Book Review: The Genome by Sergei Lukyanenko

Pros: interesting & diverse characters, solid world-building, some thought provoking philosophy

Cons: several highly disturbing (though not graphic) scenes, Lolita style relationship

Five months after a devastating accident that physically cut him in half, Alexander Romanov is released from the hospital.  With little money and no plans, he encounters a young girl nearing her spesh metamorphosis and - due to the programming inherent in his pilot spesh - has to help her out.  He takes a job as a ship captain to help pay for the treatment she needs and, once she’s done her metamorphosis, assembles a crew for an unknown mission.

The book is split into three sections.  The first section introduces the characters, the second deals with the fallout of discovering their mission, and the third revolves around a mystery.  While I really enjoyed the first two parts, the third got irritating as two of the characters claim to have solved the mystery but refuse to explain what happened, presumably so the reader has time to put the clues together.  It felt artificial, though there is a reason given for their delay in the text.  The resolution was interesting as it referred back to several of the philosophical questions the book as a whole posed. 

The world-building in this book is solid.  There are four groups at play: 1. Natural, unmodified humans 2. Speshs, people whose parents decide before birth what specialized job their child should have, and are then genetically modified physically and psychologically to do the work and enjoy it.  3. Clones.  And 4. the Others, several alien races that have interactions with humans.  You’ll also encounter human politics, with a child Emperor, various religions (and religious extremism), numerous branches of racism, etc.  Different planets have different specialties, atmospheres, and customs, while travel between planets is done using hyper-tunnels and takes a surprisingly short amount of time.

For the most part I liked all the characters, at the beginning at least.  The captain’s a great POV character.  I love his demon tattoo (and what it does for him), and the way he analyses his world, questioning the way things are, even when he’s ok with the way things are.  Kim’s a great character, though I did have issues with her… relationship with the captain (and others, as her being 14 and having sex with people significantly older wasn’t something I’m comfortable with, even if the characters - for the most part - considered it normal, or at least, not unusual).  Her specializations made her self-assured, despite her lack of experience.  Janet was my favourite character until the half-way point when her upbringing came to the fore.  I liked that she’d taken charge of her life, getting several specializations and was willing to be a mentor for Kim.   

The one character I didn’t much like was Puck.  His antagonistic attitude and desire to prove that a natural human could be just as good as a spesh made him kind of irritating.  I did, however, appreciate that he was gay and that his being natural showed off the prejudices of his crewmates.

This is a book that makes you think, though some of the scenes that open the way to philosophical discussion are disturbing to say the least.  While nothing’s particularly graphic there are mentions of rape, slavery, and war.  I could easily see this being put on university reading lists and/or used for book clubs, as there are some very interesting essay and discussion topics brought up, particularly around genetic modifications and freedom.  So, for example, as disturbing as I found the hunting scene, I did appreciate the questions about class, ethics and humanity that the captain ruminated on that arose from it.

In addition to her relationships, I had a few issues with what happened to Kim at the end of the book (dealt with in the spoiler section).

I’m not sure I would want to read it again, but it was an interesting, if somewhat uncomfortable, book to read.

*** Spoilers***

I had a serious issue with one aspect of the ending, Kim’s rape by the murderer.  Apparently, based on a throw-away line by the geneticist, Alex determines that Kim has some sort of anti-rape mechanism that will help her incapacitate the murderer.  Ignoring the fact that this isn’t a deterrant, she has to be raped for this ‘ability’ to come into play, the fact that part of Alex’s plan depends on her being raped is horrific.  

I’m surprised that the detective would agree to sell a 14 year old girl a comatose body for unknown reasons.  She also seems pretty assured that her 2-3 days of employment entitle her to a decent severance package from her now bankrupt employer, and that the company will be able to pay it.

Shout-Out: Rudolph!: He is the Reason for the Season by Mark Teppo

We've got our first snowfall sticking to the ground here, and I'm thinking about Christmas.  Which means it's the perfect time to do a shout-out for Mark Teppo's newly released novel.

Rudolph! is a first-person account of the behind-the-scenes workings at the North Pole. Narrated by Bernard Rosewood, one of the elves of the North Pole Consortium, the story begins with Santa's realization that a young girl's request to get her dad back for Christmas isn't going to happen. Dad, you see, died in a car accident on a snowy road shortly after Thanksgiving. The NPC can do a lot, but they can't do miracles. Enter Rudolph, who has been hairless, cranky, and perpetually irradiated since the unfortunate malfunction of the Nuclear Clock in 1964. Rudolph is a survivor of the worst accident in the 400-plus years of NPC delivery, and if there is anyone on staff who believes in miracles more than jolly Saint Nick, it's Rudolph. Bernie, in a valiant effort to keep Christmas from going off the rails, is swept up into a Heaven-storming, Hell-crusading, Night of Bad Musical Numbers adventure to ensure that every child wakes up with presents on Christmas morning.

Rudolph! is a funny and fast-paced reaction to fifty years of world-weary cynicism, technological advances, and post-millennial ennui since Rankin/Bass brought a stop motion reindeer into our living rooms.

Space Scene Card

*** ETA  Whoops.  This is the problem with having 2 blogs, you sometimes forget to check which one you're posting on.  Luckily this post has an actual SF connection, so I'm leaving it up.  Card crafting is my biggest time sink after reading. ***

Since I posted a space card yesterday I figured I'd post another one today.  I made this card for a science fiction fan I know using Stampscape stamps and techniques.

I used a piece of glossy cardstock to stamp on, so I could blend the different inks.  I started off by stamping the astronaut, then I masked an area off to be the planet and stamped the satellite (so part of it would be behind the planet, making it look further away.

I stamped the astronaut and satellite again on scrap paper, which I fussy cut out and sprayed with repositional adhesive so I could use them as masks.

With the figures masked, I masked off the sky and started inking the planet using different shades of red and black.  I used a marker for the black spot.  I then masked the planet and sun and inked in my background space in shades of blue with black at the edges.

After removing the masks, I inked the sun and gave it an aura of yellow glitter glue and added some grey marker to the satellite and astronaut.  I then stamped in some meteorites to show that space isn't empty.

I mounted the card on black cardstock and added 2 mini spaceships die cut out of metallic cardstock.

Creature Feature: Yakka

In this column I talk about some of the more unusual fantasy creatures and/or creatures it would be cool to see in books.

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Yakka, or yakseya, are Sri Lankan demons.  They’re ruled by a king who forbade the killing of humans and so they curse them with diseases instead.  Yakka can assume the form of any animal, including humans and are appointed a specific time of day in which they can afflict someone who enters their domain (generally a dark, inhospitable place, like a cave, hollow tree, or abandoned building).

Exorcism is required to cure the victim, or the demon can be appeased with numerous prayers from the victim’s family.

Mask of the demon Maha Sohona Yakka from Ambalangoda Masks Museum (Sri Lanka). It is used in the Tovil healing ritual (the taming of the demons). - Photo by Jan Benda via Wiki Commons.

For a more specific example, the mask above is of Maha Sohona, which Wikipedia states: 

is a demon (yaka or yakseya) in Sinhalese folklore, who is said to haunt cemeteries. The name Maha Sohona means "great graveyard demon" or "demon of the cemetery" in the Sinhala language. It is one of the most feared demons in Sri Lanka. Originally a giant who had been defeated in a duel, Maha Sohona has had his head replaced with that of a bear since he lost his head in the duel. He is believed to kill people and afflict them with illnesses. Traditional exorcism rituals are performed to repel the demon in such cases. Sri Lanka Army's Long Range Reconnaissance Patrol units are popularly known as the "Maha Sohon Brigade", named after this demon.

I have to admit that the information I found on this creature is a bit contradictory depending on the source (I used the Encyclopedia of Things That Never Were (Michael Page & Robert Ingpen, p.84) and Wikipedia for the information at the top of this post).  I’d recommend further research if you wanted to use this creature, as you don’t want to misrepresent one culture’s beliefs in a fantasy novel.

The best use of demons I’ve seen recently is Peter V. Brett’s Demon Cycle books.  And while he hasn’t shown much of demon culture, how the humans have react to them - their fear, their precautions, the people who have to deal with wards and travelling without warded walls - is fascinating.  

It would be cool to see more types of demons used in fantasy books, not just the more common western ones associated with hell and Satan.  Demons are pretty universal, but not treated the same everywhere, nor do they look the same everywhere.  A shape shifting demon who passes along diseases… now that’s interesting.

Shout-Out: Prophecies, Libels & Dreams: Stories of Califa by Ysabeau Wilce

These inter-connected stories are set in an opulent quasi-historical world of magick and high manners called the Republic of Califa. The Republic is a strangely familiar place-a baroque approximation of Gold Rush era-California with an overlay of Aztec ceremony-yet the characters who populate it are true originals: rockstar magicians, murderous gloves, bouncing boy terrors, blue tinted butlers, sentient squids, and a three-year-old Little Tiny Doom and her vengeful pink plush pig. By turn whimsical and horrific (sometime in the same paragraph), Wilce's stories have been characterized as "screwball comedies for goths" but they could also be described as "historical fantasies" or "fanciful histories" for there are nuggets of historical fact hidden in them there lies.

Video: Forging the Phantom Blade from Assassin's Creed Unity

Man at Arms Reforged has been continuing the series, making more amazing fantasy and game weapons.  They recently released a video where they do a fully functioning version of the replica phantom blade Ubisoft released for Assassin's Creed Unity.

Book Review: The Mirror Empire by Kameron Hurley

Pros: lots of political intrigue, culturally diverse, brilliant world-building, interesting story

Cons: some issues with genders, several protagonists became unlikeable

The dark star of Oma is rising, infusing power into blood magics that were lost for 2000 years.  Dhai on a dying world use that power to form gates to a mirror world they wish to conquer, one like theirs but where history went in a different direction, leaving the Dhai pacifists among more warlike neighbours.  But not everyone wants to see their reflections on this new world enslaved, and as more and more people on the imperilled world learn what’s happening, they start fighting back.

There’s a lot going on here and a ton of characters to keep track of, many of whom have similar sounding names.  There is a glossary of characters and terms at the back to help you if you forget who someone is.  The different nations are all distinct, with vastly different governments, attitudes, cultures, and languages.  It was fascinating reading about how each nation dealt with different problems.

The politics of the different nations, and how they interacted, was fascinating.  I enjoyed how Hurley brought in past battles and showed that various nations’ wars helped shape the current political climate.

There were a wide variety of characters the story followed (several men and women at different levels of power and skintone).  I started off liking most of them, though some of their choices as the book continued made me less sympathetic towards them.  In a few cases I ended up respecting what they achieved, even if I didn’t much like them as people anymore.

The magic system of drawing power from stars/satellites, was pretty cool.  I liked how that contrasted the satellite plus blood combination necessary for calling on Oma.  The deadly flora of the world was also cool to read about.

I did have some issues with the world building, mostly with how gender was used/defined.  The Dhai, we are told, use five genders: female-assertive, female-passive, male-assertive, male-passive, and ungendered.  I couldn’t understand how being passive vs assertive changed your gender.  I understand that you can have a linguistic marker of politeness or class (Japanese uses different pronouns to denote this), but again, how does it change gender?  That leaves 3 genders, which is what the Saiduan use, denoting male, female, and ataisa.  Why then does Roh, a Dhai, have trouble understanding which pronoun to use for the ataisa when his language has something similar (ungendered)?  Yes, the two languages use different words (ze vs hir), but that’s a linguistic difference, not, necessarily a gender difference.  I was left wondering if the ataisa and ungendered were in fact different genders, rather than different words for the same ‘doesn’t fit into male or female’ category.

I also disliked how the genders in Dorinah are basically swapped.  Women are larger, stronger, better educated, assertive, domineering etc. than men.  Men, meanwhile, are only around as possessions, useful for status, sex, and children.  They’re weaker and powerless over their own lives, fully submissive to the women who own them (their mothers and wives).  I was ok with the idea of gender swapping the country (making it matriarchal), but when you give the men all the stereotypical characteristics of women and all the women the stereotypical characteristics of men, you’re basically saying that traditionally female attributes are weak/useless and male ones are strong/worthwhile.  Rather than pitying Anavha, Zezili’s husband, I found myself reviling him, and felt bad about it considering he’s basically a stand in for an 18th century British woman (stereotypically speaking, of course).

I did enjoy the sexual politics of the different countries, how many husbands/wives different groups had and whether that was a matter of status or openness of their cultures.  Seeing the Dhai culture’s openness with regards to loving both genders freely was also refreshing.  I’d have like to learn more of how the Dhai deal with marriages, as I imagine genealogies would be hard to track with multiple husbands and wives in the same marriage (and an openness to affairs), as would preventing incest (assuming that’s not allowed there, which isn’t a given, considering Ahkio and Liaro are cousins).

Lilia’s actions towards the end of the book felt rushed.  While much of the book took time to thoroughly develop things, Lilia manages to take several important actions with little preparation or training, which didn’t seem as realistic as what happened earlier.

This was a slower read for me, mainly because so much was happening.  I needed to take my time with the book in order to keep track of everything.  It had some things I loved, some things I liked and some things that irritated me.  On the whole, it’s a fascinating story with some great in depth world-building and some intricate real world style politics.  I’ll be curious to see what happens next.