Ghost of the Neon God by TR Napper
I would like to thank Titan for an advance copy of this novella in exchange for a fair and honest review
Publisher – Titan
Published – Out Now
Price – £14.99 hardback £6.99 Kindle eBook
Jackson Nguyen is a petty crook living slim on the mean streets of Melbourne. When he crosses paths with a desperate, but wealthy, Chinese dissident, begging for his help, Jack responds in the only natural way: he steals her shoes.
And yet, despite every effort to mind his own damn business, a wild spiral into the worst kind of trouble begins – Murder, mayhem, fast cars, fast-talking, bent cops, and long straight highways into the terrible beauty of the vast Australian Outback.
In Jack’s world, taking a stand against the ruling class is the shortest path to a shallow grave. But when an Earth-shattering technology falls into his hands, he must do everything he can to stop the wrong people taking it. In a world of pervasive government surveillance and oppressive corporate control, it’s up to a small-time criminal to keep the spark of human rebellion alive.
We have soft spots for rogues. The criminal who may just have a heart from Hand Solo to Catwoman it speaks to the rebel in all of us who doesn’t play by the rules we feel we have to. In TR Napper’s cyberpunk novella Ghost of the Neon God we follow a thief who unexpectedly has a chance to face up to the biggest powers of their world and yet ultimately I found this trip into the future disappointing.
Jackson Nguyen is a thief moving around the city with his best friend Col stealing and surviving day by day only. A simple tyre theft though gets interrupted by a strange woman claiming the two must help her. The thieves decide not to get involved as she clearly has powerful enemies but soon find themselves being hunted regardless. Jackson is now in incredible danger and ends up on the run and in possession of a very dangerous form of technology that the powerful wave .
On the one hand if you enjoy simple action tales then this will be a quick diverting read. Napper throws set piece after set piece from high tech assassins to courrupt police and throws in government conspiracies. It’s comfortably propulsive and doesn’t slow the pace. Jackson is a sympathetic character learning sometimes you can’t keep your head down forever.
However for me I struggled with the book on multiple fronts. The characters all seem to come from those seen in 1980s B movie SF films. Jackson we can see is a rebel as he still smokes! His colleague Col as well as a mean thief has philosophical moments railing against the world and we also have a evil police officer who loves offbeat monologues there is even a plucky middle class student thrown in with Jackson and the two from opposite worlds seem to click. Its very hard not to say that we’ve seen this all before and that stretches to the look and feel of this futuristic Australia again it’s a fairly straightforward classic cyberpunk future where the use of AI, permanently plugged in populaces and driverless cars all feels fairly thinly explored. It apes the past books of the genre but I didn’t see anything particularly new saying what cyberpunk of 2024 has to offer - the punk feels not that rebellious. My other issue is some fairly random detours. A character exits and hardly gets any time for themselves and many scenes feel a bit jumpy. For a novella it feels too big a story to pull it off and by the end you’re left thinking what actually was the point.
Ghost of the Neon God was sadly very much not for me. Those who love simple 1980s cyberpunk tales may enjoy it but this feels a very disposable story that lacked depth so sadly I cannot recommend it.
