Joker Moon - George R R Martin (ed)

 Joker Moon is the third of the Wild Cards Mosaic I have read.   It is, I believe, the most recent of the ones I have read.   I still like Mississippi Roll the best, and this the least.   Mississippi Roll works well because the action is concentrated aboard the steam ship.  Three Kings has a strong storyline which, fortuitously, closely mirrored reality.  Joker Moon is unfortunately all over the place, from India in the Fifties to, obviously, the Moon.   And the central character, Theodorus, is your typical Elon Musk over-indulged brat.  Okay, you're going to feel sorry for anyone who turns into a snail-centaur.  But he's still a brat.

That said, there are plenty of more appealing characters.  I liked the all the astro- and cosmonauts.  I liked Tiago, who attracts trash like a semi-human recycling centre.   Even Aarti the Moon Maid, a female Indian mirror of Theodorus has more going for her than, well, than Theodorus.

The main attraction of the Wild Cards series is to enjoy the collaboration of multiple genre writers (11 of them in this case), each developing their theme and characters.  There was no poor or inferior writing in Joker Moon.   Some was exceptional.  I particularly enjoyed the sections done by Michael Cassutt and Leo Kendren.

Three Kings - George R R Martin

 A Wild Cards Mosaic Novel, apparently, Three Kings is the second British-based instalment in Martin's vast alternative universe series.  Essentially Queen Elizabeth II died in childbirth, her sister Margaret succeeded and ruled until 2020.  She died leaving two sons, Henry and Richard, the first a reactionary brute, the second a bisexual charmer.  Then rumours begin to circulate - that Elizabeth's newborn son survived but was hidden away on Prince Philip's orders because there was something wrong - in fact, like so many others around the world, he was born a Joker, mutated by the alien virus of 1946.

It is for Alan Turing - yes, the Alan Turing - to investigate, even though he is over 100 years old and made of metal.  He is assisted by his protege, the Joker super-spy Noel Matthews and the Joker king of London, the Green Man Roger Barnes.  They are all frustrated by the Celtic goddess of death Badb, dislodged from Belfast after the Good Friday Agreement and on the look out for a hero's death-blood to rejuvenate her.

It's a good enough pretext with lots of fun ideas.  Unfortunately the cast is miles too big to keep track of.  Most of the characters are well drawn (unfortunately, Noel isn't, and he gets much of the action).  The royals are not very convincing either, mainly because American lead writers always assume we Brits are as keen on our royals as they are.  I very much doubt the state would fall if the succession was altered, subverted or just plain failed.

Good enough, but not great.  I enjoyed Mississippi Roll much more.  Nevertheless I remain fascinated by the overarching concept.

Mississippi Roll - George R R Martin (ed)

 What attracted me to this was the shared setting with Fevre Dream - a Mississippi steamboat actually mentioned in that novel.  Actually, that was an earlier incarnation of the steamboat here, built by an ancestor of the captain here.  And as part of the Wild Cards series of more than twenty novels and stories by forty-plus writers, all edited by Martin, who created the central premise: that is, an alien virus released over New York in the aftermath of World War II, which either kills those infected (Black Queens), mutates them into monsters (Jokers), or grants them super powers (Aces or, less 'super', Deuces).

Wilbur Leathers is in New York on his honeymoon when the virus was released in September 1946.  He is not infected, nor is his wife, and they achieve his post-war dream, a new version of the family steamboat, a new Natchez, steaming up and down the Mississippi.  Five years later he's struggling to pay the bills - and he owes some very unpleasant people.  On their behalf Marcus Carpenter comes aboard and demands payment.  A fight breaks out.  Carpenter pulls a gun.  Leathers finds himself suddenly outside his body - then inside Carpenter's.  Wilbur is the actual steam now, broiling Carpenter from the inside out.

Wilbur is still aboard the Natchez sixty-five years later.  He has learned how to use steam to manifest himself but he cannot speak (though he can pick up the tools with which to write) and he cannot leave the boat and go ashore.  But, all in all, it's not such a bad afterlife.  The Natchez is doing better now, partly because of its famous steam ghost.  This particular trip is up to the Tall Stacks Race in Cincinnati - and there are several complications.  A significant number of Joker refugees from Kazakhstan have been smuggled aboard, 'illegal immigrants' being sought by the authorities for deportation to an island off Northern Ireland.  And the consortium which now owns the Natchez is planning to turn her into a floating fixed-mooring casino.  With her boilers stripped out and sold for scrap, what then happens to steam-ghost Wilbur.

This is the storyline which is then developed by six writers (part of the Wild Cards Trust).  In practice, the Wilbur story is written in eight episodes or parts scattered through the book (but double parts at the beginning and end) by Stephen W Leigh.  Five other stories, by other authors, are set within this framework, self-contained in so much as they focus on different sets of characters, but all linked to the main story.  The quality of these varies, naturally, but all are good.  My personal favourite was the last one, 'Under the Arch' by David D Levine - but would I have enjoyed it so much without being led to it by the others?  I also really enjoyed the end twist.

This sort of gaming-as-series-fiction is a side-alley of sci fi I haven't come across before.  I will certainly look out for more of Wild Cards in particular.