Neverwhere was my introduction to Neil Gaiman, and while I think he’s certainly topped it over the years, it’s still a book I have a lot of love for – I still remember experiencing its delightful blend of dark fantasy and urban myth, of magical realism and quiet horror, of wry wit and true wonder, and just being in love from the earliest pages. It’s been more than 20 years since I read it (though I did enjoy the BBC Radio adaptation a few years ago), and I’m delighted to find that it holds up every bit as well now as it did then. Oh, I can see some of the seeds and inspirations a little more clearly – how Richard is so clearly inspired by Arthur Dent, for example – and you can see so many of Gaiman’s loves and areas of interest in their earliest forms. But really, to read Neverwhere is to get lost in its hidden London and its cast of characters – the unsettling and darkly funny duo of Croup and Vandermar, the enigmatic angel Islington, the lady Door, the swaggering Marquis, the endearing Old Bailey – to say nothing of its compelling, slightly surreal yet wholly coherent world, full of labyrinths, living darkness, vibrant markets, arcane rituals, and more. Gaiman has written better books since Neverwhere, to be sure, but it’s a book that lives up to my initial reactions even after all this time – it’s funny, scary, evocative, imaginative, and just not really like much else out there, and to fall back into its world for a while was a joy. (Side note: I read the “preferred text” for this reading, which seems to involve some heavy revisions, including some blending of the US and UK versions of the book. I didn’t notice any changes, really, but it has been a long time since I read the book; regardless, if you’re getting it now, I see no reason why this wouldn’t be the version you get.) Rating: **** 1/2
A (no longer available, apparently) collection of Arthur C. Clarke’s short stories spanning the later years of his career – largely from the late 60s to the 90s – A Meeting with Medusa shows Clarke moving away from some of the pulpier, punchier tales of his younger years, all while never sacrificing the imagination and originality he could be counted on to deliver. The title novella, for instance, follows an explorer as he dives into the atmosphere of Jupiter, discovering new life forms and a foreign world along the way in a way that evokes the utterly alien perfectly (thus feeling a bit like a dry run for the masterful Rendezvous with Rama). Stories like “Herbert George Morley Roberts Wells” and “The Longest Science-Fiction Story Ever Told” find him experimenting with metastorytelling in fun, weird ways, while “The Wind from the Sun” shows how he could still come up with a simple concept – what if a boat race, but in space? – and spin an incredible tale out of it. And as he ages, you can see Clarke finding increasing confidence to use his tales as a way to comment directly on the world, from the clever reversals of “Reunion” and “The Last Command” to the cynical and frustrated “Improving the Neighborhood.” And then there are the ridiculous ones, most notably the shaggy dog story “Neutron Tide,” which is a gloriously convoluted buildup that made me laugh out loud. It’s a reminder that even in his later years, Clarke was a master; while nothing here is as iconic as “The Star” or “The Nine Billion Names of God,” the collection is still consistently great and imaginative, feeling like the work of someone who shaped the genre. Rating: ****
Maybe it’s the freshness in my mind of the recent (and outstanding) film adaptation; maybe it’s just that I’m many (many) years older; maybe it’s the way that fantasy has evolved since it was published (and in response to it). But whatever the case, even though I remembered Frank Herbert’s Dune being a dense, difficult read, that turned out not to be the case as I revisited the world of Arrakis after a good thirty years. Indeed, you can see some of Herbert’s pulpier edges here and there – some florid plotting, some big dramatic characters – all grounding the massive scope of the book and Herbert’s quite frankly astonishing imagination in things that we can latch on to and understand. There’s little need to revisit the plot here, especially thanks to Villeneuve’s adaptations (which only impressed me more after this re-read, as I could see the ways in which he changed the source material to make it work as a film while never betraying its spirit); what I will say is that I was so much more acutely aware this time of the way that Herbert is viciously critiquing so much of the modern world – the exploitation of the middle east, the use of religion as a way to gain power, the scheming of those in control to keep the profits for themselves – and just how deeply cynical the book is. Even without the knowledge of where the series goes from here (and Dune Messiah is on my upcoming list), it’s evident that Paul is never intended to be a wholly noble hero; indeed, no one in Dune comes out looking particularly good, with the compromises needed to keep power and the willingness to sacrifice others being so key to the methods of “winning” here that they’re undeniable. The other thing you forget, though, is how willing Dune was to just be wonderfully weird, especially in the second half of the story, and it’s where the book really shines; without that, you’d have a powerful but a little stiff exploration of power and exploitation of native populations, but with it, you get this fascinating science fiction epic that feels still pretty sui generis after all this time, even though it’s impossible to read it and not think “oh, there is so much sci-fi and fantasy that wouldn’t exist without this.” It’s got its flaws – some clunky dialogue, a few iffy pieces of characterization – but generally, they’re minor and pale in the face of just what Herbert is going for – and what he largely accomplished. Rating: *****
Paul Tremblay has become known for his complex, meta horror novels like A Head Full of Ghosts and The Pallbearer’s Club – books that deliver a horror tale while also constantly questioning the limits and expectations of the genre, and often moving away from reliable narrators into realms of ambiguity and uncertainty. His newest book, the upcoming Horror Movie, doesn’t go quite as far into meta games as Ghosts or Club, but it’s a similarly complex tale that interrogates the “cursed film” genre, all while also thinking about the undercurrents of slasher and horror films, the complexities of art, and people’s desire for the forbidden and the unknown. In its broadest terms, Horror Movie is the story of a remake of a cult horror film that was never released in full; instead, based off of three leaked scenes, a screenplay, and the lore around the filming, a remake that seeks to fully recreate the film has been launched, and the film’s one surviving cast member narrates both the story of the remake and the original film, all intercut with that original screenplay. In some ways, it’s less heady and complex than Tremblay’s densest work (probably Ghosts), but that in no way makes it less heady and stimulating; rather than play with the standard slasher narrative (ground that’s been tread a lot lately, even in good ways), Tremblay plunges into horror as an expression of inner pain and trauma, thinking about how it reflects the unease of the outcast or the violence that all of us are capable of. The end result is a strange little book, one that’s hard to pin down; one moment, you’re getting what feels like pretty thinly veiled satire of Tremblay’s own Hollywood experience, and the next, you’re dealing with an angry conversation between a demanding fan and a horror “icon.” Sometimes, the screenplay is pure and utter horror; other times, it becomes painfully honest and devastating, revealing a broken soul whose art is an expression of her own turmoil. It all builds up to one of the more nightmarish endings that Tremblay has ever put on the page; whereas a lot of his books are constant unease and horror throughout, Horror Movie takes its time, slowly getting under your skin and unraveling things bit by bit until…well, you’ll see. Tremblay’s last couple of books – Survivor Song and Pallbearer – have been enjoyable but lesser, in my mind, than his earlier work, but Horror Movie feels like a return to form: a smart, insightful dive into horror that toys with the audience, asks them to question the genre they’re in, but still delivers the goods and then some. Rating: **** ½
When I revisited Dune, I found the book more accessible and less complex than I remembered, and I wondered how much of that I could simply chalk up to age (and the familiarity that came from the film). But now that I’ve read Dune Messiah? Oh, there’s the complexity, weirdness, and density. In less than half the length of the original novel, Herbert delivers a truly subversive sequel that transforms the context and impact of its predecessor, giving us a book that turns Paul from a hero to a tyrant, turns a rebellion into a religious crusade, questions the nature of seeing the future, and so much more. And that doesn’t even get into the oddness of the book itself, in which most of the major events happen off-page entirely, a conspiracy turns out to be about something wholly else than we think, a character returns from the dead in a bizarre way that only deepens the weirdness, and characters’ actions can be maddeningly opaque. That all of this happens in such a lean volume is kind of fascinating; it’s hard to think of another sequel that is this interested in completely revising the impact and meaning of its predecessor, changing the story from a heroic one to a tragic tale of the corruption of power. Dune Messiah isn’t quite as solid as its predecessor, and part of that undeniably comes from the short length; there is a lot going on here, and Herbert’s abbreviating of context and characters can lead to things being confusing even before we learn that most of the major events of the book happened between the volumes or even between the chapters. But it feels like a logical next step from the conclusion of Dune, and thematically/morally/emotionally, it’s a fascinating way to keep the saga going in a way that reveals how little Herbert was really interested in the “white savior” archetype; instead, what he’s given is a cautionary tale of the danger of such tropes, as well as a vicious allegory for the corruption of wealth, power, and control that rears its head in human nature – especially in a certain region of the world dense with oil – all done with an intent that transforms the previous book in compelling ways. Rating: **** ½
I’ll say up front that I think any of my feelings about The Complete Western Stories of Elmore Leonard are more about the genre than the stories themselves. Collection of thirty Western stories from early in Leonard’s career – most of them date from the 50s – the collection is a great glimpse into an author who started to find more and more of his own voice as he went, slowly evolving from more formulaic tales (the kind of formulas necessitated by the medium of pulp western magazines) into something that’s a little closer to who Leonard would become, with a little more focus on dialogue and character and less on plot. But that transition is small at best, penned in by the expectations that would let you get published, and no matter how well done the stories are – and they’re generally solid! – there’s just not a ton here that works for me. Is that a fault of the stories? Absolutely not…but I guess I was hoping for more Leonard and less western, if that makes sense, and instead I got pure pulp western stories. Taken one or two at a time, they’re fine – and there are even some really good ones here – but doing thirty in a row, it tends to get a little old. I think this is a great collection for those who love the genre, but if you’re wanting Leonard work and not pulp westerns, I’d say look elsewhere. Rating: **** (quality) / ** ½ (personal enjoyment)
By the time I finished Dune Messiah, I was starting to remember just how complex and challenging Herbert’s series could be, but Children of Dune still feels like another step up in terms of difficulty and density, throwing us into a world of adults in 9-year-old bodies, warring prophecies, religious reform, tyranny and violence, and a whole lot more – but with a lot of things happening off screen still, a lot of characters hiding their motivations, a lot of ideas unexplained, and the plot beyond complex, with schemes within schemes within bluffs within feints. All of which could be manageable, if frustrating (I read and reread the Preacher’s messages multiple times, trying to parse their complex ideas, and still am not sure I followed it all), if Herbert had simply given us anyone to hang onto. With Dune, we had Paul, who was forced into dealing with his destiny and unspeakable choices, and while he was becoming harder and less approachable in Messiah, his regrets for what happened and efforts to ameliorate the damages still gave readers something to latch onto. But by the time we get to Children of Dune, there’s not a recognizably “human” character in our story, and the result is a book so full of ideas and philosophy that it forgets to give us anyone to like. The children are utterly alien and off-putting, Duncan is a walking computer, Alia is a monster, and Jessica…well, she’s still a Bene Gesserit, isn’t she? And all of that is before things start getting very weird towards the end, setting up the insanity of later books. But I think it’s here that I’m tapping out from my reread; I can admire the density of Herbert’s vision, and the nuance that he brings to all of the factions and power plays and groups, but ultimately Children of Dune feels like a book for mentats, not for people – it’s all ideas and cold machinations, with no humanity left for us to care about. Rating: *** ½
In the broadest terms, a book is about the journey, not the destination, and in theory, a crappy ending shouldn’t really be able to undo all the goodwill that a book has generated. But I’d be lying if I didn’t say that the absolute fizzle of an ending to Lev Grossman’s Codex didn’t singlehandedly reduce a book that I had been enjoying to a complete misfire, one that felt like it was now a shaggy dog story that never really had a goal in mind. Until that final stretch, I was quite enjoying Codex, which is the story of a corporate finance guy who, for sort of unclear reasons (that frustratingly are one of many things that never get clarified), gets drafted to help organize the massive library of old and rare books owned by some British nobility – and more specifically, to keep an eye out for one missing book in particular. From there, Codex steers into the Da Vinci Code world, but done with a more interesting world and some more fascinating subject material as it looks at book preservation, a medieval author whose most famous book might not exist, hidden messages, and much more – all of which would be more satisfying if any of it had turned out to be going anywhere, really. And that’s the same with so many elements of the book, which kept me intrigued throughout – the role of a strange video game, the identity of an odd local character, the motivations of a young graduate student – in the hopes of seeing them all pay off. Instead, all of it just…doesn’t, as the book resolves with an absolute whimper that answers basically no questions even as it muddies the waters, and in doing so, retroactively undoes some of the good of the rest of the book by making it less sensible and logical. It’s frustrating, because Codex had been a quite enjoyable and fun read up until that final stretch, with some great moments and a truly compelling-sounding MacGuffin; that ending, though, is just so catastrophically non-existent that I can’t help but warn you off of a good journey to get there. Rating: ** ½
John M. Ford is a “writer’s writer” – a relatively obscure writer who is beloved by many in the industry, including Robert Jordan (who basically thought of Ford as a brother) and Neil Gaiman, but whose books fell out of print until a Slate investigation into his work brought them back onto the market and to my attention. I loved my first exposure to Ford, his inimitable The Dragon Waiting, and it’s really thanks to how good that is that I even debated picking up The Final Reflection, a Star Trek tie-in novel – after all, when you think of books like that, you tend to think of enjoyable pulp at best, and that’s if you’re already a fan – and I am a casual fan of Trek, but not much more. But instead of a simple job-for-hire, Ford did something remarkable: he took his assignment and instead wrote a book entirely from the Klingon perspective for the first time in the series’ history (the book predates The Next Generation as well as any of the films which started to offer a more nuanced view on the “evil” Klingons), immersing us in their culture, their language, their honor codes, and so much more. Indeed, this is only a Star Trek novel in the loosest sense, with the main cast of the series relegated to two pages of the book (the prologue), and the rest to a young orphan who finds himself climbing military ranks and befriending an academic with a desire to heal the rift between the Federation and the Klingons. The Final Reflection isn’t just good “because it’s a tie-in book”; instead, he gives you about as good a piece of science-fiction as I’ve read in a long time, wholly creating a civilization from his imagination and immersing us in a world that feels entirely consistent and yet wholly unlike ours, with a focus on war, growth, dominance, and honor that explains so much and keeps the Klingons from ever being “villains” in any sense of the word. You can look at the influence The Final Reflection had if you like – parts of it became canonized over time, and much of it influenced the way the series began to depict the Klingons – but even if you don’t care about any of that, to read The Final Reflection is to read a legitimately great story about what our civilizations ask of us, about the gap between our duty and our morality, about how our legacies are defined, and about how our culture makes us see the world. Don’t let the humble trappings fool you like they did me; what I expected was a Star Trek novel with some hints of Ford’s brilliance, but what I got was a Ford novel that happened to be a Star Trek tale, and I hope others can get past assumptions to see what’s inside. Rating: *****
As much as I love Terry Pratchett’s work in general, I’ve always found that the Discworld books really were his masterpiece; while I’ve yet to read anything bad by the man, I’ve often felt like his non-Discworld books are good but never as good, if that makes sense. Which is one reason I’ve been putting off reading The Long Earth for as long as I had; I love Pratchett, but a) he has a co-writer here (which, sure, there was Good Omens, but Stephen Baxter, who may be perfectly fine, is not Neil Gaiman), and b) the idea of Pratchett writing a science-fiction epic wasn’t something that felt like it be able to work within Pratchett’s wheelhouse. And while I’ll say that part of my judgment stands true – that it can’t help but feel lesser than Discworld – I will admit that The Long Earth feels more Pratchett-esque than I assumed, with a sense of richness and imagination that shines through, a loose structure that reveals itself to be more disciplined than I assumed, and a fascinating enough idea at its core to see me through the sense that, one book into this five-book series, I’m not entirely sure what it’s all about. But, to back up to the basic premise: The Long Earth is set in a world where humanity has realized that alternate worlds stretch out around us, almost as far as we can imagine – and that you can travel between them, “stepping” from one world to the next with the assistance of an odd device whose plans were released onto the internet. Pratchett and Baxter are interested both in the social ramifications of this – the exploring of a new frontier, the collapse of gold as a valuable commodity, the stratification of society – but also in the environmental ones, as the book dives into millions of worlds and imagines what might be if evolution was ever so slightly different. The authors give us a pair of intriguing characters to work with – Joshua, a loner who has the natural ability to “step” without the device; and Lobsang, an AI who might be the reincarnation of a Tibetan mechanic, or might just be a very clever self-aware intelligence – and their exploring of the worlds and the wonders and oddness they find along the way is compelling. The issue, really, is that so far, The Long Earth isn’t really about anything other than that wonder and exploration; it feels like a pilot to see if the world can work, but little of note happens in it until near the end, and even that is a bit cryptic in terms of its larger meaning. Still, I enjoyed the read, which was breezier and lighter than I expected, and I plan on checking out at least the next book in the series; while it’s no Discworld, that doesn’t make it less of a fun time so far and any less of an enjoyable read. Rating: ****
Umney's Alley 