The Vorkosigan Saga is one of those series I’ve been meaning to read for a while. And, in fact, I read Cryoburn last year for the Hugo Awards voting. Going back to the beginning and reading the series in order has been a task long overdue, so let’s get this party started.

I love space opera. Technically speaking, Shards of Honour and its sequel, Barrayar, which I read in omnibus form, is probably more planetary romance. It is the first of a two part story of Cordelia Naismith falling in love not only with Aral Vorkosigan but with the planet of his birth, Barrayar. Cordelia leaves everything she knows behind to be with Aral—not that the alternatives are much better, thanks to her celebrity but suspect status after her participation in the defence of Escobar.

So, since I love space opera, Lois McMaster Bujold had a home-field advantage here. I love the intrigue that goes along with this type of science fiction. Because, let’s face it: if humanity does spread out among the stars one day, this is what we’ll be like. We’ll be divided and insular, petty and always bickering. Empires are difficult—as Barrayar demonstrates—and politics and diplomacy in the vacuum of space are always swift and unforgiving. The reactionary culture of Barrayar and the progressivist nature of Beta Colony both seem like possibilities for space colonies in the far future. Bujold also deals with the question of why Barayar doesn’t just go settle an uninhabited world ripe for the picking: the network of wormholes connecting all these worlds is what makes them valuable.

Shards of Honour doesn’t really deal with the Barrayar–Beta politics, however, except through the interactions of their embodiments in Aral and Cordelia. Ever since their first meeting on the surface of that survey world, two things are obvious: firstly, they are meant to be together; secondly, they will forever be the symbols of their upbringings—so I’ll leave you to guess what their union means for Barrayar.

Which brings me (finally) to my opinion of—and problem with—Shards of Honour. Cordelia and Aral are forced together by circumstance … and then he proposes marriage. Like you do. It is the ultimate contrived setup; Cordelia doesn’t fall in love with Aral so much as end up thrown together with him enough times to decide she might as well marry him. Everything about this story is so driven and obviously constructed towards getting Cordelia to Barrayar and married to Aral Vorkosigan, and it really frustrates me. I’d like to just embrace this book and love it unconditionally, because I love the characters … but I can’t ignore what is, if not lazy, extremely indulgent plotting.

Cordelia is an awesome main character. She’s smart and determined. She knows what she wants and will stick to her guns until she gets her way. In many ways, Cordelia is the perfect interface between Beta Colony and Barrayar. While she represents the non-warrior, curious nature of the Betan culture, she is actually far more of a warrior than most other Betans we see in this book. She might not always carry a gun and salute, but Cordelia is a tactician. She can scheme, and she can act and react with the best of them. It gets her out of trouble (and, yeah, into trouble) numerous times.

As much as the setup between Cordelia and Aral frustrates me, I like Aral too. Bujold does a good job making him a complex person. The Betans call him the Butcher of Komarr. He is the ultimate scapegoat and monster—until Cordelia meets him and discovers that, while he is Barrayan, he is a reasonably nice guy. For Aral, it’s all about doing what is honourable—but unlike some of his comrades, who allow the excesses of their aristocratic upbringing to corrupt them, Aral is all about his duty to the empire.

In many ways, it’s that conflict between personal gratification and service to one’s government/nation that underlies all of Shards of Honour. Cordelia essentially betrays Beta Colony to be with Aral (though she might not see it that way). Aral has to make some tough decisions about his personal loyalty in order to do what he thinks is right for the empire. And the biggest question, the conflict that this book ultimately resolves, is whether Aral and Cordelia can be together and be loyal to their own personal ideals as well as Barrayar. Beta Colony and Barrayar end their war before Cordelia marries Aral—I wonder what will happen next time war starts up?

Shards of Honour is a good novel on its own, but it is one that begs for more. I’m happy I read this as part of the omnibus. The transition into Barrayar is seamless. This really feels like the prologue to the latter book, which is where Bujold gets down and tackles the really interesting ramifications of Aral and Cordelia’s interstellar romance.

Intrigue and romance, war and murder and the conflict between honour and personal desire … Shards of Honour hits all the right notes for an interesting story. Oh, and there are spaceships and wormholes and nerve disruptors as well! Science fiction in name and set dressing, this is really just an action-adventure novel and a romance story wrapped up into one. It’s well worth reading—but don’t stop here.

My reviews of the Vorkosigan Saga:
Barrayar →

Immediately after finishing Shards of Honour, I jumped into Barrayar with gusto. I’d say this is the payoff to Shards of Honour, but that might give you the wrong idea. Both novels are good—but this is where it gets really interesting. Cordelia has married Aral Vorkosigan and left everything she knows behind to live with him on Barrayar, capital planet of the interstellar empire of the same name. Things are complicated: she’s pregnant and has very progressive ideas about raising kids; Aral gets named the regent of the new child emperor when the old emperor dies; and not a week goes by without some kind of assassination attempt. Pretty much, Cordelia and Aral have a very busy year. Because that makes for good reading.

I can say for certain that I liked this book better than the first one. However, there is a lot about Barrayar that gives me reservations. In the first book, Cordelia is this super-capable survey ship captain. She escapes the slightly-oppressive psychiatric regime imposed upon her by the authorities of Beta Colony and ends up with Aral, whom she has developed an affinity and, yes, love for. In Barrayar, though, Cordelia at first seems like her strings have been cut. She’s married but somewhat lifeless. Examples of her agency and will are few and far between—though, to be fair, they are certainly present. For the most part, however, Cordelia spends a lot of time confused by Barrayan customs and going to boring parties.

Fortunately, Lois McMaster Bujold turns it all around in the third act. Up until that point, I stayed afloat thanks to the masterful plotting even though the characterzation wasn’t satisfying me. I wanted to know who was behind these assassination plots, whether the child emperor would survive, and whether Cordelia’s child would survive. Bujold wraps all these questions up into a neat little ball—then tosses it into the creepy neighbour’s backyard and tells us to go ring their doorbell. She’ll wait.

Cordelia has to save her baby and, in so doing, gets a little ambitious by accident and saves the empire. I love it. I love it, because Bujold isn’t writing a Mary Sue here—Cordelia doesn’t go in there with the intention of killing Vordarian. It just kind of … happens … even after she tries to prevent it. The domesticity of Cordelia’s motivations frustrates me slightly, but it also makes the most sense. This isn’t Cordelia’s fight. She might be married to Aral, the rightful regent of the empire, but it’s not her empire. For all she cares, they could leave this all behind and go retire on an asteroid somewhere. What matters to Cordelia is her child, and creating a Barrayar that will accept her child. I can get behind that.

So I spent a good deal of Barrayar vaguely bemused by these characters even as I screamed, “Get on with it!” The intrigue, though, is what makes the book. This is science fiction in name only: it has the trappings and plot devices of a science-fiction novel, but Bujold has really written historical fiction transposed and redecorated. Call a grenade a “sonic grenade” instead of just grenade. Have some aristocracy and swordfighting and, oh yeah, external womb tank machines. There are some minor details in here that make it science fiction, but Barrayar will appeal to anyone who is interested in court intrigue and dynastic power struggles. Because the science fiction is secondary here, and there is nothing wrong with that when the result is a powerful and interesting story.

I can’t quite give Barrayar top marks. As I said above, it occasionally disappointed me and doesn’t quite deliver everything I wish it could. Like Shards of Honour before it, however, and Cryoburn, which was my first Vorkosigan Saga experience, Barrayar demonstrates that Bujold can create compelling and fun stories. This was exactly what I needed to read during a very stressful week at work and after two somewhat more depressing novels. Barrayar isn’t exactly “light” in terms of subject matter, but it light in tone and not exactly the most challenging read. Sometimes, that’s all you need.

My reviews of the Vorkosigan Saga:
← Shards of Honour | The Warrior’s Apprentice →

I read these in the omnibus but decided to review each one: Shards of Honour and Barrayar. Go wild.

Much like Diaspora, Incandescence is more of a fictional treatise on esoteric ideas than it is a novel. A loosely convergent tale of two plots, Incandescence is a showcase of Greg Egan's ability to think big--really, hugely, mindbogglingly big. Once again, Egan sidesteps the traditional boundaries of consciousness and identity. There is nary a human to be seen in this book--personalities descended from DNA, yes, but nothing we could call humanity. Incandescence is posthuman to a very literal degree.

The first plot follows Rakesh, “a descendant of DNA” and his friend, whose origins are not so mundane. They travel by transmission into the centre of the galaxy, territory held by the aptly named "Aloof". The Aloof eschew communication with the larger Amalgam society that inhabits the outer area of the galaxy. But they have made an exception by reaching out to Rakesh, who pursues a chance to find a heretofore unknown planet where DNA-based life might have evolved. It’s the type of discovery of a lifetime Rakesh has been yearning for in an age where everything has been seen and done.

The second plot follows Roi, a member of a species that lives within an asteroid in the halo of a neutron star. At the beginning of the story, Roi is content with tending the crops on the surface of the asteroid. Then she meets Zak, who piques her interest in the natural mysteries of their world. What follows is an Eganesque development of physics, from Galileo to Newton to Einstein, in the language and frame of reference of these very alien beings. The more Roi and Zak discover about their world, the more it becomes apparent they need to learn even more in order to save it from impending disaster.

These two plots converge in a very obvious way, but most of the time I found myself more entertained by the latter. It’s intriguing to watch Roi, Zak, and their colleagues deduce, derive, and hypothesize new theories and laws of physics that we take for granted as the received wisdom passed down to us through the institutions of high school and university. I love reading about the history of science and learning how exactly we came to know what we know. Here, Egan shows us how a species that lives in a radically different environment from what we are familiar with on Earth could deduce the same laws of physics through different observations. It’s clever and fun, and even if you don’t know a lot of physics, you should still be able to derive some satisfaction from watching Roi and Zak’s knowledge grow.

The search for the missing DNA world by Rakesh and his friend interests me less. Firstly, it’s kind of boring. Nothing bad ever really happens to them; there are no real threats. We hear that the Amalgam might not let them return to civilized society, on the grounds that this is all some kind of plot by the Aloof and the Rakesh who returns might not be the real Rakesh … but nothing ever really materializes from that. Secondly, as much as I want to sympathize with Rakesh’s desire to make a big discovery and alleviate his wanderlust and boredom, he is curiously ethical and moral. Are there no bad people this far into the future? He eventually wrestles with a genuine moral conundrum, and I admit I liked that. But for most of the book, he essentially does the right thing all the time, as does his friend.

Incandescence also doesn’t quite live up to the expectations set by the jacket copy. I was told that the convergence of these plots would reveal the motivations of the Aloof—and that really intrigued me. I wanted to know why the Aloof were so different from the Amalgam and why they had chosen to make this communication at this time. But we never really learn the answer to such questions. In fact, we never really learn anything. Egan takes us on a great ride, but there is no free T-shirt at the end of it. You just get thanked for riding and unceremoniously kicked out of the amusement park—see you next year.

As a novel, Incandescence fails to sustain interest or present much in the way of a compelling plot. Its virtues lie entirely in Egan’s ability to explore and explain science through very alien points of view. That’s certainly impressive … but I can’t say it’s sufficient to make this book great. In the end I’m still looking for a good story, and that’s where this book doesn’t deliver.

I know I keep telling this story over and over, and I feel like I've been talking about those books I consider "formative" to my interest in fantasy and science fiction rather a lot lately—probably because I've been re-reading some of them. So apologies if the anecdotes have become tiresome. Nevertheless, it is necessary in this case for the wavey lines of flashback to cascade down your computer screen, for A Song of Ice and Fire played such a big role in kindling my love for fantasy that it would be criminal not to examine it in this light.

My tastes as a child ran decidedly toward mysteries: first I devoured the Hardy Boys and Nancy Drew, then I discovered Arthur Conan Doyle and Agatha Christie. I read Lord of the Rings in grades five and six, along with Dune, but I view those experiences as separate from when I truly became enchanted with science fiction and fantasy a year later. They were mere dalliances, flirtations with the field prior to my actual deflowering. I read them and enjoyed them, but they did not inspire me to read more widely in their respective genres.

That all changed in grade seven. A classmate and friend lent me a massive book containing the first three volumes of The Belgariad, by David Eddings. It blew my mind, and with all the enthusiasm an impressionable 12-year-old boy can muster, I thought it was the best thing ever. My evaluation of the series' quality has mellowed over the years, but I cannot discount the importance it has as my gateway book into fantasy. After I devoured The Belgariad, I was like a zombie starved for braaaaains. I needed something more, and my local library delivered up to me exactly what I wanted.

I read the first three books in the Ice and Fire series in their hardcover editions. It would be an exaggeration to say I could barely lift them, but they definitely stood out from your average hardcover novel, and are much more remarkable than the mass market paperback edition I read this time. The sheer doorstopper physicality of these books made an impression on me that lasts to this day.

A Game of Thrones and the two sequels that existed at the time were not my first foray into fantasy, nor were they what got me hooked on the genre. They were the crucial second series that cemented my love of fantasy, confirming to me that I had made the right choice. The intrigue among the characters fascinated me, and I couldn't wait to see what happened to them next. (I do not recall what I thought about the sexuality, if indeed I noticed it at all.) And, as with The Belgariad, I brought my unhoned ideas of literary quality to the table when I read A Game of Thrones, and I'm sure I thought it was among the best books I've ever read.

So we come, in the most direct route possible however meandering it may seem, to my point. I do not still rank these books among "the best I've ever read;" I'm lucky enough to have read quite a few good books since then. Although I still love this series and really enjoyed re-reading this book, my adult self is better equipped to evaluate it critically. That's why I re-read books that made a difference for me as a child or adolescent, such as this one, A Wizard of Earthsea, and Fifth Business. I don't do it to destroy the illusions I hold about how great they are but to put my childhood admiration for them in a context my adult self can understand. The story I told above is a great memory, but it's just a story. It's not what actually happened, just a fragmentary recollection of how it might have happened. I have romanticized not just books themselves but their place in my younger life, and this is a way of bringing them down off their pedestal and making them more real to me.

A Game of Thrones is also kind of a reality check for the romanticization of medieval fantasy in general. The book is not so much realistic—it is, after all, set in an alternative world where there be dragons—but the way Martin depicts life in a medieval setting is a lot more reminiscent of British historical fiction than classic epic fantasy. It's one thing to have a story set in a monarchy with knights and nobility and peasantry; it's quite another to claim one's setting is "medieval" or "feudal" in a true sense of those words. Reading this book, I'm reminded of something David Brin wrote in his afterword for Glory Season:

While I have the floor, here's a question that's been bothering me for some time. Why do so few writers of heroic or epic fantasy ever deal with the fundamental quandary of their novels . . . that so many of them take place in cultures that are rigid, hierarchical, stratified, and in essence oppressive? What is so appealing about feudalism, that so many free citizens of an educated commonwealth like ours love reading about and picturing life under hereditary lords?

I remember thinking at the time, and I still think, that Brin's entirely right to question the status quo in this way. I don't know if there is a proper name for this type of folly—we could call it "the pastoral illusion" after all those people who think we should return to "a better way of life" by returning to a past level of technology—but it is not present in A Game of Thrones. Life in the Seven Kingdoms is not all that pleasant by our standards, and it mostly has to do with a fundamental lack of freedom—a lack of choice.

I have come to understand, in no small part thanks to my awesome Medieval & Tudor Drama prof, how fundamentally different life was in a feudal society compared to what we experience today. The cognitive dissonance Brin finds so distasteful is a result of our attempts to map our own cultural conceptions onto feudal society. In particular, our Enlightenment-driven ideas about individuality and self-determination often tend to get in the way. It goes deeper, however, extending beyond how we live to how we think. The society of the Seven Kingdoms of Westeros captures this lack of individual choice by showing us the obligations the characters have to their family, their positions, and the realm itself.

The Stark children are a great example. Robb Stark is destined to succeed his father as Lord of Winterfell, and he seems rather suited to the role. His brother Bran suffers a fall that leaves him paralyzed from the waist down. This shatters Bran's life and his understanding of his place in the world. Westeros has precious few slots in society for thinkers and sedentary people, and the masculine role is very much one of activity, and for nobility, fighting and hunting. Bran will never be a warrior now. He has alternatives, of course, which Eddard Stark lists for Arya when she asks what Bran can do now. Then she asks:

"Can I be a king's councillor and build castles and become the High Septon?"

"You," Ned said, kissing her lightly on the brow, "will marry a king and rule his castle, and your sons will be knights and princes and lords and, yes, perhaps even a High Septon."

Arya screwed up her face. "No," she said, "that's Sansa." She folded up her right leg and resumed her balancing. Ned sighed and left her there.

Arya, bless her heart, does not want to conform to the role of women among Westeros nobility. It's not that women are powerless—Cersei Lannister and Catelyn Stark belie that idea—but they have to be very careful in how they wield their power, for there is quite a bit of misogyny present even among the "good" characters, like King Robert. The phrase "just a woman" and its ilk gets repeated throughout the book. Women have power, but they lack the respect (or fear) that accompanies such power when wielded overtly, martially.

Sansa Stark is almost the exact opposite of her younger sister. And while it's impossible not to have a special place in one's heart for Arya, who is well on her way to being a Lady of War, I also feel for Sansa. She's not likeable: she's naive, selfish, and self-absorbed. Yet she almost feels as if he's a stand-in for the reader: she's constantly looking for a hero, and every time she thinks she has found him, her hopes are betrayed. Joffrey is not Prince Charming; Ser Loras Tyrell is not the chivalrous knight in shining armour; her father cannot save her. There are no heroes in A Game of Thrones, just fallible human beings.

This is a book which truly embraces the idea of an ensemble cast. Some characters shine more than others, but there is no single character one can isolate as "the main character" or "the hero." I won't go so far as to suggest that every character is morally ambiguous or that there are no protagonists or antagonists. The conflict is pretty clearly between House Stark and House Lannister. The former are the "good guys" who stand for truth, honour, etc.; the latter are "the bad guys" who manipulate, deceive, betray, and so on. Martin makes us want to cheer for the Starks and boo the Lannisters—but that doesn't mean the Starks are all good people who only do good things and who are above manipulation or deceit. In many ways, they remind me of Houses Atreides and Harkonnen from Dune. There's the same mixture of epic scope with intimate family relationships.

The conflict also draws from the real-life Wars of the Roses. Martin, like [a:Bernard Cornwell|12542|Bernard Cornwell|http://photo.goodreads.com/authors/1240500522p2/12542.jpg], portrays not only the harsh realities of feudal society in terms of relationships and choice but also the political instability often present in such systems of governance. I'm enamoured with British history, because it's just so juicy, and if you read enough about it, one of the overwhelming themes is one of fragility. The country gets invaded quite often, kings fall, new dynasties arise, and then those ones fall too. The idea of a single, unified army is a myth; armies consist of a few knights but mostly conscripts whose day jobs are much less militant, and the conscripts are loyal to their lords, not to the king. Martin reminds us of this fact several times throughout A Game of Thrones, notably in the relationship between Robb Stark and the force he raises to march upon the Lannisters. Later, when Arya overhears a conversation among some common people about King Robert, we are reminded that these folk don't really care who is king. One ruler will likely be just as bad as another.

So the causes for which the nobility, and in particular House Stark, fight are actually rather divorced from the concerns of the common people. Toward the end of A Game of Thrones, Lord Eddard has to choose between supporting a false claimant to the throne, which would save his family and supposedly preserve the stability of Westeros, or supporting the "rightful" king, even though he's probably not the best guy for the job. I love this dilemma, and I love Martin for putting Eddard in this situation where there are no good choices. It's great to see characters forced to choose between two bad alternatives—and it's even better if the character can somehow come up with a third option.

Eddard's choice, as I'll call it, brings to mind two things. Firstly, nobody in power today got there unless that person or a predecessor took power from someone else. Today's "rightful" leaders are yesterday's revolutionaries; history makes this abundantly clear. Eddard considers House Baratheon the "rightful" ruling house of Westeros—this is after he was instrumental in the rebellion against the previous "rightful" kings, the Targaryens. Viserys Targaryen, likewise, considers himself the rightful king of Westeros and is rather bitter about it. Secondly, in the chaos that quickly unfolds throughout A Game of Thrones, Martin has created a delightful downward spiral of events. The kingdom is well on its way to civil war before Eddard's choice, and any suggestion that by choosing to support one claimant to the throne over another he'll be preserving the stability of Westeros is a lie. Hence, fragility: a chain of events that starts with minor skirmishes among the noble houses turns into all-out civil war. A confluence of independent choices made by characters scattered across the Seven Kingdoms makes matters worse.

For all my praise about Martin's depiction of medieval society and its political intrigue, A Game of Thrones is curiously deficient in its portrayal of religion. Oh, we get the exposition. There are two religions in Westeros: the "old gods" are still prevalent in the North and are worshipped through the trees of a godswood; the seven gods are worshipped in aptly-named churches called "septs." Religion is not absent from A Game of Thrones, but its presence and its influence on the state of affairs is a lot more subdued than I would expect in an otherwise full-featured work of fantasy such as this. The High Septon gets mentioned a few times and shows up once or twice, and that's it. Does the church have money? Does it exert influence on matters of state? How did it feel about the deposition of the Targaryens?

Viserys Targaryen might be my least favourite character in A Game of Thrones because he is so obviously mad. The first few chapters featuring Viserys and Daenerys are a little painful, since the dynamic between them is both obvious and creepy. I sympathize with Daenerys, for she's about to get prostituted by her brother in return for an army, and she's only thirteen years old (not that prostituting one's siblings is acceptable at any age). And Daenerys undergoes considerable growth in this book, quickly becoming a formidable person who embraces her sex and sexuality and heritage with gusto. There is nothing sympathetic about Viserys. He's just insane. While I sympathize with Daenerys and, to some extent, even like her, I can't help but hope she fails at her plans to retake Westeros and the Seven Kingdoms, because that just means more bloodshed.

The unfortunate and wonderful truth about what George R.R. Martin has wrought, however, is that there will necessarily be more bloodshed. There is no way all the characters I like can escape unscathed or even alive from the madness that has descended upon them. The way shall indeed be steep and thorny and almost as tough for us as readers as it will be for the characters.

I'm probably a GRRM fanboy. I love this series, both because of its associations with my youth and its depiction of medieval society. Keep all those things in mind, though, if you consider my enjoyment a recommendation. This is a long book—and by no means a perfect one—so as well as being a doorstopper, it embodies the idea that "your mileage may vary." As with plenty of popular titles, A Game of Thrones suffers from its hype as well as benefiting; I think a lot of people build up an idea about this book in their minds, and when it fails to conform to that idea, they become disillusioned and kick it to the curb.

I'm just as guilty for building up illusions of what this book is and isn't, though in my case it's because I read the first three books in grade seven and haven't returned to them since. Re-reading A Game of Thrones was mostly a happy experience; plenty of times I found myself giggling gleefully or scowling at some turn of events. It's also been useful, because now I am free from the burden of memory and hazy recollection: when I talk about this book, and when I laud it, I can do it with the confidence instilled by having read it recently and finding it every bit as good as it was the first time around. A Game of Thrones isn't the best book ever written (it probably won't even make this year's top ten list), but it still holds a special place in my heart. Ultimately, it helped encourage me to continue reading fantasy. If it weren't for this book, I probably wouldn't be the person I am today.

To call something the exemplar for an entire genre is foolish and snobbish, and although I am at times both, I am seldom both at the same time. I think it's fair to say that A Song of Ice and Fire has had an influence on fantasy comparable to Tolkien and The Lord of the Rings. Neither is the master template for the genre, however, and I won't join the fanboys who call it such. There's something special about A Game of Thrones that keeps people coming back and keeps people reading, despite the notorious lengths of the books and lengths of time between publication. Whether that brand of special matches your personal brand of madness will have to be for you to decide.

My Reviews of A Song of Ice and Fire:
A Clash of Kings →

This is a very odd book. It’s the kind of love-child that might result from someone distilling Umberto Eco and Kurt Vonnegut. Adam Roberts takes on the spectre of Soviet Russia and, at the same time, explores how science fiction shapes and is shaped by the issues at work in the society of its time. Yellow Blue Tibia is not your typical work of alternative history.

At the end of World War II, Stalin gathers some of Russia’s greatest science fiction minds and asks them to create an alien menace that will keep Russia unified following the defeat of the Nazis. Just as abruptly, this secret project gets scrapped and the writers are told to forget it ever happened. Konstantin Skvorecky does exactly this for another forty years, but in 1986 his life takes a turn for the surreal. He runs into another of his writer comrades from that project, Jan (aka Ivan) Friedman, now a colonel in the KGB. He encounters two Americans, and a Russian physicist-turned-taxi-driver, who are somehow involved in a plot to blow up Chernobyl. Nobody wants to explain anything to Skvorecky, and somehow he gets wrapped up in a conspiracy that might be of his own making.

The convoluted conspiracies that lie beneath the surface of Yellow Blue Tibia remind me of Foucault’s Pendulum. After Colonel Ardenti’s mysterious visit to the publishing house, the various characters of the Templar conspiracy start coming out of the woodwork for real. A similar thing happens here, with Friedman’s reappearance triggering the landslide of events that culminate in Skvorecky and Saltykov’s mad drive to Kiev. Don’t get me wrong: there is no way Roberts’ writing comes even close to Eco’s, and I don’t think it would be fair to either of them to say that he’s trying to emulate that style. No, my comparison here is entirely one of content; both authors tackle the curious effect that conspiracy theories have on reality. Roberts draws from the rich, conspiracy-laden background of Soviet Russia, where people really did disappear for decades without explanation.

Roberts’ style reminds me more of Kurt Vonnegut. Characters enter and exit the narrative in a meandering way, pausing to deliver exposition or advance the plot before disappearing back into the space between pages. Motivations are thin or bizarre at best. What is Friedman really after—does he believe in this conspiracy, or he is merely cynically manipulating it? Whose side is he on, after all? How did Saltykov become embroiled in all this? This is where Yellow Blue Tibia probably fails some people, for Roberts refuses to tie up all the loose ends and turn in a conventional five-act narrative where everything is resolved and clear-cut.

I think this book truly shines in two ways. First, as I already mentioned, there is the connection to the ethos that pervaded Soviet Russia. Second, it is, somewhat, a commentary on science fiction in the twentieth century.

I won’t pretend to be an expert at twentieth-century history, let alone Russian history, so the extent to which I can comment on this remains superficial. But it seems to me that the society of Russia following World War II is the perfect setting for Roberts’ tale. This wouldn’t necessarily work in another country where freedoms and civil liberties are more rigorously observed. But in Soviet Russia, there is just enough of that sense of ahistory for Skvorecky’s own self-doubt to be believable. At first, he patently rejects the idea that the story he and his fellow science-fiction writers developed could actually be coming true. It is, after all, absurd. But as evidence piles up and more people in positions of authority insist that it is the case, he begins to doubt himself. It’s not a matter of proof or persuasion but simply the persistent reminder that, in Russia, nothing is as it seems, and there is the truth and then there is the truth as told by the Party.

There’s a great scene in the middle of the book, when Skvorecky visits a club and is asked to deliver a speech on UFOs, that demonstrates this concept. Skvorecky refuses to talk about UFOs on the grounds that he does not believe they exist. Yet his audience refuses to swallow this reasoning, choosing instead to believe he is speaking in circles lest he get in trouble with the KGB and the Communist Party for speaking of something that is not sanctioned. Roberts demonstrates the lengths to which some people had to go to get their point across without running afoul of censors and secret police.

Yellow Blue Tibia also explores the relationship between science fiction and society. Science fiction has often had a rocky relationship with authoritarian/communist regimes—why depict a future society that isn’t communist if communism is supposed to be the answer to all our problems? Skvorecky and his fellow writers are oppressed yet, at the same time, valued by Stalin and his cronies. And Skvorecky meditates upon how science fiction has changed since the end of World War II. The science fiction of the 1930s and 1940s is significantly different from the science fiction that followed—the difference due in part to the spectre of nuclear apocalypse now lingering over every writer’s pen. No longer was science fiction only about colonies on the moon or aliens from Mars. Suddenly, humanity had the power to destroy all life on Earth quite easily (and even accidentally). It might have been the first time when, globally, something that had only been science fiction was suddenly very, very real.

If you’re looking for a quick and easy read, look further, for Yellow Blue Tibia is not it. Similarly, it’s not quite the deep and moving work of introspection that Eco or Vonnegut might produce. It’s somewhere in between … easy enough to read but not necessarily easy to comprehend, and enjoyable if you are willing to go along with it. I don’t know if I would recommend it for people who gravitate towards alternate history, but if you are interested in Soviet Russia or science-fictional conspiracies, you should definitely give this a try.

I read this on a train back to where I’m living in England from a trip up to Scotland for a holiday. It didn’t take me long to read, and I can see now why it is so relentlessly studied in schools. The story itself almost seems designed not to be imposing, and the physical volume is much the same. The way my copy—a Longman edition for students, with extra notes and questions for consideration—was bound, as a slick hardcover built to withstand years of desks and bags and storage cupboards and everything else in between, with the sans-serif font staring out at me, definitely makes it even less imposing. Like so many classics, Of Mice and Men has become a book that can be packaged and consumed—classics meet mass culture.

Of Mice and Men has a simple style but should not be taken as a simple book. It’s certainly worthy of being regarded as a good novel, for despite Steinbeck’s adherence to clear, descriptive prose and plenty of dialect-infused dialogue, there is a very serious, thoughtful subtext here. There are enough layers here for one to peel it very thoroughly over several readings. This style is not one that appeals to me that much, but Steinbeck demonstrates how, my own tastes aside, it remains as vibrant and viable as any other.

The core of the novel is the relationship between the two main characters, George and Lennie. George is small, clever, and has dreams for the future. Lennie is big, too strong for his own good, and “simple-minded”. Theirs is a relationship that vexes many other characters: why does George bother sticking up for, and looking out for, Lennie? Steinbeck never explicitly addresses this, though he comes close, hinting that without Lennie, George would truly be alone and would staunch that loneliness with the same remedies as the rest of the farm labourers—booze and women. George needs Lennie to keep the dream of the future—their own plot of land—alive. Without someone else to work towards this goal, George would lapse into easier but emptier ways.

The emptiness of that era, or at least that part of society in that era, pervades the story. Steinbeck’s sparse writing lends itself well to creating a sense of isolation on this farm. The world has stopped; progress has come to a standstill. To these men there is only the job: six days on and one day off, getting paid so they can spend it at the end of the week, moving on when it is time to find a new employer. It’s a dull cycle, and though we may gripe at our 9-to-5, we would be hard-pressed to say that we are worse off, with our Internet, mobile phones, libraries, and parks.

I can only fault Steinbeck for not being as loaquacious and expansive as I would like. There’s nothing stopping him from expanding his narrative. As it stands, Of Mice and Men’s story suffers from the kind of aimless, “and then this happened” storytelling that lesser writers make intolerable. It works here, thanks to Steinbeck’s other stylistic choices, but it’s not my favourite type of storytelling. And I know one can achieve effects similar to Steinbeck but with purpler prose—Of Mice and Men reminds me of John Irving’s works, particularly The Cider House Rules.

So I can see why Of Mice and Men has ruled the charts for so long. Like many classics, it doesn’t necessarily resonate with me personally—I think it’s a good novel, but it’s not one of my classics. Its brevity and simplicity mean, however, that reading it is not a chore. For that reason alone, this is probably a good novel to put on your list so you can cross it off and say, “Yeah, I’ve read that.” It’s another chapter in the cultural consciousness. And you never know … it might mean a lot to you.

I’ve always thought wizards are cool. If you walk up to me on the street and utter the word, “Fantasy” to me, the first thing I’ll do is give you a bizarre look and, if I don’t know who you are, probably say something along the lines of, “What?” But the second thing I would do is conjure an image of a slightly stooped old man with a white beard, flowing robes, and yes, an impressive, gnarled staff. From Gandalf to Belgarath to the Order and Chaos mages of Recluce and Candar, wizards have been around for a good amount of my epic fantasy reading. And when it comes to urban fantasy, my favourite such series, the Dresden Files, is all about a wizard. These figures, people who live and breathe magic, capture our imaginations because they embody the quirks and dangers of confronting and using magic on a daily basis. No matter how hard they try, it always changes them.

Not every wizard has to be a greybearded old man, though. The Way of the Wizard is a celebration of the diversity of wizardry in storytelling. John Joseph Adams has curated an impressive number of tales from an equally impressive pantheon of writers, and each of them brings their own concerns, styles, and bailiwicks to the table. George R.R. Martin’s “In the Lost Lands”, with its medieval characters trying to get the better of one another, reminds me of A Song of Ice and Fire. Simon R. Green’s “Street Wizard” is reminiscent of his down-to-earth, “street” style. And then you have very non-traditional approaches to wizards, such as Jeremiah Tolbert’s “One-Click Banishment” (which I really enjoyed). This anthology is definitely not a run-of-the-mill sword-and-sorcery book. Combined with the quantity of stories, the names attached to them, and the breadth of themes and subjects they address, this makes The Way of the Wizard a potent anthology.

With any anthology of this size, however, there is wheat and there is chaff. It’s really a numbers game; unless your tastes are remarkably broad, you’ll love a few of the stories here, like many of them, dislike almost as many, and outright hate one or two. Adams has elected to be inclusive, which means there are stories here that just won’t appeal. I’ll highlight a few of my favourites—some of them were easy to love, and others won me over.

I quite enjoyed “How to Sell the Ponti Bridge,” by Neil Gaiman. To call myself a Gaiman fanboy might be a little too accurate, so I shan’t, but this is one of the best stories in the entire book. Reading it reminded me of Mr. Wednesday’s con games in American Gods. Though not strictly involving wizards per se, this story is about what wizards leave behind, and how people can make a profit off it. This is a case where I’m glad Adams was so broad in his selection criteria.

I had previously read “Endgame” when it was nominated for a Hugo. It is, to date, the most enjoyable part of Lev Grossman’s Magicians universe. His two novels have been rather lacklustre, with the second a slight improvement over the first. Grossman seems comfortable writing shorter fiction; or, maybe it’s just that he doesn’t have time to transform all of his characters into whiny, self-entitled prats. Whatever the case, “Endgame” is the perfect combination of clever characterization and action-adventure.

I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention “The Word of Unbinding”, by Ursula K. Le Guin, because … it’s Le Guin.

“Love is the Spell That Casts Out Fear”, by Desirina Boskovich, is one of those stories that grew on me. At first, I wasn’t a fan: Boskovich’s style of alternating seamlessly between our world and the other world was a little confusing. But her integration of Hannah’s issues between the two worlds was awesome. In the end, Hanna the wizard gives up everything she has and lets go of the world of magic, and it’s tragedy tinged with redemption.

Once in a while I meet a short story in an anthology that really sticks with me. More often, I dredge up the spectre of a short story many years later, when I’m reminded of it by an event or another story. (“Oh yeah, I read a short story about that once….”) All of the stories in The Way of the Wizard are well-written and, in their own way, fascinating. None, in my opinion, are all that memorable (though a few, like “The Word of Binding”, have obviously demonstrated long-lasting appeal). I haven’t read other things by all of these authors, but those I have read have produced better work.

This is a mixed bag of stories. It’s worth reading if you have the time and, like me, are slightly wizard-crazy. That connecting topic is a good idea—why aren’t there more anthologies devoted to wizards‽ And hopefully, among the vast offering in The Way of the Wizard, you’ll find a gem or two that reminds you of those days curled up in a chair, just you and your wizard of choice, working magic to win the day.

Scott Adams is an interesting figure. I'm an unabashed Dilbert fan; I have the massive, slipcase-clad twentieth anniversary book, and I particularly love the short-lived TV series. I don't regularly read the comic anymore, because I feel like it's a little stale these days. Likewise, I used to read Adams’ blog, until I got tired of his persistent troll-baiting (not to mention his other antics). But I put God’s Debris on my to-read list four years ago, and now I'm finally getting around to reading it. The setting, content, and style are almost as far from Dilbert as it's possible to get—though, interestingly enough, many of the themes and philosophical questions have appeared in the comics over the years.

Whether you like God’s Debris probably depends on the amount of patience you have for long-winded hypotheticals. As Adams warns in the preface, you need a sense of humour. He also mentions the difficulty the book poses when it comes to classifying it as fiction or non-fiction. This is essentially a Socratic dialogue for the twenty-first century. It’s fiction, in that the two characters are fictional, as is the situation he uses to frame the discussion. At its heart, however, God’s Debris is a philosophical dialogue, with Avatar posing questions and delivering short lessons that help the delivery man up toward a higher state of being.

Each chapter moves smoothly and naturally into the next, the conversation focusing mostly on the nature of the universe, the purpose of life, and humanity’s own role in all of this. As the title suggests, the existence and characteristics of God is central the discussion. I won’t spoil the full thesis, but Avatar essentially points out that the anthropomorphic nature of the Biblical God is why we run into snags like the Problem of Evil or the Omnipotence Paradox. It’s a mistake to assume God has motives and desires that we can comprehend in human terms. And so, if one starts from the premise that God is omnipotent and knows everything exist its own future, Avatar posits a chain of events that explains why the universe exists and what humanity’s role is in that existence.

Socratic dialogues have fallen somewhat out of favour in this millennium. Actual novels, with the philosophy left in the subtext, tend to work better. Even Sophie’s World, which itself is a dialogue that educates the reader about the major phases of Western philosophy, had a captivating plot. God’s Debris lacks this; the characters literally exist only as mouthpieces for Adams’ philosophical ruminations. It’s not nearly as satisfying as a full novel would be. And the reason for that all comes down to layers.

If a novel (or any fictional form) is well-written, then I can still be entertained even if the philosophy goes over my head (or, as in the case of certain Sword of Truth novels, the philosophy is contrary to my own personal leanings). Furthermore, the narrative offers its own ways to access and metabolize the philosophy—for example, the characters must confront moral dilemmas, and by experiencing those dilemmas through them, we wrestle with philosophical questions ourselves. By unearthing the philosophy and putting it front and centre, God’s Debris robs the reader of the chance to tease that philosophy out of a fictional situation. Finally, having a plot to fall back on means that if I don’t find the philosophy appealing or challenging enough, then I can still manage to enjoy the book.

The nature of God and the universe is pretty heavy stuff, but nothing in God’s Debris strikes me as particularly new or thought-provoking. Maybe it’s just because I read too much science fiction, so a lot of Avatar’s musings feel old hat rather than revelatory. Whatever the reason, each chapter flowed over me like so much water: there are plenty of interesting bits in the book, but there isn’t much that I would consider remarkable or worth remembering.

Anthologies by a single author offer an opportunity to reflect upon that author’s particular areas of focus. Most authors tend to return time and again to the same motifs and themes. Nano Comes to Clifford Falls is a menagerie of Nancy Kress stories that involve nanotechnology, genetics, posthuman evolution, and very interesting meditations upon how aliens might visit Earth. Each story is unique, but put side by side, the similarities are clear, each story delivering a new and wonderful variation upon these themes.

As the title suggests, nanotechnology is one device that Kress uses over and over. “Nano Comes to Clifford Falls” is actually one of the stories I enjoyed the least; I found its narrative arc somewhat predictable and, hence, dissatisfying. However, it’s a neat little case study on the social strife that could arise if 3D-printing becomes mainstream enough to tip us over into a post-scarcity society. Like many of Kress’ characters, the protagonist here is a middle-aged woman from a somewhat rural background who has a lot of experience and a lot of baggage.

This tendency to focus on rural locations and people who are not necessarily on the cutting edge of science or politics is another reason I enjoy Kress’ stories. So much science fiction seems to take place on the bridge of a spaceship, in a marvellous lab, or on the front lines of a disputed colony. Where are the stories about everyday people struggling to eke out a living despite the technological marvels trickling out to them from the city? Well, they’re between these pages.

Nanotechnology reappears in several other stories in this collection, but often it’s simply part of the setting rather than a focus of the plot. Once again, Kress demonstrates her mastery of the craft by effortless creating and recreating plausible futuristic worlds with minimal exposition. From “Savior” to “Shiva in Shadow” and even the very short “To Cuddle Amy”, Kress can quickly establish the technologies that have shaped society’s development before zooming in to focus on one or two particular issues. In “Savior” it’s all about identity and self-determination; Kress explores what the ability to digitize and upload one’s consciousness might mean. I also found the universal quantum computer that is entangled with the space-time continuum itself a fascinating touch. “Shiva in Shadow” takes us to the galactic core. It’s a classic tale of tense scientific exploration, but as Kress explains in the afterword, the story is about what all good stories are about: relationships; and, it works so well. “To Cuddle Amy” also works precisely because Kress doesn’t overuse the joke; as soon as you realize what the couple is talking about, a chill runs down your spine … and then it’s over.

In a few of the stories, Kress also explores alien visitation of Earth. I found these stories similar to her novel Nothing Human, where the aliens are always depicted at somewhat of a remove from humanity. Often, we don’t make contact so much as brush up against each other—and when we do make contact, rather than show it on the page, Kress lets that happen off the page, preferring to spend her valuable word count developing the tension leading up to first contact. “Wetlands Preserve” reminds us that evolution might be fact, but our ability to manipulate our genes means it might not stay that way forever. “Savior” is a slow, slow burn, and I can’t say it’s among my favourites here, but wow is it clever.

Speaking of clever, I have to single out “Computer Virus” for its unique biological resolution to a crisis of artificial intelligence. A new AI developed for military applications holds a woman and her two children hostage in a smart house, and she fights it with biological warfare. I love this, because initially it seems counterintuitive—fight a machine with a germ? Furthermore, she manages to make both the woman and the antagonistic AI sympathetic characters. All in all, it’s one of my favourites in this collection—and it has plenty of competition here.

Curling up with this book of short stories (or, as the case may be, chewing through one during lunch in the school staff room) was a singular pleasure. Nancy Kress is a master of science fiction, and she particularly shines with short fiction. She has fascinating ideas about the convergence of genetics and nanotechnology to merge biology and solid-state physics on the road to our posthuman evolution. Not every story in here is great, but every single one is thought-provoking, and most are stimulating and harrowing. Kress brings us all these possible futures while reminding us that, in the end, there is no quick fix to our human flaws. With all our technology, we still quibble, and we are still a stubborn, young species with a lot left to figure out.