The Middle Kingdom (1989)
The Broken Wheel (1990)
The White Mountain (1992)
The Stone Within (1993)
Beneath the Tree of Heaven (1994)
White Moon, Red Dragon (1994)
Days of Bitter Strength (1997)
The Marriage of the Living Dark (1999)
These books were major science fiction bestsellers in the UK but hardly received much traction in the US when they appeared—or at least any traction critically other than a few measly book reviews. If you haven’t discovered this series, then you’re in for a treat. China hasn’t been the focus of much science fiction in the past. Here it is, full bore. The series Chung Kuo (or China) chronicles the rise and fall of a future world dominated by a highly-advanced China which had earlier caused the downfall of the West in the middle of the 21st century. This China has created a fantastic world-smothering City, but despite its power, it is riddled with palace intrigues and a resurgence of the groups (racial, ethnic, and political) who are actively being suppressed by China’s iron rule. Despite the huge cast of the original characters and the unfamiliarity American readers might have with Chinese names and terms, the Chung Kuo series is very readable. It is written with both lyricism and an attention to visual detail. Wingrove is a master writer and a master storyteller, as the original series amply demonstrated. I hope that first series will return to print soon as this new one unfolds.
With this new series, Wingrove is pulling a George Lucas, telling the story of how this future China came about. Unlike Lucas’ prequels to the first three Star Wars movies, this new series seems to actually work and requires none of the knowledge of the middle books (now numbered 7-14). Son of Heaven, the inaugural novel in this new series, tells the story of Jake Reed, a man who is working in a high-tech London as a financial wizard. It’s 2085 and he discovers that China’s main computer wizard is clandestinely at work to wreck the entire global financial system. Which he does. And it throws the world into barbarism and chaos. Anyone familiar with the world-wrecking novels of British writer John Christopher (Sam Youd), who wrote The Long Winter, The Ragged Edge, and No Blade of Grass, will find much of Wingrove’s post-apocalyptic Wessex familiar (but not derivative).
What makes matters worse is that as Reed is keeping his little village safe from refugees and brigands, they observe to the east a strange white “wall,” like a line of glaciers, appearing along the horizon. This is the City being built out of nano-particles, super-cement, and indestructible steel. Then there are the odd blimp-like airships with Chinese dragon insignias flying in the distance: China is literally covering the surface of the earth with a fantastic white city that’s building itself on its own. Behind it all is Tsao Ch’un, the current Chinese ruler, who wants to destroy every aspect of Western Civilization. Jake Reed gets caught up in this conquest and thus the series begins.
The novel does stand on its own, but such is Wingrove’s skill that we do want to see how this turns out, what else China has in mind to conquer. Wingrove knows his science fiction and he creates sympathetic characters who have deep family concerns as well as broader cultural worries. This would also include one Chinese general who has a strong moral streak, a man who is probably to be further tested as the series progresses (as well as Jake Reed).
Son of Heaven is actually a quick read and the series, taken together, stands a good chance of becoming science fiction’s equivalent of War and Peace. It’s that good.
***
Sisterhood of Dune
by Brian Herbert and Kevin J. Anderson
Tor Science Fiction 2012
Hardcover: 496 pages
ISBN: 978-0765322739
Sisterhood of Dune is the opening work in a trilogy that predates the Dune series at the conclusion of the Battle of Corrin where all thinking machines (and a whole bunch of human beings) were destroyed. Faykan Butler has taken the name of Corrino and has pronounced himself as the first Emperor of a new order—the Imperium. Sisterhood starts in the backwash of the Corrin conflict where disorder rules the roost and all kinds of minor groups and partisans fight to find their place in this new society.
The novel follows the Butlerians, led by Manford Torondo, as they further their jihad to destroy all technology, and the Bene Gesserit, which is just starting to evolve, led by the Reverend Mother Raquella Berto-Anirul, who is working on a human breeding program (which will lead to Paul Atreides, of course). The Emperor, meanwhile, has his hands full juggling palace intrigues, dealing with the Suk school, the rise of the Swordmaster school, and the Mental adepts, always an interesting group. One of the most interesting tropes in this novel is the rise of the Navigators, probably the most important class of (altered) humans in the entire Dune series. I personally found their story the most enthralling (mostly because I know where it’s going to lead and how important the Navigators will be).
Sisterhood of Dune is really a fine read, falling squarely into the space opera category, moving perhaps a bit faster than the original Frank Herbert books in this series—probably because it’s less philosophical than the original novels, less talky. Herbert fils and Anderson write with both passion and skill, and the action is non-stop. All the tropes and conceits that run through Frank Herbert’s original trilogy are here and the authors don’t much violate Frank Herbert’s original creation.
The real issue here is whether or not these books add anything to the series or perhaps whether they should exist at all. The former notion is probably not germane or relevant. Readers read these books because they take us back to the original universe and all of the original intrigues. Franchising is nothing new in science fiction and novels-in-franchise such as the Star Wars novels and the Star Trek books are a case in point. True, neither Brian Herbert nor Kevin Anderson are Frank Herbert and thus cannot write like him. Still, none of that is to the point, nor should it be. Herbert and Anderson have wisely made their Dune books their own and really make no effort to write in Frank Herbert’s style. (And we can be thankful that they don’t enter the heads of their characters where we are privy to their every thought. There are hardly any italics in this book, and for that both authors deserve medals.)
Brian Herbert and Kevin J. Anderson are entertainers and they are very skilled at what they do. And in Sisterhood of Dune, they deliver. If you’re a purist and don’t think anyone should touch Frank Herbert’s masterpiece, then there’s nothing here for you. If, however, you’re looking for a few hours with a fine adventure story, you really can’t go wrong with Sisterhood of Dune.
***
The Hydrogen Sonata
by Iain M. Banks
Orbit 2012
Hardcover: 528 pages
ISBN: 978-0316212373
The Hydrogen Sonata is one of Iain M. Banks’ Culture novels wherein an ancient civilization called the Gzilt are about to Sublime and a number of entities want to participate: either to scavenge when the Gzilt disappear (to God-knows-where), or to exact revenge before they go, or to capture an ancient criminal whose mind is downloaded into a mysterious cube. Then there is Vyr Cossont, a four-armed beauty who plays an eleven-stringed instrument something like a harp (she’s attempting to learn how to play “The Hydrogen Sonata,” an unplayable masterpiece that makes for a nice recurring trope to the novel).
Part of the problem for Ms. Cossont is that no one knows where civilizations go when they Sublime and there’s evidence to suggest that it might be nowhere at all. It might just be a hoax. Ms. Cossont, who is a member of both the Culture and the Gzilt, has a personal problem, however. She doesn’t want to Sublime and quite a few Ship Minds (who actually run the ships which the races of the Culture travel on) are more than just a little bit interested in the Gzilt civilization and why everyone is racing there to get a piece of the action or a piece of the pie.
This is one of Banks’ superior Culture novels and it’s written with great humor, for both the milieu it embraces and the diverse cast of characters involved. I was especia
lly taken with the Ship Minds who have minds of their own and seem to be more curious about the Gzilt than the humans. Their conversations break up the action in the book and it’s clear that Banks was having a dandy time writing The Hydrogen Sonata.
I think right now that Banks and Alastair Reynolds own the space opera. Others have mastered it as well but few have created a galaxy-wide semi-organized melange of cultures as Banks, cultures and characters which still, after eleven or so novels, still surprise and entertain. One trope I enjoyed in The Hydrogen Sonata was the Girdle City—a city about two-hundred kilometers high that circles the Gzilt world at the equator. Millions of people live in the Girdle City. One scene (actually two) centers around a floating palace, something like a giant Zeppelin that travels the hollow core of the Girdle city. It’s a classic BDO (Big Dumb Object) I’ll never forget.
The Hydrogen Sonata was a delight from start to finish. And to Banks’ credit, it’s a stand-alone novel, not part of a continuous series or the beginning, middle, or end of a serial work. You can read it without knowing anything at all about the Culture stories because Banks so ably fills you in as you go with just enough information to allow for it to make sense and to make you want to read more Culture novels. I’m already on board.
***
The Devil’s Nebula
by Eric Brown
Abaddon Books 2012
Mass Market: 352 pages
ISBN: 9781781080238
I picked up The Devil’s Nebula by British writer Eric Brown for two reasons, maybe three. First of all I had seen Brown’s books at my local Barnes & Noble bookstore for a while now and hadn’t really paid any attention to them. He’s had no real press here in America as far as I can tell even though he’s quite accomplished. Brown has written nineteen novels and has published easily half a dozen short story collections. So I thought I’d give him a try. Secondly, I have never heard of Abaddon Books and I was impressed with their stylish logo on the spine and the book’s great cover art work. Thirdly, perhaps most importantly, so many American publishers are consolidating and eating up smaller publishers (and shrinking their own midlist in the process) that the print venues for fiction are shrinking. Thus, I am an advocate for the smaller presses or publishing houses that are taking up a lot of the slack. (And many thanks to Barnes & Noble for stocking a wide array of publishers in their SF and Fantasy section. If we didn’t have access to these other publishers, I’d only be reviewing the major writers in the field from just the major publishers…which would be something of a drag.)
The Devil’s Nebula is a stand-alone novel in a milieu called Weird Space—but this is not a dark fantasy novel nor is it horror. The “weird” gets explained fully later in the novel. The Devil’s Nebula involves the Expansion, a vast but loosely-organized confederacy of worlds. Within the Expansion are a few malcontents who’ve fallen between the cracks, so to speak. Ed Carew is the captain of a small band of misfits who are captured and sent into the domain of an evil race called the Vetch (nice name, that) to look into what was behind a distress signal sent from a lost colony fifty or so years earlier. Carew and his cadre have to go into the Devil’s Nebula or get executed on the spot by their Expansion overlords. When Carew and crew arrive at the source of the distress signal, they find that the original colonists have been enslaved by some Lovecraftian nightmares and the book details Carew’s efforts at freeing the survivors of the original colonial effort.
As I said a moment ago, this is not a fantasy or horror novel. The aliens are merely creepy in a Lovecraftian way and how they interact with the colonists is one of the cleverest tropes I’ve read in science fiction. I’d say it’s rather daring of Brown to even suggest it. The novel itself reads like one of the military novels of David Drake or David Weber, but there’s much less emphasis of military hardware and fighting and more on the very human situation the colonists find themselves in. The Devil’s Nebula is carefully written, expertly paced, and full of surprises. I am doubly thankful that this book was a stand-alone, but I think we’ll be seeing a lot of Ed Carew and his team and more of Weird Space.
****
.
.
Paperback:
http://www.amazon.com/dp/1604502002?tag=arcman-20
Kindle:
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B001I45KB6?tag=arcman-20
Publisher’s Direct
http://www.PPickings.com
Greg Benford is a Nebula winner and a former Worldcon Guest of Honor. He is the author of more than 30 novels and 6 books of non-fiction, and has edited 10 anthologies.
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Views expressed by guest or resident columnists are entirely their own.
THE REAL FUTURE OF SPACE
by Gregory Benford
Space Opera Meets the Accountants
Space opera is big these days. Myriad authors send us into distant futures where vast interplanetary or interstellar societies struggle, their cause manned (nearly always; not womanned) by masters of vast ships that sail to operatic destinies.
Since the term was invented in 1941 by Bob (“Wilson”) Tucker, space opera has had a grandiosity we pedestrian scientists could long for but seldom believe. Lately, however, developments in our rather plodding space program have provoked in me some hope that such futures make sense.
The best argument against space is its cost. The price of getting into orbit ($1 million per person-mass to reach low Earth orbit) is so high that few commercial ventures make sense. So far, only communications satellites at geosynchronous orbit have made economic sense. They have lowered the cost of intercontinental calls by orders of magnitude.
Yet space opera boasts giant spacecraft and huge space colonies. Who pays for them?
Another way to pose the problem is, what would a viable, economic space program look like at the end of the 21st century?
The British have acquired a taste for the recent style of space opera—note Iain M. Banks’s series, Ken MacLeod, Colin Greenland’s Take Back Plenty, Peter Hamilton’s popular mega-scale space operas, and more recently Alastair Reynolds and Charles Stross—all working with futures fragrant of gargantuan techno-sizzle. Interestingly, all these authors and futures are somewhat vaguely socialist. In this they contrast with the sober, often nostalgic near-future looks at the space program by Stephen Baxter, notably Titan.
A greatly expanded economy will surely be necessary to afford the vast space resources beloved of epic drama. Real-world moderate, welfare-state socialism, as seen in Europe, can afford no grand space operas. Europe has no manned space program at all. The investment for economic benefit is too steep—hundreds of billions just to set up a single solar-power satellite in near-Earth orbit, for example. The second such satellite would cost far less, of course, since the infrastructure would be done—but that first step is a killer.
Unless one envisions a society with limitless wealth (say, by matter duplication using the transporter, that Star Trek staple), there will always be limits. And the sad lesson of most advanced societies is that they get fat and lazy. Both anarchist and libertarian societies may avoid this, because they aren’t top-down socialist. But nobody knows that, because they haven’t been tried.
In these operatic futures the classic criticism of left-socialist economics has gone unanswered: that markets provide far greater information flow than do top-down, directed economic systems. Through prices, each stage from raw materials to finished product has an added cost attached, as an increased price to the next step. This moves economic information through great distances and over time, which feeds back to the earlier stages, all working toward higher efficiency. Classical socialism ends up starved for feedback. Committees or commissars are not enough to replace the ever-running detail of prices.
Politics does not offer simple maps, but one should distinguish between the Banks/Reynolds/Stross pole and the MacLeod pole. The BRS pole seems Libertarian/anarchist, and by Libertarianism I mean anarchism with a police force and a respect for contract law. Ma
cLeod is the closest thing to a true classical socialist, as in The Stone Canal. But even MacLeod is all over the board. Though socialism was his earliest fancy, he experiments with multiple social structures. In later works he espouses variants of libertarianism and anarchism, and even occasional capitalism.
The BRS pole is very muscular, quite capable of militarism and imperialism when necessary (consider Banks’s Use of Weapons). Socialism isn’t just cradle-to-grave security here. Contracts count for a lot (Reynolds’s Revelation Space), and mild anarchism is often the preferred social structure of the major protagonists. In Charles Stross’s Singularity Sky the aliens are capitalists who value everything in trade in terms of its information content, a breath of hip economics.
The whiff of welfare socialism in these novels contrasts with the bright, energetic atmosphere. This calls into question whether advanced socialist societies could plausibly support grandiose space-operatic futures.
In some ways, popular socialist thinking parallels Creationism. Unable to imagine how order and increasing complexity can arise from unseen competitive mechanisms, socialists fall into the belief that advanced societies must come from top-down direction—often, in practice, from a sole master thinker, the Chairman-for-life so common in totalitarian states. In politics, everybody is entitled to their own opinion. But not everybody is entitled to their own facts—especially not in economics.
In sf, economic dodges began well before Star Trek’s moneyless economy. Idealists have always hated mere money. It seems so, well, crass. Still, with no medium of exchange, there is no way to allocate scarce resources, so inevitably politics and brute force dictate outcomes.
Galaxy's Edge Magazine: Issue 2: May 2013 Page 19
