Ecko Rising

Ecko Rising by Danie Ware
Ecko Rising is the debut novel from Danie Ware who, for those who don’t know, is the publicist and event organiser at Forbidden Planet. Now given how deeply embedded in the science-fiction and fantasy community Danie is you’d expect her to knock it out the park first time so, while it has its flaws, it’s no surprise that Ecko Rising still makes for a very entertaining read.

Ecko Rising is set in two worlds. In the first we have a nightmare future vision of London, where robot CCTV drones keep watch on a populace kept numb via drug-induced apathy provided by the Pilgrim Corporation. In this London we find Ecko, a cybernetically enhanced terrorist/assassin that lives only to bring Pilgrim down and will stop at nothing to do it. Ecko joins forces with an erstwhile resistance group with strong resources that can help him utilise his turbocharged stealth, strength and speed. He finds himself on a mission to take out Dr. Grey, Pilgrim Corps chief ‘cook’, but the mission goes awry with Ecko taking a big fall and blacking-out, but when he comes around he’s in world number two, a quasi-medieval fantasy world of dark magic and mystical creatures. But while he’s understandably perturbed by this turn of events, he’s even more confused to find himself the prophesied saviour of humankind with a quest to set out on a beastie to salt at the end.

In the struggle to come to terms with the reality of his predicament, Ecko decides that he must have been caught and hooked-up to a virtual-world simulation that is channeling his own sub-conscious and providing him with this game as some kind of test that he must pass before they’ll unhook him let him out. But this world feels pretty real, people get genuinely injured and die and there’s a nagging doubt in his mind that things may actually be as they seem. The only way to find out is to go with it and see this quest out to the bitter end.

Ecko Rising is an interesting book in lots of ways. It’s a hybrid sci-fi/fantasy tale but rather than try to mash two out-of-sync worlds together, Ware has opted to take the Mark Twain approach of A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court and drop a larger-than-life character from the sci-fi world and drop them into a primitive fantasy setting. It’s a smart move because it gives us a fish-out-of-water story which is always fun, but sets it against an epic fantasy quest while dropping bits of time-travel wonderment onto the primitive peoples in a Catweazle style.

Then we have the main character of Ecko. On the surface at least, he’s an uncaring creature of chaos, filled with rage and violence and almost prepared to watch the world burn to reach his goal. He doesn’t speak very often and when he does it’s normally some caustic barb at whoever happens to be nearby. But as the story unfolds we get to spend more and more time in his head. Here we find a complex, troubled young man, slightly unsure of himself, often filled with doubt, and totally at sea in this world of swords and scorcery where his enhancements don’t always work. But Ecko is without fear, and he’s nothing if not resilient, so he tamps down his nagging doubts and sets out to get to the end of this challenge and back to the stink of the London he loves.

There’s an additional and slightly philosophical point here as well, because Ecko thinks it’s all a simulation anyway that means he’s free to behave how he’s always wanted to to, without consequence, because hell, if none of it’s real anyway what does it matter, and he does love a scrap. This attitude colours a lot of what he does in the early parts of the book but as the doubts about his situation creep in he adapts his behaviour subtly to accommodate the new thinking.

Elsewhere the rest of cast is nicely drawn and well rounded, characters are distinct with recognisable voices and there’s precious little wastage as they each have their role to play. The action, particularly the hand-to-hand fighting, is fast and thrilling and the resulting violence is brutal and uncompromising. The prose throughout is fabulous - even the swearing and cursing is brilliantly done - the world-building is deep and rich without being intrusive or slowing the story down, and the sex scenes pass both tests, the first being that they don’t feel tacked-on or gratuitous and the second that I had to stop reading one during the morning commute because standing up would have been..ahem..embarrassing.

As I said earlier though, it’s not without its flaws. The plot is a bit thin for 520-ish pages and feels too long-drawn-out. I’m certain that losing 50-100 pages could’ve tightened it up significantly without missing much story. The second big issue for me is that - for a central character - Ecko spends a lot of his time out-of-sight and out-of-mind while we play out the stories of the other characters of the Varchinde, the fantasy world. Now this is a double-edged sword. On the one hand they’re interesting and their stories are central to what happens overall, but on the other you run the risk of creating a sub-plot that’s more interesting to read than your central story and in some ways Ware has done exactly that but left the threads of the sub-plot dangling in a really irritating way. I’m sure the plan is to resolve this in the inevitable sequel but it rankled with me.

That said though it’s still a fine read. Ware’s imagination is full-on and her writing has wit and style and the kind of pacing that comes from someone enjoying herself, and that sense of having fun shines through as you read.

Ecko Rising is published by <a data-cke-saved-href="http://www.titanbooks.com” target=" href="http://www.titanbooks.com” target=" _new"="">Titan Books and is available with free delivery from The Book Depository and on the high street from Blackwell and all good book stores.

Danie Ware has a website and lurks on Twitter.

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