strange and random happenstance

Station Eleven by Emily St. John Mandel
Published by: Knopf
Publication Date: September 9th, 2014
Format: Hardcover, 336 Pages
Rating: ★★★
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The famous actor Arthur Leander died on the last night of the old world. He wasn't one to suffer like those in the ER on that snowy night in Toronto hailing the arrival of the Georgian Flu which would kill all but one in two hundred people. Arthur had a fatal heart attack onstage during his star performance in King Lear. He'd never know of the horrors that came after or of how he was a tenuous link between some of the survivors. He was blissfully ignorant of what was to come. Twenty years later Kirsten Raymonde is touring around what used to be Michigan with the Traveling Symphony. When she was a young girl she was in a production of King Lear with the great Arthur Leander. Now she is in a troupe that specializes in bringing Shakespeare to the various outposts of remaining civilization. The troupe tried other playwrights, but people seem to want what was best of the old world, and Shakespeare and classical music remind them of that. While Kirsten herself was too young to remember what was lost from the world before or even the first year after the collapse, she scours abandoned houses for mentions of the great actor who was kind to her and who gave her her most prized possessions, two issues of the comic Station Eleven.

To understand how lives have played out in this new world, we must go back to the previous world. The world where Arthur's first wife was working on a comic, a world where his second wife was conspiciously present at a vapid dinner party celebrating Arthur's wedding anniversary to his first wife. The birth of Arthur's son while Arthur was already moving on to wife number three. Arthur's oldest friend betraying him while his dearest friend Clark will live long past Arthur's death. Each and every step and decision plays a role in a world that Arthur could never imagine and which he will never live to see. A world where an airport is a sanctuary, where survival is insufficient, and where Shakespeare brings people hope. A world that is at one and the same time embracing the past while trying to forge a future. A world that is dangerous to live in. A world where a prophet could spell destruction and ruin for people who only wish to live as they choose. Every moment could be these people's last, yet their survived the end of the world so they must try to rebuild it. To move forward, no matter the cost.

The irony isn't lost on me that a book that touts the credo from Star Trek that "survival is insufficient" is literally only about survival, and I really hope it wasn't lost on the author. There are many ways in which Station Eleven differs from your typical post-apocalyptic story, but the lofty ideals of the book might be the biggest difference. It wants so much to be different, to show that art is needed for sanity and survival, yet in the end all the Traveling Symphony's journey boils down to is surviving to the next day, the next outpost of civilization. If it wasn't for this dichotomy between the book's ideals and what the book actually represents I think it would have worked better. Station Eleven is an intriguing mood piece that embraces different ways of storytelling, from lists to dialogue to interviews, slipping through time and the character's timelines to create a vibrant world which in no way embraces the ideals of that Star Trek quote. It just feels so shoehorned in. Like Emily St. John Mandel heard that line of dialogue and jumped off from there, forgetting that the story and this motto should actually connect. And it's not that I don't fully embrace the idea that we need more to survive, it's just that Station Eleven, boiled down to it's essence, is only about surviving, nothing more. The book might have lofty ideals, but in the end it's a post-apocalyptic story, and those are all about survival.

Aside from this quibble I liked that the narrative wasn't your typical post-apocalyptic story. Post-apocalyptic stories tend to fall into two categories, one is that the apocalypse has just happened and our hero or heroine has to survive the initial destruction of the world to help rebuild it in some nebulous future. The second is that the apocalypse happened generations ago and our hero or heroine is living under a not ideal future regime, in other words, think The Hunger Games. Here we see the initial outbreak, but then we flash forward. Not to some "Hunger Games" world but to a more pioneer world, where the old world isn't long gone, but the new world hasn't fully been formed yet. It's not just about getting from day to day, but also trying to come to terms with the life they now have while still clinging to memories of the past. This, coupled with the flashbacks to the world before the flu, makes this a more intimate and personal story. It's not so much what happened to the world but what happened to these people. What happened to these characters who were connected to Arthur and how they survived in this new world. I can't help thinking about when asked what she most missed of the old world Kirsten won't answer, because it's too personal, and that, right there is why this book works. It's about these people.

Yet by spending so much time with these people and with their pasts we don't get any sense of what the future holds. Perhaps we could say that "survival is insufficient" should be the outlook going forward. All we see is them coping, surviving day to day, year to year, without any real forward momentum. The Traveling Symphony and how they are continually stuck touring one route, year in, year out, kind of symbolizes humanity at it's current stage. They have found a comfortable routine and now don't deviate from it. Yes, their might be risk venturing off the accustomed path, but humanity is stagnating. They aren't trying to fix the world, they're just living in it. My mind kept getting stuck on questions like why don't people try to do this that or the other. Why can't they have electricity? Get some smart people together, congregate in a large community, and FIGURE IT OUT! Twenty years and they have grown lazy. Sure, the author tries to romanticize the situation a bit with the Traveling Symphony harking back to days gone by when troupes traveled the countryside bringing culture to the masses and how Shakespeare himself lived in a plague ridden time. Yes, these are interesting comparisons, but also remember people in Shakespeare's time were trying to better themselves, to move forward, not live in the past and not move on. The only flicker of hope happens in the last few pages; while personally I could have done with the hope a little earlier.

And, of course, because this is a post-apocalyptic story the Big Bad has to be a Prophet who has multiple wives and runs off anyone who doesn't play by his rules. This is Stephen King 101 people. Think of The Stand. This Prophet is the main reason this book is problematic to me. Yes, I can look beyond the lack of hope, I can look beyond the disconnect between the message and what really happens, but I can't look beyond cliched characters that bog down the narrative. This character should have been spooky, terrifying, someone to run from. Instead he's meh. It's not just that his beliefs are bog standard for any post-apocalyptic Prophet, it's that he's predictable. The least you can do with going with a cliche is embrace it. Go all out! Make him over the top, someone so big for their britches that the megalomania carries the character on a wave of crazy through his predictability. Instead I just hoped for him to have as little time on the page as possible. As for his back story... well, if you didn't figure out who he was about two seconds into his first mysterious reveal, aka what he named his dog, there might not be any hope for you. Now I'm not going to spoil this reveal for you, because that is truly cruel, but the predictability of who he is and how he got this way, well, it quite literally smacked this book down a few stars. In fact it made the whole back end of the book slide from a pretty original story into predictable meh.

But in the end what did I expect from a story where the lynchpin is a dislikable actor? Yes, we could go on one of those endless debates about how there are antiheroes and antiheroines, and that characters don't need to be likable, yeah yeah, the Vanity Fair of it all; but I'll always come to the same conclusion, sure, they don't need to be likable, but they at least have to be fascinating. For some people, aka, the people who love to watch Entertainment Tonight and read People and think TMZ is the best news out there might take glee in having an actor, even a fictitious one, be the lynchpin to a story. Because they like celebrity gossip and dishing dirt. But for me celebrity in and of itself doesn't make a character interesting. In fact all Arthur's cheating and his storytelling about his home island made me just want to smack him for his pretensions. The more I learned about him the more I disliked him. I honestly can not see the draw to him. Telling us over and over what a great actor he is doesn't make it so. Making him your lynchpin in a story without fully investing the time to make him fascinating makes your narrative weak. Station Eleven started out so strong, with memorable visuals and interesting developments, like the comic book, but it kept falling off in quality till it ended with a whimper. Much like what the dog Luli would do if reprimanded.

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: Apocalypse, Backlog Bonanza, Big Bad, Celebrities, Comics, Emily St. John Mandel, King Lear, Post-Apocalyptic, Prophet, Shakespeare, Star Trek, Station Eleven, Stephen King, The Hunger Games, The Stand, Vanity Fair

The Shepherd's Crown by Terry Pratchett
Published by: HarperCollins
Publication Date: September 1st, 2015
Format: Hardcover, 288 Pages
Rating: ★★★★
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Time doesn't stand still. Time is always moving forward. A witch, more then most, knows about life and death and the inevitability of both. The inevitable is about to happen in Lancre as Granny Weatherwax cleans her house for the last time and prepares to walk with DEATH. The rest of the witches can't believe that Esmerelda Weatherwax would do something so predictable as dying. At least her final wishes cause a stir as she leaves her steading to the young Tiffany Aching. But Tiffany isn't about to let Granny down! She will prove to all the other witches that Granny Weatherwax knew what she was doing, because didn't she always? Though the death of such a powerful witch has sent a shudder through the world. What was once safe and secure is now vulnerable, permeable, and those who were kept out sense it too. The fairies have long been trapped in their realm, unable to hunt among the humans, unable to enslave musicians, kidnap children, and kill indiscriminately. The Queen had an unforgettable encounter with Tiffany Aching and since that time the Discworld has become more and more inhospitable to their kind, banding the world in iron and steam. But the Lord Peaseblossom defies the Queen and decides that it's time for the fairies to take back the human world. Only they have one problem. Witches.

When Terry Pratchett died earlier this year I might have cried more than a little. Here was one of the most amazing authors I've ever read whose life was cut way too short. I had seen him only four years earlier, and sadly in those four years it was a rapid decline for him. He had all these stories left to tell and in the end he gave us one more before going. It's not just the nostalgia in me, this book really did feel like one more for the road. Before even picking it up I just intuited that Granny Weatherwax was leaving this world, because Terry was taking her with him, moreso than the other characters. It was his way to say goodbye. Granny Weatherwax organized her little cottage, put everything in order, let her wishes be known, and walked with DEATH hand in hand out of this world. This was the goodbye Terry wanted to leave us with, his work was as done as it could be and he and DEATH walked together, with a very opinionated witch by their side. This slim volume has everything there that you could want in a Discworld novel, but it lacks that final something. It's not unfinished, it's unpolished. The text wasn't pushed to it's furthest point and repetitive phrases weren't excised. This makes it even more bittersweet. The goodbye we were given was a hasty one. Everyone has one last quick cameo and then they shuffle off, stage right, living on through their stories though their creator is no more.

Terry has admitted more than once that his favorite character he created was Tiffany Aching, and that is perhaps why his fanbase, me included, have connected so strongly with her. Therefore it makes sense that the last tale to tell was one from Tiffany. But there's a part of me which is asking why. Why write it? Why write The Shepherd's Crown at all? This might seem ungrateful, like asking someone to take back this great gift they have given you, but might I rejoinder with I Shall Wear Midnight. Five years ago Terry Pratchett released what was to be the final Tiffany Aching story, I Shall Wear Midnight. This book is amazing, brilliant, perfection. It was a flawless ending. Tiffany came into her own and you could see the shape of her future. You could see her happily ever after. Then along comes The Shepherd's Crown and pokes holes in that happily ever after. Yes, we got to see more of her future and her inheritance from Granny Weatherwax, but I don't think that future needed to be spelled out, implying it was enough. Instead of envisioning this lovely future with her working side by side with Preston, the perfect match for her, we see their relationship fraying, and one can't help hoping that Tiffany and Preston's future doesn't mirror that of Granny Weatherwax and Mustrum Ridcully. We are told that work is more important then love. Perhaps in the end work was what was most important to Terry, finishing the stories he still had in him. But he was surrounded by people who loved him and fans who still love him. Love not duty seemed a better tone to end on, even if it's not as realistic.

Yet I can counter my own argument by saying, this wasn't so much a Tiffany Aching story as it was a witches story and therefore partially exempt from my displeasure. Prior to Tiffany coming along and hijacking all the witches plot lines they had six books of their own. Despite her being the protagonist here, it's more like those first six books with her filling the figurehead status that Granny Weatherwax did in those books. Therefore I guess you could say it's a more conventional Discworld book and perhaps that's where it fell a little flat for me, I like the individual character studies a little more. The threat isn't just a threat to Tiffany, and therefore her story, it's a threat to all witches, and therefore their story. So the gang is all here. Every witch that has ever graced the pages of Pratchett's writing, and even a wizard, show up. Magrat Garlick threw off her mantle of Queen and once more embraced her witchiness. Agnes took time out from singing to do battle. And of course Nanny Ogg was Nanny Ogg (and if one day she isn't played by Dawn French in some kind of movie or miniseries my life will have been in vain). It was great to see not only the newer witches but those who have been relegated to asides and background characters come to the fore again. Magrat has even got her battle armor on! Though this again brings about that nostalgic feeling. They're being let out for one last battle, one last moonlit broom ride before leaving us forever. Sigh.

Though for me, the best part of this book wasn't any witch or wizard, it was You. And by You I mean Granny Weatherwax's cat. Since that little white fuzzball first appeared I have been fascinated how she and Granny Weatherwax have gotten along, but more then that, how she is kind of a totem for Granny Weatherwax. While a cat would be the first to admit that they are in no way representatives of any person, being their own creatures, I think that cats might just induct Granny into their species, what with her prickly attitude and superior demeanor. After all "witches were a bit like cats. They didn’t much like one another’s company, but they did like to know where all the other witches were, just in case they needed them." Terry Pratchett just has this supernatural ability to understand cats. How You herself is just a fuzzy living bit of magic, able to get from one place to another with the simplest of ease, even if it takes Tiffany hours and hours to get between the two locals. Also, by having You approve of Tiffany it cements her status as Granny Weatherwax's successor. More than missing Terry, I'm going to miss his insights into those furry little mass murderers I love.

As for the real fault in the book? It has nothing to do with it's lack of finish and all to do with the villain. So therefore, no matter how much I could have loved this book if it was 100% finished, I would still end up at the level I feel now because of the fairies. OK people, especially you writers on Doctor Who, I don't like Big Bads coming back. I like fresh villains, wraiths with no eyes, the spirit of Winter, stuff like that, that's original. Cybermen, Daleks, no. The fairies again? No thank you. So far there have been two witches books dealing with these damn fairies, Lords and Ladies and The Wee Free Man. Why are they back? Why why why? It's not good enough to say because they ALWAYS come back. They always come back because writers are lazy and think if it worked once it will work again and readers on the whole like the predictable. For me this doesn't make interesting reading, it makes me bored. It makes me sit back and check out a little, occasionally tuning in to see if they have moved on yet. I will admit in the height of the battle I was a little caught up in the action, but overall, no. But the real truth? If I could get a few more Discworld books and Terry Pratchett back, I would read about as many fairies as he cared to write.

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: Big Bad, Cats, DEATH, Discworld, Doctor Who, Fairies, Granny Weatherwax, I Shall Wear Midnight, Lords and Ladies, Nanny Ogg, Terry Pratchett, The Shepherd's Crown, The Wee Free Men, Tiffany Aching, Witches

Ghosts of War by George Mann
Published by: PYR
Publication Date: January 2011
Format: Paperback, 232 Pages
Rating: ★★★
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Gabriel Cross, the erstwhile Ghost, is still in mourning from the loss of his love Celeste. She did what he would have done in her situation, but that doesn't mean his heart is so easily healed. But luckily for Gabriel New York is a city under siege. The newest devilment takes the form of winged creators, half brass, half dark magic. These raptors swoop out of the sky and kidnap people, for what evil purpose no one knows. They aren't just the bane of the police, with over fifty people missing, but Gabriel as well, they are too strong and too fierce for him to kill and too fast for him to follow back to their nest in order to rescue the captives, if they should still be alive. Gabriel's friend on the police force, Donovan, is surprised when his boss pulls him off the raptor case a puts him on the case of a missing British spy at the request of Senator Isambard Banks. Yet the more Donovan looks into things with the help of Gabriel, the more it looks like the two cases aren't so separate as the Senator would like them to appear.

The fact of life is that sometimes life itself gets in the way of a good book. This past week I've been bedeviled, luckily not by raptors, but by deadlines and holiday preparations. A few times perhaps I would have liked a raptor to swoop me away from my work, but only if it was to a cosy bed and not where the Ghost finds their victims... but alas, I don't think they'd play ball. Therefore a lot of the peril and immediacy of the book was lost due to the sad fact of setting it down. Sometimes when this happens I picture the characters in the book standing around and looking bored waiting for the story to begin again, like actors waiting for the director to shout action. Silly though this thought is it does show how attached I become to my stories. But enough about me, I'm sure that's not why you're reading this.

Ghosts of War was a solid second outing in George's Ghost series, though it might have veered a little towards a certain trope that every penny dreadful and every horror story has utilized, the big bad that everyone though vanquished returning. Yes, yes, I get that this is more a tradition of the genre then anything else, and I will admit that George gave enough of a spin on a certain evil creature's return that it didn't overly annoy me, it's just that at a certain point credulity sometimes gets strained. The villain, who definitely was totally dead, I mean 100% totally for sure dead magically goes, "but wait," can really become a really tiresome trend.

Yes, their are villains we grow to love, but lets look at Doctor Who as an example. Am I the only one who thinks that the Daleks and the Cybermen should be put on hiatus for AT LEAST five years? No! Because new is more unique then old told in a different way. Though George tells the old in a new and different way, so I will allow it this once because yes, it did work, but I don't want to see these Cephalopod-esque aliens for quite awhile now, thank you.

But what I felt was the flaw in the book was oddly it's creepy reflection of reality. A group of wealthy men and politicians war mongering. Where there is war or the possibility of war, no matter how disgusting it is to us, no matter how unpalatable, there are people looking to either make money or secure power. Even if their means are supernatural verging on the extraterrestrial, well, their motives are sadly all too common. Everyday in the news their is something like this. Or at least I feel that way. Politician's are more and more looking out for their own interests and their own pocketbooks than doing the altruistic job of helping their fellow man. I read, for the most part, to escape the real work, the news that could easily bring on a panic attack. To have the news seeping into my story... well, yes, it's realistic and shows that humans haven't changed, but it kind of puts a damper on my escapism.

That doesn't mean that I am any less enamoured of the Ghost. In fact I have kind of gotten maybe a little overly attached to him and one thing in particular is making me worried about him. What is that one thing? It's the breaking down of his identities. I don't mean breaking down as in having a break down, but as in Gabriel and the Ghost merging, coming together and accepting that they are both needed in order to become who Gabriel once was, before the war shattered him; and before he created careful facades in order to survive. I am liking that he's coming to terms with himself, growing and becoming more functional...

But at the same time I'm worried. With this acceptance of who he really is, this inclusion of both halves I'm worried that he might be in danger. By being seen with Donovan as Gabriel and not the Ghost, might people start to wonder? Is his safety at risk? His old flame Ginny shows up out of the blue and within minutes he's all, I'm the Ghost! There's a reason superheroes have secret identities. The secret is their for protection. Sure the secret might weigh on you and cause psychological issues, but wouldn't you rather be safe then sane? I guess I'll have to wait for more of his adventures to find out!

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: Big Bad, Cybermen, Daleks, Doctor Who, George Mann, Ghosts of War, Mann Month, New York, Penny Dreadful, Politicians, Raptors, Secret Identity, Spies, The Ghost