I've been building up to this one for a couple of days. Partly active social life/work consuming time related. There should be a special theory of relativity for that...putting this on my to do list. Invent time machine and give the idea to Einstein.
Okay, I'm digressing. Big time. So, to explain, the title of this blog...well, it's not a quote from the Whedonverse like most of my blog entries. No, these are words straight from the man himself.
This entry is, once regarding the pain and anguish of not going to San Diego ComicCon, specifically the awesome Firefly 10th Anniversary Reunion Panel. But also...this is about Firefly and what it means to me. As always, this will follow the usual format - chronological context of how and when I came to Firefly, followed by lots of ramblings and personal anecdotes, maybe even a little bit of gushing about stuff here and there.
As the presenter of the Panel, Jeff Jensen, said - "Let's get on with the thrilling heroics".
It was 2005, the tail end of. I was watching Film 2005, hosted back then by old Jonathan Ross. It was their "Film of the Year" show and Serenity netted the top prize. I saw the clips they played, Joss Whedon's acceptance speech and I was thinking "Hey, I actually have a total lack of awesome spaceship sci-fi. I should get this on DVD when it comes out, it looks totally cool". Roll on February 2006. I pre-ordered Serenity. It arrived...on a Wednesday, I think. I was in my penultimate year of secondary school, I was thinking about university. As soon as I came home from school, found that Serenity had been delivered, I broke open that package, put the DVD in my Xbox, played the DVD.
I fell in love.
Pure and simple here, kids. I fell in love with this movie. In the space of Serenity's two hours, I had a new favourite film. It's still my favourite film, of all time. It even beats Joss's latest epic, Avengers. Which was bad ass. But it can't hold a candle to Serenity.
Like the Hero of Canton, my love for it now, ain't hard to explain. It was the characters, the warmth, the soul of the film. It's not an epic...well, it is, but it is by not trying to be an EPIC, it's not trying to be a mind-expanding exploration of the human soul, it's not a summer blockbuster. It just is. It's a beautiful piece of simple writing, with amazing performances bringing life to characters that you absolutely truly believe are a family. It's...incredible.
And heck, kids, this is just Serenity.
Funnily enough, shortly after falling in love with Serenity, I obtained Firefly. I fell even further and deeper in love. I knew true heartbreak about the fate of certain unnamed characters. I became even more attached to the characters. And when I learned the true nature of Firefly's fate, Joss Whedon became my idol.
As a writer, you have to learn to deal with rejection. Like I said, in 2006 I was getting towards thinking about university. I previously mentioned in a prior blog post about The Writerverse that I decided, when I was 15, that I wanted to be a writer. By the time I was 17, I was coming closer to understand the trials that writers undergo and finding my idols, people to admire and hold as inspiration. Joss Whedon's refusal to let Firefly die and giving me my favourite film of all time was that inspiration. Added to that the brilliance and wit of the dialogue of his writing, the darkly beautiful humour that slips into the most serious of episodes...I have taken that and introduced it into my writing. During the days of workshops at university, it was mentioned, often positively. I owe you, Joss Whedon, for teaching me that there's always a place for dry witticism.
But this isn't the end, it's not just about the influence the show and the film had on my writing, how Joss Whedon became an inspiration. It's about the people Firefly has helped me to meet.
Ladies and menfolk, my fellow Browncoats.
It was university. By this time, I had my beloved Serenity t-shirt. To this day, one of my most complimented t-shirts. And largely due to this t-shirt, I met many, many fellow Browncoats. There are so many of us. So, so many of us. We do have a lot of other major interests, but...well...we largely came together because of Firefly, because we are Browncoats. It was that curious fact that you come across, that exclamation of "You like Firefly? So do I! That's awesome", which spirals into a much deeper, more meaningful friendship. And from that very starting point, some of my best friendships have developed. If I had not watched Serenity and fallen in love with it, who is to say I would have met these people and become such great friends? Well, might be a slight over-exaggeration, but still. Being a Browncoat has brought me closer to some wonderful people.
But the story isn't just the influence on my writing or the fellow Browncoats I've met.
I work in a café. It's been mentioned before. Now while I am determined I will be a successful writer in some shape or form...I've contemplated a back-up plan. A café. A geek café, in Bath, because I just feel there's a sad lack of a major hub of geek congregation in Bath. There's a comic book shop, but it's small. We need something bigger. With tea and coffee.
To this end, my back-up plan - Leaf on the Wind. Two-fold reference: obviously, Wash's beautiful, if slightly tragic, line from Serenity. Secondly, a reference to the fact that only loose leaf tea would be sold in this café. It would emulate the fusion of Western and Eastern furniture seen in Firefly. There would be a memorial to our most beloved, fallen character. There would be an alcohol license so we could serve, probably only late in the evenings, the cocktail, the Sereni-Tea. I would be able to justify and write-off all QMx purchases of awesome Firefly collectibles as business expenses. The only permitted expletive for staff would be "gorram". There would be a pool table, with a sign next to it saying "Management not responsible for ball failure" with the notice repeated in Mandarin underneath. All the menu boards would be in English and Mandarin. Staff would be encouraged to say "Shiny".
I would go utterly mad with power, just as I seem to have gone mad with ideas.
But then again, this is all about what Firefly means to me, so...it's to be expected.
Ladies and menfolk, I am a Browncoat, proud and tall. I aim to misbehave.
Tuesday, 17 July 2012
Saturday, 14 July 2012
Sitting Under the Shade of the Tree: L.A. Confidential
It's time for a slight divergence from my usual sci-fi, a bit of infinite diversity in infinite combinations to spice things up. The following instalment of Sitting Under the Shade of the Tree features a hard-boiled detective thriller, James Ellroy's L.A. Confidential.
Some of you may remember that back when I rambled about The Man in the High Castle, I mentioned having previously "demolished" a James Ellroy book. That was The Big Nowhere, book two of Ellroy's LA Quartet. L.A. Confidential is book three and, in an ironic twist, the book that actually started it all for me. Allow to put things into context.
It may be common(ish) knowledge that in 1997, L.A. Confidential was adapted into a film, directed by Curtis Hanson and starring Russell Crowe, Guy Pearce, Kevin Spacey, James Cromwell, Kim Basinger and Danny DeVito. To name but a few of the names cropping up in the movie. It was here that my inevitable journey to reading the LA Quartet began. I loved the film. When I discovered it was based on a book, I decided I had to read it. I then discovered that, as aforementioned, it's book three of four and being borderline OCD, I had to read book one (The Black Dahlia) first.
Eventually, last year, I bought The Black Dahlia and then, round about the beginning(ish) of this year, my reading pile finally decreased to the point where I was able to read it. Instantly impressed and engrossed by Ellroy's writing, I went out and bought The Big Nowhere and L.A. Confidential. Last week, I finally finished the book I'd been building up to for so long.
Now. Enough context. Time for some substance.
To set the scene, it's Christmas 1951 in Los Angeles. Three LAPD officers are about to be set on an inevitable collision course that will shatter their lives apart - ambitious ladder-climber Sergeant Edmund Exley, brute force thug Officer Wendell "Bud" White and flash celebrity narcotics hound Sergeant Jack Vincennes. They're all caught up in Bloody Christmas, a scandal that gives the LAPD a black eye, only this is merely the start of spiral downwards for the three officers. From the ashes of Bloody Christmas comes the Nite Owl Massacre, a heinous crime that brings the three into conflict, then eventually a bizarre partnership as they peel back the layers of deception the crime is veiled in, threatening their careers and their lives in the process.
Ellroy's novels are incredibly compelling. I'm used to crime thrillers that focus on the crime, the evidence, the nail-biting cat-and-mouse game between criminals and the cops. But with Ellroy...well. His novels are pretty much a journey into the heart of darkness that resides inside these cops - usually all inevitably crooked or corruptible in some way. And these journeys, they're frakking intense. I'll admit, L.A. Confidential wasn't as intense as The Big Nowhere (that was some dark stuff right there, but no less brilliant and awesome a novel), but nonetheless, it was a compelling read, but also for the similarities to the movie. It was brilliant to see how all the actors in the movie perfectly suited the characters in the book and even more gleeful when I found lines of dialogue that I recognised from the movie. A lot of the time it was in an entirely different context, spoken by an entirely different character, but I still had a little smile and a little "Hey, I remember that".
In reference to the movie and the similarities, I think one of the most intriguing things I found in reading L.A. Confidential is how the screenwriters managed to take the source material - the third in a quadrilogy - and make a stand-alone movie from it, but still make it recognisable enough that (I imagine) fans of the book wouldn't be tearing their hair and screaming "WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU PLAYING AT?" Okay, so in fairness I did the whole thing a bit backwards, movie then book, much like I did with Scott Pilgrim vs. The World, but I have very good reasons for that. Digression aside, I'm still impressed by the job the screenwriters did. Ellroy's book is a beautifully twisted tale and while the screenwriters couldn't fit everything in, they did a fine job of get the bare bones across, with the actors filling in the rest and making a brilliant film noir-esque journey into the corrupt heart of the 1950s Los Angeles Police Department.
So there you have it. Fans of the film, read the book. It's so much grittier and darker and sheds so much more light (ironically) on the motivations of the characters. Fans of the book, if you haven't seen it, fear not the film. It does well.
Until next time...my reading pile grows ever larger, with the entire volumes one to five of the Song of Ice and Fire series due on Wednesday. I'll have plenty of books to keep writing about.
Some of you may remember that back when I rambled about The Man in the High Castle, I mentioned having previously "demolished" a James Ellroy book. That was The Big Nowhere, book two of Ellroy's LA Quartet. L.A. Confidential is book three and, in an ironic twist, the book that actually started it all for me. Allow to put things into context.
It may be common(ish) knowledge that in 1997, L.A. Confidential was adapted into a film, directed by Curtis Hanson and starring Russell Crowe, Guy Pearce, Kevin Spacey, James Cromwell, Kim Basinger and Danny DeVito. To name but a few of the names cropping up in the movie. It was here that my inevitable journey to reading the LA Quartet began. I loved the film. When I discovered it was based on a book, I decided I had to read it. I then discovered that, as aforementioned, it's book three of four and being borderline OCD, I had to read book one (The Black Dahlia) first.
Eventually, last year, I bought The Black Dahlia and then, round about the beginning(ish) of this year, my reading pile finally decreased to the point where I was able to read it. Instantly impressed and engrossed by Ellroy's writing, I went out and bought The Big Nowhere and L.A. Confidential. Last week, I finally finished the book I'd been building up to for so long.
Now. Enough context. Time for some substance.
To set the scene, it's Christmas 1951 in Los Angeles. Three LAPD officers are about to be set on an inevitable collision course that will shatter their lives apart - ambitious ladder-climber Sergeant Edmund Exley, brute force thug Officer Wendell "Bud" White and flash celebrity narcotics hound Sergeant Jack Vincennes. They're all caught up in Bloody Christmas, a scandal that gives the LAPD a black eye, only this is merely the start of spiral downwards for the three officers. From the ashes of Bloody Christmas comes the Nite Owl Massacre, a heinous crime that brings the three into conflict, then eventually a bizarre partnership as they peel back the layers of deception the crime is veiled in, threatening their careers and their lives in the process.
Ellroy's novels are incredibly compelling. I'm used to crime thrillers that focus on the crime, the evidence, the nail-biting cat-and-mouse game between criminals and the cops. But with Ellroy...well. His novels are pretty much a journey into the heart of darkness that resides inside these cops - usually all inevitably crooked or corruptible in some way. And these journeys, they're frakking intense. I'll admit, L.A. Confidential wasn't as intense as The Big Nowhere (that was some dark stuff right there, but no less brilliant and awesome a novel), but nonetheless, it was a compelling read, but also for the similarities to the movie. It was brilliant to see how all the actors in the movie perfectly suited the characters in the book and even more gleeful when I found lines of dialogue that I recognised from the movie. A lot of the time it was in an entirely different context, spoken by an entirely different character, but I still had a little smile and a little "Hey, I remember that".
In reference to the movie and the similarities, I think one of the most intriguing things I found in reading L.A. Confidential is how the screenwriters managed to take the source material - the third in a quadrilogy - and make a stand-alone movie from it, but still make it recognisable enough that (I imagine) fans of the book wouldn't be tearing their hair and screaming "WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU PLAYING AT?" Okay, so in fairness I did the whole thing a bit backwards, movie then book, much like I did with Scott Pilgrim vs. The World, but I have very good reasons for that. Digression aside, I'm still impressed by the job the screenwriters did. Ellroy's book is a beautifully twisted tale and while the screenwriters couldn't fit everything in, they did a fine job of get the bare bones across, with the actors filling in the rest and making a brilliant film noir-esque journey into the corrupt heart of the 1950s Los Angeles Police Department.
So there you have it. Fans of the film, read the book. It's so much grittier and darker and sheds so much more light (ironically) on the motivations of the characters. Fans of the book, if you haven't seen it, fear not the film. It does well.
Until next time...my reading pile grows ever larger, with the entire volumes one to five of the Song of Ice and Fire series due on Wednesday. I'll have plenty of books to keep writing about.
Wednesday, 11 July 2012
Life is Pain, Highness. Anyone who says differently is selling something
Life is pain, but not the in the context our dear Westley meant. No, today, as I forgo the words of Joss Whedon for the words of The Princess Bride, I'm not talking about heartbreak...oh wait, yes I am. But not heartbreak and pain as Westley understood it. No, for today I talk about something that has been tormenting my soul for the last couple of weeks.
San Diego ComicCon 2012.
It's a simple dream, held by many a geek the world over. One day to have the money to attend San Diego ComicCon. To those geeks who are going, who have the money and resources, I salute you in my near Hulk-like greenness of envy. If there was ever a year to go to San Diego ComicCon, it would appear to be 2012.
Perhaps this is mostly because I've become far more clued into the happenings of the geek community since starting up this blog in January. You see, before then, I didn't use Twitter except for a dark time in my third year known as "Professional Writing" and didn't follow as many fan pages on Facebook. But thanks to this blog and a certain school friend and Caerdydd-based "Landshark", I am, as aforementioned, far more clued in.
And it's torturing me.
Let's start with Quantum Mechanix. These beautiful, wonderful people have been the light of my growing geek collectibles collection and bane of my bank account since July 2011, when I obtained the River Tam Big Damn Heroes maquette and my beloved Browncoats t-shirt. As is to be excepted of geeks of their talents, artistry and prominence, they have a booth at San Diego ComicCon, (hereafter abbreviated SDCC, because while I'm OCD enough to keep saying San Diego ComicCon, it'll probably be easier on your eyes if I say SDCC). At this booth...oh lords, oh lords, the goodies! Pictures are abounding Facebook and Twitter. The key source of torment? These. Dogtags. Firefly dogtags. Oh, they say it's just prototypes, but...as the Futurama Fry meme goes - "SHUT UP AND TAKE MY MONEY!" Come on, QMx, you know you have it. I might as well just set up a direct debit, you take monthly instalments and just send me your awesome stuff. Please? Pretty please?
Then there's the panels. Doctor Who. I know I'm British, I know I only live an hour's train ride from Cardiff (and have friends there too!), but you know, I've never seen much of Doctor Who outside of the episodes on TV. Oh and once, Sylvester McCoy (the Seventh Doctor), regularly visited my workplace while performing at Bath's Theatre Royal. So I've been in the presence of the Seventh Doctor, but that's it. And let's face it, he does not have a companion as drop dead gorgeous as Karen Gillan. So maybe I would want to see the Doctor Who panel just for her.
But then there's an Iron Man 3 panel! Tantalising promises of panels from industry professionals! As a writer, that last part intrigues me most - don't get me wrong, an Iron Man 3 panel with the likelihood of Robert Downey, Jr popping in for a quick stage-stealing appearance? Hell yes! But...as aforementioned, I'm a writer. It's twenty to three in the morning here. I'm babbling about the heartbreak of not being able to attend SDCC 2012. One day, my wish is be on one of those SDCC panels. So I best get writing.
And it's not just panels either. I mentioned Quantum Mechanix and their goodies. A while ago, back in April, I stumbled upon a link someone had posted on Thief's wall. It was about ALL COLOUR versions of Bryan Lee O'Malley's Scott Pilgrim series. Guess what's going to be at SDCC 2012.
However, I'm not quite finished here. Oh no. For you see, I've saved the real kicker, the real heartbreaker of not being able to go to San Diego ComicCon 2012 until last.
The 10th Anniversary Reunion of Firefly.
This article, where I'm getting a lot of my heart-wrenching info on what's happening at SDCC, reckons there won't be a dry eye in the house when those guys get back up on stage together. I agree. I don't know if my eyes would be dry. Throats are probably going to be raw screaming approval. Women swooning over Nathan Fillion and Alan Tudyk. Men swooning over Jewel Staite and Morena Baccarin. The sheer awesomeness of the momentous occasion.
I cannot adequately express how much I could be there. Even if I was crammed in, way at the back of the room, struggling to see, I wish I could be there. There's only one thing in the world I wish for more and believe me, between Firefly reunion and that unspecified thing, it's one frakkin' tough call!
However, although I'm going to miss out on a lot of these awesome things, I'm determined not to entirely languish in self-pity. I may not be attending SDCC for a long, long time due to not having near enough money to fly out to California, I'm going to have my own little geek-fest I think. I can't pretend it'll be anywhere near as epic or awesome as San Diego ComicCon, but if the best I can do is curl up with my favourite geeky movies this weekend to try and numb the pain, then by the gods it's what I'll do.
For those lucky enough to be attending, once again, I salute and envy you. San Diego ComicCon 2012 is yours. Bring back some great stories, kids. You owe us that much!
San Diego ComicCon 2012.
It's a simple dream, held by many a geek the world over. One day to have the money to attend San Diego ComicCon. To those geeks who are going, who have the money and resources, I salute you in my near Hulk-like greenness of envy. If there was ever a year to go to San Diego ComicCon, it would appear to be 2012.
Perhaps this is mostly because I've become far more clued into the happenings of the geek community since starting up this blog in January. You see, before then, I didn't use Twitter except for a dark time in my third year known as "Professional Writing" and didn't follow as many fan pages on Facebook. But thanks to this blog and a certain school friend and Caerdydd-based "Landshark", I am, as aforementioned, far more clued in.
And it's torturing me.
Let's start with Quantum Mechanix. These beautiful, wonderful people have been the light of my growing geek collectibles collection and bane of my bank account since July 2011, when I obtained the River Tam Big Damn Heroes maquette and my beloved Browncoats t-shirt. As is to be excepted of geeks of their talents, artistry and prominence, they have a booth at San Diego ComicCon, (hereafter abbreviated SDCC, because while I'm OCD enough to keep saying San Diego ComicCon, it'll probably be easier on your eyes if I say SDCC). At this booth...oh lords, oh lords, the goodies! Pictures are abounding Facebook and Twitter. The key source of torment? These. Dogtags. Firefly dogtags. Oh, they say it's just prototypes, but...as the Futurama Fry meme goes - "SHUT UP AND TAKE MY MONEY!" Come on, QMx, you know you have it. I might as well just set up a direct debit, you take monthly instalments and just send me your awesome stuff. Please? Pretty please?
Then there's the panels. Doctor Who. I know I'm British, I know I only live an hour's train ride from Cardiff (and have friends there too!), but you know, I've never seen much of Doctor Who outside of the episodes on TV. Oh and once, Sylvester McCoy (the Seventh Doctor), regularly visited my workplace while performing at Bath's Theatre Royal. So I've been in the presence of the Seventh Doctor, but that's it. And let's face it, he does not have a companion as drop dead gorgeous as Karen Gillan. So maybe I would want to see the Doctor Who panel just for her.
But then there's an Iron Man 3 panel! Tantalising promises of panels from industry professionals! As a writer, that last part intrigues me most - don't get me wrong, an Iron Man 3 panel with the likelihood of Robert Downey, Jr popping in for a quick stage-stealing appearance? Hell yes! But...as aforementioned, I'm a writer. It's twenty to three in the morning here. I'm babbling about the heartbreak of not being able to attend SDCC 2012. One day, my wish is be on one of those SDCC panels. So I best get writing.
And it's not just panels either. I mentioned Quantum Mechanix and their goodies. A while ago, back in April, I stumbled upon a link someone had posted on Thief's wall. It was about ALL COLOUR versions of Bryan Lee O'Malley's Scott Pilgrim series. Guess what's going to be at SDCC 2012.
However, I'm not quite finished here. Oh no. For you see, I've saved the real kicker, the real heartbreaker of not being able to go to San Diego ComicCon 2012 until last.
The 10th Anniversary Reunion of Firefly.
This article, where I'm getting a lot of my heart-wrenching info on what's happening at SDCC, reckons there won't be a dry eye in the house when those guys get back up on stage together. I agree. I don't know if my eyes would be dry. Throats are probably going to be raw screaming approval. Women swooning over Nathan Fillion and Alan Tudyk. Men swooning over Jewel Staite and Morena Baccarin. The sheer awesomeness of the momentous occasion.
I cannot adequately express how much I could be there. Even if I was crammed in, way at the back of the room, struggling to see, I wish I could be there. There's only one thing in the world I wish for more and believe me, between Firefly reunion and that unspecified thing, it's one frakkin' tough call!
However, although I'm going to miss out on a lot of these awesome things, I'm determined not to entirely languish in self-pity. I may not be attending SDCC for a long, long time due to not having near enough money to fly out to California, I'm going to have my own little geek-fest I think. I can't pretend it'll be anywhere near as epic or awesome as San Diego ComicCon, but if the best I can do is curl up with my favourite geeky movies this weekend to try and numb the pain, then by the gods it's what I'll do.
For those lucky enough to be attending, once again, I salute and envy you. San Diego ComicCon 2012 is yours. Bring back some great stories, kids. You owe us that much!
Tuesday, 3 July 2012
Sitting Under the Shade of the Tree: Embassytown
I've been a lot more active with my literary segment lately and I'm pretty determined to keep up with it. So despite the fact that I finished this book last week, I think it's time I shared my thoughts on my latest read. Today, it's another helping of China Miéville (as seen here), but this time one of his more recent works - the 2011 novel Embassytown.
I mentioned in my thoughts and feelings on Perdido Street Station that I couldn't remember on what whim I purchased that book. With Embassytown, I have very distinct recollections. I was having a book spree. It was marked with a 25% off sticker. I'd enjoyed The City & The City so much that I thought "what the heck" and indulged. I like these whims, even if my bank account doesn't.
So, anyway, to the point. Embassytown.
I feel, somewhat naturally, that I have to draw from what I blogged about Perdido Street Station in relation to Embassytown. See, China Miéville is an intriguing and fascinating writer. He is credited as part of the "New Weird" literary movement and I heartily agree. This is good. Weird is very, very good, as well as being a typographically pleasant word to look at. In Perdido Street Station, we were treated to the weirdness of New Crobuzon, the almost organic feeling of this insane city and its mixture of races. Miéville achieved this through what I would regard as his trademark use of language, his wordsmith mastery twisting the English language to suit his needs.
In Embassytown, he not only twists the English language in weird ways to achieve his goals, but puts the concept of language at the heart of the book - the weird and wonderful character unto itself, much as New Crobuzon was virtually a character of its own in Perdido Street Station.
So, a brief summary - Embassytown follows the trials and tribulations of Avice Benner Cho, a native of the eponymous Embassytown on the planet Arieka. She's a rarity among Embassytowners - she's an immerser, someone who travels on the immer, which appears to be a sort of hyperspace, an organic sea connecting regions of space together. Avice is human, but humans are not native to Arieka - the native aliens are reverently referred to as "the Hosts", a race of aliens who cannot lie. Now I could attempt here to describe how their language (or, as it is written in Embassytown, Language - the capital L is very important here), but my words...I know they'd fail to do Miéville's words justice. Suffice it to say, communication with the Hosts can only be handled by specially trained Ambassadors - essentially two cloned individuals whose minds are linked together, but it's far, far more complicated than that. Read the book and you shall discover this.
Anyway. Avice. Not only is she an immerser, but she's a simile. The Hosts, their Language so intriguing and intricate, actually seem to require humans to perform certain strange actions so they can use them as similes in Language. It carries with it a certain celebrity, which is how Avice, not only a rarity as an immerser, becomes so embroiled in the chaos that Miéville kicks off with the introduction of the mysterious and unprecedented Ambassador EzRa. And we see all of this through her eyes, her thoughts and interpretations.
When all is said and done, Embassytown is another triumph of the weird and wonderful. Miéville beautifully weaves together an intricate narrative, sucking you into yet another strange world he's created. So far, Embassytown is only my third helping of China Miéville's writing and I can't wait to read more. Next up I think is The Scar, book two of the Bas-Lag Trilogy. I'm looking forward to seeing what else the world of Bas-Lag has to offer.
Until then, dear readers, go forth, buy, read and enjoy Embassytown. It's weird in the best of ways.
I mentioned in my thoughts and feelings on Perdido Street Station that I couldn't remember on what whim I purchased that book. With Embassytown, I have very distinct recollections. I was having a book spree. It was marked with a 25% off sticker. I'd enjoyed The City & The City so much that I thought "what the heck" and indulged. I like these whims, even if my bank account doesn't.
So, anyway, to the point. Embassytown.
I feel, somewhat naturally, that I have to draw from what I blogged about Perdido Street Station in relation to Embassytown. See, China Miéville is an intriguing and fascinating writer. He is credited as part of the "New Weird" literary movement and I heartily agree. This is good. Weird is very, very good, as well as being a typographically pleasant word to look at. In Perdido Street Station, we were treated to the weirdness of New Crobuzon, the almost organic feeling of this insane city and its mixture of races. Miéville achieved this through what I would regard as his trademark use of language, his wordsmith mastery twisting the English language to suit his needs.
In Embassytown, he not only twists the English language in weird ways to achieve his goals, but puts the concept of language at the heart of the book - the weird and wonderful character unto itself, much as New Crobuzon was virtually a character of its own in Perdido Street Station.
So, a brief summary - Embassytown follows the trials and tribulations of Avice Benner Cho, a native of the eponymous Embassytown on the planet Arieka. She's a rarity among Embassytowners - she's an immerser, someone who travels on the immer, which appears to be a sort of hyperspace, an organic sea connecting regions of space together. Avice is human, but humans are not native to Arieka - the native aliens are reverently referred to as "the Hosts", a race of aliens who cannot lie. Now I could attempt here to describe how their language (or, as it is written in Embassytown, Language - the capital L is very important here), but my words...I know they'd fail to do Miéville's words justice. Suffice it to say, communication with the Hosts can only be handled by specially trained Ambassadors - essentially two cloned individuals whose minds are linked together, but it's far, far more complicated than that. Read the book and you shall discover this.
Anyway. Avice. Not only is she an immerser, but she's a simile. The Hosts, their Language so intriguing and intricate, actually seem to require humans to perform certain strange actions so they can use them as similes in Language. It carries with it a certain celebrity, which is how Avice, not only a rarity as an immerser, becomes so embroiled in the chaos that Miéville kicks off with the introduction of the mysterious and unprecedented Ambassador EzRa. And we see all of this through her eyes, her thoughts and interpretations.
When all is said and done, Embassytown is another triumph of the weird and wonderful. Miéville beautifully weaves together an intricate narrative, sucking you into yet another strange world he's created. So far, Embassytown is only my third helping of China Miéville's writing and I can't wait to read more. Next up I think is The Scar, book two of the Bas-Lag Trilogy. I'm looking forward to seeing what else the world of Bas-Lag has to offer.
Until then, dear readers, go forth, buy, read and enjoy Embassytown. It's weird in the best of ways.
Thursday, 28 June 2012
Say you're happy now - once more with feeling
Today's entry may turn into something of rant. For today I wish to touch upon a very delicate, oft controversial topic.
Remakes.
I bring this up because today I discovered that they (the mysterious, amalgam Hollywood "They") are remaking Starship Troopers. This is on top of Total Recall (coming out 29th August in the UK) and RoboCop (no release date as of yet as far as I know). The first thing I noticed here is the disturbing trend - these are all Paul Verhoeven films. And the first thing I want to say here - Leave Paul Verhoeven alone!
Okay, so I'll admit, I'm actually conflicted. First off, the trailers for Total Recall look pretty damn cool. I'm a little disappointed by the fact that there won't be any mention at all of Mars as there was in the 1990 Arnold Schwarzenegger version because I'm quite fond of Mars as a planet and general sci-fi locale. But because of the lack of Mars, I'm intrigued as to what they're going to do with the film's plot. What is it that Doug Quaid has inside that head of his, eh? In the five seconds of that sentence I came up with a strange idea - are they going to go down a Prometheus-style route, have them discover (on Earth though) some kind of mysterious alien artefact that explains human existence or something like that? Or are they going to run away from that aspect of Total Recall (1990)?
From the look of the latest trailer though (kindly furnished by SFX magazine) it appears that, with the exception of Martian locales, Total Recall (2012) will be a straight up remake. Ish. Again, I'm conflicted. There are elements in the trailer that you can connect straight to the 1990 movie, but the sticking point for me is Mars. Without Mars, this should be an entirely different story. Also, they've cast Bill Nighy as Quato...or, well, the Quato-esque character as they appeared to have renamed him. Either way, Bill Nighy is in this film. I'm going to see it.
Next on the list of conflicted emotions about remakes is RoboCop. Now, the title of this blog is Sufficiently Cyberpunk. RoboCop is quite possibly one of the best existing examples of the cyberpunk genre in movies. It's a classic, a true product of the 1980s, where fear over escalations in the Cold War seemed to produce the perfect mindset for cyberpunk to arise - it was in this very decade that William Gibson wrote the iconic Sprawl Trilogy, the definitive starting point of cyberpunk, a vision of a decaying, dystopian future. A future everyone back then thought they were heading too.
Now the classic 1987 RoboCop wasn't 100% dystopia - okay, so Old Detroit, the movie's primary setting, was a crumbling, decaying cityscape that provided quite a beautifully gritty backdrop for the whole affair. No, the cyberpunk aspect that RoboCop elegantly captures is corporate greed and domination - represented perfectly by Omni Consumer Products and their Senior Vice President, Richard "Dick" Jones, wonderfully portrayed by Ronny Cox. If there was ever a definitive, vile corporate stooge villain, it's Dick Jones.
If the last two paragraphs haven't given it away yet, I love RoboCop. It's an incredible piece of cinema and like I've said, a brilliant, shining example of cyberpunk at work. Which is why I really, really want to say HELL FRAKKIN' NO to a remake. But from what I've read online about it, this isn't going to be a straight remake. It's apparently going to be set in the time between Alex Murphy being brutally murdered by Clarence Boddicker and his gang, taken to the hospital, then built into RoboCop. On some levels, this does sound intriguing - the director, José Padilha - has talked about exploring how OCP stripped Murphy of his humanity, thus turning him into RoboCop.
The other conflict - a similar one discussed about Total Recall (2012) - is casting. First off, we have Gary Oldman as an OCP scientist in charge of the project. This is good - we like Gary Oldman. Second and most conflicting is something of a casting rumour, but if it turns out to be true, I might be broken by this film.
Hugh Laurie as the villain.
Whether he plays it with his native British accent (Hollywood seems to love those British villains) or his gruff, American House accent, I will need to see this film. If the rumours are true. If Hugh Laurie is the villain...well, there's a Futurama meme going around, a picture of Fry, holding a fistful of dollars (yes, deliberate pun), with the words -"The Dark Knight Rises? Shut up and take my money". Confirmation of Hugh Laurie will result in a similar scene from me, substituting The Dark Knight Rises for, obviously, "Hugh Laurie in RoboCop".
It goes without saying that The Dark Knight Rises has already laid claim to my money.
Since I've only just discovered they're going to remake Starship Troopers, I feel no conflict. My precise feeling is "HELL FRAKKIN' NO". Starship Troopers is brilliant. As a kid, it was an exciting sci-fi action film where soldiers went around the galaxy killing massive bug-things. As an adult, it's a glorious satire of military fascism, which makes you giggle about the fact that, as a kid, you were totally rooting for a bunch of fascist, oppressive jerks.
Then some jackass went and made a second film. It was awful. All the satire was dropped. I haven't seen the third film. Not sure I want to. So this is the challenge to the poor unfortunate soul who has dared to even consider remaking Starship Troopers. If you leave out the satire, I don't care if you've faithfully decided to stick to the armoured exoskeletons used in Robert A. Heinlein's original novel. No satire, no monies for you. You got that? Good.
So, to sum up: Total Recall, I'll give you the benefit of the doubt and watch you. RoboCop, cast Hugh Laurie and my money is yours. Starship Troopers...in the words of the Alan Rickman cut-away gag in Family Guy - "Do not disappoint me".
Remakes.
I bring this up because today I discovered that they (the mysterious, amalgam Hollywood "They") are remaking Starship Troopers. This is on top of Total Recall (coming out 29th August in the UK) and RoboCop (no release date as of yet as far as I know). The first thing I noticed here is the disturbing trend - these are all Paul Verhoeven films. And the first thing I want to say here - Leave Paul Verhoeven alone!
Okay, so I'll admit, I'm actually conflicted. First off, the trailers for Total Recall look pretty damn cool. I'm a little disappointed by the fact that there won't be any mention at all of Mars as there was in the 1990 Arnold Schwarzenegger version because I'm quite fond of Mars as a planet and general sci-fi locale. But because of the lack of Mars, I'm intrigued as to what they're going to do with the film's plot. What is it that Doug Quaid has inside that head of his, eh? In the five seconds of that sentence I came up with a strange idea - are they going to go down a Prometheus-style route, have them discover (on Earth though) some kind of mysterious alien artefact that explains human existence or something like that? Or are they going to run away from that aspect of Total Recall (1990)?
From the look of the latest trailer though (kindly furnished by SFX magazine) it appears that, with the exception of Martian locales, Total Recall (2012) will be a straight up remake. Ish. Again, I'm conflicted. There are elements in the trailer that you can connect straight to the 1990 movie, but the sticking point for me is Mars. Without Mars, this should be an entirely different story. Also, they've cast Bill Nighy as Quato...or, well, the Quato-esque character as they appeared to have renamed him. Either way, Bill Nighy is in this film. I'm going to see it.
Next on the list of conflicted emotions about remakes is RoboCop. Now, the title of this blog is Sufficiently Cyberpunk. RoboCop is quite possibly one of the best existing examples of the cyberpunk genre in movies. It's a classic, a true product of the 1980s, where fear over escalations in the Cold War seemed to produce the perfect mindset for cyberpunk to arise - it was in this very decade that William Gibson wrote the iconic Sprawl Trilogy, the definitive starting point of cyberpunk, a vision of a decaying, dystopian future. A future everyone back then thought they were heading too.
Now the classic 1987 RoboCop wasn't 100% dystopia - okay, so Old Detroit, the movie's primary setting, was a crumbling, decaying cityscape that provided quite a beautifully gritty backdrop for the whole affair. No, the cyberpunk aspect that RoboCop elegantly captures is corporate greed and domination - represented perfectly by Omni Consumer Products and their Senior Vice President, Richard "Dick" Jones, wonderfully portrayed by Ronny Cox. If there was ever a definitive, vile corporate stooge villain, it's Dick Jones.
If the last two paragraphs haven't given it away yet, I love RoboCop. It's an incredible piece of cinema and like I've said, a brilliant, shining example of cyberpunk at work. Which is why I really, really want to say HELL FRAKKIN' NO to a remake. But from what I've read online about it, this isn't going to be a straight remake. It's apparently going to be set in the time between Alex Murphy being brutally murdered by Clarence Boddicker and his gang, taken to the hospital, then built into RoboCop. On some levels, this does sound intriguing - the director, José Padilha - has talked about exploring how OCP stripped Murphy of his humanity, thus turning him into RoboCop.
The other conflict - a similar one discussed about Total Recall (2012) - is casting. First off, we have Gary Oldman as an OCP scientist in charge of the project. This is good - we like Gary Oldman. Second and most conflicting is something of a casting rumour, but if it turns out to be true, I might be broken by this film.
Hugh Laurie as the villain.
Whether he plays it with his native British accent (Hollywood seems to love those British villains) or his gruff, American House accent, I will need to see this film. If the rumours are true. If Hugh Laurie is the villain...well, there's a Futurama meme going around, a picture of Fry, holding a fistful of dollars (yes, deliberate pun), with the words -"The Dark Knight Rises? Shut up and take my money". Confirmation of Hugh Laurie will result in a similar scene from me, substituting The Dark Knight Rises for, obviously, "Hugh Laurie in RoboCop".
It goes without saying that The Dark Knight Rises has already laid claim to my money.
Since I've only just discovered they're going to remake Starship Troopers, I feel no conflict. My precise feeling is "HELL FRAKKIN' NO". Starship Troopers is brilliant. As a kid, it was an exciting sci-fi action film where soldiers went around the galaxy killing massive bug-things. As an adult, it's a glorious satire of military fascism, which makes you giggle about the fact that, as a kid, you were totally rooting for a bunch of fascist, oppressive jerks.
Then some jackass went and made a second film. It was awful. All the satire was dropped. I haven't seen the third film. Not sure I want to. So this is the challenge to the poor unfortunate soul who has dared to even consider remaking Starship Troopers. If you leave out the satire, I don't care if you've faithfully decided to stick to the armoured exoskeletons used in Robert A. Heinlein's original novel. No satire, no monies for you. You got that? Good.
So, to sum up: Total Recall, I'll give you the benefit of the doubt and watch you. RoboCop, cast Hugh Laurie and my money is yours. Starship Troopers...in the words of the Alan Rickman cut-away gag in Family Guy - "Do not disappoint me".
Sunday, 17 June 2012
If poets are the unacknowledged legislators of the world, science-fiction writers are its court jesters
Today I'm borrowing the wise words of sci-fi author Bruce Sterling, words I first came across in the foreword for William Gibson's short story collection, Burning Chrome. These have special meaning for me. All through my time studying Creative Writing at university, there was this tiny little struggle - every now and again - to be taken seriously. In fact, for a third year feature article assignment, I pretty much wrote a rant (an eloquent one, I might add), on how it felt to be marginalised in a subject that struggled so valiantly to justify its academic merit.
But today, today is not a rant. No, lately I've found myself in this strange kind of equilibrium, a sense of acceptance of both things outside of my control and feelings that I have. However, today isn't about this either. No, today's random rambling (off to a very nonsensical start), is about something else entirely. It's about writing. Of a sort.
Okay, more than of a sort. See, today's ramble is inspired by this video, made by a dear friend and fellow writer. It was inspired by the very first lines of this video. Because, not only I am a writer, but - shock horror - I'm a big reader too. And I'll be honest, it sometimes really, really surprises me how many writers, how many big names, actually know each other personally. To put into some perspective, take William Gibson (American-born, Canadian-based) and Douglas Coupland (Canadian-born, Canadian-based). I've read pretty much everything Gibson's ever written, while I've only (so far) read jPod (brilliant book, also awesome short-lived TV show), but one of Coupland's many, many works. But it was in the acknowledgments of Gibson's novel Pattern Recognition that I learned that more connected these two authors than Canada. Apparently, coffee was consumed, high above Shinjuku, new perspectives on Tokyo shared that evidently affected what Gibson wrote in Pattern Recognition.
This is, of course, but one connection amongst a sea, nay ocean, of the fundamental interconnectedness that is the universe. Or, as The Slush Pile Project video states, The Writerverse. This is becoming a thing. It's so totally a thing. But back to topic. So yeah, one of many connections in The Writerverse.
So this is kind of a response to my friend's video, to the notions presented about the loneliness of writing and importance of a community (aka, The Writerverse. You got that now? Writerverse? Good). So I'm going to take you all on a journey. I'm going to tell you where all this random crap started. I'm taking you back...to 2004.
It was around here that I twigged. I'd been writing stories, mostly only when they were assignments in school, for years. I loved it, I always had. Every chance I had, I would write a story...sometimes, I would stretch the assignment details to their very limits to write what I wanted to. Once though, my imagination in one assignment culminated in an interesting result - when I was in Year 6 of Junior School (this would've been around 1999-2000), a student teacher taking our class assignment as a creative writing task. She gave each table of students one picture and a back story on what was happening in that picture and they had to write the rest. She came to me, gave me the picture - one I remember vividly to this day. Back then, I didn't get it, but now, seeing it clearly, it was a pair of Israeli riot police and their van. Anyway, she gave me this picture and said "I'm not going to tell you what happened here, you've got such a good imagination I'll let you make up whatever you want."
That kind of faith in my imagination was exactly the kind of thing I needed and over the following years, I found myself writing more and more little stories at home. But something changed, something twisted in 2004. I can't quite tell you what it was, but I know the story that changed everything. It was 15-page short story, entitled The Fallen Angel. It was the first ever story I set on Mars. The year was 2207. The setting was the city of New Seattle, on a terraformed Mars, the main character was Angel O'Neal, a contract assassin.
From here, my writing, my ambitious imagination, it grew and grew. And I had my first taste of The Writerverse, of being a part of a community. I was part of a fan forum for the TV show 24, called 24Natic. Here, in the fan fiction section of the board, I posted my stories - one long, 24-related project and many, many others, completely non-24 related. Original works of mine. People liked them, commented to that effect. The first time my work was truly nurtured by a community. We may have only been fans, occasional dabblers in a spot of fiction about the show we loved, but it didn't make us any less part of The Writerverse, giving each other feedback on our work.
Time-jump to 2007. One of the biggest years of my life. Love and loss, moving away from home, university. It was the first step into a brave new part of The Writerverse. Suddenly, on my course, I was surrounded by like-minds, fellow travellers on this long and treacherous road we weave through The Writerverse, where road metaphors can suddenly give way to faster-than-light travel metaphors, dinosaurs or dragons, depending on whose company you were in.
We were, suffice it to say, an eclectic mix. You had your literary fiction types, people who seemed to be aiming with a massively ambitious cannon at some far away zeitgeist idea they wanted to be the pioneer of. You had your genre fiction people - those who loved certain times in history, or like me, people who loved imagining times to come, visions of what humanity could become in a few centuries' time. And together, we supported each other.
In the three years I studied Creative Writing, my writing grew leaps and bounds. I can honestly say that while I may have been a good writer when I was in school, when I came out of university, I was so, so much better. And this was not only thanks to my amazing classmates, who told me what I was doing wrong, what I was doing right, and for the love of the gods, would I stop making a huge song and dance of how frakkin' hot that holographic girl is with those freaking angel wings! It was the tutors too - those who supported me and those who seemed determined to get me to write anything but sci-fi. Especially the latter bunch in fact. They forged me, put me through a fire, challenged me and made me come out swinging. I'm still a sci-fi writer, they failed to stop me from being that, but by gods I'm damn frakkin' gorram proud of being a sci-fi writer.
But honestly, one of the most important things, what The Slush Pile Project is trying to do, what it will frakkin' well succeed at doing, what really matters when you're a writer, is to have people around you, people to bounce your ideas off and point out things that don't make sense to them. Everything might make sense to you, but if you're the only person it's making sense to, then there's something really, really frakkin' wrong here, kids. And it's that the community, those fellow writers flying around The Writerverse, who can help you.
So not only is this blog me talking about my origins as a writer, it's my unwavering declaration of solidarity and support for The Slush Pile Project. For The Writerverse. Watch the video. Heed the words. Seek out new writers and new imaginations. Boldly go where writers have gone before and where you can damn well make your mark. The Writerverse is ours, but we are most definitely not alone in it. We conquer it together.
Welcome to The Writerverse, children. It's a wonderful place to exist. We hope you enjoy your part in it.
(Song of the Mind: Dissolved Girl - Massive Attack)
But today, today is not a rant. No, lately I've found myself in this strange kind of equilibrium, a sense of acceptance of both things outside of my control and feelings that I have. However, today isn't about this either. No, today's random rambling (off to a very nonsensical start), is about something else entirely. It's about writing. Of a sort.
Okay, more than of a sort. See, today's ramble is inspired by this video, made by a dear friend and fellow writer. It was inspired by the very first lines of this video. Because, not only I am a writer, but - shock horror - I'm a big reader too. And I'll be honest, it sometimes really, really surprises me how many writers, how many big names, actually know each other personally. To put into some perspective, take William Gibson (American-born, Canadian-based) and Douglas Coupland (Canadian-born, Canadian-based). I've read pretty much everything Gibson's ever written, while I've only (so far) read jPod (brilliant book, also awesome short-lived TV show), but one of Coupland's many, many works. But it was in the acknowledgments of Gibson's novel Pattern Recognition that I learned that more connected these two authors than Canada. Apparently, coffee was consumed, high above Shinjuku, new perspectives on Tokyo shared that evidently affected what Gibson wrote in Pattern Recognition.
This is, of course, but one connection amongst a sea, nay ocean, of the fundamental interconnectedness that is the universe. Or, as The Slush Pile Project video states, The Writerverse. This is becoming a thing. It's so totally a thing. But back to topic. So yeah, one of many connections in The Writerverse.
So this is kind of a response to my friend's video, to the notions presented about the loneliness of writing and importance of a community (aka, The Writerverse. You got that now? Writerverse? Good). So I'm going to take you all on a journey. I'm going to tell you where all this random crap started. I'm taking you back...to 2004.
It was around here that I twigged. I'd been writing stories, mostly only when they were assignments in school, for years. I loved it, I always had. Every chance I had, I would write a story...sometimes, I would stretch the assignment details to their very limits to write what I wanted to. Once though, my imagination in one assignment culminated in an interesting result - when I was in Year 6 of Junior School (this would've been around 1999-2000), a student teacher taking our class assignment as a creative writing task. She gave each table of students one picture and a back story on what was happening in that picture and they had to write the rest. She came to me, gave me the picture - one I remember vividly to this day. Back then, I didn't get it, but now, seeing it clearly, it was a pair of Israeli riot police and their van. Anyway, she gave me this picture and said "I'm not going to tell you what happened here, you've got such a good imagination I'll let you make up whatever you want."
That kind of faith in my imagination was exactly the kind of thing I needed and over the following years, I found myself writing more and more little stories at home. But something changed, something twisted in 2004. I can't quite tell you what it was, but I know the story that changed everything. It was 15-page short story, entitled The Fallen Angel. It was the first ever story I set on Mars. The year was 2207. The setting was the city of New Seattle, on a terraformed Mars, the main character was Angel O'Neal, a contract assassin.
From here, my writing, my ambitious imagination, it grew and grew. And I had my first taste of The Writerverse, of being a part of a community. I was part of a fan forum for the TV show 24, called 24Natic. Here, in the fan fiction section of the board, I posted my stories - one long, 24-related project and many, many others, completely non-24 related. Original works of mine. People liked them, commented to that effect. The first time my work was truly nurtured by a community. We may have only been fans, occasional dabblers in a spot of fiction about the show we loved, but it didn't make us any less part of The Writerverse, giving each other feedback on our work.
Time-jump to 2007. One of the biggest years of my life. Love and loss, moving away from home, university. It was the first step into a brave new part of The Writerverse. Suddenly, on my course, I was surrounded by like-minds, fellow travellers on this long and treacherous road we weave through The Writerverse, where road metaphors can suddenly give way to faster-than-light travel metaphors, dinosaurs or dragons, depending on whose company you were in.
We were, suffice it to say, an eclectic mix. You had your literary fiction types, people who seemed to be aiming with a massively ambitious cannon at some far away zeitgeist idea they wanted to be the pioneer of. You had your genre fiction people - those who loved certain times in history, or like me, people who loved imagining times to come, visions of what humanity could become in a few centuries' time. And together, we supported each other.
In the three years I studied Creative Writing, my writing grew leaps and bounds. I can honestly say that while I may have been a good writer when I was in school, when I came out of university, I was so, so much better. And this was not only thanks to my amazing classmates, who told me what I was doing wrong, what I was doing right, and for the love of the gods, would I stop making a huge song and dance of how frakkin' hot that holographic girl is with those freaking angel wings! It was the tutors too - those who supported me and those who seemed determined to get me to write anything but sci-fi. Especially the latter bunch in fact. They forged me, put me through a fire, challenged me and made me come out swinging. I'm still a sci-fi writer, they failed to stop me from being that, but by gods I'm damn frakkin' gorram proud of being a sci-fi writer.
But honestly, one of the most important things, what The Slush Pile Project is trying to do, what it will frakkin' well succeed at doing, what really matters when you're a writer, is to have people around you, people to bounce your ideas off and point out things that don't make sense to them. Everything might make sense to you, but if you're the only person it's making sense to, then there's something really, really frakkin' wrong here, kids. And it's that the community, those fellow writers flying around The Writerverse, who can help you.
So not only is this blog me talking about my origins as a writer, it's my unwavering declaration of solidarity and support for The Slush Pile Project. For The Writerverse. Watch the video. Heed the words. Seek out new writers and new imaginations. Boldly go where writers have gone before and where you can damn well make your mark. The Writerverse is ours, but we are most definitely not alone in it. We conquer it together.
Welcome to The Writerverse, children. It's a wonderful place to exist. We hope you enjoy your part in it.
(Song of the Mind: Dissolved Girl - Massive Attack)
Saturday, 2 June 2012
Sitting Under the Shade of the Tree: The Man in the High Castle
Slowly but surely, my massive stack of reading material is going down. I don't think I've mentioned it before, but, well, I have quite the stack of books to get through. My burning desire to get through them quickly stems from the impending arrival, in July (barring any further delays to release), of the boxset of Volumes 1-5 of the Song of Ice and Fire series (in paperback). That's a nice stack of seven books. And I want to read my hardcover, signed copy of A Clash of Kings before the boxset arrives. So, mission to get through my stack of reading.
Now, the other day (/a week or two ago), I treated you all to my thoughts and feelings on Perdido Street Station, the largest book in my reading stack. Since then I demolished a James Ellroy novel (not to be reviewed here, alas, but maybe one day) and, not ten minutes ago, I finished The Man in the High Castle by Philip K. Dick.
I'll admit, I've only read one Philip K. Dick book before - Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? And it weirded me out a little. So maybe I was a little hesitant in picking up another Philip K. Dick novel. But numerous friends kept on telling me of the brilliance of The Man in the High Castle, so whenever I wandered into my local bookstore and had a browse, I picked up The Man in the High Castle, read the blurb, flicked it open and gave the first page or two a little read. Eventually, I caved - but mostly on account of the cover, a neat little hardback number in Gollancz's SF Masterworks series. And finally, on Wednesday morning while on the train to Reading to visit my friend Thief, I finally sat down to read the book properly.
So, to those uninitiated, The Man in the High Castle is set around the 1960s, (I imagine 1962, when the book was published), in a world where Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan won World War II. The United States is pretty much in three parts - the Pacific States of America, administrated by Japan, the Rocky Mountain States in the middle, with the Nazi-controlled puppet state of the United States existing on the East Coast. In the Rocky Mountain States is the eponymous "Man in the High Castle", an author of a work of fiction banned by the Reich in all its territories, but popular in the PSA - a work of fiction that describes a world where Germany and Japan were on the losing side of the war.
I have to say, the world-within-a-world idea of the book being about a book that pretty much describes our world was what hooked me. I was intrigued by the post-war world that Dick described - the parallel between what happened here in reality and what is happening there in fiction. Instead of Europe being the buffer zone between the superpowers of the United States and the Soviet Union, the Rocky Mountain States are the buffer between the Empire of Japan and Nazi Germany, as their former allegiance drifts apart and a Cold War scenario emerges.
Now, as I mentioned earlier, my first experience with Philip K. Dick weirded me out. Just as I imagine that sentence could in the wrong contexts, but moving on. The Man in the High Castle, while not exactly any less weird, was a different kind of weird. An extremely enjoyable kind of weird. Dick brilliantly draws together the characters, painting a broad, strange portrait of American life under Japanese rule (we only ever get to see events in San Francisco and the Rocky Mountain States - the puppet USA is mentioned, as are various political intrigues in Germany), all drifting around their daily lives and somehow becoming entangled by the book within the book. Some more so than others.
I'm reaching that awkward point of wanting to say more, but not wanting to spoil the plot. This is about where I wrap things up. My friends, for all their pestering about this book, can sit smugly knowing that they were right. I thoroughly enjoyed it and it is well, well worth reading. It's a quiet little book, not one that goes around blowing things up and screaming your face, it just gently nudges you, draws you in and makes sure you can't put it down and have to read it in four days.
Now, on to the rest of my book pile...
Now, the other day (/a week or two ago), I treated you all to my thoughts and feelings on Perdido Street Station, the largest book in my reading stack. Since then I demolished a James Ellroy novel (not to be reviewed here, alas, but maybe one day) and, not ten minutes ago, I finished The Man in the High Castle by Philip K. Dick.
I'll admit, I've only read one Philip K. Dick book before - Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? And it weirded me out a little. So maybe I was a little hesitant in picking up another Philip K. Dick novel. But numerous friends kept on telling me of the brilliance of The Man in the High Castle, so whenever I wandered into my local bookstore and had a browse, I picked up The Man in the High Castle, read the blurb, flicked it open and gave the first page or two a little read. Eventually, I caved - but mostly on account of the cover, a neat little hardback number in Gollancz's SF Masterworks series. And finally, on Wednesday morning while on the train to Reading to visit my friend Thief, I finally sat down to read the book properly.
So, to those uninitiated, The Man in the High Castle is set around the 1960s, (I imagine 1962, when the book was published), in a world where Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan won World War II. The United States is pretty much in three parts - the Pacific States of America, administrated by Japan, the Rocky Mountain States in the middle, with the Nazi-controlled puppet state of the United States existing on the East Coast. In the Rocky Mountain States is the eponymous "Man in the High Castle", an author of a work of fiction banned by the Reich in all its territories, but popular in the PSA - a work of fiction that describes a world where Germany and Japan were on the losing side of the war.
I have to say, the world-within-a-world idea of the book being about a book that pretty much describes our world was what hooked me. I was intrigued by the post-war world that Dick described - the parallel between what happened here in reality and what is happening there in fiction. Instead of Europe being the buffer zone between the superpowers of the United States and the Soviet Union, the Rocky Mountain States are the buffer between the Empire of Japan and Nazi Germany, as their former allegiance drifts apart and a Cold War scenario emerges.
Now, as I mentioned earlier, my first experience with Philip K. Dick weirded me out. Just as I imagine that sentence could in the wrong contexts, but moving on. The Man in the High Castle, while not exactly any less weird, was a different kind of weird. An extremely enjoyable kind of weird. Dick brilliantly draws together the characters, painting a broad, strange portrait of American life under Japanese rule (we only ever get to see events in San Francisco and the Rocky Mountain States - the puppet USA is mentioned, as are various political intrigues in Germany), all drifting around their daily lives and somehow becoming entangled by the book within the book. Some more so than others.
I'm reaching that awkward point of wanting to say more, but not wanting to spoil the plot. This is about where I wrap things up. My friends, for all their pestering about this book, can sit smugly knowing that they were right. I thoroughly enjoyed it and it is well, well worth reading. It's a quiet little book, not one that goes around blowing things up and screaming your face, it just gently nudges you, draws you in and makes sure you can't put it down and have to read it in four days.
Now, on to the rest of my book pile...
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)