Reading Wednesday 28/06
Jun. 28th, 2017 01:42 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
livRecently read: Too like the lightning by Ada Palmer. I borrowed jack's copy to read this for the Hugos. It's thinky and original, but also rather unpleasant.
I expected to like Too like the lightning a lot. I was intrigued by the hype, and lots of people whose taste I trust were enthusiastic, and I really like Palmer's non-fiction. As it is, I did like some things about the book quite a lot, and felt motivated to keep reading, but also felt considerably repelled and annoyed by it.
It's partly that I'm a hard sell on unlikeable narrators, and Mycroft really is just awful. Not quite Thomas Covenant levels of awful, but extremely unpleasant. I mean, a lot of the plot hinges on him being an (ex) criminal, and we don't learn until about two thirds of the way through exactly what terrible things he did, but even before that I couldn't stand him. He hectors the reader, and manipulates people for dubious ends, and is constantly prurient and can't stop rambling on about his gross sexual fantasies about everybody he meets, including children. I have rarely read a female-authored book so unremittingly male-gazey. I can sort of buy that as part of character creation, and there are lots of other cues that Mycroft is supposed to be an unreliable narrator, but it's far from uplifting to read.
I stuck with it because the world-building is fascinating. I've always dreamed of a world without geography, and TLTL explores a utopia where geography has been abolished by high speed transport. People live in chosen families called bash', and voluntarily affiliate to global groups that suit their mindset, some of which are based on former nations or conglomerates of nations. The most powerful of these form Hives which effectively rule the world between them. I was very interested in the political intrigue between these different Hives and the exploration of the system where everybody chooses their own affiliations and even which laws they follow, rather than just being born into a particular position. I was intrigued by the conceit that, in order to make this work, religious groups are very strictly suppressed though concessions are made for strictly private spirituality. I really wish the story could have been told from just about any point of view other than that of dreadful Mycroft; lots of the secondary characters are really interesting and many of them have nearly as much high level access as he does.
People had warned me that book one of the quartet isn't really a complete story but the first half of a two-volume doorstop. I didn't actually feel too dissatisfied by the not very conclusive ending; there's a partial resolution to the plot hook mystery, and some of Mycroft's backstory, and information about how the ruling classes actually operate while some new mysteries are introduced as well as leaving some open. But I did feel dissatisfied that some of the really cool worldbuilding and exploration of an original utopia gets sidetracked into kind of sophomoric speculation about the conflict between giving everybody free choice and the problem that some humans will use that choice to be cruel. And the device of the unreliable and unpleasant narrator made me question whether the whole thing was just an elaborate sexual fantasy on Mycroft's part, which is even more unsatisfying than 'it turns out it was all a dream'. Or at least his interpretation of everything is through the lens of his own perversions, which I really don't care about.
Even the plot about miracles doesn't work if you have to keep holding the possible interpretation that nobody can actually perform miracles, just Mycroft finds the idea of X character having divine powers hot. Mycroft finds a lot of stupid things hot, such as an exaggeratedly lechy idea of gender role complementarianism. I have a feeling this is supposed to be satire on how our real world society is warped by heteronormativity, but it's a satire that is quite hard to distinguish from fiction that is driven by the lowest common denominator fantasy of young straight men.
I won't be voting for this for the Hugo, though I wouldn't be horribly disappointed if it won. And I haven't quite decided whether I'm going to bother with the sequel.
Currently reading: All the birds in the sky by Charlie Jane Anders. Partly because it's Hugo nominated and partly cos several of my friends were enthusiastic about it. I'm a bit more than halfway through and finding it very readable and enjoyable. Patricia and Laurence are really well drawn as outcast characters and their interaction is great. It feels very Zeitgeisty, very carefully calculated to appeal to the current generation of geeks. The style is sort of magic realist, in that a bunch of completely weird fantasy-ish things happen and nobody much remarks on them. I find that sort of approach to magic a bit difficult to get on with, because it appears completely arbitrary what is possible and what isn't, so the plot seems a bit shapeless.
Up next: I'm a bit minded to pick up Dzur by Steven Brust, because I was enjoying the series but very slowly, and it's been really quite a few years since I made progress with it.
jack's copy to read this for the Hugos. It's thinky and original, but also rather unpleasant. I expected to like Too like the lightning a lot. I was intrigued by the hype, and lots of people whose taste I trust were enthusiastic, and I really like Palmer's non-fiction. As it is, I did like some things about the book quite a lot, and felt motivated to keep reading, but also felt considerably repelled and annoyed by it.
It's partly that I'm a hard sell on unlikeable narrators, and Mycroft really is just awful. Not quite Thomas Covenant levels of awful, but extremely unpleasant. I mean, a lot of the plot hinges on him being an (ex) criminal, and we don't learn until about two thirds of the way through exactly what terrible things he did, but even before that I couldn't stand him. He hectors the reader, and manipulates people for dubious ends, and is constantly prurient and can't stop rambling on about his gross sexual fantasies about everybody he meets, including children. I have rarely read a female-authored book so unremittingly male-gazey. I can sort of buy that as part of character creation, and there are lots of other cues that Mycroft is supposed to be an unreliable narrator, but it's far from uplifting to read.
I stuck with it because the world-building is fascinating. I've always dreamed of a world without geography, and TLTL explores a utopia where geography has been abolished by high speed transport. People live in chosen families called bash', and voluntarily affiliate to global groups that suit their mindset, some of which are based on former nations or conglomerates of nations. The most powerful of these form Hives which effectively rule the world between them. I was very interested in the political intrigue between these different Hives and the exploration of the system where everybody chooses their own affiliations and even which laws they follow, rather than just being born into a particular position. I was intrigued by the conceit that, in order to make this work, religious groups are very strictly suppressed though concessions are made for strictly private spirituality. I really wish the story could have been told from just about any point of view other than that of dreadful Mycroft; lots of the secondary characters are really interesting and many of them have nearly as much high level access as he does.
People had warned me that book one of the quartet isn't really a complete story but the first half of a two-volume doorstop. I didn't actually feel too dissatisfied by the not very conclusive ending; there's a partial resolution to the plot hook mystery, and some of Mycroft's backstory, and information about how the ruling classes actually operate while some new mysteries are introduced as well as leaving some open. But I did feel dissatisfied that some of the really cool worldbuilding and exploration of an original utopia gets sidetracked into kind of sophomoric speculation about the conflict between giving everybody free choice and the problem that some humans will use that choice to be cruel. And the device of the unreliable and unpleasant narrator made me question whether the whole thing was just an elaborate sexual fantasy on Mycroft's part, which is even more unsatisfying than 'it turns out it was all a dream'. Or at least his interpretation of everything is through the lens of his own perversions, which I really don't care about.
Even the plot about miracles doesn't work if you have to keep holding the possible interpretation that nobody can actually perform miracles, just Mycroft finds the idea of X character having divine powers hot. Mycroft finds a lot of stupid things hot, such as an exaggeratedly lechy idea of gender role complementarianism. I have a feeling this is supposed to be satire on how our real world society is warped by heteronormativity, but it's a satire that is quite hard to distinguish from fiction that is driven by the lowest common denominator fantasy of young straight men.
I won't be voting for this for the Hugo, though I wouldn't be horribly disappointed if it won. And I haven't quite decided whether I'm going to bother with the sequel.
Currently reading: All the birds in the sky by Charlie Jane Anders. Partly because it's Hugo nominated and partly cos several of my friends were enthusiastic about it. I'm a bit more than halfway through and finding it very readable and enjoyable. Patricia and Laurence are really well drawn as outcast characters and their interaction is great. It feels very Zeitgeisty, very carefully calculated to appeal to the current generation of geeks. The style is sort of magic realist, in that a bunch of completely weird fantasy-ish things happen and nobody much remarks on them. I find that sort of approach to magic a bit difficult to get on with, because it appears completely arbitrary what is possible and what isn't, so the plot seems a bit shapeless.
Up next: I'm a bit minded to pick up Dzur by Steven Brust, because I was enjoying the series but very slowly, and it's been really quite a few years since I made progress with it.
(no subject)
Date: 2017-06-28 01:20 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2017-06-28 01:35 pm (UTC)I feel it's trying to do *something* philosophical or clever or something, and I'm probably missing something, but what actually happened didn't make it seem optimistic I'm going to "get it" at some point.
I really liked the exploration of "what miracles can this boy do, what do we DO about that, what are the theological implications", I'm sad that just seemed to fade out.
I think I have Dzur in my collection, you're welcome to it if you want a print not electronic version. I have not enjoyed the last few as novels as much as I did when started the series, but I'm still really excited by the series as a whole.
(no subject)
Date: 2017-06-28 01:46 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2017-06-28 05:12 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2017-06-28 05:59 pm (UTC)I agree the miracle boy was interesting and maybe got a bit buried with all the political intrigue stuff. I think there's going to be more theology in book 2 after the set-up in the last couple of chapters, but still.
I am not sure whether the problem with the book is that I'm missing the subtle philosophical point, or whether the book only has an anvilicious and simplistic point when it's trying to be subtle. I think it might be a mixture of both, but anyway.
(no subject)
Date: 2017-06-28 06:08 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2017-06-28 06:34 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2017-06-29 12:13 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2017-06-29 03:16 am (UTC)I opened the first page of TLTL the other night and had to close it again, because I don't get why Palmer is so into the Enlightenment. I read the author's note about her wanting to "join the conversation"…of dudes…and I just am not into rehashing problematic things as a way of "satirizing" them. It is possible to do the sort of thing that Palmer is trying to do, I think, because Samuel R. Delany did it in Trouble on Triton. But unless you're Samuel R. Delany, I think people should not try.
(no subject)
Date: 2017-06-29 10:03 am (UTC)I would be especially interested in your take on Too like the lightning, given you actually have professional contact with men with criminal pasts and generally unsavoury views. So I am really curious how you get on with Mycroft. Plus I think you're likely to pick up lots of the historical and philosophical references.
(no subject)
Date: 2017-06-29 10:11 am (UTC)I would guess the reason Palmer likes the Enlightenment so much is that she's a professional historian of the Renaissance with a focus on history of knowledge. But it's so true that all the people she's in conversation with are Dead White Men. The book does try to acknowledge China and Japan as important geopolitical forces, but there aren't any actually Eastern thinkers mentioned, which is a big gap.
(no subject)
Date: 2017-06-29 06:17 pm (UTC)I'm glad of your review and the warning of an unlikeable narrator. I'm interested to find out now how I get on with Mycroft, too.
Apparently I was the only person to have a luke-warm reaction to All the Birds in the Sky? I didn't hate it, I don't think it's terrible or evil, but I just found it sort of... meh. ETA: Part of the problem may be my low interest in romance plots. ETA2: Also, on further reflection, I don't like the people the protagonists grow up to be all that much; I think they're meant to be loveably flawed? Also, I have some issues with the politics.