Review - Tau 4

I just finished the book ‘Tau 4’. It is a large paperback measuring 8 inches by 5 inches. It has a total of 496 pages, see photo above for cover illustration. This is a novel written by an up and coming author by the name of VJ Waks. I bought mine at Gen Con in 2009 and had a chance to meet the author. I usually don’t buy books from authors from Gen Con because there are just so many you don’t know which ones to buy. She is a most interesting lady and after speaking with her for about 10 minutes (she is personable and energetic about her work) I decided to pick one up. I even got mine autographed by her. If I’m not mistaken there was a special ‘show’ price discounted to, I want to say $15. The usual price is around $20.50 and is available at Amazon, Barnes & Nobel, Borders and other large book sellers.

‘Tau 4’ is an unusual book as it is marketed and categorized under the genre Science Fiction. When I first started reading it I prepared myself for reading a book of this genre. What that will usually entail is getting on your best technical game. Even though some of the concepts and sciences might be beyond your understand, time travel for instance, you still expect to read things like, microbes, nanos, phasers, lasers, etc. In the case of ‘Tau 4’ that is not necessary. While there is some science through out the book it doesn’t get bogged down in the sciences. Instead you just need to accept those things as they are presented to you. Does this sound like it would be a problem for a book in this genre? Maybe so, but not in this case.

Waks uses that steering away from the sciences or pseudo- sciences to give you something else. A story. If you’ve read any of my reviews of books or even plays you already know I am a lover of storytelling. Storytelling defines whether a book is just words thrown at you or if it a story to be savored. It’s like eating a fine meal, instead of shoving the food in your mouth like you would from a fast food restaurant, you take smaller portions, appreciating the presentation of the food, allowing the aroma to tease your appetite and letting the flavor fill every miniscule space in your mouth. So many authors forget that the origins of ALL stories come from storytelling. From a time when early man would sit around a fire, telling his stories and tales to others it has been a part of our makeup. It was the earliest form of communication before there were printed, written or even drawn stories. Man has used it for communicating his past, his history and lifes’ lessons.

This is not lost on Waks. She is a wonderful storyteller and you can tell, very quickly, from reading the book that she too is a lover of storytelling. At times it was lyrical. Was it a story or a song? I have yet to decide.

Storytelling is not her only strength. Her knowledge of the English language is seemingly quite extensive. There were a couple of times I needed to pull out a dictionary to look up a word. Again this is another aspect that some authors seem to miss out on. They seem to ‘dumb-down’ their writing. That’s a shame as it’s making us all, in my opinion, a dumber society. Use those words, that’s what they are there for. She made me use some brain cells that had gone to sleep for quite awhile. It felt great!

I think that because her vocabulary is so varied that she is able to make things come to life. Instead of just reading about the landscapes and environments she is trying to paint, you almost see them come to life in your minds-eye. They are rich, vibrant and full. However it is not just things that benefit from her descriptions but also her characters. They too are full and have real lives. You know them, understand them as she lets you become part of their lives. The story revolves mostly around a young woman named Gerda Tau who is what is referred to as a ‘morph’. Gerda is something much more than just a young woman. While she is that young woman, with fears and misgivings she is also something dark, deadly and beautiful. A part of her is animalistic and Waks does a incredible job of portraying that side of Gerda in the character. I could readily understand in relationship to a certain animal what Gerdas’ actions looked like. If I say more I give it away. No spoilers here!

There are a few other main characters and several secondary characters as well. Waks does not reserve her descriptive skills only for her main characters, all of her characters come to life via her writings. Even the most villainous Dyle Carzon is a real, if not deadly in his own right, character with loves and flaws. He is a great villain and as I’ve said before, great villains make stories. Her characters also enjoy the heartache that can only be brought on by loves or lost loves. I don’t usually get caught up in the romantic aspects of stories. Most of the times I just kind of glaze over that part of stories. What can I say? I’m a guy. Not in this case though. I became vested in what was going to happen. I wanted to see what would happen next. I flipped pages to get to the payoff. I was such a little girl. Not an easy accomplishment to get me to do that. So you will probably get sucked right in as well.

What else can I say? Probably nothing. I loved this book and I’m giving it, in case you haven’t guessed by now, a huge 10. I now hold this book up with some of my favorites. It will sit on my bookshelf next to others like; Of Mice and Men, The Old Man and The Sea, To Kill a Mockingbird and Man of La Mancha. What does that tell you about the book?

As Waks autographed in my copy,
“To the warrior in all of us”