Greg Bear (1951-2022)

Just heard that the science-fiction writer Greg Bear had passed away. I read [a French translation of] Blood Music in 1985 or 1986, and while I did not like the second half so much, I remember being impressed by the originality of the story when compared with classics like Asimov’s Foundation trilogy. (Little did I know that Bear would later contribute to the Foundation corpus by Foundation and Chaos, which I have not read to this day.) Later, much later, I read Hull Zero Three, again an original (if space-operatic) book, and Darwin’s Radio, which remains one of my favourite books in science fiction, if only because it is deeply grounded into science. Followed by Darwin’s Children this very summer. (I may have read Moving Mars as the story synopsis sounds familiar, but I am unsure…) A great writer, to whom I am grateful for all the gripping time spent on his page-turning books!

a desolation called peace [book review]

This book by Arkady Martine is a sequel to the Hugo Awarded Memory called Empire, which I appreciated, pverall. I also did enjoy this one, no matter how different the settings are.

“The statistical chance of imago-integration failure leading to irreversible psychological and/or neurological damage is 0.3%”

Indeed, this second (and last?) volume is much more space-opera-esque in that most of the action takes place on a spatial fleet trying to fight an incomprehensible and invading alien force (whose mindset is rendered through an initially obscure chapter!). And subject to internal tensions, despite its military hierarchical structure. While the attempts at communicating with this unknown enemy are central to the story, they echo the main theme of the Teixcalaanli series (duology?), which is on how to reach the delicate balance between complete assimilation into a rich and fascinating culture and isolationism in order to preserve one’s original culture and way of life, doubled by the dilemmas caused by falling in love with someone from this other culture. (This may be the strongest aspect of the novel.) The related theme is the opposition between collective and individualistic societies, even though power competition is described in both the Teixcalaanli and the space station societies. (All three groups have achieved a way to operate as a collective. I actually wondered whether the “desolation” in the title was itself an intended collective, as in a murder of crows, esp. since a major character is nicknamed Swarm, but I could not find this collective ever being used.) It brought back some memories of Ender’s Game, in the sense of facing a radically different but still sapient species and backing away from complete annihilation. (The futuristic component of the book is as sketchy as in the previous one, with USB sticks being carried by spaceships as the only way to communicate, for no clear reason… But this is far from being of importance.) As an aside, the author linked her Teixcalaanli construct with the Mixtec civilisation, from Oaxaca.

the Galaxy and the ground within [book review]

This book is a standalone sequel to Becky Chambers’ Wayfarer trilogy. Where strangers find themselves stranded in the same spot for days and start sharing and relativising their differences. If on a useless rock in the middle of the Universe rather than in a snowed-in Yorkshire pub! But the science-fiction aspects become quickly irrelevant, except for enlarging the initial specific (as in species) differences between the five (non-human) antagonists. On the one hand, this book is a rather conventional, caricaturesque, care-bear, feel-good, rosy, cocoonesque story… On the other, it is a more profound and humanist fable on the fact that we are more alike than we are unalike. Actually, the book reads better as a fable than as a novel as the story is almost inexistent and the characters too perfect to be anything but shells (and literally so for some of them) for their awakening to the others. Perfect mind-candy for a bleak day!

Jean-Claude Mézières (1938-2022)

Harrow the Ninth [book review]

After rushing through the fabulous Gideon the Ninth over a weekend, I attacked the second volume of the Locked Tomb trilogy, Harrow the Ninth, with much enthusiasm! But then very quickly hit a (tomb) wall as the story did not seem to make much sense, although I remembered quite vividly (or sepulchrally!) the previous volume and this one involved some of the earlier characters plus some, including God (also called John). The character seemed to change radically from one chapter to the next and sounded mostly insane. While the writing style was great and kept a tiny fraction of the earlier, I kept plodding on a few pages at a time, until the Season break, when I spent a day in front of the fireplace and finished the volume in one go. As it started making some sense after circa page 400…. This is such a weird book, even when considering the unusual mix of necromancers and space opera, horror novel and thriller, teenage love and immortal lust, dealing with trauma and holding bone magic, having tea and biscuit with God John and living full time with a ghost! The main character Harrow or Harry appears to be insane and the writing is trying to reflect this impression while making her definitely compelling and attractive.

“It is wickedly challenging to read, deliberately impossible to comprehend in full and, frankly, I still feel like I only got about 80% of what actually happened. But there’s just something so gorgeously Baroque about it all.”

Some readers complained that they understood less than 80% of the book, but I am rather leaning towards 30%. And still I find the book quite compelling, if less funny than the first volume. )And too much of a space opera.) I may have to read it anew, though. Even with the help of this great NPR review.