SPFBO 10: Mushroom Blues by Adrian M. Gibson

Welcome to the Final stage of SPFBO 10! As you know, the 10 blogs all picked their champion who advanced into the finals, including ourselves. Check out our SPFBO 10 page for more info! SPFBO 10 ends on April 30th, and so we’ll post our finalist reviews every two weeks or so until then.

Our 2nd SPFBO 10 finalist review is for Mushroom Blues by Adrian M. Gibson. The order of the reviews within a post will be in alphabetical order.

A quick reminder about how we are proceeding in the Finals: our judges had the freedom to opt out of reading any of the books due to personal interest, time restrictions, unforeseen life events, etc. Our aim is to have at least 4 reviews/scores for each finalist.

Both in the Semi-Final and Final stages we have a DNF rule in place: if a judge reads a book (either semi-finalist or finalist if they didn’t opt out beforehand), they have to read at least 25% of it. If they decide to DNF between 25%-50% they’ll have to give a score but can opt out of writing a review, and if they DNF after 50% (or not) then also have to score AND write a review.

For Mushroom Blues we have 6 reviews and 6 scores for your reading pleasures.

So, without further ado, let’s take a closer look at our first finalist!

Table of Contents

• About the Book
• Book Blurb
• Reviews:
  • Arina
  • Drew
  • Jen
  • Liis
  • Timy
  • Tru
• Our Judgement

ENTER THE FUNGALVERSE. Blade Runner, True Detective and District 9 meld with the weird worlds of Jeff VanderMeer, Philip K. Dick and China Miéville in Adrian M. Gibson’s hallucinatory fungalpunk noir debut.

Two years after a devastating defeat in the decade-long Spore War, the island nation of Hōppon and its capital city of Neo Kinoko are occupied by invading Coprinian forces. Its fungal citizens are in dire straits, wracked by food shortages, poverty and an influx of war refugees. Even worse, the corrupt occupiers exploit their power, hounding the native population.

As a winter storm looms over the metropolis, NKPD homicide detective Henrietta Hofmann begrudgingly partners up with mushroom-headed patrol officer Koji Nameko to investigate the mysterious murders of fungal and half-breed children. Their investigation drags them deep into the seedy underbelly of a war-torn city, one brimming with colonizers, criminal gangs, racial division and moral decay.

In order to solve the case and unravel the truth, Hofmann must challenge her past and embrace fungal ways. What she and Nameko uncover in the midst of this frigid wasteland will chill them to the core, but will they make it through the storm alive?

Arina

Read: 70%

Mushroom Blues is a fungus-infused detective procedural about a woman who must find a killer targeting mushroom-kids. 

As excited as the premise got me, from page one I started out as the worst audience for this story, as I have a deep-seated disinterest in oppressor redemption stories. I just very rarely (if ever) see an author handling the intricacies of such a story well.

Nevertheless, I was determined to be utterly challenged and gave Mushroom Blues the same full-hearted treatment I give every book; perhaps, this time, I would be proved that unlikeable tropes can flourish into a good story. Unfortunately, that never really happened.

Henrietta’s violently (and constant) racist viewpoint quickly detracts from the wonders of this story; a whodunnit in an unknown land, mycelium pervading every corner, a curious human-mushroom species that can communicate via their own underground network. All this I hoped would be fleshed out but the incessant racist narrative (as told from the main character’s POV, not the narrative itself pertaining to it) obscures the barrier between the reader and the lush world Gibson has imagined.

With obvious parallels (if not simple straight lines) to our world, the world of Mushroom Blues reimagines the perplexing capabilities of nature’s most awe-inspiring fungus.

However, getting stuck in Henrietta’s head made it impossible to enjoy the world around her, as her narrative is riddled with racial slurs and disgust. It would have been nice to get a 2nd POV of another character closely related to the fungus world.  

This prominent setup of Henrietta’s racism also made the subsequent unshackling of her most ingrained beliefs a bit abrupt. 

I had to wonder, does this character explore a complex moral ground or is it merely a pawn used to trail an obvious line towards a pinpointed lesson? I couldn’t really answer this question surely, but I do know I enjoy it more when characters in a book have development arcs concordant to their own beliefs (be they what they are). Given the timespan, Henrietta’s arc smelled a tad too fabricated.

Traits meant to humanize the character in the reader’s eyes also didn’t quite work for me. If anything, they served to highlight Henrietta’s inconsistency, à la “I can excuse racism but I draw the line at sexism” (yes, it’s a Community reference), although, I can argue (with myself and with you, dear reader) that like in Community, they might be employed to highlight these very human and very real inconsistencies.

Sadly, I didn’t manage to stick around to find out. I ended up DNFing the book, such was Henrietta’s desensitization. I realized I wasn’t particularly interested in finding out what fate might befall her or what successes she might achieve. I find this is often the pitfall of single-POV books; if your character doesn’t evoke a modicum of a spark in the reader, the entire story will fall apart behind them, no matter how well thought-out the rest is.

Even so, there were very interesting elements here and I hope to chase Gibson’s fascination with mycelium into a new story. I praise the author for taking on such complex themes as good and evil (and if there even is such a thing), oppression, and defying your institutions, both internal and external.

Drew

Read: 100%

I usually love a good mystery and, if there is an element of political intrigue to it as well, then so much the better. So, it could be fair to say I’m the target audience for a story like Mushroom Blues.  Beginning with a standard noir set-up; the 1st person protagonist is an embittered detective, one step away from alcoholism, called out on a cold and miserable morning to investigate a dead body. But the body pulled from Kinoko Bay is Hōpponese, one of the humanoid fungal race that live under the oppression of the occupying Coprinians ever since the Spore War ended and the murder threatens to spark a rebellion.

Henrietta Hofmann; or Hen as her seemingly only friend calls her, is not the easiest character to engage with initially. She is abrasive toward most of her colleagues and downright bigoted towards the Hōpponese, particularly the secondary protagonist of Koji, one of the few Hōpponese to have joined the Neo Kinoko police and who ends up assisting with her investigation. Frequently morose to the point of self-pity, it’s only when she begins to look at the possibility of solving the case as a lifeline back to who she used to be, that some of the walls about her begin to drop a little. 

If the above sounds familiar from any number of murder mysteries or buddy cop movies, then I can’t really dispute that assessment. But I would argue that the tropes used here are less important than how they’re handled and, as far as I was concerned, there was more than enough of a new spin on them to make this a great read. Not that it is entirely without fault; Hofmann’s final transition toward sympathising with the Hōpponese does feel a little bit rushed, particularly given an assault that occurs early on in the story. Still, there were also glimmers of it earlier too, when dealing with children or a potential informant so, my assessment may differ from others. 

While a good part of the novel explores the Hōpponese culture and religion, there isn’t a great deal devoted to the world at large. Despite a few mentions of the Spore War, there isn’t much about its causes or duration, only the outcome, which is fair enough since none of that is really important to the story Mushroom Blues tells. Having said that, it is something I was curious about and would be interested in learning more of in future instalments. 

Overall, I found Mushroom Blues to be a great introduction to this world, with a good balance of the familiar and the fantastic.

Jen

Read: 100%

I’ve been hearing about Mushroom Blues for awhile and had totally the wrong idea of what it was going to be about. I’m not even sure what I thought it was going to be but I know mushroom crime noir was nowhere in the picture I had in my head.

The story itself has a bit of that Japanese crime flair, and is set in a truly inspired fungal world. It’s a fast-paced story and it’s a very visual world. When I saw Blade Runner mentioned in promo, it led me to expect more of a punky, advanced cyber kind of city- this was not that at all and I thought it was very cool change from the norm. I really enjoyed the setting.

Mushroom Blues‘ story unfolds through it’s lead Henrietta Hofmann; a detective doing her stint (exile as she likes to refer to it) in Coprinia, and her partner Koji Nameko; a fungal (the only one of his race currently on the force) who are forced to team-up to investigate a bunch of kids that have gone missing.

There is nothing I love more than a couple of characters having to work together that are total opposites ala Odd Couple (or any kind of character team-ups really) but my fave in any genre is the enemy to friend trope (or enemy to lovers… which this isn’t) and so I was seated.

I enjoyed the characters for the most part, but it did take a while for me to come around to Detective Henrietta Hofmann. She was such a horrible biased/prejudiced and completely bitchy person in the beginning. I didn’t like her one bit. She’s that character that’s going to divide the readers down the middle.

Once I realized that Henrietta’s attitude wasn’t only tied to her prejudices (though she’s definitely quite hateful) I found it was a lot easier to put up with her grumpiness.
She’s just an irritable, middle-aged, alcoholic cop, who’s done a good job of flushing her own life down the toilet and I don’t know why, but it feels easier to swallow that bitterness when the nastiness is directed at everyone, and not just one race, though she sure doesn’t like Fungals.

Eventually and quite abruptly, she comes around with her prejudices (though the crankiness doesn’t ease). I am honestly not sure if I grew to like her, or if I just got used to her abrasiveness.

I liked Koji the most of the two characters (he’s not nearly as irritable and I tend to lean towards the quieter more mysterious feeling characters in a story). Koji though, felt like more of a background character for a large portion of the story. He was there and quietly active but Henrietta was our window, until all of the sudden, he’s full of life and moved forward in the story.

It was kind of weird but I also can see why he was like that because knowing more about him, allows us to know more about the world he comes from/lives in… which brings me to the final thing that I really liked and that was how the magical parts of the world were everywhere (hope that’s vague enough to not spoil) but we really didn’t find out more about it, or how it works, until towards the end. So, it’s makes for a fine line to walk with his character, to let us know more about him, without spoiling the rest- if that makes sense.

It took some time but I did come to enjoy Mushroom Blues, especially once our leads became a team. Could Henrietta’s change of heart have been smoother? Most definitely! Or the word ‘mycelium’ been used a hundred or so times less? Maybe not… because good luck finding a replacement – even knowing that it still drove me crazy after a few chapters.

For a debut story, Mushroom Blues, showed huge potential. I really liked the ideas and I can see how this could shape-up to a really great series – it would be very cool on screen too, and probably would do well, because networks love to take anything cool and different and turn them into crime procedurals.

Liis

Read: 100%

Mushroom Blues has had a decent amount of hype, so frankly, everyone in the SFF circles has at the very least heard about this book by now. The audience seems to fall firmly into two, from what I have seen and felt myself with this book. One side, where they love it, truly love it. The other half just can’t get past the certain details which in one way or another have interfered with their reading enjoyment.

I fall into the latter. The first 20% of the book, I am sorry to say, felt quite superficial as everything felt like it was delivered by skimming the surface only, by delivering a series of hard facts to get the introductions out of the way, and personally, due to missing the depth, I found myself rather disengaged. Maybe it’s also down to the story being plot driven rather than character driven, or the balance being tipped more towards plot than characters anyway. The second half of the book, however, picked up exponentially. I started seeing the characters more, I felt their purposes more. In fact, I can pinpoint the exact moment where I went – Finally! I now feel the emotion that the story wants the reader to feel! – and it was the scene in the police station where a bullying incident happened and the chief let loose. And, it’s worth noting that some would enjoy the slower pace of the first half to the fast/paced second half. 

Then again, where most would point out the very unlikable main character, I didn’t mind her grittiness as much. Clichéd as she was with her alcohol problem and personal drama. Personally, I didn’t think that she overcame her racism too quickly. She overcame her dislike towards the fungals because she was finally pushed into a corner by having a fungal partner and shit hit the fan. So, that change of tune in her made sense to me. 

I understand that a lot of folks enjoy the fungal aspect, the police procedural, the politics and crime aspect. Yes, solidly written, Mushroom Blues follows noir fiction down to a T with the bleak world, corruption and blurred lines in between right and wrong, and yet it somehow didn’t feel noir. I can’t put my finger on it when I try to explain why. The story certainly had these dingy locations and scenes galore, so maybe it is because of the fungal layer? It took most of the focus to this rather unique angle? I don’t know. Anyway, the fungal approach was a clever move to freshen up a story which without the fungal aspect would have simply and comfortably fit alongside others in the genre without rocking the genre boat. Whilst it sadly wasn’t a book that blew me away, it has most certainly blown away many others, and for potential readers that means, you won’t know it until you try it yourself. Mushroom Blues has, with the backing of its fans, managed to sprout the feeling of FOMO in the reader community, so yield to the FOMO and give it a go!

Timy

Read: 100%

I admit I was curious about Mushroom Blues as I kept seeing it all over the place, people praising it left and right. That was partly why I never picked it up for myself, and I don’t think I ever would have, to be honest. I wasn’t so curious as to put it on my priority TBR. Plus I’ve never been a big fan of mushrooms, thank you very much. And now that I read it, I know my instincts were right, it wasn’t quite as much up my alley. Even though I love murder mysteries and police procedural type of thrillers/mysteries. But this one just had way too many tropes crammed into one book.

To keep this review under a reasonable word count, and also because we have overall 6 reviews in this post, I’ll try not to ramble too much about the plot and stuff.

It’s clear right off the bat, that Gibson used Japan and Japanese culture as an inspiration for Neo Kinoko and the Hōpponese people. The Coprinian occupation works as a parallel with how the US treated Japan in the aftermath of WW2. Although there are quite a few other, similar cases throughout history. While I usually don’t mind books reflecting on real-world issues, this was a bit too much on the nose for my liking. Especially as I found it hard to disconnect from the Japanese inspiration and see that more than the fungal culture would have been more interesting.

On the other hand, the best selling point of Mushroom Blues is its unique setting with the mushroom people, and the mycelium being an integral port of this world, but it feels like it’s not explored too deeply in this book (who knows where the series will go?). One of the biggest misses here is not including a fungal POV, say, Koji who works with Hofmann to investigate a case of dead or missing children. A shame, as he is the only remotely likeable/interesting character in the whole book. He would have deserved more spotlight.

And since we are talking about characters, I just couldn’t stand the MC, Henrietta Hofmann. Which was probably the point of her, I don’t think she was meant to be likeable, which would be fine, if there was anything else for me to connect with. She is racist, she berates everything and everyone, she barely has any dialogue where she is not cursing. And don’t get me wrong, I’m a foul mouthed person myself so it’s not the swearing that bothered me, just the general attitude and way she interacted with others. And sure, she does have a background story (sad, but not as well executed to make me feel anything for her, and also super clichéd), and a character arc, but due to the 3-day timeframe, it’s not very convincing. Despite everything she goes through, the changes are way too fast and not very relatable. The problem is not that she is a racist stuck up bitch, it’s just that we don’t get any respite from her POV, or rather, a counter balance as Arina pointed out in her review (actually, I pretty much agree with most of what she says there).

I’ll be honest, I struggled with Mushroom Blues, especially in the first half of the book, but eventually, as the investigation starts moving, and the action picks up, it gets more engaging. Not least thanks to Koji finally getting a voice and getting more involved. 

Overall, I found Mushroom Blues a bit bland, with a unique setting that still has a lot of potential left to explore, once Gibson finds his feet as an author. Despite my criticisms, it’s clear that he put a lot of work and effort into the production of the book which comes with a cool cover and a soundtrack to boot.

Tru

Read: 100%

Mushroom Blues is one of those weird and wonderful genre-bending stories that can be hard to categorise. The story is set within the modern urban sprawl of Neo Kinoko and home to the Hōppense, a humanoid race of mushrooms that act more or less human, but they’re effectively fungal with various sprouting mushroom caps for hair. The entire city of Neo Kinoko is built around spreading mushrooms and other fungi. Due to the decade-long Spore War, the city is occupied by human forces, and the Fungals as they are unfortunately known by, are suffering from food shortage, crime, and other horrible aspects of occupation. Our main character, Detective Hofmann, is a human who works for the human police. Like most humans, she doesn’t care much for the Fungals, but when she’s assigned to the case of a dead Fungal child, she’s forced to team up with a Fungal cop and delve deep into their world to investigate.

So Mushroom Blues is part crime thriller, part noir, and part mystery. Is it sci-fi? I’ve seen the story referred to as fungalpunk, biopunk and cyberpunk, putting it into the sci-fi category. There’s also some body horror thrown in. But to me, it feels more like an urban fantasy—the setting doesn’t give me cyber vibes, but more modern American/Japanese ones. That the author could fit so many elements into this one book is an impressive feat, and I sympathize with him, having written books that I also struggle to categorize. Genre-blending books go by their own rules!

But back to the story. If the author set out to write an unlikable protagonist, he certainly succeeded with Hofmann. She’s racist, quite frankly, and I wouldn’t fault readers for putting the book down within the first few chapters because she’s insufferable. Personally, I’ve always been drawn to unlikable female characters, because unlike their male counterparts, they’re often judged more harshly. I kept thinking there must be a reason in Hofmann’s dark backstory for why she was so racist, but there wasn’t. It’s just how ignorant people are.

During her investigation, she’s partnered with Koji, a fungal cop, and this story belongs to Koji as much as Hofmann due to his own personal struggles between loyalty to his job and his people. I loved him and their banter as they slowly peeled away the world of the Fungals. The world and their growing investigation gave me Max Payne vibes. It’s dark, with dark moments, and it obviously touches on themes such as racism and colonialism. As a white person, I can’t really judge how well these aspects of the story were handled. Hofmann is a controversial character. Over the course of the story, she starts to change. Some may argue her character development was a little fast, but she grew on me by the end.

Apparently, I love detective novels now, because the story kept me rushing through the pages. The author has spawned a unique world with potential for more cases for Hofmann and Koji, and I look forward to seeing them work together again.

Our score for Mushroom Blues by Adrian M. Gibson:

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