For the October meeting of City Lit's Weird & Wonderful book club, we discussed We Have Always Lived in the Castle by Shirley Jackson.
A superb horror/psychological thriller, the novel follows the survivors (and perpetrators) of a terrible crime years later. Brief notes and possible spoilers below.
Monday, November 20, 2017
Thursday, November 17, 2016
Secretly Crossing Invisible Lines: Hutchinson's "Fractured Europe" Trilogy
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Yes, I also keep thinking that's David Boreanaz, Britney Spears, and... shadowed guy. |
"My grandfather writes of maps having a power over the land, and theorises that if an imaginary landscape is mapped in great enough detail, it will eventually supplant the actual physical landscape, as a wet cloth wipes chalk from a blackboard.I've really wanted to share something about Dave Hutchinson's "Fractured Europe" series, so rather than just reviewing the latest (and final?) installment, Europe in Winter, I'm going to do a bit of a review of the trilogy entire.
My great-grandfather, on the other hand, wrote of all possible landscapes underlying each other like the pages of a book, requiring only the production of a map of each landscape to make it real."
It seemed to me that Europe in Autumn (2014) flew weirdly low under the radar: it's an ambitious and well-executed novel, a genre blender that seems like it could be a real hit, but it barely blipped on my review & nominations-based "to-read" radar.
But! I'm glad I got around to reading it, as well as the sequels.
Set in the very near future, the books envision a Europe that is fragmenting into smaller and smaller microstates. Initially following Rudi, a chef who sort of stumbles into a world of espionage, organized crime, and mysterious activity, the weirdness in these books ramps up exponentially as parallel and virtual realities make themselves known.
I found these books a delight to read, for two main reasons. Firstly, these are a stylistic genre-departure for me: these are very grounded, unglamorous spy novels, essentially. Individual sections are well-drawn, character-focused; but the larger plot is often completely obscure, with both the reader and the point of view characters unsure from where, or why, danger is coming.
Against this world, and this is the second joy of the book, Hutchinson slowly doles out evidence of these deeply, seriously weird developments. He walks this very interesting line of making them huge and real, yet also refusing to let the story turn completely to the science-fictional elements. The world and its problems continue, just with some very big additions.
You can tell how hard I'm fighting spoilers. There will be some after the jump.
Friday, December 4, 2015
Sulzer SF/F- Timeline
For the last meeting of the Sulzer SF/F Club, we discussed Michael Crichton's 1999 novel "Timeline".
A time travel adventure story, "Timeline" is pretty weird even for Crichton: a tech company that sorta-accidentally sorta-invents sorta-time-travel; naturally, they accidentally strand a history professor in 14th century France, and, naturally, the company's response is to send back his grad students (including one who, naturally, is fluent in multiple dead languages and proficient at period-appropriate combat techniques) to rescue him.
A great, meandering discussion ensued--we thought this feels a little rushed, even for Crichton, with some of the most intriguing bits of the book also the most confusing--there are a few major ideas and threads that he either forgot to cut or meant to develop. And, since this is time travel, we spent a lot of time just unravelling the mechanics and comparing it to other work. Spoilers below!
A time travel adventure story, "Timeline" is pretty weird even for Crichton: a tech company that sorta-accidentally sorta-invents sorta-time-travel; naturally, they accidentally strand a history professor in 14th century France, and, naturally, the company's response is to send back his grad students (including one who, naturally, is fluent in multiple dead languages and proficient at period-appropriate combat techniques) to rescue him.
A great, meandering discussion ensued--we thought this feels a little rushed, even for Crichton, with some of the most intriguing bits of the book also the most confusing--there are a few major ideas and threads that he either forgot to cut or meant to develop. And, since this is time travel, we spent a lot of time just unravelling the mechanics and comparing it to other work. Spoilers below!
Wednesday, July 22, 2015
Think Galactic: Feed
Last time at Think Galactic, we discussed Mira Grant's "Feed" (2010), a novel that has in it: zombies. Also journalism? It was a fun if somewhat aggravating read, and we had a good discussion.
"Feed" takes place a few decades in the future, and a bit after a zombie infection has taken a big chunk out of the world population, and remains an ongoing threat. Our protagonists are a team of bloggers--independent journalists/entertainers, really--who follow a contender for the presidential nomination as he begins the election trail. Along the way: zombies.
I took a ton of notes at this one--our criticism leans towards the madcap at a times. Which, befitting the ravenous unlife being resisted, I shall record with LOTS OF BULLETS. IN QUOTES are CLEVER THINGS that PEOPLE SAID. Almost certainly, there are spoilers below:
"Feed" takes place a few decades in the future, and a bit after a zombie infection has taken a big chunk out of the world population, and remains an ongoing threat. Our protagonists are a team of bloggers--independent journalists/entertainers, really--who follow a contender for the presidential nomination as he begins the election trail. Along the way: zombies.
I took a ton of notes at this one--our criticism leans towards the madcap at a times. Which, befitting the ravenous unlife being resisted, I shall record with LOTS OF BULLETS. IN QUOTES are CLEVER THINGS that PEOPLE SAID. Almost certainly, there are spoilers below:
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