Admirably crafted light science-fiction novella told from the perspective of a devoted father. Young Matthew has an imaginary friend, but rather than Admirably crafted light science-fiction novella told from the perspective of a devoted father. Young Matthew has an imaginary friend, but rather than reserving it a seat at the dinner table or creating embarrassing demands, he's arguing irritably with it about calendar systems and why there are two sexes. And he doesn't really seem to want to draw anyone's attention -- in fact he seems rather to be keeping quiet about the whole thing. Matthew's maths teacher is attempting to politely discourage his parents from teaching him different number systems, his geography teacher is puzzled by Matthew's odd new interest in cosmology, and his physics teacher is fed up with all the strange (and surprisingly difficult) questions he's been asking of late. Matthew's parents are starting to wonder if he should see a psychiatrist -- except he seems mostly as well-adjusted as he ever was. It's just that sometimes Chocky can be quite annoying.
Wyndham makes great use both of the battleground of family life and various mysterious and potentially sinister components to the whole encounter. In more ways than one this is more like a supernatural possession story than an alien visitation, mixing the mundane with the alarmingly unknown. A difficult book to put down despite little in the way of overt drama, and manages to conclude without too much of a let-down. ...more
A charming fantasy story, written in a manner fairly targeted at cat-lovers. In most respects fairly typical in structure (a young male responds to th A charming fantasy story, written in a manner fairly targeted at cat-lovers. In most respects fairly typical in structure (a young male responds to the Call To Adventure, is guided by a mysterious wizard, makes plenty of friends along the way) but with the hook being that almost all of the characters are cats (there is also a magpie and a fox) and the fundamental conflict is about protecting the magical inheritance of the feline race from being subverted by an undead Isaac Newton.
King is clearly a cat-lover himself, and the book is dedicated to two cats which this edition memorialises with pictures at the end of the book. These cats are also the inspiration for two of the cat-characters, including the main protagonist. Throughout both the journey and the contextual mythology introduced in the story, King sprinkles in various facets of cat psychology and folklore, and brings to the foreground various cruelties inflicted by mankind on our least-domesticated companions. There are several touching moments that are difficult to forget (I think of Mousebreath's story, and Wriggles) and though you could argue it's easy to make people feel something for well-loved companion animals, King handles this material properly.
The writing is competent but not particularly unusual as a standard fantasy story. I would probably rate this as just 'okay' if it was a human-centred narrative. But, well, I like cats....more
Surprisingly enjoyable despite me not knowing more than the barest outlines of the American Civil War, and I suspect rewarding for people with a keene Surprisingly enjoyable despite me not knowing more than the barest outlines of the American Civil War, and I suspect rewarding for people with a keener interest in this period. As I was reading I got the impression that the setting was being treated with some care, but it was only once I read the author's note at the end of the book that I appreciated how much: Turtledove didn't simply invent plausible Confederate characters, he found real people from the records of the time and elaborated on their background to flesh out the recorded facts. I was fairly impressed by both this and his approach to deciding the elections in the book (he gamed them out rather than solving them via authorial fiat).
Aside from the effort involved at a mechanical level, the book is also just good -- Turtledove threads the needle very well both in making it clear how disadvantaged the South was in the war and making a sympathetic case for their cause, without flinching from the race-based slavery issue that was at the root of the split. Indeed, he makes excellent use of his time-travel device in focusing on just this issue: the AWB organisation coming back in time to support the South are white supremacists, but ironically both their uncompromisingly harsh treatment of slaves and the information they eventually leak to the CSA work against their aims. Vicious treatment of slaves did not find approval amongst most of the Confederates, however much they looked down on the blacks, and the AWB injured their misrepresentation of the future by bringing back with them literature making it clear how much the general consensus of the future was against their viewpoint. Similarly, also, their willingness to resort to violence creates an antagonism that draws support to the opposite of their camp.
I did think there were some awkward components: Turtledove has the Confederates, and Lee in particular, focus on how the future perceives the US chattel slavery system as part of a motivation for gradual reform, but neglects the Confederate reaction to so much else about the future, which would inevitably have shaped the weight they place on its opinion. Bear in mind that at the time, even most of the North did not want black men to be able to vote, let alone any of the other sweeping social changes the future promised. The CSA also seems oddly acquiescent to the opinions of others for a nation that has just fought a war specifically over the principle of being able to make exactly this decision itself.
The cast of the book includes US and CSA presidents and generals, but aside from the grand picture and major political leaders, the book also covers the ordinary man's life, and there are a number of small characters with less than straightforward views on the major topics of the day. I appreciated Turtledove's avoidance of simple mouthpieces for black-and-white positions -- even the main AWB antagonists are accorded some complexity of character. Overall, I was pleased with the book and a little sad that Turtledove didn't develop this alternate history further (though, a little confusingly, it appears he does have another series in which the Confederacy won the war a different way)....more
An urban fantasy set in a version of London that has been warped by fey powers, with heavy political subtexts. As an adventure in its own right, it isAn urban fantasy set in a version of London that has been warped by fey powers, with heavy political subtexts. As an adventure in its own right, it is comparable to Gaiman's Neverwhere -- entertaining enough but nothing you'll remember for long. The central protagonist is a drug-dealing pimp who likes to think of himself as a heroic type (and so becomes). Leading into some of the book's themes, his enemies are (with the exception of one foulmouthed little girl) all abstract and untouchable -- they cannot be found and punched in the face because they are more like market forces than antagonists.
The dressing on the book is of progressives fighting reactionary forces. However, once you get past the surface there is, amusingly, a clearly reactionary story here. Is there a strange collective intelligence at work in certain rich areas of London, which seems to be working against the interest of Londoners? Are they affecting the ethnic makeup of the city, and the relations between the sexes? Are they making it hard for ordinary people to get jobs? To buy houses to raise their families in? Do they have a vested interest in keeping everyone locked into thinking of themselves as individuals, disrupting any sense of a collective national or local identity? Do they try to ? Are they constantly trying to change the language used in everyday life?
In the end, the major action that causes the downfall of Dream London is a marching band. Men and women and children, in uniform, marching along in unison to the sound of brass. They are supported for the most part by football hooligans. And this is no march for peace:
"Look at them. They're happy to sing a song or hold a peaceful demonstration. That sort of thing never changes anything. That's just playing the game the way the people in charge want it played. They'll give you a pat on the head, tell you that you're a good little soldier for protesting peacefully, and then they'll just continue doing the same thing."
No, this is a paramilitary operation, a militia trained in secret, targeted at the major zones of control, the areas of London where strange inhuman intelligences are sitting on wealth and trying to dictate how normal people are allowed to talk and think, while they gradually open up the city to more and more dangerous foreign influences.
"But the thing is you see, if we don't march, then those things, those things that are worse than death will soon be in here with us. Those things will be living here, in Dream London."
I'm not sure how much of this was conscious. The moral that we need to stop selling property to foreign investors was too prominently placed to be accidental, but some of the other reactionary elements may have been accidental, either caught up in a left-wing anti-establishment revolutionary sweep that wasn't taking care to exclude sympathy of the right, or various implications overlooked entirely by the author.
Highlights of the book, other than exoteric readings, include the foul-mouthed little girl who had the main character brutally raped in front of a jeering crowd, a somewhat amusing construct whereby people can't leave Dream London because the trains never work out, and the general concept that the London property market was exploited by an entirely non-sentient hive mind....more
A reasonable enough science-fiction story about multiply-embodied beings at war with themselves, which is unfortunately disfigured by an odd authorial A reasonable enough science-fiction story about multiply-embodied beings at war with themselves, which is unfortunately disfigured by an odd authorial insistence on having the viewpoint character's narration refer to all characters as 'she', even if they are male and are referred to as 'he' in conversation between characters. I found this pretty annoying, both because it made a science-fiction book about strange worlds and alien beings seem like it was trying to make some inscrutable point about Current Year gender obsessions, and also because there didn't seem to be any real point to it -- I think perhaps one conversation in the entire book refers to the viewpoint character's strange disability. There are lots of ways to play around with sex and gender in science-fiction, but this seemed pretty clumsy.
The general plot of the book focuses on the idea of an omni-present Emperor who rules a space empire as a host of synchronised clone bodies, and what it would mean for them to go to war with themselves. Some part of them wants to keep growing the Empire, forcefully integrating other human worlds into a common functional hierarchy using armies of lobotomised humans under the control of ship minds. The other part wants to raise human armies, destroy the corpse-armies, overthrow the social order and, presumably, fragment the empire. The viewpoint character, a ship-mind, refreshingly takes no particular side in this conflict, but wants to use it to kill as many of the Emperor's bodies as possible due to this conflict between factions of the Emperor having cost the life of a favoured companion. I did somewhat like that the grand political conflict was considered just a cause and convenient mechanism for the main character's revenge.
Losing (or not caring about) the annoying pronoun issue, this would make for a passably interesting scifi thriller, albeit not one that would top any lists. ...more
A fairly interesting premise -- a plague that causes people to understand animals -- that is rolled out in a fairly limp and boringly introspective na A fairly interesting premise -- a plague that causes people to understand animals -- that is rolled out in a fairly limp and boringly introspective narrative. The sex-and-drugs grandmother character is most interesting when she is being someone else (the segments where she was harassing people online or caring for her granddaughter) and most boring when she is floundering about the general wreckage of her life, but unfortunately the latter makes up more of the book and it ends up difficult to offer her much sympathy.
The pandemic hook of the book has some obvious topicality at the time of publication that now dates it a bit, and the 'understanding animals' element was presented in a loose sort of suggestive babble that it never seemed worthwhile to try and puzzle apart. I do give McKay credit for pointing out how insane this would be if communication was extended to every animal, but the fact that all the animals sounded like the same sort of nonsense really detracted from something that could've been more amusing....more
Loading...
