Up the Walls of the World
This book is absolutely bonkers. Mad. And completely wonderful.
This was Tiptree’s first novel, but naturally enough many of the concerns and interests of his short stories are present here as well. I am so sad that he did not write more novels; this made me so happy, as did Brightness Falls from the Air, that I do wonder what else could have come from that amazing brain.
Let’s start by talking about the authorial situation and get that out of the way. This was published in 1978. Tiptree had been revealed as Alice Sheldon at the end of 1976. I was surprised therefore to discover that the brief bio in the end flap (oh hard backs I really do love you) makes no mention of him being her, although it does acknowledge Tiptree as a pseudonym. But I guess that pre internet, how are people going to know about the identity? Via Locus maybe, and fanzines, and word of mouth. Tiptree was not such a big deal that the New York Times was going to run an expose. Presumably therefor with this publication your more casual, less crazy SF fans aren’t going to know who Tiptree ‘really’ is – and Tiptree is enough of a name (… and male…?) to make it worth keeping the pseudonym. But THEN I turned to the back and the back cover image is Sheldon! Now I’ve seen the pic before and it’s quite obvious to me who this is; but others have suggested that this could, actually, be an ambiguously gendered person. I’m not entirely convinced. But anyway, there’s that.
Now, to plot. I’m going to be entirely spoilery because I really want to think about what Tiptree is doing here.
Aurora: Beyond Equality
I felt like a traitor giving this book only three stars on Goodreads. But it has to be said that I don’t feel the anthology lived up to what it was setting out to do.Does that make me a heretic? Possibly.
In the introduction, Susan Janice Anderson discusses how hard a lot of people said they found the topic. That they had to invent an entirely new society in order to talk about men and women being actually equal (to which in my head I say, duh; you’re writing SF aren’t you? Maybe that’s a bit harsh). It was very interesting reading about what they wanted to avoid (female monsters), and how hard it was to find models of what they did want. The Dispossessed and “When it changed” were of course mentioned.
The stories:
Sorcerer of the Wildeeps
This was provided to me by the publisher.
This is not a straightforward novel. The plot is not linear, the characters are slippery, and so is the language sometimes. But it is engaging and haunting and (much as its trite to say) challenging.
1. The plot is not linear. The focal character, Demane, sometimes has flashbacks to his past experiences – and sometimes to the experiences of other people, and sometimes he’s simply reflecting on history. It’s not always clear when this is happening, which I think is a stylistic choice; it took me a little while to understand when that was happening, but once I left myself go with the flow it usually made sense. The only frustrating thing by the end of it was that I really, really wanted to know more about Demane’s history and that of the world he lives in, with its Towers and demigods gods who have gone back to the stars…
2. The characters are slippery: this is somewhat related to the lack of narrative linearity (did I mention this isn’t a problem? It’s not a problem, as long as you don’t mind having to work a bit). Demane is definitely not straightforward – he’s got one mammoth backstory that only gets revealed in dribs and drabs, and that’s nothing on Captain, whose life is like a picture that’s entirely in shadow except for one tiny bit where one spotlight hits. Again, not a problem, but it does make it hard to explain what you’ve just read: “There’s this guy who works with a merchant caravan at the moment but he’s had this amazing life in the past, where he was kinda taught magic except it’s not magic, and in the present he’s trying to keep everyone around him alive…”
3. The language is slippery too. I’m not referring to the dialogue here, which is written very much in a spoken style (I know nothing about Wilson but I presume he’s thought long and hard about the use of the n-word; I can’t imagine Tor leaving that in a book without it being very deliberate and considered, either); dialogue doesn’t bother me. I think the elusiveness of the language often related to the non-linearity of the narrative actually. It took me a few pages to get the hang of it anyway, and once I was properly immersed it flowed beautifully.
I will look out for more work by Kai Ashante Wilson. Well recommended.
Night Sky Mine
I feel conflicted about rating this on Goodreads. I’d like to make it 3.5 – I’m such a sucker for half marks; I guess I tend towards ambivalence? I dunno…
(see what I did there?)
The set-up is great, as I’ve come to expect from a Scott novel. In fact after I read the first few pages I sighed with happiness and wondered why it took me so long to get around to reading this – it’s been on my shelf for ages – since the writing is lovely and captivating and immediately immersive. So that’s a wonderful thing and the prose itself stays very readable. The plot, though… it feels like a very long build up to a very abrupt and somewhat unsatisfying conclusion. I was surprised, as I read, that there were increasingly few pages left to go and no sign of clima – oh, there it went! Blink and you just about miss it. It felt like Scott either got bored by the story and/or characters (I’m going with the latter), and just wanted out, or she’d been given a timeframe that meant she had to rush the conclusion. Perhaps that’s a disservice and she always intended it to work that way, but it didn’t work for me.
Anyway: the story has two different plots that end up entangled. In one, Ista lives on a station owned and run by the Night Sky Mine Company, and she’s learning to be a hypothecary – someone who deals with what we would call the virtual world. There are safe nets, controlled by companies and governments, and then there are the wildnets – where anything might develop. Programs are flora – basically immobile – or fauna; Scott has developed an awesome nomenclature that give teasing hints as to characteristics of these programs (chogets and hug-me-tights and walaroo…). That was the aspect that felt really familiar from other Scott novels and that playfulness is something I really enjoyed.
The second plot involves Justin and Tarasov, men of very different backgrounds trying to make their relationship work dirt-side. Tarasov works in policing and they end up getting involved in an investigation that leads them to the Night Sky Mine system, and meeting up with Ista, and discovering that they all have some common interests that they want investigated.
The virtual world aspect is intriguing; there are hints at how it developed and got away from strict human control, but nothing too definite. The other world-building aspect that is intriguing is how Scott imagines human society working; this is no utopia, although it’s not quite a dystopia either (so quite realistic then). Humanity, at least within the Federation systems, are born into quite distinct castes – Union, Management, Transport, probably a few others – and there are definite resentments towards the different groups; Union always feels hard done by and that they are always the bottom of the pile. Friendships across castes are difficult, and love even more so. And then Scott adds another group, which I think is absolutely true to human nature: the Travellers. People who reject the idea of being tied to a caste and a certain job and a certain place. The most extreme Travellers (the Orthodox) take a spiritual view of their place in society, while Reformed Travellers are in it for the movement and lack of stricture. I could definitely read more stories set in this world, exploring how the different groups interact.
In the end I certainly don’t regret reading the book. I am glad that it wasn’t the first of Scott’s books I read, because I probably wouldn’t have gone on to read others – and then I would have missed out on Trouble and Her Friends which is definitely one of my very favourite cyberpunk stories.
Of Sorrow and Such
I received this as an ARC from the publisher.
Firstly, LOOK AT THAT COVER OH MY IT IS A THING OF BEAUTY.
Secondly, Margo Lanagan is right, as usual. This is a riveting read.
Mistress Gideon, the narrator, is not a nice person. She’s not a good person, either; she works for and wants the best for those she loves, and for that reason is a fierce and loyal friend… but she’s not nice. And she’s not good. She is terrible to her enemies.
Mistress Gideon has enemies because she is a witch. Those of her neighbours in Edda’s Meadow who know she is a witch don’t say anything, because it’s useful having a witch nearby. But when visitors come through with a bit too much curiosity… well. Curiosity can be unhealthy.
Slatter has written a – well, not a lovely story. There’s a bit too much ruthlessness and hands cut off for ‘lovely.’ But it is a fierce story and one that demands to be finished; it’s complex and surprising. Don’t expect an entirely happy ending. It takes the old story of witches being found out and burnt at the stake and makes it a far more dynamic tale, exploring motivations and cause and consequence and collateral damage.
What I liked most, in the end, is that this is a story focussed on women. Women who love and who hate and who survive and who hang on through sheer bloody-mindedness. There are brutal witches and resentful teenagers and flighty wives and despairing lovers and bitter sisters and the guilty, the grim and the determined. Some of the women are a number of those things at the same time. These women are complex and challenging and very very real.
Of Sorrow and Such will be out in October. You know you want to read it.
Stranger in a Strange Land
I don’t really remember when I started this. It might have been 2012, or 2013. You see, I’ve been reading it for about half an hour every fortnight of school time… and not quite every fortnight even then. So it’s taken me a while. And I feel somewhat bereft now that it’s finished. It was such a hefty, cosy friend every time I went into the library to set a good example by reading.
Yes, this was my first Heinlein. Yes it was deliberate; I’d heard it was his “liberal” book, and the concept intrigued me. Yes, I know there are people who are appalled by this. I did read the whole thing though, so it wasn’t that bad (… over a few years…).
Not having read other Heinlein I don’t really know how else he presents his politics. I’ve seen the move of Starship Troopers, but I think there’s some squabbling about whether he meant the novel to be quite as satirical as the movie ended up being? Anyway, from the perspective of a leftie in the 21st century, this doesn’t seem all that liberal in its politics. I mean, I guess it seems to be advocating a form of socialism, but I’m not sure how seriously anybody was meant to take that (although given how prevalent ‘grok’ is in certain circles… hmm). Of course if you take ‘liberal’ to mean ‘happy to talk about sex and have sex and I don’t believe in marriage to have sex’ then yes, it is liberal. Of course compared to modern books the sex scenes are positively chaste and I had to re-read some sections to understand what the fuss was about (ohhh he talked about them kissing but he meant they weren’t ONLY kissing…).
It’s a very long book to talk about the return of a human child to Earth, now a man, who has been raised by the inhabitants of Mars and has therefore quite a different way of understanding the world. He has no clue about human interactions and the ability to perform various mind-tricks like telekinesis and so on. There’s also a financial aspect since the way the law works he appears to be the owner of or ambassador from Mars, plus other technological side-benefits, which means that he is a multi-millionaire… all of these things naturally mean he has more enemies and would-be friends than he can deal with.
Interestingly the focus, I think, is not really on Mike, the Man from Mars. Nor is it on Jill, his nurse, at least not after the first bit. Instead the character who has really stuck with me is Jubal. Jubal almost seems to me how I imagine Heinlein to have been (and this is completely unfair since no one is born old): old, cranky, seen it all, cynical, bored by the world but still in love with it, impatient, garrulous, and desperate to do right by all those around him. Also the most amazing sense of entitlement. Jubal appears to have tried everything worthwhile and he runs a house that is at once a commune, a resort, and a demanding place of work. His obstinance and his love of his adoptive grandchildren, his bullying and arrogance matched with the fact that he uses his enormous brain for the good of those he loves – this, rather than Mike, seems to me to be the epitome of humanity.
Because in many ways I think Mike is meant to represent the best of humanity. But he’s a distant figure, for all he sleeps with every woman he gets close to as far as I can tell. He is unknowable. Interestingly he’s an inversion of the Great White Saviour trope, I think, because he’s doing humanity better than humanity but he IS human, just raised by a distant and unknowable people. I’m not sure that he’s being a better Martian than the Martians; we’re not given that info.
There are some appalling moments, especially about the women; this is not unexpected. The stuff about Fosterites was weird and a bit uncomfortable (but not nearly as weird as the bits about Foster himself!). The inclusion of a Muslim character surprised me, given the publication date… and the way he’s treated by those around him is simultaneously welcoming and also appalling.
I am glad I’ve read it. I’m not sure I would recommend it to anyone. Perhaps someone like me who is old enough to be cynical and hasn’t read any Heinlein before… as long as they’ve read enough other SF to know that it’s not all like this. Will I read any more Heinlein? I’m honestly not sure. There are so very many other books to read.
Galactic Suburbia: Tiptree Month!
It’s Tiptreemonth! Our second Tiptree Spoilerific looks at several of James Tiptree Jr and Raccoona Sheldon’s most iconic and important short stories from the collection Her Smoke Rose Up Forever. You can get us from iTunes or at Galactic Suburbia.
Houston, Houston, Do you Read?
Your Faces, O my Sisters! Your Faces filled of Light!
And I Awoke Me Here on the Cold Hillside
The Girl Who Was Plugged In
Love is the Plan the Plan is Death
The Screwfly Solution
The Women Men Don’t See
You can Skype us to leave a short feedback message about Tiptree or any of our other episodes, to be included in a future show.
03 90164171 (within Australia) +613 90164171 (from overseas)
Please send feedback to us at galacticsuburbia@gmail.com, follow us on Twitter at @galacticsuburbs, check out Galactic Suburbia Podcast on Facebook, support us at Patreon and don’t forget to leave a review on iTunes if you love us!
The Girl who Circumnavigated, etc
Neil Gaiman said this book was a “glorious balancing act between modernism and the Victorian fairy tale, done with heart and wisdom.”
Yes.
I love a sneaky, omniscient narrator who takes liberties with speaking directly to the reader. Especially when they’re not condescending to the reader but takes us into their confidence, presumes we are as intelligent as they are, and goes out of their way to be warm and inclusive.
I love a story where the girl who goes to Fairyland is chosen because she is irascible and short-tempered sometimes. Not because she is good or pretty.
I adore the concept of all children being Heartless in some degree or other. I adore Wyveraries (wyverns and libraries having babies, why not?), although a land of Autumn doesn’t really translate to the Australian experience – especially not for a girl who grew up in the tropics, where leaves don’t really turn red, let alone fall off branches – unless there’s a mighty storm.
I do actually really like whimsy, when the wide-eyed joy is balanced with just enough cynicism that is self-aware enough not to get in the way.
I like it when heroines are sensible and determined, when they know they’re in a story and try to decide how to be in that story, and when they get to be brave and afraid at the same time.
I liked this story more than I expected. I liked the pictures, too.
Conquerors: or Portugal goes to India
I read Conquerors: How Portugal Forged the First Global Empire courtesy of the publisher, via Net Galley.
Roger Crowley has done a wonderful job of acknowledging the truly stupendous effort that was required for Portugal – tiny, generally-ignored-by-Europe Portugal – to get a trading foothold in India… while also detailing, in occasionally remorseless detail, just how barbarous the Portuguese practises were in getting and maintaining that foothold.
I believe it’s important to acknowledge things like the astonishing insight that, in order to take advantage of winds and currents, ships needed to swing way, way out west from the African coast in order to then be driven east, around the Cape of Good Hope, and into the Indian Ocean. I think we should acknowledge the hundreds of unnamed sailors who died on the voyages of exploration – from scurvy, dehydration, disease, fights with inhabitants encountered along the way – who families didn’t know their fates sometimes for years, and whose names are not commemorated in geographic features. And understanding historical context is important too: wanting to get to the Indian Ocean in order to screw the Egyptian Muslims is definitely unpleasant, but (and this is not to downgrade the unpleasantness) I want to know why they did it.
Crowley does these things. Using what can only be limited information – since who cares about sailors drawn from jails and the lowest classes – he gives an indication of what life must have been like on these tiny, tiny carracks travelling across a big big ocean. And while I might have liked just a little more context about why the Portuguese king – furthest west of Christians! – had quite such fervent crusading dreams, he does do a good job of setting these remarkable few decades of exploration into a global political context.
But with all the yes-they-were-remarkable (the leaders, that is; your grunt sailor really has no choice) because of their tenacity, and vision… it was impossible for me to not to be appalled by the actions of the Portuguese, both as they travelled the coast of Africa and when they got to India. (Please note that I am of course not singling the Portuguese out as particularly barbaric!) The actions taken against Muslim traders and their families for example were shocking and, in the established context of trading in the Indian Ocean, unnecessary. And their arrogance in dealing with Hindu rulers, likewise.
I think the aspect that surprised me most – which it really shouldn’t have, because I did actually know some of it but hadn’t put it together – is just how well-established trading was in the Indian Ocean. It makes sense, too: after all, it’s basically like a great big lake (rough and all, I know) with land on three sides – land with really different stuff that just screams out to be traded. And with monsoon winds that are regular to make criss-crossing if not straightforward then timetable-able – well of course the various different civilisations, from Malacca and what is now Malaysia over to what is now Oman, with India in between, they’re going to do what humans do: explore, and look for ways to make money. To some extent Crowley presents this pre-existing as idyllic; few disagreements between merchants or rulers, and so on. I have no doubt this was not the case, humans being humans, but it was long-established and everyone seemed to be getting something out of it, so why rock the boat.
And then along come Europeans, en masse (there were a few random Euros about previously, but never in big groups). They already dislike Islam and are looking to completely stop them from trading in this area (which, nicely for the Portuguese, will also screw Venice). They completely misunderstand Hinduism, because a) they’ve never encountered it before and b) they’re expecting to meet Christians (who do exist in the east, just not quite in the numbers the Europeans thought), so logically the Hindus must be Christians. And the Portuguese Christians demand exclusivity in trading rights (wha-??) and that the Muslims be kicked out (WHA-??) and if you don’t like our terms we will shoot our fancy guns at you until there is death and destruction.
Another aspect I enjoyed of Crowley’s book is his analysis of the Portuguese themselves. This is largely focussed on the leaders, since that’s who get books written about them in the day (early 16th century), and because they do shape policy after all. Finally I discover that Albuquerque is a Portuguese name! (…this one didn’t go to America, so I assume it was a relative.) The difficulties of leading men in what were, admittedly, difficult conditions – human enemies all around (largely of your own making but in the end that doesn’t matter when they’re fighting you), plus scurvy and weird new diseases… and a king whose letters only reach you once a year, who is getting advice from your enemies back home, and who wants you to pay the sailors with money you make from your trading thank you very much. Crowley does a generally good job of presenting these men as actually human, rather than icons, although at the same time they were clearly exceptional men to do what they did.
Another aspect that surprised me, which had a big impact on the Portuguese: this period is really a turning point in understanding how wars are fought (well, for the Portuguese anyway; Agincourt was a while back…). The fidalgos are all about one-on-one combat, personal honour, reckless charges and self-sacrifice. Albuquerque in particular isn’t stupid; he sees how impossibly pointless these tactics are, and starts making changes. He starts making men train in squads, to work together, and with weapons that can be used in such conditions. The fidalgos however are so insulted by this that at one stage they apparently tried to break the weapons! Of men who might be able to help them not die in battle!! I just can’t even.
Parallels have been drawn between this age of European exploration and the modern space age. I think these are warranted to some extent. The money, the dreams, the bravery and tenacity required – these the two periods have in common. I’m glad the moon did not have inhabitants for the Apollo astronauts to patronise and threaten, though.
Crowley has written an accessible book about a remarkable and depressing period in world history.
Every Heart a Doorway
The publisher sent me an e-galley of this book.
Just like I like Mary Robinette Kowal’s stories for talking about the bit after the falling-in-love stage, and shows that married life can be worth stories, Seanan McGuire has presented a story about the girls and boys who come back from fairyland… and wish they hadn’t.
Nancy went to the Halls of the Dead and basically learnt to act as a statue to please the Lord and Lady there. Her parents, of course, do not understand what she experienced and think she needs to be helped through whatever trauma is causing her to tell such dreadful tales. I’d never really thought to consider what Alice’s parents or friends might have thought… although Swift does have Gulliver deal with some repercussions of his travels and travails (these two go together in my mind because of a uni subject that made me read both).
Fortunately for Nancy, Miss West has a school specifically for people like her; those who have gone to other places and desperately want to go back, because that is home. Which sounds all well and good and like you’re going to meet people with whom you have lots in common… but not all fairylands are alike. In fact McGuire does marvellous work of sketching out how such places might be categorised, including the difficulty of ever really categorising such places, and if the place that felt like home to you was all about stillness and silence, how much do you actually have in common with someone who went to a land called Confection filled with light and colour? Yeh, adolescents have a hard time finding anyone they can actually connect with.
While simply telling a boarding-school story with such a bunch of misfits would probably have been enjoyable of its own, McGuire decides to hit them with problems as well – murder, to be specific – to play out the ramifications of trust issues, insecurity, and bonding under duress. And I haven’t even mentioned the fact that not all of the characters are heteronormative.
McGuire has created a fascinating world here, and much as I would like a series of boarding-school books set at Miss West’s, somehow I think that might hurt the magic. This is a wonderful novella and I’m glad it found a home with Tor. It comes out later this year. ETA: turns out it comes out in April 2016. Sorry!
Randomly Yours, Alex 