The Tent

The Tent, by Margaret Atwood, is a delight to read. Thirty or forty short stories - some not even stories; merely thoughts a couple of pages in length, hints and suggestions of larger stories and issues. The blurb on the back cover calls them "fictional essays", which doesn't seem quite right.

To be honest, it felt like a Dr Seuss book for grown-ups. There was the same delight in language, the twisted-about twirling dance of words, but much darker, more solemn and filled with the sadnesses and mysteries and compromises of adulthood.

The only other book of Atwood's I've read is Oryx and Crake, which is an amazing piece of science fiction*, and one that mesmerized me.

I must read more of her books; The Blind Assassin and The Handmaid's Tale are sitting on my shelves, waiting patiently.

* she claims it isn't science fiction, since the science in it is merely an extrapolation of current trends in science. Genius though she is, she's completely wrong there, confusing "Science Fiction" with "Fictional Science".

The Steep Approach to Garbadale

Iain Banks (aka. Iain M. Banks) never fails to impress. I started reading his Sci Fi a few years ago when someone said "you should read these Banks' Culture novels - they'd be your sort of thing", and whoever that kind recommender was, was exactly right. I had kind of gone off reading actual Science Fiction for a few years there, concentrating my efforts on History, Horror, and Fantasy, and Banks (and then Stross) dragged me back into the fold.

Banks writes two kinds of books, different enough that he has the slightly different pen names, with and without the M. His Science Fiction, under Iain M Banks, is mind-blisteringly* broad in scope. As I've said before, I've got a background in Math and Science, and bad Science in Sci Fi irritates me. I'm happy with logical science and different laws of physics based on currently-undiscovered scientific principles; but random laws of physics that aren't consistently applied, or stupid applications of real laws irk me. Banks is one of those authors whose physics is spot on.

But that is an aside. The Steep Approach to Garbadale isn't one of his science fiction books. It's the other kind - the well-written fiction novel. A lot of these books steer of at least a little into the fantastical of horrific, but this is a novel clearly set in our world, with real and flawed characters, and reflects on the politics of our time - or at least, our time two years ago; it sits solidly in the Bush era, and the characters reflect on and rail against US imperialism. I found it quite gripping, and on occasions hard to put down. It's a little more normal for me to not put a book down because a stupendously powerful star cruiser is about to chop up an Orbital with billions of people living on it; not being able to put down a book because Alban was about to go fishing with his cousin Sophie and oh my goodness what will transpire between them! was an unusual and pleasant feeling.

So, it's a definite worth-reading book. My problem now is that I can never quite remember which of my Banks non-sci-fi I've read and which I haven't. I've started reading one before on at least one occasion only to discover that I'd red it before. I'll have to go and work it out.

* Oddly enough, my spell-checker is happy with mind-blisteringly, but has an problem with recommender.

Singularity Sky

Singularity Sky, by Charles Stross, is the kind of book that reminds me why I read science fiction. It actually comes before Iron Sunrise, which was the first Stross book I read, and was the one that made me decide to read all his books (not there yet, but well on my way).

The setting is some time after the Singularity, when an artificial super-intelligence has scattered humanity over several thousands of light years, and the various outposts of humanity have settled on various levels of technology, depending on whether they have embraced or rejected technology.

It's a big ol' space opera, a couple of people from Earth are working in/for a backward totalitarian empire, and get involved when that empire ends up fighting a very high-tech invader. The people are well done, though some tend towards caricature. The culture clashes between the various groups are very nicely done; the technology is mind-blowing.

This one is a definite recommended read if you like your science fiction. One of the books I'll recommend down the years, and read again at some point in the future (unless Stross keeps up his current prolific rate of writing, in which case I'll just try keeping up with him).

Byzantium's Crown

I have a rocky relationship with trilogies; I try to avoid reading them unless I've got the whole series, since I hate having read one of a series and not being able to find the others. So this book has been sitting on my shelves for over a decade; probably something closer to 20 years. I finally found the others in the series at a second hand book shop and got them (not too cheaply, of course; it was a Newtown secondhand bookshop), and so I figured it was time to read this one.

Also, historical fiction (and/or historical fantasy; I'm not an expert on the divisions between genres) is always a risk to read. When it's good it's great, but mostly it's awful.

Byzantium's Crown, by Susan Schwartz, fell closer to the awful end of the spectrum than the excellent end. The world is "Antony and Cleopatra won at Actium, and there's magic". Which could be cool, but ends up rather disappointing (possibly not quite all the way to awful, though). It may be because I had looked at it for twenty years and was expecting some awesome after this time; it may be also that I automatically end up comparing it to Gillian Bradshaw's excellent historical fiction. I probably should've read this one when I was fifteen; I think it might have been much better back then.

Stations of the tide

I think I missed something in this book. It's by Michael Swanwick, of whose books I've read Vacuum Flowers (many years ago) and The Iron Dragon's Daughter (quite recently), both of which blew me away. The subtlety and complexity of the concepts and world building was astounding in those two novels, and so I had high expectations. While it was interesting, it seemed like it was trying to jump a few too many genre boundaries, and never really went anywhere. This reviewer covers my feelings about it pretty well; I think the author of that book had a bit more of an idea of what was going on than I did. And now that I've read the spoiler-laden interpretation that is linked to from that review, I see that there's whole layers of meaning in there that I did completely miss, largely because it references things I've not been educated in. I've always been pretty poor at picking up on symbolism in literature (and people who've run roleplaying games with religious themes are often exasperated by my overly literal mind). I think it's part and parcel of my atheist upbringing and particularly of my having degree in mathematics. Math, while it's all about symbols and representation, is also about clarity of definition and structured, logical thought, which while generally useful, does at times tend to hinder one.

Well, it appears I ramble. I expected more of this book, and would only recommend it if you're into this sort of thing. I know that next time I read one of Swanwick's books I'll do so a lot more carefully.

The moral of the story...

I don't know if you've ever read and Care Bears stories (my advice: Don't!), but they are oppressively saccharine and dull. Unfortunately I was reading one to Atty and Elora the other evening (Elora grabbed the book from the shelf for her bedtime story). This one was about Sharing. Funshine Bear (or something stupid like that) had just received a box of Rainbow Bars (confectionery, I can only assume), and wasn't going to Share. But then Share Bear told him a story of other care bears who had failed to Share, and the dire consequences of this. Mainly that the other bears didn't play with them or were sad (disappointingly, no being torn to shreds by wolves or plummeting tragically over a cliff or anything). At the end of this tale of woe, Funshine Bear decides to Share the Rainbow Bars with the other care bears. Every Share second Share flipping Share word Share in Share the Share flipping Share story Share was Share Share. Share.

So, a little sarcastically, I then asked Atty and Elora what the moral of the story was. This should be easy, thinks I; Care Bears stories really hit you over the head with the moral mallet.

"Rainbow Bars" says Atty.

The kid is a genius.

Vernon God Little

Inspired by Jen's plan to read all the Man Booker prize winning books, I bought Vernon God Little (by DBC Pierre) a while back. It finally floated to the top of my to-read list, so I figured I'd give it a go.

I always find these literary masterpieces rather daunting to start. There's a girding of the loins, a deep breath to be taken before embarking on them. I think it goes back to a lot of badly translated classics that I've read in the past - always worth a read, even though the prose flows like a river of bricks. But then, as often as not, they take me by surprise.

This was one of those ones - lyrical, intense, and at times impossible to put down. It was responsible for several very late nights and cranky following days as I stayed up reading. It's story of a teenager wrongly accused of a crime, written in the first person. It chronicles the gathering of evidence for and against him, the various people in his life - his mother and her friends, schoolmates, and others who are brought in on the tide of publicity surrounding the crime.

This is definitely worth a read, and will propel on to try to get through more of the Man Booker winners.