Monkey Around by Jadie Jang

I would like to thank Hanna from Rebellion for an advance copy of this novel in exchange for a fair and honest review

Publisher – Solaris

Published – Out Now

Price – £8.99 paperback £5.99 Kindle eBook

San Francisco has a Monkey King - and she's kinda freaked out.

Barista, activist, and were-monkey Maya McQueen was well on her way to figuring herself out. Well, part of the way. 25% of the way. If you squint.

But now the Bay Area is being shaken up. Occupy Wall Street has come home to roost; and on the supernatural side there's disappearances, shapeshifter murders, and the city's spirit trying to find its guardian.

Maya doesn't have a lot of time before chaos turns up at her door, and she needs to solve all of her problems. Well, most of them. The urgent ones, anyhow.

But who says the solutions have to be neat? Because Monkey is always out for mischief.

I enjoy contemporary fantasy for the exploration of what would happen if the magical was real and in our own world. Now that itself is an adventure but we often see things from either someone completely new to the world discovering its rules or someone who is long brought up in its traditions and knows it all. But life for all of us is often a lot more in between we know a bit about our world, and we rarely know where we are going with our lives. This was what struck me the most about Jadie Jang’s glorious new novel Monkey Around which gives us a very interesting magical community in San Francisco, a puzzling set of crimes and an awesome new lead character to get to know.

It is Sand Francisco in 2011. The Occupy movement has moved to the East coast and activism is on the rise. Maya is in her twenties and these days works on the board of a promising independent Asian American magazine named Inscrutable, works hard to encourage activist movements in California and has a third secret life that most people think is working as a barista in a small indie coffee shop but is actually supporting her other secret role working to investigate issues in the supernatural shapeshifter communities of San Francisco. Maya is one of the group but has very little knowledge of where she comes from as she was found at an orphanage at two years old. She can turn into a Monkey very easily but can shapeshift into anything or even anyone with some effort; a hair from her can open locks, become flares or even clothes. She can summon a cloud to travel on too, but no one knows where these powers come from.

Maya is investigating a missing Aswang when she comes across an unusual dead body a wealthy and well-known shapeshifter drained of all their life and magical essence. This becomes part of a sequence of deaths across various shapeshifter groups. Maya is also asked to help a fellow former university student Tez whose younger sister Chucha are members of the Naugal communities (linked to the Aztecs and also can change into any animals with added magical healing powers just for starters).   Chucha has decided to abandon her brother’s dreams other going to college and has started working with a tough street gang. Maya is asked to help persuade Chucha to come back to the fold. Throw in a shadowy force behind the murders, a magical stick that can possess its owners and Maya is about to have an even busier few weeks than she was planning to.

What pulled me from the start is Maya’s voice as she is our lead narrator. A lot of authors tend to use the noir private eye style but what I like about Maya is she is doing this for her community. She is funny, bawdy, frustrated just a tad geeky and wears her heart on her sleeve. She is the twentysomething who wants to do something good, have bills paid and also is exploring her own culture and heritage. Not knowing where she comes from means she is interested in all the communities of the Bay area, and this gives the story an interesting look at identity. It should be noticed despite the book’s introduction maya herself is oblivious to the legend of the Monkey King (and has avoided reading Journey into the West after an unpleasant college tutor rocked her confidence in Asian studies).

As we meet more and more of the cast, we have a group of american multiple generation immigrants who ae balancing their family’s culture and parental expectations with modern life in the US. We meet shapeshifters who are politicians, ex-MMA fighters, band members and would be poets/doctors. As with Maya there is a sense of people working themselves out that definitely should strike a chord with many readers. Some people want to be their best selves, some just want to let their inner monster finally let loose. An interesting angle on Maya is although now heavily involved in her community she was in her teenage years was herself a feared enforcer/member of one of the many gangs in the city. This is a world of the highs and lows of humanity and Jang has a great gift for making this world come alive and we find ourselves caring even about side characters like a gang leader’s clearly clumsy brother or a non-shapeshifting force of nature bestie of Maya’s who acts as her conscience and also a community leader. It’s a world of depth, texture and feels like we are only just finding out how it all works.

The fantastical element is also really interesting. The murders and the unusual stick of power we find start to cross paths and it opens up ancient tales of family legends, power struggles and nefarious plans. Jang has many many enjoyable fight scenes and Maya is not one to be under-estimated (she is often said to be one of the most powerful in the area) and the many clues and myths to untangle make this a chewy mystery with a great resolution. It also underlines that Maya’s nature means sometimes she will do the unthinkable for her own aims which was actually quite shocking. There are hints of more stories and agendas in this world to explore but this tale itself has a very satisfying conclusion.

Monkey Around is a very refreshing entry into contemporary fantasy. Action packed and character focused with a really great take on how any city is itself comprised of other communities and they themselves are not just one group all acting and thinking in the same way. There are delights of many mythical creatures to explore and a lead character who I think will become a fan favourite for many of you. The quality of Jang’s word-building, character-building and storytelling is excellent especially in the start to a brand-new fantasy series. Go get this story into your brains!