Review: Any Minor World by Craig Schaefer

 

Any Minor World by Craig Schaefer follows Roy - a sort of private detective/"hired muscle" who is approached by a bit of a suspicious client. Despite his misgivings, he takes the job and goes after a dead writer's unfinished manuscript and begins to unravel a mystery surrounding this author's books. The mystery brings him up against a legendary criminal network and introduces him to Lucy Langenkamp, an art restorer who once wrote a cancelled comic. As they struggle to survive the crazy adventure that springs up around them, Roy and Lucy slowly grapple with their own pasts as well. It's a well-written book with a very distinctive noir/pulp vibe to it. 

Before I go on, I have to comment on the descriptions. I'm usually someone who doesn't enjoy/gets bored by descriptions, but I found the ones in this book to be well-written. They're interesting and paint some very vivid pictures that enabled me to imagine exactly what some of these characters and places were like. Definitely an interesting experience for me and that alone made think the book was very well-written.

Another thing I really enjoyed about this book was that it wasn't easy for me to predict what was going to happen. The book continued to surprise me, with more of the Sci-Fi/Noir elements coming through as the book progressed. 

It was a bit weird to be reading a book so focused on authors and how they think/world-build and how the publishing industry works at the beginning there. Then the story progressed to include and show us more of the characters and places in the world of the comic books that Lucy wrote and it became an important part of the story. 

Roy was a good main character to follow the story with, but I also really enjoyed the brief glimpses we got of Lucy's personality and inner thoughts. I feel that I may have enjoyed it a tiny bit more or been more invested if it focused on Lucy more, but at the same time, I realize that the story structure relied on being more from Roy's POV and it did work well. 

Overall, the book was well-written and had a satisfying ending. I almost didn't realize there would be a continuation/more books in the series, because it ends pretty conclusively and can be read as a stand-alone. Definitely an interesting first foray into crime/noir novels for me and worth checking out even if you're not familiar with the genre! 

I read this book as part of my SPSFC3 judging for team Peripheral Prospectors and can definitely see why it made it to the semifinals round. This review is only my own thoughts on the book and doesn't reflect any final decisions regarding the book's progress yet. Any such decisions will be made by the team as a whole once we've all read our assigned semi-finalists. I look forward to discovering more great reads!