Inside a Silver Box

Starred review from November 24, 2014
In this terrific genre-defying work, Mosley (Rose Gold) uses an eons-old battle for control of existence as a backdrop for a character-driven novel of philosophy and social commentary. Ages ago, the Laz created the Silver Box to inflict torture on other life forms, but the Silver Box rebelled and imprisoned the Laz within itself. In the present day, black thug Ronnie Bottoms kills white Columbia student Lorraine Fell in Central Park, above the Box’s resting place. Lorraine’s spirit draws Ronnie back to her body and he resurrects her using the artifact’s power, but a sliver of the Laz escapes, so the Silver Box calls upon the unlikely duo to “try to save the Earth” and sends them on a journey to gain superpowers. Mosley really pulls out all the stops, managing with improbable success to combine a struggle for the fate of all existence with a story about two New Yorkers from very different backgrounds coming to understand each other and address the mistakes they’ve made in their own lives. Wild concepts and deep thoughts sit comfortably alongside the musings of ordinary people undergoing radical changes in this top-notch tale. Agent: Gloria Loomis, Watkins/Loomis Agency.

November 15, 2014
After an African-American thug murders a white graduate student jogging in Central Park, the two team up to combat an alien menace in Mosley's (Rose Gold, 2014, etc.) latest science-fiction effort.When Ronnie Bottoms brains Lorraine Fell with a rock, her corpse conveniently falls on top of the Silver Box, an incredibly powerful AI remorseful about its original purpose: fulfilling the whims of the Laz, a sadistic conquering race. When the Box acts to help Ronnie resurrect Lorraine, they also inadvertently awaken the Laz as well, which soon sets its sights on Earth. Mosley is always genuinely interested in getting inside people's heads and trying to bridge social, economic and racial divides-or at least, to disseminate understanding about the natures of those divides. But for some reason, his science fiction is typically crafted in the form of fables, and the insights which seem organic and integrated in his mysteries lose subtlety in his SF. The message of this particular fable is also somewhat murky: What do Lorraine and Ronnie gain by their encounter with the Silver Box? Have they really become more enlightened? Ronnie does become a more philosophical person, willing to consider the implications of his actions (although fidelity doesn't seem part of that package). But Lorraine seems to have gained Ronnie's less attractive qualities in return, rejecting philosophy (formerly her area of study) and words for the purely physical, running for miles and having sex with a stranger (the oddly named Alton Brown-does Mosley have some connection with the Food Network celebrity?). And although she's strong enough now to resist her domineering father's bullying, she apparently has no problem continuing to accept his financial support and never for one second worries that it might be cut off. Food for thought, if not entirely digestible.

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January 1, 2015

When privileged young Lorraine Fell interrupts her daily Central Park run for philosophical meditation, a feral black man named Ronnie Bottoms kills her in a botched rape attempt. The crime is committed atop ground where the titular Silver Box, a sentient artifact, lies buried. Reanimated by the box, Lorraine convinces Ronnie to use the item's powers to resurrect hewer's characteristics, among other new powers. The box enlists the strange duo's aid in its battle against the Laz, the alien species that used it to terrorize the universe before it became entirely sentient. VERDICT While showing flashes of humor and insight, Mosley's ("Crosstown to Oblivion" series) latest sf outing will ultimately leave most readers unsatisfied. Explorations of class and race, sex, violence, and subjugation mix in a plot too frail to sustain its cosmological questions, and that meanders too much to work up momentum or emotional force. Fans of Mosley's crime fiction will long for his return to that genre, while sf readers may find the work short of science or action. Best recommended to those interested in New Age philosophy. [Mosley's new Leonard McGill mystery, And Sometimes I Wonder About You, will be released May 2015.--Ed.]--Neil Hollands, Williamsburg Regional Lib., VA

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December 1, 2014
Mosley, who's written various mystery series (including the hugely popular Easy Rawlins novels), is not widely known as a science-fiction writer, but he's been a fan for many years, and his recent Crosstown to Oblivion series has showcased his rather experimental approach to the genre. Now comes this full-length novel in which two people, who could be modern literature's most mismatched pair (he's a rapist and a murderer; she's the woman he killed, brought back to life), are all that stands between humankind and a superpowerful alien race determined to retrieve a mysterious weapon in the form of a silver box buried in New York City's Central Park. Fans of Mosley's brand of sfbig ideas, carefully drawn charactersshould really like this one.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2014, American Library Association.)