The Coldest War
By Ian Tregillis
(Tor)
With “The Coldest War,” Ian Tregillis continues an impressive fantasy/alternative-history trilogy he began with “Bitter Seeds.”
The first novel, set in Britain’s darkest hours of World War II, pitted British warlocks, calling on dark otherworldly forces, against young Nazi Ubermenschen, whose X-men-like superpowers (invisibility, flamethrowing) are fueled by battery power fed directly into their brains.
Now it’s 1963. The Russians rule everything east of Paris. They’ve reverse-engineered the vanquished Nazis’ Gutterelektron devices, and it seems only a matter of time before they’ll invade a battered Britain.
However, Klaus and Gretel, a brother-sister pair and two of the surviving
German enhanced warriors, escape their Russian imprisonment with the necessary batteries, and head toward London. Klaus, who can render all or part of himself invisible under current, has been growing in awareness, even in conscience, while in confinement. He’s also become repulsed by his sister, a precog with a long-range plan whose steps she reveals to others only when she needs them to know. When they flee their captors, he realizes with horror that Gretel drove a colleague to suicide years ago simply so that a humble piece of equipment would be available for their escape.
To defeat the Nazis, the British warlocks bargained with the Eidolons, horrific forces who loathe human beings and demand a bloody payment for each deed.
The British sacrificed many just to survive; now it seems the chickens are coming home to roost. Warlocks are dying mysteriously, in a fashion that suggests a traitor inside the secret Milkweed network is revealing their identities. The spy Reybould Marsh, festering in alcohol and a failing marriage, grieving the death of his infant daughter and barely coping with a deformed son, returns to service to investigate.
Even as Britain prepares for all-out war with Russia, and the remaining warlocks consider how to use the Eidolons while keeping them from destroying humanity, the ultimate confrontation is between Marsh and Gretel.
Marsh will do whatever it takes to save his country. As for Gretel, the reader must consider if she’s evil, or if she is something beyond evil, and even scarier.
Tregillis’ breathtaking set pieces include an attempted ambush of an invisible assassin and the rescue of a savant from an enemy stronghold. Some of the seeds he planted in the first novel flower bitterly and impressively in this one.
(MCT)
