Review - The Girl Who Could Move Sh*t with her Mind

Cover by Steve Panton

The Girl Who Could Move Sh*t with her Mind
Jackson Ford
Orbit, 20 June 2019
PB, 444pp

I'm grateful to Nazia at Orbit for a free advance copy of this book.

The Girl Who Could Move Sh*t with her Mind is Jackson Ford's debut novel, it's published today, and you should read it.

Teagan Frost is having a bad day at work. A VERY bad day. It begins when a routine job goes wrong, endangering her and a colleague, gets worse when her boss gives her a carpeting for how she got out of that situation, and positively implodes when she's framed for murder and has to go on the run as the city of Los Angeles burns around her.

Oh, due to being on the run, she has to miss a date with a nice, single man at THE up and coming restaurant in LA.

And she hasn't slept in 48 hours.

Welcome to the world of The Girl Who Could Move Sh*t with her Mind. Teagan is The Girl, and she can, indeed, move - stuff - mentally, a talent referred to as psychokinesis (Boss Paul won't let her call it PK for reasons explained herein). That talent's employed in the service of a secretive branch of Government, Teagan's cooperation the price she pays for not being taken away to a secret lab and vivisected to find out how she works. It doesn't make her very happy, but it's a living, and as long as she's living, she can dream and plan about opening her own restaurant.

I just LOVED this book. It's a non-stop, hectic chase around the seedy side of LA (presented with no glitz and glamour: somewhat reminiscent of Joseph Wambaugh's LA based police procedurals) as Teagan and her colleagues seek to establish her innocence while a mysterious opponent plays them from street to street, mall to mall and scuzzy diner to scuzzy diner. And that fire just keeps getting closer.

Written largely from Teagan's point of view and giving us a lively, if rather pissed-off, protagonist who's perhaps just a little too persuaded that she's right and that everyone around her is stupid, the book is nothing if not engaging. For a story with such a gaping, fanatical premise - PK is real, people, and can be genetically engineered - the writing makes it very believable. Getting the register and attitude of a bored, annoyed and overtired employee in a dead end job just right, Ford evokes roughly the same psychological/ bureaucratic space as Charles Stross's Laundry books, except that Teagan's not a diffident English male geek but a forthright LA woman with views on everything, especially food. And rap music. And her colleagues. And did I mention food?

It is, really, simply fun and a joy to read - though it does go to some very dark places. Teagan's Nemesis, whose point of view also features, is a truly grim and mixed-up person, especially dangerous for being convinced of being right (and, indeed, having some degree of justice to back that up) and does some truly grim and mixed-up things. And, as I've said, the book doesn't spare us the seamier side of the city, presenting the paradox of a vast area where the homeless live in tents amidst the wealth of one of the world's richest cities. There are also gangs, corruption and a particularly nasty black-ops soldier who really has it in for Teagan.

When you see what Teagan has to go before she can have a meal, a sleep and a beer, you won't be surprised how cross she gets - but you might be surprised by the results...

In all, a great read and, yes, I can see this becoming a popular and I hope long-running series. I wouldn't want to work with Teagan Frost but I do want to read more about her, please Mr Ford and please, O Orbit.

For more about the book, see the Orbit website here.