprehensible as, say, “Deadmen Walking,” but that truly is damning by faint praise. There IS a plot here, and there ARE characters, and there’s no mid-story switch that makes you feel like you universe-hopped without warning. This is one of those stories that drops big exposition chunks whenever it needs to, the characters’ motivations are paper-thin and changeable as the tide, and everything feels so slapped together that the tone is akin to a Lisa Frank explosion on a spaceship going through a trash compactor.
The book is also clearly part one of a longer story, so it feels unfair to knock it for unanswered questions or unresolved plotlines. But I’m still left wondering what the point of this story is. Why does it exist? Why did the author feel the urge to write it? The ultimate message seems to be that humans are universally awful and don’t deserve any leeway, will intentionally misunderstand clear instructions for their own benefit, and basically have nothing to offer the world except their insistence on their own superiority (the takedown of American expansionist ideals is particularly unsubtle—“manifest destiny,” indeed). Which … fair, I guess, but kind of a downer in a story this patently silly. It’s hard to make a cogent point when everything in the book is an incoherent muddle.
But at the end of the day, I did not read this book for witty discourse or thoughtful plot or compelling characters. I read it because it seemed utterly batshit, and it did not disappoint on that front. At the end of the day, I’m glad I live in a world where something this zany can be published and even find an audience, no matter how small.
June 7, 2018
ARC provided in exchange for review. Review will appear on the Nerd Daily & then here closer to publication date.
July 29, 2018
There were a lot of things to like here, but I just didn’t end up enjoying it that much. The characters, the plot, and the setting all had great potential but didn’t deliver.
September 29, 2019
Weird & not funny. Seems pointless. Abandoning.
October 11, 2021
I suppose I can only blame myself, didn’t read the synopsis, thinking there would be some alien unicorn smut. Cruel and unusual punishment. DNF.
October 11, 2021
Ok, so. I really liked the world building, even if I found it a little naive on some Bala description.
The whole plot had a really distinct message to convey that can be summed up in something like: we humans are a scourge to the entire universe, we can't even get along between us on the earth we are consuming, figures we are doomed with failing miserably in coexisting with other life forms from around the galaxy.
Heard that a ton of times, in many different languages, and it never fails to find me in agreeing. But there must be something else to a story.
And here, sadly, i didn't find it. I grew more on the side characters (like the dwarves or Kaila the Dryad) than to the main ones.
I found the pace slow, the dialogs quite boring and the last few chapters left me with a stomach ache.
The Phymmies, omniscient all powerful beings wrap up the whole plot by inviting the main characters to lunch, giving us a cinematic flashback of the scene around which the whole plot revolves and then transporting all Bala staff to heaven and leaving humans all alone with no technology, because they had the wonderful idea to warn them about Armageddon with a bloody email.
But there's just a tiny loophole that makes it possible for the shadiest man to ever grace these pages to manage to get away with a piece of unicorn horn up his ass.
And this is the only reason there is a second book... I think it's a little weak as far as reasons go...
The whole plot had a really distinct message to convey that can be summed up in something like: we humans are a scourge to the entire universe, we can't even get along between us on the earth we are consuming, figures we are doomed with failing miserably in coexisting with other life forms from around the galaxy.
Heard that a ton of times, in many different languages, and it never fails to find me in agreeing. But there must be something else to a story.
And here, sadly, i didn't find it. I grew more on the side characters (like the dwarves or Kaila the Dryad) than to the main ones.
I found the pace slow, the dialogs quite boring and the last few chapters left me with a stomach ache.
The Phymmies, omniscient all powerful beings wrap up the whole plot by inviting the main characters to lunch, giving us a cinematic flashback of the scene around which the whole plot revolves and then transporting all Bala staff to heaven and leaving humans all alone with no technology, because they had the wonderful idea to warn them about Armageddon with a bloody email.
But there's just a tiny loophole that makes it possible for the shadiest man to ever grace these pages to manage to get away with a piece of unicorn horn up his ass.
And this is the only reason there is a second book... I think it's a little weak as far as reasons go...
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
September 10, 2021
I would probably have rated it 3.75 stars if I could. I had a hard time getting into this; I like a good fantasy novel and I don't have anything against mythical creatures per se but unicorns in space felt a bit much for me. So I battled a bit with my own biases and questioned why I have a hard time getting into unicorns but dragons are okay (the patriarchy perhaps?) but once I did get over that, I started looking forward to the end of each day when I'd get a chance to read it. It is a quirky and silly adventure with deeper layers about colonialism, capitalism, love and forgiveness. The diversity of abilities, sexuality, gender and culture was also top-notch!
August 15, 2024
Very uneven sort with a nice idea but failed to land for me and feels like two many things being juggled at once for me to enjoy
Full review - https://www.runalongtheshelves.net/bl...
Full review - https://www.runalongtheshelves.net/bl...
April 7, 2019
A great Science-Fantasy tale. You'll love to hate the four main characters at first until more of their story comes out, and then you'll just love them (three of them at least). I loved the blending of myth and science-fiction. The story is a pot-boiler that will keep you at the edge of your seat until the end.
September 18, 2018
If you ever feel like modern sci-fi just isn't weird enough, then this is the book for you.
Humanity has left planet Earth, which has become uninhabitable, and in their search for a new home, they discover the Bala. These are powerful, magical beings, who resemble creatures from Earth myths and legends (unicorns, phoenixes, elves, fairies) because they have visited Earth in the past. But humans cannot live peacefully with the Bala and have all but destroyed their planets and populations. This book is a brutal description of colonialism, and a blunt depiction of the horrors of imperialism.
The main characters are Gary, a half-unicorn, half-human, and Jenny, a wheelchair-using Maori lesbian. Gary has a sentient, fast-than-light ship, which is powered by unicorn-horn and the song of dwarves, but he has been put into prison for murder. Jenny tortured Gary in order to get her hands on his horn, but now they're forced to work together in order to escape the corrupt empire and save Jenny's wife, a dryad.
It's also a race against time. This novel mostly takes place over the course of 25 hours, but boy does a lot happen in those 25 hours. I'm having a lot of trouble writing this review, because there is so much to summarise, and it's all so complicated. The ideas are great and I had a lot of fun reading this, but as a narrative it has a few fatal flaws. The characters never really go beyond being ideas and never become fully realised, and too much happens. This book is almost non-stop action, and I think if the author had more space to reflect on the myriad of exciting and complex ideas, and on the characters, who have so much potential to be fascinating, this would be a much better book. I want to sit the author down and say, "Not every chapter has to end with an explosion!"
But I'll definitely read the next book in the series.
Humanity has left planet Earth, which has become uninhabitable, and in their search for a new home, they discover the Bala. These are powerful, magical beings, who resemble creatures from Earth myths and legends (unicorns, phoenixes, elves, fairies) because they have visited Earth in the past. But humans cannot live peacefully with the Bala and have all but destroyed their planets and populations. This book is a brutal description of colonialism, and a blunt depiction of the horrors of imperialism.
The main characters are Gary, a half-unicorn, half-human, and Jenny, a wheelchair-using Maori lesbian. Gary has a sentient, fast-than-light ship, which is powered by unicorn-horn and the song of dwarves, but he has been put into prison for murder. Jenny tortured Gary in order to get her hands on his horn, but now they're forced to work together in order to escape the corrupt empire and save Jenny's wife, a dryad.
It's also a race against time. This novel mostly takes place over the course of 25 hours, but boy does a lot happen in those 25 hours. I'm having a lot of trouble writing this review, because there is so much to summarise, and it's all so complicated. The ideas are great and I had a lot of fun reading this, but as a narrative it has a few fatal flaws. The characters never really go beyond being ideas and never become fully realised, and too much happens. This book is almost non-stop action, and I think if the author had more space to reflect on the myriad of exciting and complex ideas, and on the characters, who have so much potential to be fascinating, this would be a much better book. I want to sit the author down and say, "Not every chapter has to end with an explosion!"
But I'll definitely read the next book in the series.
January 20, 2019
Unexpectedly awesome... It's not often that you get a book about magic in space to do it well, and not only that... but we humans aren't the good guys.
I think there were a number of story elements that didn't add up, but the story was so great that it didn't matter (basically, it ignored the 'just how far apart is anything, anyway?' thing just like the recent Star Wars movies, but until the end it actually didn't matter). Yeah, the end came very quickly, and it did that thing where they only wrap up some of the things, and push you for a sequel, but I really want to read that sequel when it comes out.
It was a really fun, quick read.
I think there were a number of story elements that didn't add up, but the story was so great that it didn't matter (basically, it ignored the 'just how far apart is anything, anyway?' thing just like the recent Star Wars movies, but until the end it actually didn't matter). Yeah, the end came very quickly, and it did that thing where they only wrap up some of the things, and push you for a sequel, but I really want to read that sequel when it comes out.
It was a really fun, quick read.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
November 4, 2018
Maybe this just isn't my style at this point in life. It certainly isn't my first wacky space opera, and in a world where Groot is willdy popular, how can I complain if a mostly-human falls in love with a tree?
Gary has a decent personality, and is an acceptable character from the drawer marked "this is the character that things happen to".
Diversity is present and smoothly handled.
+1 for unicorns being asexual; that frees up the author to avoid some otherwise almost obligatory scenes.
Ricky is just Pratchett's CMOT Dibbler, but with attitude. The Pymmie are quite like Crowley and Aziraphale from Good Omens, cracking wise while they stop time and shift planets.
The whole Jenny storyline is just implausible. Not to mention her being the hero of Wossname, AND meeting far too many people who were also involved.
I deduct a point, as I always do, for the classic "how long was I out?" scene. Can we not JUST ONCE have the awakening character ask, "What happened?" or "Where am I?" or "What day is it?" or "Did we make it?"
Of course Gary's , sigh.
Jim. Grrr. HOW Long were they together and no one ever even TRIED to explain, and he never asked? Credit though for having a character who's consistently a jerk.
Wenck was bad, from the Bwah-hah, I'm SO evil drawer, and his minions worse, to the Imperial Stormtrooper level. And they are presented so woodenly that it is incongruous to find more than one of them being quite decent really.
Biggest problem for me is that this hasn't decided whether it is a rollicking space opera full of "I am Groot" characters, or an actual story with dilemmas and moral issues. The Ricky Tang bar scene should have had Bugs Bunny in it, but later on people are saving each other heroically. I admit that a very few authors have mixed humour and social concern successfully (GNU, STP), but for me this one is only partially successful.
I'll probably skip the sequel, because I can live without finding out how the horn got moved at the end. [grin]
Gary has a decent personality, and is an acceptable character from the drawer marked "this is the character that things happen to".
Diversity is present and smoothly handled.
+1 for unicorns being asexual; that frees up the author to avoid some otherwise almost obligatory scenes.
Ricky is just Pratchett's CMOT Dibbler, but with attitude. The Pymmie are quite like Crowley and Aziraphale from Good Omens, cracking wise while they stop time and shift planets.
The whole Jenny storyline is just implausible. Not to mention her being the hero of Wossname, AND meeting far too many people who were also involved.
I deduct a point, as I always do, for the classic "how long was I out?" scene. Can we not JUST ONCE have the awakening character ask, "What happened?" or "Where am I?" or "What day is it?" or "Did we make it?"
Of course Gary's , sigh.
Jim. Grrr. HOW Long were they together and no one ever even TRIED to explain, and he never asked? Credit though for having a character who's consistently a jerk.
Wenck was bad, from the Bwah-hah, I'm SO evil drawer, and his minions worse, to the Imperial Stormtrooper level. And they are presented so woodenly that it is incongruous to find more than one of them being quite decent really.
Biggest problem for me is that this hasn't decided whether it is a rollicking space opera full of "I am Groot" characters, or an actual story with dilemmas and moral issues. The Ricky Tang bar scene should have had Bugs Bunny in it, but later on people are saving each other heroically. I admit that a very few authors have mixed humour and social concern successfully (GNU, STP), but for me this one is only partially successful.
I'll probably skip the sequel, because I can live without finding out how the horn got moved at the end. [grin]
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
December 31, 2019
1/2, DNF, literally dropped it after a few pages. I found the language far too simplistic for something that is apparently aimed at adults. I flipped throughout the book and found the prose to be consistently simple.
"And the people left here on Earth - people deemed too sick or poor for a chance at a new life - were the angriest of all. Gary didn't blame them one bit. Mostly, he kept his head down and tried not to attract any notice..."
I do keep in mind that this is this author's debut novel, but I've read far better debuts in this year alone.
I'll probably avoid the Angry Robot imprint for a little while, considering I haven't been able to finish three of their published books so far.
"And the people left here on Earth - people deemed too sick or poor for a chance at a new life - were the angriest of all. Gary didn't blame them one bit. Mostly, he kept his head down and tried not to attract any notice..."
I do keep in mind that this is this author's debut novel, but I've read far better debuts in this year alone.
I'll probably avoid the Angry Robot imprint for a little while, considering I haven't been able to finish three of their published books so far.
May 6, 2018
Thoroughly enjoyable while also being deeply uncomfortable. Manages to present a spacefaring romp with a small group of unique characters that will appeal to fans of Firefly, while skewering various types of bigotry and establishing a unique version of FTL travel and space colonization. I look forward to the sequel. The only reason I won't recommend it for purchase in my library is we're too small to have enough members of the likely audience. But I may buy personally...
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