The Changeover
So back in Feb, my friend Kate challenged dared suggested that we re-read The Changeover, by Margaret Mahy. I agreed readily enough, not having read it for a number of years – and then discovered that I didn’t actually own a copy any more, how is that even possible?? Kate went all silent-running on me for a while, but she has now posted some of her own thoughts, so I will finally do the same… spoiler: the Suck Fairy did not visit!
Chase the Morning
I have loved this book for a fairly long time now, but have not re-read it in a rather long time, leading to some sweating over the possibility of the Suck Fairy waving her wand. Fortunately, overall that was an unnecessary concern…
The Good
This is still a rollicking fun adventure story. Pirates! Evil! Rescues! Fights! Sailing ships!!
I still adore the concept of ships that can set off at dawn or dusk into the cloud archipelago, and that places exist in both the Core and the Rim. That is, places exist in what we understand as the ‘real’ world, but those places with long histories especially of trade and contact with the exotic, and thus I guess have a firm grip on the imagination, can exist… outside of the mundane. And this applies to imaginary places as well as real – so Prester John gets a mention, and there’s one rather awesome place I remember from one of the later books too. Rohan goes so far as to discuss and explain why this Rim world uses old-fashioned weapons, too, which shows that he’s put a deal of thought into it.
I like the characters, mostly. I still love Mall – apparently based somewhat on a real woman attested by occasional mentions in historical records – I love that she is fierce and independent and a superb fighter and a passionate friend. Jyp is still amusing, although seemed a bit… shallower this time around? That is, not as well-rounded as I seem to recall. Maybe he gets more interesting in the later books. And Le Stryge, a rather unpleasant magicky type, is magnificent. If chaotic neutral is allowed to swing towards evil and then towards good, that’s him.
And then there’s Stephen, our Point of View. I was intrigued to discover that I found him more interesting this time around, and not because I found him any deeper – exactly the opposite. There is less to him, especially initially, and that is indeed the point of the entire book. He’s hollow. He’s forced other people out of his life, he’s marginalised meaningful human contact, to progress his career – and he’s made to confront that as the story progresses. And while Stephen is an extreme example, I think it’s fair to say that Scott is taking a shot at a whole section of society who have sacrificed love, family, imagination and dreams on the altar of Getting Ahead.
The Bad, or at least The Less Good
There are two aspects that left me somewhat uncomfortable. One to do with gender/sexuality, the other to do with race.
In the first few chapters, Stephen is presented as almost Mad Men-esque in his approach to women. His descriptions of them are physical, and while not entirely callous he does call his secretary ‘girl’ and his gaze lingers long on boobs. However, this is not entirely approved by the narrative. In fact, his approach to sex and love is very definitely seen as part of his nature as nearing hollow-man status, and this disappoints a number of characters whom the story sets up as moral compasses. So that’s an interesting take. Additionally, there is a moment where a female character has a lesbian smooch and Stephen is aghast, and clearly suggests this is not a normal thing to do. Now, it does get written off as shock, this-isn’t-really-real, but one of the other characters has no adverse reaction to the kiss, and in fact makes Stephen feel pretty small and pathetic for the way he reacted. So, not entirely positive, but also not entirely negative. Which is better than entirely negative, I suppose?
Also, one of the women is damsel’d pretty early on. On the other hand, there’s Mall.
The racial aspect comes in with the voodoo aspect. There’s always an issue when a white writer uses a non-white religious/magical/ etc system to their own ends, especially when those ends are not entirely good. Now, Rohan does suggest through the story that the original positive aspects of the African/Carib beliefs have been twisted beyond recognition, and by a colonial desiring power at that, but there is no denying that this book essentially sets up Haitian voodoo as the Big Evil to be combatted. I’m not sure how to grapple with that, except that it made me somewhat uncomfortable to read such appropriation – even when Rohan shows every sign, here and elsewhere, of appropriating other religious systems just as wholesale, to his own ends. So at least he’s not limiting himself to non-whites? Also, voodoo is shown not to be entirely evil, which I guess is also something of a redeeming feature. Not entirely, but a little bit.
I still like it. I will read the sequels at some point in the near future. Hooray.
Verdigris Deep
I have had this sitting on my TBR pile for ages, and given how much I adore Hardinge it doesn’t make sense it took me so long to pick it up. Oh well, water under the bridge… heh… Anyway, I went in expecting a rollicking adventure like Fly by Night. After all, how bad could it be to take coins from a wishing well, right? And even if there is a spirit in there who doesn’t like being stolen from, how bad can it be? And if she decides that you need to help her in fulfilling some of the wishes, that can’t go badly, can it? Especially if she gives you some shiny powers to aid you in that effort?
Yeah. This book was way darker than I had expected. On reflection Mosca Mye’s adventures weren’t all sunshine and skittles either, but I don’t think I ever actually feared for her life, or that Saracen the goose would end up in a pie (much as he might have deserved it). Nor did Mosca ever end up with eyes growing on her knuckles.
Josh, Ryan and Chelle sneak off to a village they’re not meant to visit, and they miss the last bus their tickets will get them home on. To get more money for tickets, Josh goes down a wishing well. Over the next couple of days, all three children discover that weird things are happening: Ryan is growing weird itchy wart-things on his knuckles, Chelle can’t stop herself from randomly spouting what seems like nonsense, and Josh is making light bulbs blow and phones go staticky. Naturally, with some experimentation and a weird dream experience for Ryan, they discover this is connected to their theft from the well and they have now been press-ganged into granting wishes, with powers to help. Fun, eh?
Of course, we all know that wishes are – as Ryan describes it – a bit like conkers. There’s the outside bit that you can see, but then there’s the inside bit – the meaty bit – that’s often darker, and spikier, and not so speak-out-loud. But the spirit in the well knows that bit, too.
Things get out of control. Of course. There’s adventure – some exhilarating and some terrifying – and some occasions of just sheer terror for Ryan, our point of view character, in particular. As with the best stories there’s more than one level of problems to be dealt with, and I’ve rarely read a YA/kids’ book where parental arguments are shown quite so realistically, along with the child’s reaction. Also the fact that your parents aren’t necessarily going to get along with your friends’ parents, although that was mostly just funny. Adolescent friendship and its highs, lows, difficulties, competition, and hierarchy is treated very tenderly: Hardinge pulls no punches but does allow her characters to develop over just a few days in reaction to their circumstances. I’m quite sure most people will recognise aspects of Ryan, Chelle and Josh’s little clique, and not necessarily with rosy memories either.
As for other characters… there’s also a mean old lady who was, on reflection, actually treated rather poorly – she was certainly nasty but probably didn’t deserve quite the ending she got – and a nice young lady whose agoraphobia wasn’t explored in great detail but was treated with sympathy. There are five parents between the three children, which is rather a change from your classic YA where the parents are got rid of or otherwise not involved in the story; Ryan’s parents are very present in much of the story, and they get to be appropriately complex. And the spirit in the well – I won’t say much because I don’t want to spoil it, but I was really impressed with the context Hardinge develops, and especially with the ultimate resolution.
Look, I read this in an afternoon. It’s utterly absorbing and gloriously written. Just read it already. You can buy it from Fishpond.
(Apparently it was released as Well Witched in America. I do not know why.)
Cloud Atlas
I went to see it, and you know what? I really, really enjoyed it.
Firstly: I know people have said they found the narrative structure difficult to follow. Perhaps if you’re only used to a completely linear narrative, with no interweaving, then this would indeed be somewhat difficult to follow, because there are lots of cuts back and forth. But each timeline is designed very differently – you can tell just from looking at the scenery what time you are in – so I didn’t find that aspect disturbing or confusing in the slightest.
Something that was a little disturbing, and intriguing, and uncomfortable-making, was the cross-race acting. Now, I am as anglo as it gets, so my take on this is to be read from that perspective. But anyway: I found most of the Anglos-as-Koreans to be cringeworthy; James D’Arcy was the only one that seemed passable, ish, while Hugo Weaving was verging on grotesque. But what I really liked was the fact that some of the non-white also crossed race. Halle Berry as Jocasta really worked, for me, although Doona Bae as Tilda was somewhat less convincing. I think the fact that the actors all played multiple parts made this race-crossing more acceptable – it made sense, in this weird cinematic world, that a version of Berry would exist in the rarified whites-only world of 1930s English snobbery. If it had just been ‘let’s put Weaving into Neo Seoul!’ there would have been a serious problem. I haven’t read any reviews of the film yet, because I wanted to go in totally unspoiled, but I’d like to read reviews by people of colour to gain an understanding of how it looks from a non-privileged perspective.
The multiple-character thing was immensely amusing, as I eagerly tried to figure out who each actor was in each time – and nothing will ever compare with Hugo Weaving as Nurse Noakes. Some of the cosmetics and prosthetics were genuinely very clever; there was some excellent use of fake teeth, especially for Tom Hanks, and some very good use of hair, too. Hugh Grant as an incredibly painted and very nasty warrior-savage-type was a magnificent casting-against-type instance, Hanks did well in all of his varying roles, and I really, really liked Berry, too.
This film was not, in the end, actually what I thought it would be. I expected that, because of the multi-time and multi-character acting, I was going to get something a little like Kim Stanley Robinson’s Years of Rice and Salt, where people keep getting reincarnated and being with the same souls generation after generation. And while some of the same actors found themselves together in some form or another in multiple settings, it’s not like Berry and Hanks were always lovers or whatever. In fact, there is little similarity between any of the epochs, with the exception of what I see as the main theme playing out: fate vs freedom. And, yes, there’s love as a real and binding force, but I don’t really see that as a theme, more as a Human Condition kinda thing.
So, fate vs freedom is really what it comes down to. How do you act within your fate, how can you fight against your fate, what are the limits of freedom… and tied up in this is the notion of an ‘established order’ within society, the existence of which a number of characters insist on – and when that’s contrasted between the ‘order’ of whites over blacks, and the ‘order’ of pureblood over fabricant – it could have got preachy, but actually I think it skated the line well enough.
There are big moments, of trying to change the world, and small moments, of trying to change one single person. There are intensely sad moments, and some brutal ones (I see why it’s MA, but it wasn’t nearly so bad as I had expected); some poignant, and occasionally funny ones as well.
I saw this with my friend Mel. Last movie we saw together at the cinema was Inception. We’ll have to be very careful in picking the next film we see together… it will either have to be the filmic equivalent of War and Peace, or maybe Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.
Rapture: the last Nyxnissa novel
When I finished reading the second of the Bel Dame Apocrypha novels, Infidel, I was unable to write a review as such, so I wrote an open letter to the main character, Nynissa so Dasheem, instead. And now the series has finished, and… well. It wasn’t an easy ride, but it was a worthwhile one.
There are spoilers below. You know, things like Nyx is alive for this novel. Which shouldn’t be a surprise, but kinda is.
So, who would have thought that things could get more brutal than God’s War and Infidel? Well done to Hurley by surprising me with that one. I’m thinking particularly of the fact that while previously there have been references to what might happen if you bury a body with its head attached, I don’t believe the consequences have been described in quite such visceral detail. Er… squick. Also, the fight scenes. Brutal indeed.
As with the previous two novels, this one involves Our Nyx taking a a mark that she doesn’t particularly want to, but that she doesn’t feel she can refuse. It’s seven years since the last book, and this is perhaps one of the most remarkable things about Nyx: she got old. And slow. And maybe a bit on the pudgy side, like an ex-boxer or rugby player gets when they stop working out. You see this all the time in movies like Die Hard or Lethal Weapon, where the old heroes get to complain about being old before busting someone’s butt; it’s rare for it to be allowed to happen to a woman. Heck, even Ripley gets to come back as a fully modded clone rather than being old. But there are a number of references to Nyx being old, and a bit a slow, and by no means as stealthy as she would like to think she is. So that’s very cool, because of course she still gets the job done. Kinda. Mostly. Well, she gets something done, anyway.
Back to the plot: it sees Nyx move into quite unfamiliar territory, both literally – we go places we’ve barely even heard of previously – and metaphorically, because she’s actually not sent to kill someone, but rather to bring them back. And it’s a rather surprising someone for that particular mission for this particular ex-bel dame (no, it’s not Rhys). There’s a new set of crew that have to be broken in (er, perhaps a bit too literally), and seriously excruciating things like crossing deserts to contend with. There’s fights and unpleasantess and weird people and death to confront. Some of those things not even of Nyx’s doing. Also, a great big wall that could be a joke at GRR Martin’s expense, since this one is in a desert and has even weirder things on the other side than exist in Nyx’s ordinary world, and since that includes bugs that will turn a dead body into a zombie – well.
One of the really tantalising things that Hurley offers in this section of Nyx’s saga is a glimpse of the backstory of this crazy planet. Little hints about why and when it was colonised, and what happened in the early part of its human history, and how the human population manages to survive. It’s still not enough to make everything make sense, though, and OH MY do I wish Hurley would write a prequel (I know she’s written at least one short set in this universe, maybe that covers it?), because I really, really want to know about the moons and initial colonists and what the heck is going down with the surviving deadtech.
Anyway. The plot is a little bit convoluted but simple enough to follow. It’s not trying to be tricksy because dealing with the bugs is hard enough without having to unravel all sorts of narrative tricks. Once again, though, the characters are a highlight. Nyx doesn’t so much shine as reluctantly, grudgingly, and with a mean scowl shed as little light as she can get away with, but boy if she isn’t still mesmerising. Even when she’s spitting venom and being as cranky as she possibly can. As mentioned, most of her crew is new, with the exception of the shapeshifter Eshe, who is struggling to figure out how to be himself and not be like her, while still worshipping the ground she walks on. The rest of the crew are interesting enough in their own right, although I couldn’t help but see them as so much cannon fodder – much like Nyx sometimes sees them I think, for all she has a surprisingly well-developed sense of duty to those who sign on with her. Because, as well – and here’s a slight spoiler, sorry, but if you’ve read the other two this is important – they’re also outshone by Rhys. Yes, Rhys is here again, in a very surprising – for both himself and Nyx – twist. And that relationship is so fraught, so difficult, so sad and so bitter and so frustrating, that anything else rather pales.
Finally, it would be remiss of me not to mention the political side, which is important but somewhat overshadowed by the action. There’s the possibility of a treaty with Chenja (I know, right? The war’s only been going for like three centuries)… which means something rather unexpected: the boys are coming home. And they appear to be expecting that they’ll have, like, some sort of rights when they get there. And jobs maybe? Certainly some place in society. Outrageous, I say! I think this is one aspect that could have done with a little bit more development, if I’m being critical at all – but only because I’m intrigued by how the arguments could play out and would have liked to see more of the philosophical and political discussion that Hurley could bring to bear.
Nyx, you are heartless and cold, a drunk and a killer, mean and brutal. You have changed my perception of how female warriors can be portrayed, and your world has made me see bugs in a new, occasionally more revolted, light. Cheers.
You can buy Rapture from Fishpond.
The Thrawn trilogy
I reviewed the first in the Thrawn trilogy, Heir to the Empire, here, and it’s taken me a while to get around to the rest of the series. But I have finally read Dark Force Rising and The Last Command and you know what? I continued to enjoy them. Such that I do plan on reading more in the expanded universe. Especially since I discovered there’s a Han Solo trilogy set just before the events of episode IV. (!!) What follows is in no way a comprehensive review of the last two books… more just some rambling thoughts. These thoughts do contain spoilers, both for the first book and the later ones.
Look, the first thing I have to say is WILL MARA AND LUKE JUST HURRY UP and get together already?? If they don’t end up having a beautiful Leia/Han relationship, or at least a tempestuous love affair, I will be righteously peeved. Because they are so clearly right for each other.
Oh my, this may be the first really serious case of ‘shipping I’ve ever experienced. It might mean I can never read any of the later books IN CASE I AM WRONG.
Ahem.
It’s really the characters that kept me reading here. I did enjoy the plot – and an enormous amount of kudos goes to Zahn, and I guess Lucas as the owner of the franchise for allowing him to do it: the idea that actually, it might take more than one battle to change the fate of an entire galaxy is brilliant and I am so glad it actually gets explored. Bizarre as it might seem, there wasn’t enough politicking in these books for me. I understand that the focus is on the threat posed by Grand Admiral Thrawn, especially as he keeps showing up, attacking important planets, and then running away again – and that Luke and Han and Leia get to go off and have exciting adventures. And there’s a bit of politicking as Admiral Ackbar is confronted by the weaselly Fey’lya with fraudulent bank accounts, and the occasional discussion about which planets are dispensable. But seriously, people! Where is the tit-for-tat bargaining to get planets on your side? Where is the committee taxed with the task of writing a new constitution? Are we having elections any time soon? These are the questions I want resolved!
Possibly I have been thinking about real-world revolutions too much.
So, characters. While the Mara/Luke thing frustrated me, my greatest surprise on finishing the trilogy was the revelation of who Delta Source – the source of all that oh-so-useful intel Thrawn keeps getting from inside the very bowels of the New Republic – actually was. And this was clever, and nicely played, etc. But I had been reading for 2.5 books absolutely convinced that the source was Winter, Leia’s aide. I do not remember why I thought this – I vaguely recall some scene in the first book that seemed to suggest she was secretly communicating with someone, but maybe my brain invented this as a reason for thinking she was eeevil. Perhaps she’s just too perfect and I am too accustomed to betrayal in my science fiction. Or maybe, maybe, the revelation in this book was a trick and she will still turn out to be a traitor! ha ha!
Or not.
Luke is slightly less wet than in the films, which is nice. There’s still a lot of ‘oh my goodness what if I’m not good enough?’ which I always imagine in the voice of Annie from the eponymous movie. Still, he’s making advances in understanding and using the Force, so that’s a positive.
Han continues to be awesome, and still struggles somewhat with actually being respectable. I really like that he is cranky about not having time with his wife, and only going off on missions when they are of Direst Importance To Save the Galaxy. And even then he’s not happy about it. Also, he loves his kids. That’s nice. And there’s some good banter with Lando.
Leia is the great revelation for me, in these books. Yes she had some great parts to play in the films, but I was quite concerned – especially as the trilogy opens with her pregnant, with twins – that she would rapidly be sidelined. But oh no. She is on missions, and getting into trouble, and negotiating deals, pretty much until she gives birth. (She would probably get on well with Alexia Tarabotti… although she may not care quite so much about dresses.) Not in a run-around-oops-my-belly-got-in-the-way way, though; she is consciously aware of the twins, and of ensuring their safety – but she faces the difficult question of keeping them physically safe while also safeguarding the new republic she has also helped to birth. (Those metaphors could get a leedle clunky, not to mention questionable.) Anyway, she’s great. And shoots things. And uses the Force. And overrides the men for their own, and her own, good.
Of the lesser characters… Threepio is more annoying than ever. Lando gets a nice amount of page-space, and continues to be banterific. Mara is probably the most intriguing of the new characters, with the gradual revelations about her background – Emperor’s Hand, maybe some sort of access to the Force, an overwhelming desire to kill Luke but actually wanting to shag him needing him to get things completed. I can see that she will be a big character in later books – or ought to be anyway.
There are of course lots of other new characters introduced in this trilogy… possibly too many, actually. Thrawn and his XO Pellaeon are interesting opponents, and I said in my first review that it’s an intriguing narrative device to give the reader such a clear insight into the ‘enemy’. While it makes Thrawn come across as a definite enemy – cos he’s a bit nuts; no one should be able to gain that sort of insight just from looking at a society’s art – that’s just creepy – Pellaeon is a good follower, a genuine believer in the empire but not a fanatic, delightfully concerned for the welfare of his crew, and basically sympathetic. It’s very sad that he’s on the wrong side, and I wonder if this is an intentional move: make the reader see that people on both sides are (for want of a better word) human? Because the same sort of thing happens, of course, with the alien Noghri – whose entrance into the story is as assassins, and who progress to being allies of the New Republic because of their allegiance to the children of Vader and because the Empire is shown as having screwed them over (…which actually makes their devotion to the children of Vader problematic, unless they’ve transferred their allegiance because of the revealing of the truth…).
And then there’s Talon Karrde, who if I’m not much mistaken will also feature in later books, because he is basically the replacement for Han in the bad-ass but basically good (chaotic good maybe?) stakes. Smuggler, racketeer, but still good to his people and basically honest… yeh. Han replacement. And he’d totally shoot first, too.
There will be more Star Wars in my future. Not sure when, but it will happen.
You can get these books from Fishpond: Heir to Empire, Dark Force Rising, and The Last Command
What Night Hides: review
I first read this book in manuscript form, because Kate is a long-time (I could hear the objections over the water and out of the future when I considered writing “old”) friend of mine. When it got published – last year! – Kate sent me a copy with the inscription “at last” – and at last I have got around to reading it. Of course, I remembered the awesome denouement, which meant I didn’t get the same thrill as I did the first time through; nonetheless it was still a wild ride.
One of Kate’s great talents is an ear for odd, rhythmical, and charming description. She links together sometimes outrageous words to compose a scene, drawing in visuals and sounds and even scents to bring together a very real, if whimsical scene: “colder rays and tentacles of witch light fountained, splashing in an ever-widening search pattern over spines and shelves, turning the cobwebs infra-blue…” (34). She also has a habit of incorporating music and lyrics into her stories, sometimes making connections that seem quite peculiar unless you’re able to follow the devious turnings of her brain and keep up with the pop culture references.
As to plot – it’s urban fantasy, I guess? The chief characters are Josh, who appears to have no memories older than a few months; his new employer, Scarlet, a Nichtthane – someone responsible for keeping the bogeymen away from humanity; and Kelly, Scarlet’s seneschal, largely responsible for keeping Scarlet herself away from humanity, at least until she’s appropriately caffeinated. There’s a lot of banter and discussion of shoes in between dealing with vampires, were-creatures, and other, less immediately recognisable, supernatural critters. The common thread through it all, at least in theory, is Josh and his past; actually though I think Scarlet and Kelly’s relationship is the more interesting, as Scarlet continues to deal with being nearly immortal and Kelly shows that although intensely loyal, he doesn’t belong to Scarlet – there’s a wider world requiring attention. These stories were initially written as short stories, and sometimes it feels like it. Overall, though, they do hang together nicely.
I was also amused, of course, to recognise two of my very own connections to Kate within these pages: a vampire with a tshirt reading “it’s all liminal to me” – liminal being my very favourite word and one I’ve made Kate roll her eyes over too many times to count; and another character wearing a tshirt reading “Dear Pluto, no matter what they say you’ll always be a planet to me” – a tshirt that I own, courtesy of the author. Does this mean that I have been Tuckerised??
This is my first review for the Australian Women Writers Challenge for 2013!
You can buy What Night Hides at Fishpond.
At the Mouth of the River of Bees
Turns out I have loved Kij Johnson longer than I thought I had. I first remember reading something of hers and being blown away with “Spar,” in 2009. Except, though, it turns out she wrote “26 Monkeys, Also the Abyss,” which I read and adored (possibly unreasonably) in 2008. And
now I own these two and a whole bunch of other glorious work in this fabulous collection. Also, “Ponies.”
“26 Monkeys, Also the Abyss” is told in 24 parts of varying length and purpose. It revolves around Aimee, who one day became the owner/manager/carer of a troupe of 26 monkeys (well, 25 monkeys and a primate), who travel the fairs and carnivals of America (127 in a year, with time off for Christmas) performing their routine… which ends with them disappearing from a bathtub. It’s a story of the unexpected things in life and how they are the things which can matter most; that the things we love don’t have to make sense, and it’s ok when they don’t. Life has loss and love and discovery. And, sometimes, monkeys. (And a primate.) I love, LOVE, this story.
“Fox Magic” is one example of Johnson’s penchant for Japan and Japanese culture and myth. Here, a fox falls in love with a man, and the magic is to make it reciprocal. This, of course, has Repercussions. One thing I admired about this story in particular is that the fox maiden is mostly very aware of the doubled world created by the magic. There is little pretence that the magic has made everything (some things, yes, but not everything) different. Also, it confronts some of the detrimental repercussions, beyond the fox and her beloved. This sort of honesty and, well, bluntness is a bit of a hallmark of Johnson’s.
“Names for Water” is utterly unlike the previous two stories – which, let’s face it, is also a hallmark of Johnson’s stories. You never quite know what you’re going to get. This one… well, it could be read as a reason for keeping up your studies; it could be read as a meditation on the long-term and unexpected consequences of small things, and on the inter-connectedness of the universe. Johnson takes the idea of static on a phone call and… goes places. It’s also lovely how many names for water she includes.
“The Bitey Cat” is a fairly unpleasant little story – that is, well written, but the narrative itself is not nice. A little girl and her bitey cat and the trouble they get into. It’s dark with the sort of darkness that you can only talk about with childhood.
“The Horse Raiders” is also dark, this time the sort of dark you get when a story’s about, well, horse raiders; a planet where things are not going that well, where communication between different groups has broken down, and different groups have very different sets of values. Katia’s family are nomads, travelling with their horse herd; she is the vet. Tragedy strikes and she must adapt, through pain and difficulty and anger, to a new life. One of the most intriguing parts of the whole story is the concept of n’dau. The world here turns so slowly that it is possible, being a nomad, to always be where a person and her shadow are matched in height; a right place. I love this idea of the psychic matching the landscape.
This is not a generally happy collection, is it? Brilliant, but by no means happy. “Dia Chjerman’s Tale” is in some ways the impersonal story of an entire planet – one that is theoretically part of an empire, and has contact with an alien race, and the repercussions of that. But it is also a heartbreaking personal story, as the opening indicates; Dia Chjerman is the 27-times grandmother of the woman relating the tale, who is now living those repercussions. Yeh. Personal and political, hello.
On a completely different note is “My Wife Reincarnated as a Solitaire – Exposition on the Flaws in my Wife’s Character – The Nature of the Bird – The Possible Causes – Her Final Disposition.” For a start, oh that title. This is Johnson playing with what I think of as 19th-century prose that’s quite different from her normal style. And it is clever. Oh, so clever. Nice layers, nice inversions.
It took me a little while to fully understand the joke that Johnson was making with “Schrodinger’s Cathouse,” but I got there. It’s a one-shot trick, but she does play it out nicely.
After those slightly more lighthearted tales, it is back to the bleaker side with “Chenting, in the Land of the Dead.” Choices that we make, and how perception is everything, how even when the outcome appears exactly the same for two people it’s not – it’s really not. She’s good at gently and softly and smilingly breaking your heart, Johnson.
I seem to be coming across tales of prophecy a lot recently. “The Empress Jingu Fishes” deals with that ever-vexed question of if you know the future, can and should you change it? Does trying to change it lead to exactly the foreseen outcome? Ah predestination; it will never cease to be a human challenge.
“At the Mouth of the River of Bees” is, I think, my really Great Big Discovery of this collection. It’s glorious and bewildering and comforting and inexplicable. It’s another story of a woman who makes a choice even though she doesn’t understand what motivates it, or where it will lead – in fact even though she knows that it might be a bit crazy. Like following a river of bees. I did not want this story to end, although when it did it was absolutely perfect.
“Story Kit” is one of those stories with multiple strands that don’t immediately seem to connect with one another at all until… and then… oh yes. The story of Dido and Aeneas; lists of reactions, of words, books; an author’s notes on her attempts to compose a story, the decisions she makes, the consequences around her. I suspect this is very much a writer’s story. I love this sort of playing with structure, through short stories.
“Wolf Trapping” is a story of obsession and the desire to belong, and ways in which that can go wrong. I don’t know where Lake Juhl is, or even if it’s real, but Johnson made me feel cold just reading about it – and glad to live in a country with no wolves. And also glad not to experience the sort of obsession that might drive someone to want to be a wolf. Interestingly, she doesn’t actually make that much attempt to explain that; it just demands to be accepted at face value, and if you can’t – well. Too bad.
“Ponies.” How I dislike “Ponies.” I appreciate that it is well written, but I just cannot like it. It’s just too, too unpleasant. Not least because on a symbolic level, it’s just too too real.
The last 130-some pages is made up of four stories; one quite short, the others novellas (I think). This is an interesting choice of structure; I would have thought you would want to spread the long ones out a bit more. Anyway, not my decision! I am conflicted by “The Cat Who walked a Thousand Miles.” It’s a rambly sort of story, and isn’t fantasy or sf – unless one counts the idea of self-aware cats as fantasy. Maybe that does fit. Anyway, it’s Japan, and has to leave its home. It has adventures… cat adventures, anyway, involving mice and lakes. It is captivating prose – it’s lovely – but… it’s kinda boring. The plot’s not that interesting, but neither are there particularly absorbing character developments or discoveries. Maybe this just isn’t the story for me.
… and then there’s “Spar.” Oh, “Spar.” A story that might have been written in order to answer the question, “can a story that revolves entirely around sex actually explore interesting issues?” with an “absolutely.” Because the story does just that – revolve around sex between a human and an alien – and explores questions of identity, and belonging, and communication, and ohmyhowcouldwehopetotalktoaliens? It’s squicky, that’s for sure, but it’s masterful too.
Penultimately comes “The Man Who Bridged the Mist,” and here I gave to admit that the first time I read this I skimmed it and did not appreciate it. It was while reading for the Hugos, and it seemed so long and a bit dull and… yeh. I skimmed. And, it turns out, I missed a lot. It is long; it’s a novella, it’s allowed to be. But things do happen; a bridge, for one, plus lots of complex and interesting and beautiful and difficult human interactions. To what extent are we what we do? Do we get to make our own decisions about things like that? While I appreciated the story of Kit and his bridge-building this time, I also really savoured Kit’s back-story, which I completely missed last time; it has some wonderfully poignant moments. I loved the affirmation of life and love and choice. I now fully endorse, long after it matters, its inclusion on the Hugo ballot. And I kinda wish it had concluded the collection, because
“The Evolution of Trickster Stories Among the Dogs of North Park After the Change” does not really compare. It too is poignant, and clever, and the rumination on what might happen if our pets suddenly developed the ability to speak is chilling and pointed and discomfiting. But it’s just not on the same level as “The Man Who Bridged the Mist,” for me. Maybe I’m just not enough of a pet person.
Overall, this collection cements for me that Kij Johnson is one of the most talented and varied writers of speculative fiction going at the moment. She changes style and genre effortlessly, she pokes fun and makes serious comments on the human condition, and she writes glorious prose. MORE.
The Rise of Endymion
After reading Endymion I wavered as to whether to back it up with the concluding the series. On the one hand, so many other books to read! On the other hand, getting a conclusion (again)! On the gripping hand, I knew I had Issues with this book when I first read it, and I was worried…
Anyway, I did it. In fact, I stayed up rather late last night to finish it, because I really, really wanted to get to the end again.
Spoilers ahead for the first three books. Actually, spoilers for this book, too. What the hell.
Endymion concludes with Aenea, Raul and A. Bettik on Earth – somewhat miraculously – with Aenea giving mysterious hints about her and Raul’s futures, and Raul being all confused (again). This final volume of the Cantos finally clears up most of the mysteries that have plagued it, especially about who Aenea is and what she’s meant to be and do. Raul does some travelling alone, which is mostly filled with terror; he reunites with Aenea and has some non-terror time; then they travel together again, with bonus terror. Also, you know, the finally being adults together in the same place and time *waggles eyebrows*.
I do love this book. I do. But I have more problems with this volume than with any of the others.
1. It’s bloated. There are some sections with extensive lists that really could, and should have been cut down. Also, gratuitous descriptions that could have been pared.
2. Sex scenes that are… well. They’re not quite Bad Sex Awards prize-worthy, but they’re not great.
3. The whole idea of using Aenea’s blood as some sort of communion thing… made me very uncomfortable. Perhaps it’s that I’m Christian and I’m offended/annoyed by the appropriation. Perhaps it’s that the suggestion of her being a virus had been an aspect of the Pax/TechnoCore’s propaganda that seemed just that, so to have it accepted and perpetuated by Aenea herself was jarring. Also, surely there are other ways of sharing nano machines? And if it has to be via blood, does it have to be in this parody of an important and immensely symbolic ritual, when Aenea herself keeps on insisting that she is no messiah, let alone a god?
I do not have a problem with the multiple conclusions. It makes sense, actually, since Raul has been writing a memoir and then we, the reader, finally catch up with his life and get to experience what comes next alongside him. That feels ok.
I have no problem with Aenea dying. It was sad, for sure, and I don’t doubt others have had legitimate problems with it and its outcomes: perhaps that it seems a way of redeeming the men via a woman’s sacrifice, or that it was pointless – and they wouldn’t be wrong, I just don’t have the same reaction. I guess I can accept the idea of a willing sacrifice, especially when it has the (admittedly perhaps overblown) consequences that it does here.
I think my big annoyance last time I read this was the time-travel aspect right at the end. This time, partly because I knew it was coming, it didn’t trouble me. It does seem like a little bit of a cop-out, but it’s neat and it works ok. And it’s not like it completely changes things – Aenea is still dead, they all still have to carry on.
So. Overall, I do think this is one of my best-beloved SF series. Simmons creates great and believable characters, he does masterful world-building, he does clever things interrogating how humanity might interact with AI (which here really stands for Autonomous Intelligence, which I like) and how they might use androids and story-telling. He melds the evil of humanity (have I mentioned this is not an Alisa book? THIS IS NOT AN ALISA BOOK) with the glory and wonderful potential of humanity. It was worth re-reading.
Endymion
I have a ludicrous number of books that I physically own but have not read.* Yet I have indeed indulged in some re-reading recently; specifically, the last two of Dan Simmons’ Hyperion Cantos.
This post includes some spoilers for the first two books in the series.
Endymion begins nearly 300 years after the end of Fall of Hyperion, when the farcasters were destroyed, along with a number of planets, and various nefarious things had been revealed about the TechnoCore. Brawne Lamia was pregnant to the cybrid John Keats, all sorts of weird things seemed to be promised by the AIs, and the Shrike – the 3m-tall, made-of-metal, makes-the-Terminator-look-pathetic Shrike – was Up To No Good. And it opens with the accusation “You are reading this for the wrong reason.”
Who me?
Choosing to reveal the end-point of your story at the start can be a risky business. Sure, pointing out that they’re “star-cross’d lovers” can make for that spine-tingly dread and anticipation that can sometimes be very enjoyable. But it can backfire, too, if you don’t care enough about the characters to want to know how they got there (cough, Romeo and Juliet). Here, we know that the narrator is under a death sentence, and that he has been the lover of someone thought of as a messiah. That’s… bold. He does also seem to verge on being a bit of a whinger.
Fortunately, things get better. The story itself is somewhat like Hyperion, in that it’s a journey story. Raul Endymion is tasked with finding and protecting a child, Aenea, which he does through fire and sand and the Shrike. He and she (and another friend) then proceed to travel to various worlds, learning about each other and their galaxy and getting a bit of a sense of what’s ahead of them. Simmons is good at describing new planets, and at making them varied; he has imagined enormous challenges for humanity in colonising different worlds, and knows that yes humanity probably would make a go of living on a planet much like the Arctic tundra, or a jungle, or a desert. Why not? We do here on this planet.
I’d read the book if that was all there was to it, as long as the characters and dialogue were intriguing enough. Raul is an entertaining enough narrator, with some really nice asides about the realities of being a hero (ie he’s not); Aenea acts too old for her age, but that’s explained by her experiences, I think. Simmons goes beyond the simple journey-narrative, though; he also gives the reader insight into some of the other characters, and here’s one of his master strokes: the man tasked to hunt Aenea is not portrayed as a monster. It would have been too easy to do that; after all, we’re meant to be entirely on her side, and against the Pax (on which, more below). Simmons, though, makes him sympathetic, so that while being appalled by some of his actions there’s a certain admiration for his tenacity, and sympathy for his trials. I like this aspect a lot; I’m largely impatient with straight-forward villainy these days.
The other really intriguing aspect of the Hyperion Cantos is the world-building, on the macro scale. In the first two books, most human worlds are under the Hegemony; connected by farcasters and communicating via the fatline (FTL, haha), accessing a datasphere thanks to the TechnoCore, and generally living the high life (well… if you’ve got the money. There is still poverty and misery on a massive scale). Here, not only has that ease of communication disappeared, but the Catholic Church has risen to immense importance once again thanks to one thing: the cruciform that Father Paul Dure discovered, which – once implanted – allows the bearer to be resurrected after death. Many, many times. This, not unnaturally, gets them a lot of converts. It also gets them a lot of temporal, not just spiritual, power (why yes, much like medieval Europe, now you mention it). Their dominion is known as the Pax.
This is one of the few books that I’ve read that seriously considers religion in a space-faring age (and not just Catholicism; there’s also Judaism, and Islam, and Buddhism, and new religions too. Protestants only get one mention, and it’s a fleeting one – “Protestant sects” – in the next book… which makes me sad). The hierarchy of the Church is unpleasant and there’s a lot of greed and ambition; but Simmons does also show priests and parishioners who are genuine in their faith, for which I am glad. Again, complexity; so much more intriguing than simplicity.
My love for this book is possibly somewhat unreasoning. Yes, I think it goes on a bit, and some of the Raul-Aenea bits are maybe indulgent. But I can’t read this with genuinely critical eyes; the Suck Fairy has not visited, so I’ve still got my initial rosy-coloured glasses in place from the first time I read it. LOVE.
*Ludicrous by my standards, and by the shelf space in my house. I understand that my physical TBR pile is laughable when compared with the entire bookcases of certain other people, not looking at anyone specifically, Alisa and Tansy.
Randomly Yours, Alex 