Customer Reviews

Tinker

5 star:		(42)
4 star:		(9)
3 star:		(9)
2 star:		(4)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

It's shutdown time again and part of the city of Pittsburgh has once again been returned to Earth. For most of the year, it resides on the planet of Elfhome or the Faerie World where all of the human inhabitants have come to rely on magic instead of science. Most elves were not really interested in the short lived humans and none of them wanted to be stuck on Earth during shutdown time, even though it was only for 24 hours. That is why it was so unusual to see an elf running through Tinker's scrapyard. Tinker immediately recognized him as Windwolf, the elf who had saved her life several years ago. Windwolf placed what Tinker assumed was a life debt on her and who knew how that linked them together? Fearing that, if Windwolf died, she would die, Tinker heroically battles the terrifying wargs and manages to get rid of them, but Windwolf is gravely wounded. With no magic to heal him, Tinker must use all of her scientific know how and intrinsic genius to get him through the rest of Shutdown. Unfortunately, Tinker's problems don't end when she is finally able to get Windwolf to an elvish hospital...

Tinker and her cousin Oilcan are attacked by some random suits who try to kill Windwolf and any witnesses to the attack. Then there is the NSA and EIA, both organizations very curious as to what is going on in the elvish power structure and wanting to know a little bit more information about the scientific genius who just happens to be Tinker. Turns out that the feds have finally caught up with her and know that she has the mental ability to construct another gate, like the gate that links Earth to Elfhome. But humans aren't the only ones who know that Tinker has this ability - the oni, or Japanese demons, are determined to conquer Earth & Elfhome and are trying to use Tinker to do it! Windwolf is determined to protect Tinker from these people, but Tinker isn't sure if she agrees with his methods. After all, wasn't turning her into an elf and marrying her a little too drastic? Perhaps they should get to know one another first, like a date or something...

Tinker was an absolutely wonderful romantic fantasy that was also refreshingly original. I love Wen Spencer's Ukiah Oregon series and so was thrilled when I saw that she was writing something new because I knew that it would be different and I knew that I would love it! Tinker is such a great heroine - she is young and has many flaws and has a lot of growing up to do, but she is also very mature in some ways and a very smart, eccentric genius. I know that many readers have complained about the hero, Windwolf, in that he seems to perfect, but, heck, so long as we're going to be reading fantasy, lets go all the way! I loved him as a hero and thought that he matched Tinker perfectly. The villains were suitably evil and thus worthy of hatred and yet, you still felt sorry for them and could understand their motives. The plot is very fast paced and I just gobbled this book up - I couldn't put it down! If you haven't read Wen Spencer before, what are you waiting for? She is fabulous!

European Elves, Japanese Oni, the city of Pittsburgh spending 1 day a month on earth and 30 days on the world of Faerie, and an eighteen year old girl who makes Eienstein look mentally challenged. These are the elements that Ms. Spencer weaves into a highly entertaining tale.
Tinker is an inventive genius, born ten years after her father died, who has spent all of her eighteen year growing up in this strange/familiar city of Pittsburgh. Brilliant, inventive and brave it developes that she is the pivot upon which the fate of worlds turns.
These elements could have been put together into a terrible book. But Wen Spencer's supurb writing turns them into a wonderful romp. The only disappointment was that the story ends far to soon. One can only hope that Ms. Spencer plans to revisit Tinker at some time in the future.
Read this book. Then if you have not read her first three books, get your paws on them and read them.

On the Rim of Elfhome in Pittsburgh, business owner Tinker and her cousin Oilcan are moving around wrecks that temporarily reside in her Pittsburgh Scrap and Salvage yard to makes room for the influx of new vehicles that Shutdown Day always brings to her. However, a power failure leads to her gadgets inability to keep out the local flow of magic that jumps sky high when a pack of wargs chase an Elf into her scrap yard.

Preferring to literally mind her business, Tinker laments that the prey has to be Windwolf, an arrogant noble who saved her life five years ago from a saurus, but placed a life debt on her that forces her to help. Not long afterward every official from the NSA to the EIA (Elfin Interdimensional Agency) make demands of Tinker. Even those not officially officious want a piece of her. All Tinker desires is to remain in Pittsburgh wanting her first kiss on her first date, but alas even the city will not cooperate as it is no longer earth tied.

Anyone who thought Pittsburgh was Steelers, Pirates, and Penguins, oh my, will quickly change their mind with Wen Spencer's wild fantasy. The story line is as fast as a novel can go yet the key players seem genuine. Readers will adore the harried heroine, an ingenious tinker who has never been kissed (but is standing on an Elven mound not a pitcher's mound). Windwolf lives up to his clan's reputation for inhuman haughtiness though this human has breeched his soul. Amusing, ironic and loaded with daring and dastardly deeds, TINKER is a wonderful tongue-in-cheek fantasy joy ride around the city by the three rivers.

Harriet Klausner

Wen Spencer (Alien Taste, Tainted Trail, Bitter Waters) is one very imaginative writer. Tinker, his latest book, proves that he is here to stay.

Tinker is young human woman living in Pittsburgh. She runs her own scrap yard for a living, invents and builds her own gadgets, and is incidentally a genius where hyperphase gates are concerned. Her murdered father was the inventor of the Chinese hyperphase gate in orbit of earth. Its activation twenty years ago, resulted in the veil effect which transported Pittsburgh to ElfHome and a huge section of virgin forest to Earth in its place.

One night, Tinker is working in her yard when a pack of magically enhanced dogs called wargs, chase the viceroy (an elf named Windwolf) into her yard determined to kill him. Tinker intervenes and saves his life. As a result, Windwolf owes her a life debt. When he gives her a gift, she doesn't realise that he is proposing marriage. She accepts his gift, and later agrees to a spell that will "prevent her death" (or so he says) without realising that she is agreeing to be turned into an elf!

Tinker is wonderfully inventive. I particularly like the idea of Shutdown when the hyperphase gate is turned off once a month so that Pittsburgh reverts to earth for twenty four hours. Buy this book, and pray for a sequel.

Reviewed by Mark E. Cooper
The Warrior Within

This book was very creative- and within that, very well done.

The idea of linking two parralell universes is good, and the way it was managed - expressed before in numerous books - was still accomplished in an interesting way.

In addition, thr characters were well done. It's almost impossible to write about a super-genius effectively (without boring your audience, or confusing them), but Wen managed to do it. Some of the other characters are interesting enough stereotypes to compel true interest.

The plot was very fast-moving, and again creative. It changed directions several times, and was difficult to anticipate.

Overall, a very creative book and a good read.

It's barely possible to suspend disbelief that Pittsburgh shifts between normal reality and elfland through a very implausible mechanism.

The protagonist, Tinker, is just a bit too hard to like and you don't really find yourself rooting for her or really worried when she gets into trouble, especially after you meet Windwolf. You just know the author isn't going to let anything too bad happen to her.

Her love interest, the elf-leader Windwolf, is pretty much a cardboard character; no depth, no interest to his personality. And he's downright stupid, which makes it even harder to work up much interest in whether Tinker gets him or not. I don't think the author meant him to be stupid, but that's how he comes across.

Consider the first time we meet this wise, powerful elf-lord: He's chased into Tinker's junk-yard by a pack of monster "Foo" dogs and stands them off heroically with his sword, then his dagger when he loses his sword, then he's on the ground being savaged (page 8 already!) when Tinker rescues him but is menaced by the dogs herself until...wait for it...Windwolf pulls out a gun and shoots the dog to rescue Tinker.
So...if the Wise Elf Warrior had a gun all along why didn't he just shoot the beasts in the first place and save himself and tinker all that trouble?!?!?!??

Because the author needed a dramatic rescue-each-other scene and a wounded Windwolf to drive their relationship and the story line through the rest of the book, that's why.

It's entertaining enough what-happens-next storytelling if you have nothing better to do and don't mind putting your brain and critical faculties into neutral for an afternoon.

Or, unpunished as the case may be. Tinker, a genius level salvage yard owner and inventor is just minding her business when she sees an elf attacked. Unhesitating, she helps him out.

Next thing she knows, she's dragged to Elfhaim, the part of Philadelphia that is a slice into another world due to a Chinese gate malfunction. Worse, she discovers she's married to the elf she saved.

Wen Spencer's world of not-so-distant Philadelphia changed by technology and the invasion of elves is both engaging and intriguing. Spencer weaves a fine tale with Tinker and the assorted cast of human, halfling and elves. She's definitely an author to read whether in this world or the one she created for Ukiah Oregon in Alien Taste.

This book is old-fashioned storytelling with a wonderful new sensibility. It's an original, and lots of fun.

Tinker was raised in an eccentric family, and now is the resident junkyard inventor in the strangest city on earth. Pittsburgh is on earth for just one 24-hour period each month. The rest of the time Pittsburgh is on the alternate Earth planet of Elfhome, thanks to a problem with an orbiting stargate that is part of the Chinese space program.

Tinker is not your everyday ordinary eighteen-year-old gearhead genius. She's likeable, wry, funny, and unpredictable as she gets over her head in the maneuverings of the NSA, the Earth Interdimensional Agency, and elfhome politics, as well as assorted bad guys.

The plot of the book is a wonderful page-turner, and defies genres. The storytelling itself is exquisite. It drew marvelous pictures in my mind that I had never seen before. Tinker is a story to return to over and over. My hope is that a sequel will come soon with more of the adventures of Tinker. Go Tinker ze domi!

The toughest stuff for me to read in books or watch in movies and television is the blending of Science Fiction with Fantasy. It's a crossing of genres that many have tried and failed miserably at...

...but Wen Spencer gets it right with TINKER, a beautifully crafted, wickedly funny, and action packed adventure featuring one spitfire girl genius, elves armed with swords and sub-machine guns, and a demonic consipracy of global proportions. What makes this book a must read is how Spencer elegantly interweaves the magic and mysticism of Elfhome with the sciences of Earth. Tinker turns the mystery of Elf Magic into the next level of Quantum Theory Physics, and it all makes sense! Sadly, it is this brilliance of our Teenage Einstein of Future Pittsburgh that makes her THE MOST POPULAR GIRL with the Elves, government agencies, and dark forces from an alternate universe.

You think being a teenager is rough...try being a teenager with Stephen Hawking's I.Q. stuck in an inter-dimensional Pittsburgh. THAT'S rough!

One fun ride and worth every page! Thank you, Wen!

Due to a side-effect of the orbital gate, a 50-mile section of Pittsburg has been pulled into the alternate Earth of Elfhome. For 20 years, Pittsburg has existed in Elfhome, except for a once monthly 24-hour gate shutdown period, when it returns to Earth to allow for trade and such. Tinker runs Pittsburg's scrap yard, where she uses her free time to invent incredible gadgets using her genius for quantum physics and the ambient magic of Elfhome.

The Elves are generally friendly, but rather private about their culture, and though Tinker has made less effort than most to understand them, she soon finds herself up to her ears in Elfin intrigue, after twice saving the life of the Elf Viceroy. To save Earth, Elfhome and her honor, Tinker must out maneuver the Elfin court, the NSA, the Elfin Interdimensional Agency and murderous technology smugglers, without further endangering her life and the lives of those she loves.

Wen Spencer has conceived a profoundly detailed world with characters so vibrant and realistic, I almost feel like I've actually met them. The book's three main strengths are uncommon depth of the characters, portrayal of the fantastic in such a way that it seems utterly plausible, and an inspired, well-organized plot. If you like science-based fantasy, mystery, magic, romance, elves/faeries, smart girls that kick butt, or great storytelling, you'll love this book. The ending is a bit abrupt, but after my second read, I find it fitting. I'm already looking forward to the sequel.