My reading time, which is mostly listening time, took a bit of a hit in
October as I became embroiled in the podcast Wolf-359, so I’ve rolled these two months together.
We begin with Solaris, a
classic of Russian SF, in which Kelvin, a psychologist, is dispatched to a research
station orbiting the titular planet. A scientific anomaly, the planet is
covered by a single, self-mobile ocean which somehow regulates its orbit, and
has become the subject of its own vast and internally schismatic branch of
science, dedicated seemingly to producing a definitive explanation of how and why no-one can actually understand what the shit is up with Solaris. Kelvin has been sent to investigate a breakdown in communication from
the station, which turns out to have been caused by the mysterious appearance
of replicas of the crew’s – often deceased – loved ones aboard the station, by unknown processes and to unknown ends.
This is SF at its most cerebral. Solaris
is a long, slow, rambling discourse on the nature of loss, isolation, guilt and
communication. There isn’t a lot of action, and about 60% of the significant
conflicts occur entirely within Kelvin’s own mind and conscience. The true
nature of Solaris itself is, ultimately, less important to the story than
humanity’s inability to understand the true nature of Solaris. It takes some
time to get into and sort of… engulfs you like an overeager duvet, especially
as a reading, rather than being an instant page turner.
Worth the read, if only for genre completeness, but it can be an effort
at times.
Because it was on offer, I moved on to Assassin’s Creed: Odyssey, which if nothing else prepared me for
the game’s opening violence against children. Kassandra(1) is an exiled Spartan
mercenary (or Misthios, which also becomes her particular nom de guerre,) who
graduates from small-time debt collection work when a dodgy individual hires
her to assassinate a Spartan general, who turns out to be her own father. On
discovering that her employer belongs to the all-powerful Cult of Kosmos, Kassandra
sets out to bring the Cult down, helped or hindered by a who’s who of the Peloponnesian
War, including Perikles and Aspasia of Athens, Herodotus, Socrates and a
slightly anachronistic Pythagoras, to name just the ones that I recognise without
having to get all Wikipedia about it.
As fictional adaptations of computer games go, Assassin’s Creed: Odyssey is pretty good. Okay, that’s a low bar,
but the writing it pretty decent, and the author has made a decent fist of
reducing a branching storyline to a single narrative (and, incidentally, bypassing
all of the Misthios’s potential
romance options.) Notably, coming from a game means that the action is both
non-stop and punctuated by regular boss battles. The reading is initially a
little stiff, but I think that’s mostly due to the contrast between the reader’s
primary crisp RP delivery and the more earthy, Greek-accented(2) voice she uses
for Kassandra’s first person segments. We open with the latter, so when we shift
to the former it sounds oddly formal, but it settles in well enough.
I don’t regret the time invested in this one, although I might feel
differently if it hadn’t been on offer when I bought it.
Saga was once the greatest band in the world. They were the Kings of the Wyld, the storied heroes of
many a tour of the Heartwyld and countless smaller gigs to take down local
monsters. Their names were legend: Golden Gabe, with his blade Velicor; knife-wielding
rogue Matty Skulldrummer; the wizard Moog; Ganelon, the warrior born; and ‘Slowhand’
Clay Cooper, the tank. Now, they’re old men, and their profession is in the
hands of younger fighters, and in slow decline as the monsters run out. But
then a horde of monsters descends upon a neighbouring republic, and Gabe’s
daughter Rose is one of the mercenaries trapped in the capital after coming to
its defence. The horde is closing in. The city is surrounded, the food is
running out, and there’s little chance of an official relief mission. It’s time
to get the band back together.
For something that is basically an extended joke about mercenary bands
who act like rock bands – monster-fighting ‘gigs’ and ‘tours’ by celebrity
bands are arranged by cutthroat agents known as bookers, the bands are as
famous for their partying as for their battles, some even have armoured ‘argosy’
war wagons that act as their tour buses, and I suspect that more than half of
the background mercs are references to one rock legend or another – with some
D&D references thrown in for good measure, Kings of the Wyld has an impressive degree of staying power. In
part, this is down to a unique world, with the constant threat of monsters down
to the age-old actions of a dying race of immortal, rabbit-eared,
dimension-hopping refugees who used to rule the world, and a federation of
kingdoms whose wary but stable peace has produced standing armies with little
to do but parade and guard things. My main worry with the concept – that things
would get laddish in this old boys’ club – proved groundless, as our heroes
reminisce about respected female contemporaries and are twice robbed by a gang
of female bandits without any sign of wounded pride. With a fair number of
women involved in the final battle, the author also doesn’t shy away from
casualties among the female mercs. There are signs of cultural homophobia, but
as an outlier in a fantasy world with gay marriage.
The world is interesting, and our crusty old protagonists are generally
likeable, if dangerous and occasionally inclined towards a pointy brand of
conflict resolution. They aren't exactly good people, but they are generally more committed to doing good things than they are inclined to even inadvertently do bad, which is as much as you can ask from what is basically a cross between a hedonistic classic rock band, and a party of D&D murder hobos. The band metaphor manages not to get tired, and the humour
and the action both work well enough.
This was a good read, and I have the sequel lined up for future
listening.
I’ve been working through The
Graveyard Book slowly, not because of any reluctance, but because I’ve read
it before and I like to have something with a more episodic structure on hand
for when I’m looking to knock down an hour’s listening between novels. Neil
Gaiman’s urban undead revision of The
Jungle Book has been around long enough that I suspect anyone reading my
blog will have read it already. My original review of the book vanished with
the website that used to host it, but I received my copy pretty much day of
release and I’ve loved the tale of Nobody Owens and his life among the dead
ever since. As is usual, Gaiman reads his own work.
Definitely worth the time invested.
Finally, for the months, I checked out Audible’s new musical adaptation
of The War of the Worlds, which is weird
AF. I really don’t know what went on in the meeting where they decided that
they should do a full cast adaptation mostly of the original novel, but with
some of the material from Jeff Wayne’s musical version, and using the music
from said musical version as incidental music but not including the songs. The failure of the familiar intros to
transition into the full lyrics is almost as distracting as Michael Sheen’s narration,
which seems to be based on an impression of Tom Baker’s impression of Liam
Neeson’s impression of Richard Burton.
Weird, but fun.
(1) The game allows you to choose between playing Kassandra and her
brother Alexios; the novel takes Kassandra as the canon protagonist.
(2) I’m not going to pretend I know if this accent is any good.
