If you look up anything about Mieville, one of the first things you will discover is his political leanings. He's pretty much on the extreme left wingIf you look up anything about Mieville, one of the first things you will discover is his political leanings. He's pretty much on the extreme left wing, and revolution is an idea that is dear to him. For example, in 2018 he co-founded Salvage, a "bi-annual journal of revolutionary arts and letters." I don't hold his politics against him. Another of my favorite authors, Steven Brust, is an avowed Trotskyite, and I love his work though I probably disagree with him on just about everything politically.
In the other books of Mieville which I've read (Perdido Street Station, The Scar, Embassytown), you can feel the influence of his political leanings, particularly in his world-building. But it remains more something in the background, informing the texture of his stories. Here, the revolution is front and center, and this focus does not serve him well. In this book, I felt like the world was acting in the service of his political ideas. And he was presenting his idea of revolution as though it were made inevitable by the forces of history (a pretty Marxist idea). Indeed, the idea of the Iron Council, as a train, underscores this inevitability.
As a result, I felt the individual characterizations fell kind of flat, with the exception perhaps of Cutter and Judah. And the story itself is deliberately disjointed. We have two parallel tracks going on - one outside of New Crozubon, and the other within the city itself. Beyond that, we also get an extended flashback, in the form of a novella within the novel, which presents the backstory of the Iron Council itself. This fairly complex structure, for me, undermined the immediacy of what was going on.
The other main problem I had with this book is that the antagonists basically are ciphers. If the central conflict is the revolution, then the antagonists are the established government. But they are, almost entirely, absent from the story. There isn't a single significant character who represents the establishment. We basically only get viewpoints from the standpoint of people who are involved with the revolutionary forces. The significantly reduces the drama and the impact of the many scenes of conflict in the book.
As usual, Mievelle has packed the book with both cool, and horrifying, ideas and images. Here, for me, the most interesting thing was Judah's golem magic, and his relationship/obsession with that magic. His internal conflict between supporting his political cause and exploring/expanding his control of magic is one of the best parts of the book.
Less successful, in my opinion, was the explorations of sexual identity. There's a bunch of same sex coupling, with varying degrees of emotional attachment, in the book. Some of it worked quite well, but I also sometimes had the feeling that Mieville was using it for a kind of shock value. And that just didn't work for me. I mean, in Perdido Street Station, the main character was having an ongoing sexual relationship with a bug (the Khepri are a species with the body of a human and the head and shoulders of a scarab). That was shocking. Maybe there are people who would be revolted by the idea of sex with another man, but not by the idea of sex with an insect, so long as she had a hot bod. I'm not one of them.
Of the Bas-Lag books, I definitely enjoyed this one the least. Still, it's pretty good and has many of the things in it that I like about Mieville. But on balance, I found myself not particularly engaged with it, except in a few sections - most notably in the novella about the creation of the Iron Council. ...more
For me, this had all of the bad features of Lovecraft's writing with practically none of the good.
The situation is great. An expedition to the AntarcFor me, this had all of the bad features of Lovecraft's writing with practically none of the good.
The situation is great. An expedition to the Antarctic finds a new mountain range in which there is an impossibly old city. Then some of the explorers are killed, others have gone missing.
Lovecraft manages to make this as dull as it could possibly be, without suspense, without characterization, and with endless "descriptions" of what the narrator insists is indescribable. The danger should be palpable, but instead it's basically non-existent.
Worse, as two surviving explorers go into the city, they encounter a series of sculptures from an alien culture, millions of years old. They see these things for a couple of hours, but from them, they extract the entire history and culture of the ancient aliens. This is just too absurdly unrealistic. Assuming that we could understand these alien artifacts at all, their meaning would likely be puzzled out over many years, not several hours, by a couple of non-experts who should be more interested in the live things that have been killing them.
On top of that, by revealing so much about the aliens, Lovecraft diffuses the horror. And he never even begins to explain why it would be impossible to just get along with an advanced alien civilization, especially one that was so readily understandable from just their sculptures. So, it's not only dull but ridiculous.
Lovecraft always relies heavily on using adjectives like "horrible," "grotesque," "unimaginable" etc... Words that don't actually describe anything, but instead purport to tell us that we should be scared of what, in ordinary terms, just isn't that scary. And that weakness is basically all that is on display here when it comes to the "horror."
I've read a fair bit of Lovecraft at this point (about 40%). This one has a great reputation, and I just don't get it. It has been far and away the worst of his stories that I've read so far....more
This book has some amazingly cool ideas in it and I found myself alternately fascinated and a bit bored. As much as I admired what Mieville was doing,This book has some amazingly cool ideas in it and I found myself alternately fascinated and a bit bored. As much as I admired what Mieville was doing, I never became thoroughly engaged with it. The book centers around a world where there are creatures who communicate in a way that is basically incomprenhensible. And it truly is, which makes it difficult to care about any of these creatures and I never did.
Spoilers hereafter...
The idea is that these creatures only understand stuff that is directly communicated by another living creature. If the same sounds that someone says get made by a machine, the creatures simply don't listen to it - it means nothing to them. Moreover, these creatures effectively have two voices which they speak at the same time. So the only way to communicate with them is by having a single mind speak with two voices -- not something most humans are born to do.
But the creatures also have incredibly cool bio-technology which is quite valuable, so we would like to trade with them. Thus, humans being what they are, they figure out one way to communicate, through twins who become ambassadors. But these twins are all located on planet and a threat to the central powers of the planetary empire. So the empire creates another mechanism.
The empire's mechanism has the unexpected effect of being highly addictive to the creatures and creates a whole planet of strung out addicts looking for their word-fix. Revolution ensues. And things finally resolve when the planet natives learn who to break their connection and how to understand signs not directly connected to minds. This process also involves an extreme loss of a kind of innocence for these creatures, since they are now capable of thinking in metaphors, which means they are also capable of lying.
In its outlines, I think all of that is really cool. In its execution, I didn't enjoy it all that much. There were parts of the book that I loved. But nothing really grabbed me the way the New Crozubun books did. Mieville is a very talented writer, and here I think he worked so hard on his ideas that he neglected some of the emotional punch. I've since picked up Iron Council, the last of the New Crozubon (Las-Bag) books, and I'm looking forward to it. This one was OK, but ultimately not for me....more
While sticking pretty closely to time-honored fantasy tropes, these books also, at almost every turn, mess with your expectations. It's been clear froWhile sticking pretty closely to time-honored fantasy tropes, these books also, at almost every turn, mess with your expectations. It's been clear from basically the first page of the books that Severian is destined to become Autarch, and in this book that destiny is fulfilled, but not at all in the way one would expect. There is no grand "final battle," or perhaps there is, but it has little to do with Sevarian's fate (and even that is not quite right).
At the same time that the book is closing off many of the open threads that it had created, and coming to a very satisfying conclusion (particularly with respect to Dorcas), its also revealing just how much broader and grander the conflicts and stakes where than what we had thought.
There are times when I dismiss intricate, extremely clever fiction for simply being too clever and lacking heart. At some points, I would maybe like to do that with this series. It's decidedly more intellectual than emotional, and it presents some extremely complex puzzle boxes. And the main characters are difficult to either like or empathize with. And yet, I still think this book is great. Part of the reason is because I think that when you solve the puzzles at one level, it only leaves you with greater puzzles and more to question and think about. Also, while Severian does not hit me at an emotional level, I find him almost endlessly fascinating.
As I've said in my other reviews here, this one will definitely be re-read and maybe more than once....more
I suppose I should say something about each one of these separately, though I think the series works best if thought about as a single, unified book. I suppose I should say something about each one of these separately, though I think the series works best if thought about as a single, unified book. After all, it is The Book of the New Sun. In this installment, the weirdness starts to ramp up pretty steeply. We also get a bunch of revelations and connections that are both cool and quite surprising.
Nothing and no-one is quite what they have seemed to be, and that's certainly true of Sevarian himself, since it's at least reasonable to say that Sevarian isn't simply the orphan boy he claimed to be. But it goes much deeper than that. The conceit of the book is that Wolfe found this book which was deposited with him from the far distant future. In the translation, he has chosen words that he says are close to what we would now understand, but they may not be exact matches. So when Sevarian calls something, say, a horse, it does not mean that the horse is necessarily what we would recognize as a horse. This becomes more obvious at some points here.
At the same time, Wolfe continues to adhere to some time honored fantasy devices. Here, Sevarian sort of gets to act as a spy/emissary for the underground, gets taken captive (sort of) and needs to plan and execute his escape. Along the way, we get one of the strangest plays within the text I've ever seen (not a play within a play, but it feels that way). It contains some obvious self-reference, some obvious allusions to the Christian Bible and to actual history. And yet, I found it almost impossible to make sense of. Maybe on a reread? And Wolfe has adhered to the overall sense of a quest, in that Sevarian is still trying to get to the town that he had been exiled near the beginning of the first book.
Of the four books, I found this one the most confusing, and in some ways the most static. However, I still enjoyed it immensely, and I suspect that on a reread it might become a favorite. As I said before, this is one of the few series I've read that I know I will re-read, at least once. I'm now wondering whether I should first read the other Solar books first (Urth of the New Sun, Book of the Long Sun, Book of the Short Sun). Not sure on that....more
Of the four installments in this longer book, this one is in some ways the most self-contained and the easiest to follow on a surface level. It's alsoOf the four installments in this longer book, this one is in some ways the most self-contained and the easiest to follow on a surface level. It's also the one with the most connections to revelations that are truly weird. Wolfe has a knack for this - having you simultaneously thinking that you are getting what's going on and having your mind blown at the same time. For that reason, it might be my favorite of the four, but its close.
It's been 3 months since I've finished these and I'm still thinking about them almost every day. Definitely going on a "to re-read" pile. And probably soon. I also need to pick up the sequel book (Urth of the New Sun)....more
I'm not going to say a lot about this book. There's either too much, or not enough. I've finished the main series and loved it. This has a reputation I'm not going to say a lot about this book. There's either too much, or not enough. I've finished the main series and loved it. This has a reputation for being extremely difficult and while I was reading this first book, I didn't understand why. The surface story seems quite simple, and it sticks quite closely to some common fantasy elements. (Orphan boy, chosen one, exile, a hero's journey).
It's also supposed to be difficult because of Severian's notoriously unreliable narration. And this is an element that presents some problems. But as unreliable narrators go, Severian is not particularly hard. Certainly no harder than Humbert Humbert, or Nick Carraway, or Victor Frankenstein for example.
This opening seems fairly standard, except for the weird idea that our main character is an apprentice torturer. And everything up to the moment of his exile seems like it's on comfortable ground. When he goes out into the city and starts to relate to people, things start to get weird. And then weirder still, the book just seems to stop without anything being resolved.
As a standalone book, I would have shrugged my shoulders. There's tremedously good writing here, but that's it? It turns out that that is not it, and the first book gets better and better as you go through the rest of the series. And the series gets better and better the more I think about it.
It's been a fairly long time since I read a book and knew that I would at some point re-read it. (The last two I can think of are the Malazan Book of the Fallen series and Infinite Jest. Haven't gotten to a reread of Infinite Jest yet, but I'm on my third go through of Malazan.) I will definitely be re-reading this at some point and probably more than once....more
Bujold is nothing if not audacious. In almost every Vorkosigan book to date, there has been a thread that involves something seriously implicating theBujold is nothing if not audacious. In almost every Vorkosigan book to date, there has been a thread that involves something seriously implicating the fate of the galaxies. Even in the more seemingly low stakes books, this sort of threat comes through in the background. Not here.
Rather, this is a completely low stakes book about coming to terms. With grief, with old age, with family. The main plot basically involves a dilemma for the main character: Admiral Jole. He needs to decide between his career and his personal life. Beyond that, there's basically no action, no real tension. As A Civil Campaign was basically Bujold doing her take on Jane Austen, this feels like her doing a take on one of Anthony Trollope's thinner books, like Cousin Henry.
And my problems with it are basically the same that I have with the slender Trollope books. They are charming, but there just isn't a whole lot of meat there. A guy needs to make a decision, and then he does. "Cozy" has become sort of a big deal in the last year, at least in the fantasy fiction realm. This book is about as cozy as it gets. But there's a very thin line between cozy and dull, and this book is not always on the right side of the line.
Bujold's structure and writing of this are just fine. But it lacks the uproarious humor of A Civil Campaign, or the intensity of most of the Miles-centered books. It's good, but for me, a decided step down from the better books in the series. From what I've read, it appears that this may be the last Vorkosigan book, and that's kind of a shame. It's such a good series....more
A short story that centers on the events leading up to Miles wedding. The main focus here is on a romance involving between Sergeant Taura (Miles" wolA short story that centers on the events leading up to Miles wedding. The main focus here is on a romance involving between Sergeant Taura (Miles" wolfwoman ex-lover and super-soldier) and Armsman Roic, who was mercilessly embarrassed in A Civil Campaign. It also involves a mystery, which seems a fairly common thread in these books. Miles basically gets a cameo here.
This had some interesting moments, and it's hard not to like Sergeant Taura. But overall, it was pretty slight....more
This is one of the Vorkosigan books that treads the line between Sci-Fi and Mystery. It also, like these others, has the riddle at the center of the bThis is one of the Vorkosigan books that treads the line between Sci-Fi and Mystery. It also, like these others, has the riddle at the center of the book also deeply entwined with intergalactic politics. Bujold seems to make these things come off easily and naturally. This one also delves deeply into the implications of a technology that would allow people to freeze themselves, with the expectation that they will be revived in a future where they could perhaps live forever, especially in a scenario where that technology is also tied to private corporations.
Overall, I found this one to be more interesting that some of the other Vorkosigan books from the pure Sci-Fi/speculative aspect, but less engaging from a character standpoint. Miles is away from home turf, so we have fewer of the returning characters that have grown so well throughout the series. There is, fortunately, a brief and quite good cameo by Mark - Miles' clone/brother.
A rather breezy installment in the series, which appears to be winding down. Nowhere near as good as A Civil Campaign, Captain Vorpatril's Alliance or Memory, but very enjoyable on its own, slighter terms....more
A delightful book, not quite up to the level of A Civil Campaign, but in many ways it is in the same vein (sci-fi tinged with romance). Here, Ivan getA delightful book, not quite up to the level of A Civil Campaign, but in many ways it is in the same vein (sci-fi tinged with romance). Here, Ivan gets himself entangled in a marriage of convenience and is not quite sure whether he wants it only to be that.
Miles Vorkosigan has only a brief cameo here, and does nothing instrumental to the story. Bujold's writing has been so good in this series that she pretty easily transforms her formerly minor players into the major players in this one. Ivan is much more interesting and a bit deeper than he has been presented before, but entirely consistent with his earlier portrayals. His mother and Illyan, the former chief of ImpSec, are both excellent here, especially ImpSec. And the book manages to be both lighthearted and a bit tense, a neat trick that Bujold pulls off effortlessly.
The structure of the book is a bit odd. It starts out with a messed up ImpSec operation on Komarr that leads to the marriage of convenience and a return to Barryar to dissolve the marriage. That's roughly the first third of the book. Then there is the stuff at Ivan's home planet, introducing his new "wife" to all the nobility. And then the book takes an abrupt left turn, which was a bit jarring, but ends up making sense. In that way, I thought the book was a bit clunky at times, but always so much fun and so easy to read that I was never particularly bothered. By this time, I have great faith in Bujold, especially when she is going for something more than a slight mystery story....more
On their way back from their honeymoon, Miles has to stop off at a space-station where there has been a diplomatic crisis, involving a murder mystery.On their way back from their honeymoon, Miles has to stop off at a space-station where there has been a diplomatic crisis, involving a murder mystery. As these Vorkosigan books go, this one was decidedly middle of the road, which still made it a pleasure to read. But it was kind of a letdown after A Civil Campaign, lacking the humor and wit that loaded that book. It also suffered by limiting the recurring characters to only a handful. Even so, it was a perfectly fine book, and a decent mystery....more
Bujold keeps getting better. This is a pretty slight book, but its thoroughly enjoyable. She has a great way of mixing genres. This one is sci-fi, mysBujold keeps getting better. This is a pretty slight book, but its thoroughly enjoyable. She has a great way of mixing genres. This one is sci-fi, mystery, and romance all rolled into one. She shifts believably back and forth between two perspectives, and makes all of it more or less seamless.
The basic set-up is that, in his new role as Imperial Auditor, Miles accompanies a colleague to Komarr to investigate the crash of a freighter into a big space mirror, which has messed up Komarr's plans to terraform the planet. His colleague's niece is married to the head of the Terraforming division, but her marriage is extremely unhappy.
There's lots of intrigue and betrayals. Miles falls in love along the way. The underlying "accident" turns out to be a plot which jeopardizes the entire political stability of the Empire. And Miles is crucially, but not solely, responsible for saving the day and the Empire. In its basic form, this is all pretty standard for a Vorkosigan novel, so it's truly amazing how different Bujold makes these books seem from each other, how the best of them involve fairly deep thematic developments, how much character growth there is from book to book (in Miles and other characters), and how consistently entertaining she is. Good stuff....more
**spoiler alert** It's a prequel to the Vorkosigan novels, which deals with the founding of the quaddies. Quaddies, for those not in the know, are gen**spoiler alert** It's a prequel to the Vorkosigan novels, which deals with the founding of the quaddies. Quaddies, for those not in the know, are genetically modified people who have had their body chemistry altered to make them thrive in a zero-g environment. Also, to make them more useful, their legs have been modified to be an extra set of arms. Thus, they have four arms, but no legs. Great for zero-g; a bit cumbersome on any planet with significant gravity.
In this book, an engineer has been brought to the quaddie station. They are all basically kids or young adults, and the engineer is going to train them in space age welding. The station itself seems to be outside any system of law, and thus is governed by the law of the company, which views the quaddies as their property. The managers of the station for the most part are only interested in promoting their own careers, and care little or nothing about the modified people under their control. Moreover, the company has gone to great lengths to indoctrinate the quaddies into believing that their goal in life is to serve the company and to cooperate with each other.
This is all, more or less, fine with a few glitches. There's one quaddie who has found the joy of casual sex with two-legged shuttle pilots. And in exchange for her favors, he gives her videos and books of stuff which would not have been approved by the company. Thus, the quaddies are learning something about individuality, love and chivalry. Another pair have had their own child, and have committed the sin of becoming too attached to him, and to each other. And as a group, they have established a secret hang-out in the station where they can enjoy the little contraband they have obtained.
Despite these little problems, things seem to be going well for them. Then, it is learned that Beta Colony has invented a gravity drive which makes it possible for spaceships to create artificial gravity. This effectively tanks the quaddie project for the company, who, to cut their losses, decide to terminate the project and all the quaddies in the process. The engineer decides to try to save them, and the last third of the book describes how it happens.
Overall, I enjoyed this, but I had a few problems. First, the suspense wasn't that suspenseful. I knew going in that this was a prequel, and I knew from my other reading that quaddies were around in Miles generation. Thus, without knowing the details, I knew how this was going to end. That didn't particularly spoil it for me, and Bujold's writing was as fluid as ever. But it did remove the suspense from a book that felt like it was trying to build up the suspense.
Second, the characters, particularly the villainous ones, were decidedly flat. The book simply riffs on the cliché of the evil bureaucrat, with little or nothing behind it. The engineer was slightly more developed, and one or two of the quaddies were actually interesting. However, I'm used to fairly rich characters from the Vorkosigan books, and this book simply didn't have them. Maybe Bujold needs more space to develop her people -- I probably had the same reaction about her characters after the first of the Vorkosigan series, and I'm now judging them by the standards of how they appear in, say, Memory or A Civil Campaign.
Finally, I didn't buy the main plot mover here. The gravity drive would certainly make it more practical to send two legged people into space. So it eliminates some of the advantage that the quaddies would bring. But however it works, the gravity drive would be an energy/resource drain. The quaddies could accomplish the same work for less than a gravity driven ship. Also, people with legs are used to being on planets. The natural habitat for quaddies is in space. Thus, I don't think it's entirely clear that the quaddie project would have become an instant failure. The start up costs for it have already been expended, and the project of raising new quaddies through birth did not seem to be inordinately expensive. Thus, in the middle of the book, I was asked to swallow a big plot mover that simply didn't make that much sense to me.
Then, as the book reaches the end, it fails to address a couple of fairly obvious points. The quaddies are heading to an asteroid belt, where they can start their own society. They've been saved by a handful of two legged humans how are still with them. What will happen to them? The engineer is not adapted for the long term zero g environment that he has consigned himself to. And yet the book never even addresses this. In addition, the real challenges for this group are just beginning, and how they go about establishing their new society would be fascinating, but it's something Bujold simply never bothers to take up. Thus, as the book ends, I felt like I was wanting more, which is typically a good thing. But here, I know that there simply isn't going to be any more, and I felt a little bit like I was left hanging. The book's ending is satisfying, since they get their freedom, but there's more to life than that....more
This book was thoroughly charming, with a dinner party in one chapter that ranks among the funniest things I've ever read. It's dedicated to Jane (AusThis book was thoroughly charming, with a dinner party in one chapter that ranks among the funniest things I've ever read. It's dedicated to Jane (Austen), Charlotte (Bronte), Georgette (Heyer) and Dorothy (L. Sayers). And it's subtitled "A Comedy of Manners and Biology." That's an unusual mix for a science fiction novel, but Bujold makes it work almost effortlessly.
Miles is determined to marry Ekaterina, and courts her with much of the same calculation and obsessive determination that he brings to everything else. That works less well in matters of love than it had for him as a fake Admiral of a space fleet. In the meantime, his brother is starting a galactic changing new enterprise based on the genetic engineering of bugs who produce edible vomit. And there are a couple of disputed seats on the Vor council that may be up for grabs.
Mix all of those things together and you get a delightful romp that sits equally well in thoughtful commentary, some surprising action, and ridiculously funny slapstick. Moreover, the reason it all works so well is because of how thoroughly well Bujold has drawn her extensive cast of characters in the earlier books. The things that they do are both absurd and perfectly natural based on what we already know about them.
This is by far my favorite of the Vorkosigan books, and I was already enjoying these books immensely. Bujold is truly a wonderful writer and, now, I am not only looking forward to the remainder of the Miles books, but I think I will also pick up her other books somewhere along the line....more
John Sturges transplanted Kurasawa's Seven Samurai to the old West, and King now takes the same premise and grafts it into his genre mashing series foJohn Sturges transplanted Kurasawa's Seven Samurai to the old West, and King now takes the same premise and grafts it into his genre mashing series following Roland and his katet on their quest for The Dark Tower. So it's a samurai western with more than a splash of horror and sci-fi. And, on balance, it was quite enjoyable.
King is especially good with kids, and the stuff here with Jake is no exception. It is also a plus that almost all of the main action here is with the main group of characters, instead of an elaborate flashback. But even so, I didn't like it quite as much as the last book, Wizard and Glass, which I thought had a better confict set-up, and a better resolution.
A big plus here was the character of Father Callahan, who makes a reprise from Salem's Lot. I read that book in probably 1983-84, so I can't say that I remember much of anything about it (creepy vampire rents a house in Maine, lot's of blood sucking). But the portrayal of Callahan here makes me tempted to go back and re-read that, even though it was not one of my favorites. This is either an advantage, or a problem, with King's multi-verse. It's tempting to see whether the reappearances add to new depth (like the characters from It who appear in 11/22/63). On the other hand, life's too short to even read all of King's books once, let ago getting into some rereads of some highly inconsistent work.
I was a little disappointed with the subplot here having to do with Susannah, for two reasons. We already resolved her multiple personality disorder, we thought. But King gives it to her again, with a vengeance. Worse, from a purely structural standpoint, he introduces it as a major plot thread in this book, but leaves it unresolved and almost as a cliff hanger (cave hanger?) in this book. I understand that that's pretty common in these multi-book series, but that doesn't mean I have to like it. I'm just glad that I don't have to wait years for the next installment (though I'm a little bummed at the bad reception Song of Susannah seems to have gotten)....more
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