Interzone 244 Jan - Feb 2013 (21 page)

This collection is not afraid to push
through the nominal boundaries and venture into a kind of
no-man’s-land where the connection to the genre is tenuous. It
starts off with the very epitome of steampunk, Carrie Vaughan’s
‘Harry and Marlowe and the Talisman of the Cult of Egil’, and then
veers off into uncharted areas such as Jeff VanderMeer’s ‘Fixing
Hanover’, or Ben Peek’s ‘Possession’, where the steampunk itself
provides only the most distant of backdrops.

‘
A Handful of Rice’ by
Vandana Singh could be said to go even further – it eschews the
familiar setting of Victorian England and transplants it to the
Indian Subcontinent. The central pivot of the story is the friction
between the old and the new, between pranic energy and steam-power,
yet the latter is only incidental to the story itself but
nevertheless essential to the telling. Bruce Sterling contributes
‘White Fungus’, set in 2040s Europe amidst a global collapse. Its
crumbling cyberpunk aesthetic (which is, if you think about it, the
logical conclusion of steampunk) signals a harsh critique of
systems reliant on technology, whether those systems are home
computers or large political bodies. It seems to be saying
“
what about people?” Curiously, the story inverts the focus
of hope, from shiny technology to post-steampunk human invention
and resourcefulness.

It is impossible to encapsulate the full
spectrum of instantiations of the genre as contained in this
anthology. It is by turns astonishing and audacious, emphasising
just how wide the spectrum of steampunk can be. Absolutely
essential reading for students of the genre

* *

TAKEN

Benedict Jacka

Orbit pb, 319pp, £7.99

Juliet E. McKenna

Having enjoyed Jacka’s first two books, I
opened
Taken
with mingled anticipation and apprehension.
Book three is often when prior knowledge of character and scenario
becomes essential. That, or painstaking recapping sees the opening
flow like cold treacle. Encouragingly, neither applies.

Alex Verus, low-level divination mage, sits
in a Starbucks waiting to meet an unknown but very powerful mage
woman. As Crystal offers him a job, and he turns it down, Jacka
swiftly and deftly portrays the essentials of Alex’s character and
grounds his story in contemporary London while simultaneously
revealing the perilous parallel world of rival mages of Light and
Dark. A new reader should have no problem picking up the series
here while fans of
Fated
and
Cursed
learn new facets
of Alex’s life. So far, so good.

Alex turns down Crystal’s offer because he
has other responsibilities, notably training his apprentice Luna.
Their relationship is now firmly master and pupil and it’s good to
see Jacka avoiding the urban-fantasy-soap-opera pitfall. Luna’s
currently taking classes in magical duelling. So far, so Harry
Potter? Third books often see a new writer’s imagination running
out of steam and resorting to imitation. Not so here. Jacka draws
on broader traditions of magicians’ apprentices to expand his
magical world. That said, I don’t think Potteresque echoes are
accidental, but an indication that readers and characters alike
shouldn’t leap to assumptions as this story unfolds.

Next, Talisid wants Alex’s help and turning
down a request from a high level Council member isn’t easy. Not
that Alex wants to. Apprentices are disappearing. If Dark mages are
recruiting by abduction, this is serious. Even more so if some
Light mage is letting information slip as to where vulnerable
apprentices might be found, by accident or design. As in the
earlier books, ‘Light’ and ‘Good’ are by no means synonymous. Light
prejudice against magical creatures, the less magically powerful
and particularly the non-magical world becomes apparent and
ultimately significant. Meantime, Dark mages mercilessly pursue
ambitions and grudges alike.

Events take a deadly turn as Alex follows a
promising lead into an unexpected hail of gunfire. Getting out of
that isn’t easy, even if Alex can read the future. Jacka’s
continued inventiveness with spellcraft is a continuing strength of
these books. Magic’s full potential relies on its intelligent use
as well as an understanding of its limits. Though that’s just the
beginning of Alex’s challenges. Some mages would prefer to do away
with all such limitations. A low-level diviner and a few
apprentices can’t battle them.

This finely crafted story is a solidly
satisfying read.
Taken
sees Jacka established as a writer
with a distinctive voice within the best traditions of contemporary
urban fantasy.

* *

ORIGIN

J.T. Brannan

Headline pb, 400pp, £7.99

Ian Hunter

For the world’s self-proclaimed most
reluctant reader,
Origin
appears on the surface to be the
perfect book. Split into five parts and seventy-two chapters, this
has all the hallmarks of a short chapter page-turner. But is it?
Well, we are in Dan Brown-ish territory, I suppose, and before the
supermarket shelves became dominated by paperbacks with black or
grey covers and a photograph of maybe a mask or a glove or a chain,
then
Origin
would have been right up there on the shelves
beside books with three words in the title, with one of them being
Nosferatu, or Lucifer, or Doomsday, or Templar. You get the
picture.

First-time author (and former army officer)
Brennan knows how to spin a yarn at breakneck speed, and the
military antics have more than a ring of authenticity to them. The
action opens down in the Antarctic on Pine Island Glacier, where a
member of an expedition lets his curiosity get the better of him
and falls to what might be his death. His team follows to the
rescue and find what he has just discovered, which is a mummified
body with “anomalous artefacts” as they say in the trade. Something
that couldn’t possibly be, but is, and no sooner does the
expedition reveal that they have discovered something “anomalous”
than shadowy powers, listening in via satellite, quickly join up
the dots and wipe out our band of intrepid explorers. Apart from
team leader Lynn Edwards who has nowhere to turn except into the
waiting arms of ex-husband Matt Adams who, handily, was once a
member of a crack government unit. Their relationship brings to
mind Andy McDermott’s series of books featuring Nina Child and
Eddie Chase.

What follows is the mother of all conspiracy
theories as well as some minor ones, such as the mysterious,
possibly all-powerful Bilderberg Group; theories about the missing
link between man and ape; the remote Area 51 in the Nevada desert;
the Nazca Lines in Peru; and a certain Hadron Collider in Geneva.
To be sure,
Origin
isn’t subtle; there is a tad too much
conspiracy theory dumping, a kitchen sink approach to piling this
“otherness” into the mix, and some fast switching between multiple
viewpoints of different characters, regardless of their importance
to the plot.

My advice? Don’t look down, keep your eyes
straight ahead, and your knuckles white by holding tightly to the
covers of the book until the end.
Origin
isn’t great, but it
isn’t bad either. There is maybe too much going on and the reader’s
incredulity will be stretched with regard to the characterisation,
some of the action, and parts of the plot, but it does what it says
on the tin by providing a few hours of over-the-top entertainment
perfect for the beach, the pool, or before the lights go out, and
it ends in a cliffhanger that just cries out for a sequel.

* *

HELIX WARS

Eric Brown

Solaris pb, 383pp, £7.99

Lawrence Osborn

Helix Wars
is the sequel to the 2007
novel
Helix
, which described the arrival of humans on the
Helix, a vast artificial environment created by a race of
benevolent aliens known as the Builders as a refuge for intelligent
races that have been threatened by extinction on their home worlds.
The new story is set some 200 years later. Humans are now
well-established on the Helix and have been appointed by the
Builders to the largely diplomatic role of peacekeeping.

The central character, Jeff Ellis, is a
shuttle pilot who regularly transports peacekeepers to other worlds
of the Helix. However, on this occasion, his shuttle crashes on
Phandra (a world occupied by tiny empathetic humanoids), killing
his passengers and leaving Jeff himself seriously injured.

He is rescued by some Phandrans and restored
to health by Calla, a Phandran healer. It transpires that he was
shot down by the Sporelli, an aggressive authoritarian race who
have invaded Phandra in order to gain access to the natural
resources on another world further along the Helix. As soon as he
is well enough, Jeff sets out with Calla to get news of this
invasion back to the peacekeepers on New Earth. However, the
Sporelli pursue and capture them.

Fortunately for Jeff his crash has come to
the attention of Kranda, a member of the warlike Mahkani (the
Helix’s engineers), whose life he once saved. Because of their code
of honour, she is now bound to rescue him and duly does so with the
aid of some highly advanced Builder technology. Jeff then insists
on rescuing Calla and in the process they save the Helix from an
alien invasion.

Interwoven into this is a secondary story
about Jeff’s marital difficulties. Since the death of their son he
and his wife Maria have grown apart, and Jeff, based on advice from
Calla, clumsily seeks reconciliation. After some spectacular twists
the two storylines merge, Jeff is made an offer he can’t refuse by
the Builders, and they all live happily ever after.

The novel is driven by the well-paced action
of the main storyline, while the secondary storyline adds depth to
Jeff. However, most of the minor characters, particularly the
aliens, are little more than two-dimensional stereotypes.

By contrast, Brown’s description of alien
technologies is very imaginative. The wind-powered mass transport
system on Phandra is refreshingly novel, while the technology
underlying the Helix itself is mind-blowing. Unfortunately he
allows the technology to become a
deus ex machina
by
providing Jeff and Kranda with nearly invulnerable Builder-designed
exo-skeletons that all too easily enable them to overcome the
challenges that face them.

In spite of my reservations, I enjoyed
Helix Wars
. It may not be Eric Brown at his best, but it is
still imaginative, well-paced and easy to read

* *

IN OTHER WORLDS

Margaret Atwood

Virago pb, 272pp, £9.99

Barbara Melville

Margaret Atwood messes with me. Sometimes,
as with
The Handmaid’s Tale
,
Oryx and Crake
and
The Year of the Flood,
this is a positive experience, taking
me on unexpected journeys, and making me think in different ways.
For me, this knack of uprooting people’s thinking is pivotal to
good science fiction. But despite penning these tales, all
frequently considered science fiction, Atwood insists she’s been
miscategorised. Over the years, she’s been challenged and even
chastised for saying so. This collection offers a riposte of sorts,
whilst exploring and celebrating her personal relationship with the
fantastic.

In the book’s earlier essays, Atwood charts
two histories: her own, from childhood to adulthood, and that of
science fiction. The book’s later essays explore and review
specific other worlds, including H. Rider Haggard’s
She
,
Aldous Huxley’s
Brave New World
, and Kazuo Ishiguro’s
Never Let Me Go
. While each essay is taut and engaging, the
book’s overall structure is difficult. The opening essays are the
most powerful, rich in strong ideas and skilfully bonded through
memoir. The later essays are just as riveting but not as personal,
making them harder to get into.

Despite the clunking mechanics of this
setup, these essays share a common thread: the concept of other
worlds. Such worlds, Atwood tells us, may be physical, conceptual
or temporal: alternate realities, other planets or unwritten
futures, to name a few. They may be utopias, dystopias, or both –
what she terms “ustopias”. What these worlds have in common is
their mapping of unknowns.

Atwood’s personal account includes a world
borne of her childhood mind’s creation – Mischiefland – comprising
superheroes of the flying rabbit persuasion. She considers
Mischiefland and others like it as descendants of the earliest
storytelling, and explores why they manifest in the human psyche.
The superhero’s power of flying, as a means of transcending the
body’s material limits, is one such example. Atwood notes the
winged creatures in myths tend to be tricksters, and their stories
warnings. This lust for ideals – and the question of whether or not
to trust them – is an integral theme in this collection.