Review: Edges, by Linda Nagata

Review: Edges, by Linda Nagata

by Rich Horton

Linda Nagata published four novels in the 1990s that got considerable notice -- Tech-Heaven, The Bohr Maker, Deception Well, and Vast. For whatever reason, though I was tempted, and though I bought a copy of Vast, I never got around to reading them. They are all set in a common future history, stretching forward at least a couple of thousand years, and a couple of hundred light years, as humans colonize a good chunk of the localish star systems, and undergo significant changes themselves, and encounter the Berserker-like Chenzeme: alien spaceships left by a long gone race, with the goal of exterminating any technological civilizations they find. She won the 2001 Nebula for Best Novella with "Goddesses". 

Then, it seems, her publishing career went the way of all too many solid midlist writers. I met her at a convention a number of years ago, at a kaffeeklatsch, and she discussed her new publishing model: self publishing via her own press, Mythic Island. She was working on a new trilogy, The Red, which as it happened, after the first novel came out from Mythic Island, found a home with traditional publisher Saga Press, and which garnered a couple more award nominations. She also published some more excellent short fiction -- I reprinted three of her stories in my best of the year series. Her novels since the Red trilogy have come out from Mythic Island.*

With all this, I knew I needed to try her novels, but my short fiction reading schedule made that hard. That schedule has eased however, and recently she mentioned somewhere the release of Blade, the fourth novel in a new series collectively called Inverted Frontier. I figured I should start with the first in the series, which is the book at hand, Edges, which was published in 2019. I went looking for an audio version, and was delighted to find that Edges is available free in that form. So I got it, and I've read it. (It is narrated, very well, by Nicole Poole.)

It turns out that the Inverted Frontier books are set in the same future as her 1990s novels. Indeed, Edges is a more or less direct sequel (if hundreds of years later) to Vast, and the two books share some characters. The novel opens with Riffan Naja serving on Deception Well's ship Long Watch, monitoring space for evidence of a Chenzeme attack. (I confess that I first heard the name as "Griffin", which became amusing later on when a starship named Griffin became part of the plot.) Riffan is an anthropologist who has a particular interest in studying the collapsed human civilizations "inward" (towards Earth, that is) -- civilizations that were either destroyed by the Chenzeme or failed on their own -- many of them had cloaked their stars in Dyson swarms, which have since disappeared, so that the stars are again visible. (Deception Well's people call these the Hollowed Vasties.) An intruder spaceship is suddenly detected, and it has Chenzeme features. But as it nears there is a message, a human voice, urging them not to shoot.

They soon realize that this is a captured and subverted Chenzeme ship, and its sole crewmember is Urban, who had been part of the Null Boundary expedition from Deception Well several hundred years before. (This expedition is, I understand, the subject of Vast.) And suddenly another member of that expedition -- or a version of her -- is awakened from cold sleep on the Long Watch. We realize (and readers of Nagata's earlier novels presumably already know) that humans in this future are long-lived, either in their physical bodies, or by spending time in cold sleep, or by copying themselves (as "ghosts") into computational substrates. Clemantine has had a copy of herself in cold sleep, waiting for news -- of danger, or of something like the return of the Null Boundary expedition. And she now realizes that if Urban has returned alone, she herself as well as the other members of the expedition, did not. 

Urban has a message -- he's not returning home. He wants to continue inward, towards the Hollowed Vasties. He wants company in the form of Clemantine, who had been his lover. They soon reignite their relationship (with Urban, who had been a ghost, occupying a newly grown body.) And she agrees to accompany him -- but right away Riffan and another of the Long Watch crew, Pasha, ask to join them. And before long, there are dozens more Deception Well citizens sending ghosts to Urban's ship (the Dragon) with the intention to also explore the Hollowed Vasties.

The plot of this novel, then, turns on two conflicts. One is political disagreements among the sixty plus people now on the Dragon -- which at first doesn't have room to host them all physically, or even as active ghosts. The other concerns a mysterious "entity" who at first shows up in a separate series of chapters -- apparently a much altered human who was exiled to an uninhabited rock in the area between Deception Well and the Hollowed Vasties. Inevitably, the Dragon is lured to the signs of activity at that rock, and when the "entity" manages to send a copy of itself to the Dragon, the question arises -- is this creature even human? Is it friendly (as it claims) or dangerous? That question too divides the Dragon's new population.

There's a lot more going on. And while some of the main questions are answered, others are unresolved, and further complications are set in place -- just as we expect for the first book of a five book series. That's OK, mind you. This book is exciting and stuffed with good old-fashioned Sense of Wonder. The plot is cool -- Nagata manages to make fights between disembodied patterns of data both comprehensible and exciting. There is real tension, real human relationships to deal with, cool technology, and an ending that promises more wonders -- after all, the Dragon (and some companion ships that eventuate!) has not yet even reached the first star they wish to visit in the Hollowed Vasties.

I'm not at all sure how different the experience would be to someone who had read Vast and its predecessors. I will say that Edges works quite well without knowledge of the other books -- but there are some things I really want to know that I realize I'll have to read at least Vast to learn. (Which is hardly a bad thing.) 

The book is gloriously stuffed with cool SFnal ideas, mostly ones we've seen before but expertly wielded here. It's an example of far future SF that I would call "hard SF" even though I find some of the technology implausible. (I think that the farther in the future a writer goes, the more important it is to have implausible (and often likely impossible) tech -- because it would also be implausible to imply that thousands of years from now our understanding of science won't have revealed unimagined wonders.) So -- in this book we have uploaded minds, cold sleep, exotic tech that propels starships at significant fractions of light speed (but no FTL), multiple versions of oneself (and lots of different ideas among different persons about the identity questions that arise), group minds or hive minds implied (not really seen yet), genocidal robot ships, Dyson swarms, body-swapping and body alterations, astronomical wonders, and more. It's a great deal of fun, exciting, scary. And now I'll have to read the rest! 

*This career path seems to have been taken (or been forced upon them) by a number of really fine older writers recently -- besides Nagata I can cite Greg Egan, Lawrence Watt-Evans, and Brenda Clough at least. I think it can work for writers who have established an audience and who have the experience to realize they need editing and other forms of help (and, hey, I know there are new writers who have had success in this fashion as well.) For all that, it does make me sad that traditional publishing seems less likely to support writers with established reputations who may be unlikely to produce a major bestseller but who still write good books that should sell at some reasonable level.

Two Linked Novels by Robert Silverberg: Regan's Planet and World's Fair, 1992

Two Linked Novels by Robert Silverberg: Regan's Planet and World's Fair, 1992

a review by Rich Horton

I have been trying to finish reading all of Robert Silverberg's "early period" novels. This may seem a silly quest, for after all Robert Silveberg is celebrated as a writer whose early career was marked by extreme prolificity more than by particularly strong work. And I don't deny this at all! Still, I'll say that he learned to write skillfully and professionally very quickly, his early novels, while none of them are of truly lasting value, are mostly quite readable, and often engage with worthwhile and interesting ideas. 

Famously, Silverberg "retired" from science fiction around 1960, and turned to writing mostly popular science and history -- and doing so quite well. But around 1963, Frederik Pohl, editor of Galaxy, If, and Worlds of Tomorrow, lured him back, urging him to write more ambitious fiction. Silverberg quickly produced some exceptional short fiction, and by 1967 he was also publishing exceptional novels. 

There's a curious interregnum there, however -- what about those novels that appeared between 1961 and 1967? Some may have been -- some certainly were -- novels already in the pipeline, or novels based on already published short work. And there were a few YA novels. But one at least stands out as neither of these -- Regan's Planet, from 1964. Silverberg states in his introduction to the 1982 reprint of World's Fair, 1992, that he wrote it in 1963. Clearly he was not "fully" retired from SF -- but does this novel stand with his best later work? No. 

Anyway, I feel like I should call it a transitional work of sorts. It's well written, in a very professional fashion. But it is not as ambitious as most of his post 1967 novels. It's not in any sense experimental. And, it's never been reprinted -- it's only publication was a 1964 paperback.

For all that, Silverberg did produce a sequel -- the other book under review here, World's Fair, 1992, which appeared in hardcover from Follet in 1970. It was marketed as a YA novel, but it did get a reprint, from Ace Books in 1982. During the late '70s and early '80s, several of Silverberg's early novels were reprinted by Ace, sometimes in omnibus form, and with couple of different book designs. These featured genial introductions in which Silverberg explained the genesis of the novels and admitted that they weren't up to the quality of his later work but were, in his view, worth resurrection. This edition of World's Fair, 1992, doesn't really seem to be part of that series of reprints -- the novel is a later work, for one thing, and the book presentation is much different. But it does have a genial introduction, discussing the writing of each novel, and, most importantly, clearing up some confusion. Apparently -- and, to my mind, not surprisingly -- many readers assumed that World's Fair, 1992, was simply a retitling of Regan's Planet. (This claim even ended up in some bibliographies.) It was a somewhat plausible claim for a couple of reasons -- one, that World's Fair, 1992 is a thoroughly reasonable title for Regan's Planet; and two, that neither the paperback edition of Regan's Planet nor the original hardcover of World's Fair, 1992 were readily available to check. Instead, World's Fair, 1992 is a YA novel, set during the period of Regan's World's Fair. (Regan's Planet ends just as the Fair begins.)

Regan's Planet is centered around Claude Regan, the head of Global Factors Inc, which by 1990 has become probably the most powerful corporation in the US, having bought up a lot of companies during the Panic of '76. Regan himself, only 35, took over the corporation years later in a power play in which he ousted his uncle. And suddenly he is summoned by the President, who asks him to take over the running of the planned 1992 World's Fair in the US, on the 500th anniversary of Columbus's first voyage. It's 1990 -- so Regan has only two years, and a site hasn't even been selected.

The bulk of the novel follows Regan's efforts to stage the Fair. His biggest innovation is his choice of a site -- instead of choosing one of the many US cities angling for the job, he decides to have it in space. He will have a large satellite built, 50,000 miles* up, and also build a fleet of spaceships to shuttle visitors back and forth. In this depiction, the biggest problems aren't engineering -- he hires a Brazilian firm to build the satellite, for example, and they seem to slap it together in no time. His biggest problems are financial, and the novel shows him making some desperate maneuvers, which risk bankrupting Global Factors. He also has to fight off an internal takeover attempt by people unhappy with the financial chicanery he's trying. 

Other aspects of the novel include a depiction of a much changed international political order. The US and the USSR are still important, but clearly on a downward slide, with countries like Nigeria, China, and Brazil becoming the new world powers. The book attempts to portray the other countries in a positive manner, but there is some stereotyping (and one cringey sideways reference to South Africa.) There is essentially only one female character, Regan's wife, and their marriage is displayed as quite toxic. 

The plot, besides the financial aspects, turns on the difficulty of attracting enough visitors to pay off the debts Regan incurred to set up the space station. There is a lot of reluctance, partially due to the cost of the trip, and partially due to fears after some apparently spurious threats to attack the station surface. But Regan comes up with a spectacular, if icky, solution -- there are colonies on Mars, and very recently men have discovered a few living "Old Martians" -- the indigenous inhabitants, a dying race. Regan decides to build a representative Old Martian cave on the station, and invites a few of them to come and live in the cave for a year. And if they're not interested? ... well, I'll leave that for the reader to see.

It's slickly written, and a quick read, and there are some interesting aspects, and a moral conundrum (well, not THAT much of a conundrum!) and a decision for Regan to make at the end. I thought the science and engineering aspects were brushed over a bit -- which is to say, I was not convinced that the space station could be built in that time and be suitable for so many visitors, nor was I convinced by the Mars colonies or especially the Old Martians (who seem very similar to those in the otherwise unrelated middle grade novel Lost Race of Mars). Regan himself is not a very inspiring character, though his eventual fate suggests a better path for him. And, of course, the future history up until 1992 bears little resemblance to real history -- indeed, the book was written a few months before JFK was assassinated, so it was already obviously out of date when published in 1964. But you can't blame the author for that! In the final analysis, it's a pretty minor book, more evidence of Silverberg's professionalism but no real evidence of his ability to treat deeper themes that was soon to show up in his novels.

A little bit to my surprise, I liked World's Fair, 1992 rather more than Regan's Planet. The protagonist is Bill Hastings, a high school senior interested in xenobiology who won an essay contest to spend a year on the World's Fair satellite. His essay concerned the possibility of life on Pluto, and while on the satellite, he will be part of the team maintaining the exhibit of the Old Martians. 

Bill soon realizes that most of the other young people working at the Fair got their positions due to their families' wealth or influence, and he's rooming with a couple of wealthy young men, though they seem decent enough. He's also met (literally) a pretty girl of about his age, who ran into him as he was trying to find his way after arriving. This is Emily Blackman, the daughter of a Senator, and she seems to be a fairly, well, bitchy young woman. As Bill's roommates warn him -- one of them is her cousin, and the other also knows her socially.

Work in the Mars Pavilion turns about to be pretty interesting. Seven scientists are using the opportunity to study the Old Martians as extensively as they can. Bill is adopted as a gofer, but also as a bright young student who they all want to recruit to their branch of xenobiology. Over time Bill seems to make a slight connection with the six Old Martians, who remain stoic and not terribly interested in anything outside their own situation. Bill also realizes that the scientists are all, to one degree or another, appalled with the decision to uproot the six Martians and bring them to the Fair. Bill also has a chance to spend some time with Emily, and he starts to feel attracted to her, and to feel that she is attracted to him. But the Fair in general isn't doing so well -- after an early rush of interest, attendance has fallen drastically. There is a risk that the Fair will have to close early. (This is clearly a change from the implied situation at the end of Regan's Planet, but to be fair, that novel did end only as the Fair was starting.)

But Claude Regan has a plan. (He always has a plan.) His company happens to have magically developed, in the nick of time, a nuclear-powered spaceship that can get to Pluto in only a couple of weeks. He has sent an unmanned probe there, which has found evidence of life -- life resembling the sort of life Bill Hastings has speculated Pluto might feature. So now he wants to send a manned expedition, in the hopes that they can grab some samples of Plutonian life and open a Pluto Pavilion, to attract more visitors. And -- he wants Bill Hastings to be on the expedition, to take advantage of his having, sort of, predicted all this.

Well -- we can guess the outline of the resolution. Will the expedition find samples of life on Pluto? Will there be some adventure, even some danger, making Bill a hero? Will the expedition over all be a success, and save the fair? Will the notoriety gain Bill a foothold on the xenobiology career he wants? Will this raise Bill's status with Emily enough to make his dreams come true?

The answers to these questions are smoothly revealed, and really they make a lot of sense in the context of the novel. Is a lot of it a bit silly? Sure -- like the convenient appearance of frankly unbelievable two week travel times to Pluto. But I took a lot of this in stride, as consistent with a lot of SF shortcuts, particularly in YA novels (but adult novels too.) The emotional core of it all pretty much works -- Bill's interest in xenobiology, his worries about Emily's vastly different social status, the attitudes of the scientists to their morally queasy study of the Old Martians, and to the potentially similarly queasy issues raised by the discovery of the Plutonians. It's a smooth read, of course, and interesting even though implausible, and I liked it. A reprint of both Regan's Planet and World's Fair, 1992 in an omnibus edition would be kind of neat, though I daresay the audience for it wouldn't be all that huge.

*The orbit is stated to be "fixed" over the United States at 50,000 miles, but that really makes no sense (and the fuel costs of maintaining position over the US (not a true "orbit") would be, er, astronomical.) A geosynchronous orbit (at a radius of some 26,200 miles from the center of the Earth) would be more logical, even though it would not always be over the US.

Review: Spear, by Nicola Griffith

Review: Spear, by Nicola Griffith

by Rich Horton

Nicola Griffith is the author of a great many excellent novels -- SF, crime, contempoary -- but she has made her biggest mark with two remarkable historical novels, Hild (2013) and Menewood (2023). These concern the life of the 7th Century Saint Hilda of Whitby. (More books about Hild are planned.) While working on Menewood she took a break to write Spear, which appeared in 2022. It is set in Wales and England in the 6th Century -- thus not dissimilar in time frame to the Hild books. But it is different in another way -- it is an Arthurian story, and truly a fantasy, leaning entirely into the Arthurian mythos complete with magic. Yet it is her own take on Arthur -- Welsh-centered, reimagining the characters as diverse, differently abled, queer, polyamorous, but still entirely true to the (already wildly diverse) legendarium.

The viewpoint character is Peretur, a version of Percival. But this Percival is a woman, and queer. We meet her growing up with only her mother Elen, in a secluded valley in Wales. But she feels always that her fate is different -- she is drawn to an image of a lake. And as she grows close to adulthood, she feels a need to leave, and to head to Caer Leon, and the King, Artos, and his Companions.

She has acquired spears, and a sword, and has developed remarkable skill. She encounters some of the Companions, and establishes a reputation, but when she comes to Caer Leon, she encounters some resistance. But after further feats -- defeating some bandits, rehabilitating some and killing the worst, she returns, and begins to develop relationships -- with Cai, at first skeptical; with Llanza (Lancelot), a great warrior though lame in one leg; and especially with Nimuë, the sorceress. But Artos is still wary -- and the secrets of Peretur's birth begin to come clearer (even to her.)

The novel then rushes to its conclusion -- the quest for the Grail (which here is, quite beautifully, not the Grail but one of the treasures of the Tuath Dé.) This too involves a confrontation with her father, and a resolution of her relationship with her mother, and with Artos; and of Artos' relationship with Gwenhyfar and Llanza. 

This is a lovely book, and the reframing of the story of Arthur is throughout sensible and intriguing. Peretur herself is wonderfully portrayed, and her sexuality is frankly and honestly depicted, and seems natural in its context. (And honestly Griffith does great sex scenes.) As with Hild, the depiction of everyday life in historical Britain is remarkable. The prose is graceful and lyrical. The fight scenes are outstanding. The characters all come to life. If I had a complaint, it would be that the ending is a bit rushed, and at times comes off a bit convenient. But Spear remains a glorious contribution to the (huge!) array of Arthurian retellings -- and it makes us see Arthur and his fellows in a way both familiar and refrshingly new.

Review: Love's Shadow, by Ada Leverson

Review: Love's Shadow, by Ada Leverson

by Rich Horton

Looking for my next audiobook recently, I browsed a selection of free ones (mostly from Librivox), and this book seemed worth a try. The name of the author rang a very faint bell, and, hey, how wrong can you go for $0? And it came up aces. (I have, of course, since bought the physical book, or actually an omnibus of the entire trilogy for which this book is the first volume.) I should mention upfront the reader: Helen Taylor, who did an excellent job. (Librivox recordings can be a crapshoot sometimes, but this one is very good.)

Ada Leverson was born Ada Esther Beddington in 1862. She married Ernest Leverson, unwisely and against her father's wishes, at the age of 19, and had two children, one of whom died as an infant. The marriage was generally a disaster, and eventually her husband decamped to Canada. She began writing witty sketches in the early '90s, publishing them pseudonomously in places like Punch, Saturday Review, and (eventually) The Yellow Book. One sketch, a parody of Oscar Wilde's work, was praised by its subject, and the two became good friends. Wilde called Leverson "the Sphinx", a nickname that stuck with her.

Her six novels all appeared in the decade 1907-1916. Love's Shadow (1908) was her second novel, and it was followed by two more novels about the same people, Tenterhooks (1912) and Love at Second Sight (1916). The three together are known as The Little Ottleys, and have been generally available as an omnibus under that title since 1962.

I'm going to shamelessly steal the way Hyson Concepcion described these novels, because it's perfect: "at once frothy, angry, incisive, and hilarious." It ranges from brittle satire on the English upper class in the Edwardian period, to light romance, to laugh out loud sketches of various silly people, some harmless, some less so. It's a shortish, novel, at some 56,000 words, and presented in 39 short and snappy chapters.

The story essentially follows two threads. One concerns the marriage of Edith and Bruce Ottley, and the other concerns Edith's friend Hyacinth Verney and her romance with Cecil Reeve. The two threads intersect, of course. 

Hyacinth is an orphan, an heiress, and strikingly beautiful. So far she has had several suitors, none of whom have interested her much. But she seems a bit more attached to Cecil Reeve, perhaps because he seems unusual to her (though the other characters assure us he's a completely ordinay Englishman.) His main quirk is his fascination with Eugenia Raymond, a widow about ten years his senior, who clearly regards him as more or less a puppy. Partly at Eugenia's insistence, he eventually seriously courts Hyancinth and they marry -- but Hyacinth remains jealous. All this is nicely enough done but mostly a tad conventional.

The more engaging thread is about Edith and Bruce. Bruce works in the Foreign Office, and the couple have a son, Archie, who is about two. It's quickly clear that Bruce is a fool and a bore, and is unthinkingly abusive to his much more sensible wife. Edith has learned to maneuver him by suggesting the opposite of what she prefers, realizing that he'll insist on doing what she wants instead. But she can't get him to reliably go to work on time, or to perform his responsibilities, such as writing letters he has promised, or communicating with his parents, or managing the finances. All this seems at first merely the eccentrities of a rather dense young man, but before long it's clear that Bruce, without really much intention of being so, is a terrible husband.

Over time Bruce, while ignoring his FO duties, hatches a scheme to write a play that will, he is certain, make him a fortune. Then he decides to take a part in an amateur theatrical performance. He is a hypochondriac, to the point of eventually deciding that he is a hypochondriac -- in a hypochondriacal sense. He is often absent, and appears to either be philandering, or attempting to philander but failing because the objects of his attentions reject him. He accuses Edith of an affair with a strange friend of his named Raggett, whom he had thrust upon her. And of course he is a terrible spendthrift and the household is soon deeply in debt. All of this is portrayed with a savage but light touch by Leverson. (It is speculated that this marriage is based on Leverson's own unhappy marriage.)

Their are numerous gloriously funny set-pieces. One of my favorites concerns Bruce attempting to babysit Archie, who is a pretty convincing if slightly precocious two year old -- the sequence where Archie asks Bruce if parrots have pockets had me rolling in the aisles. Bruce's absurd pretensions about his acting ability, in the two tiny parts he is given (with three total lines) are hilarious. (Indeed, pretty much all of the Edith/Bruce conversations are, if uncomfortable at times, lovely to read.) Raggett's tics -- such as his adoption of the Legitimist position (arguing that the true King should be in the line of King Charles the Martyr) and his subsequent attempt to develop a sense of humour -- are great fun. The acerbic contributions of Hyacinth's companion Anne Yeo, who is evidently Lesbian and in love with Hyacinth, and who customarily wears a macintosh, a golf cap, and boots, are wonderful. Hyacinth's uncle and guardian, Sir Charles Cannon, is in another unhappy marriage, though in this case the primary fault lies with his wife. Lady Cannon is a pompous snob who is only too willing to give her unwanted advice to all and sundry. Cecil Reeve's obsession, Eugenia Raymond, is an eccentric 40-something widow, and her view of life is refreshing.

This is really a very enjoyable novel, sprightly yet at the core darkly portraying the place of women in society. As I noted above, there are two sequels, and I will be reading them soon. 

Review: Hester, by Margaret Oliphant

Review: Hester, by Margaret Oliphant

a review by Rich Horton

Here I continue my discovery of Victorian writers. This ongoing project has been as rewarding as any reading I have done for a long time. There is something in the Victorian approach -- partly the prose, partly the particular angle on realist fiction, partly the portrayal of an interesting historical time, and also, I think, the use of author-viewpoint omniscient. I maintain that this is a tremendous way to tell a story, and the more recent insistence on, typically, either first-person or tight-third (sometimes tight-third with multiple viewpoints) is an overreaction. Those are certainly valid choices for many stories, but the near abandonment of omniscient is a loss of a great tool.

Margaret Oliphant Wilson Oliphant was born in Scotland in 1828. Her mother was named Margaret Oliphant, her father Francis Wilson. She married a cousin, Frank Wilson Oliphant (the name suggests he may have been a double cousin.) They moved to London, and had six children. Frank, a stained glass artist, contracted tuberculosis, and the family moved to Italy for his health, but he died there. Margaret returned to England, to Windsor. She had already published some novels and stories, and now set to work writing regularly to support her family. Her life was generally sad, it seems -- all six of her children predeceased her, and so did other family members (a couple of dissolute brothers) whom she supported. She wrote quickly, and ended up publishing 93 novels, as well as some nonfiction (including a rather frank autobiography) and many stories, some of these supernatural. She died in 1897, at 69. 

Her prolificity may have harmed her reputation. Indeed she herself worried about her literary status, in particular with respect to George Eliot. But if she concluded that she would not be ranked with Eliot by posterity -- which proved true, of course -- it does not follow that her work was negligible. Indeed, to be the second best, or fourth or tenth best!, Victorian novelist is hardly anything to be ashamed of. And on the evidence of Hester -- considered perhaps her best novel -- she was very good indeed at the top of her form.

Hester was published in 1883. As with most of her work, it was signed Mrs. Oliphant. This was common practice for married women writers at that time, but the present day editions tend to use the writer's full name. That said, Mrs. Oliphant was how she chose to sign her books, and certainly that may have been a surrender to convention, but there is also evidence that, especially in her case, her identity as "Mrs. Oliphant" was important to her, perhaps especially given her husband's early death, and the fact that Oliphant was her mother's maiden name.

Hester opens sometime in the late 1820s, with a careful description of the background to Vernon's, a provincial bank in the town of Redborough. The bank has a reputation for conservativism, making it a very safe place to keep your money. It has been owned for generations by the Vernon family, and the current owner is one John Vernon. He was expected to marry his cousin Catherine, who has as much hereditary right to the bank as he, but who will not be in charge because she's a woman. Instead, John marries a pretty woman who is part of a respected county family, and cousin to a baronet -- hence by some measures of higher social status than merely wealthy people like the Vernons. John builds a new house for his bride, and otherwise keeps her in luxury. And somehow the bank is not doing quite as well -- whether due to John Vernon's extravagance, or his poor management, or both, is not clear. Then comes a rumor of a run -- which will ruin the bank. John Vernon is nowhere to be found -- he has run away and abandoned his responsibilities. All is lost -- until Catherine Vernon is summoned, and, using her personal fortune (as a descendant of the bank's founder) and her, it turns out, very impressive management skills ("she has the brain of a man" people say, not entirely in an approving way) she saves the bank. Over the next few decades she makes it as successful as ever, and also establishes a reputation as a wonderful philanthropist.

In the late 1850s, after John Vernon dies in France, his wife and their 14 year old daughter return to England, and are offered a place in a house Catherine Vernon owns, called "The Vernonry" as a wry pun based on its original name, The Heronry. Catherine has retired from an active role in the bank, handing the reins to two cousins, Edward and Harry. Edward is Catherine's favorite, and the more intelligent of the two. Harry is much more stolid, and lazier, interested more in football than banking -- though he is faithful enough about doing his work. 

Hester and her mother, called Mrs. John, settle into their new rooms. The Vernonry has been subdivided into several apartments, and Oliphant takes great joy in sardonically portraying some of the other residents, particularly two sisters, Martha and Matilda Vernon-Ridgway; and another cousin, Mr. Mildmay Vernon. They are mean and jealous people, professing gratitude at the place Catherine has given them, but ever sarcastically snipping at her behind her back. There is another couple, Captain Rowley Morgan and his wife, who are in their 80s. Captain Morgan is a connection to Catherine on her mother's side, so "not really a Vernon" as the Miss Vernon-Ridgways insist, and they are more truly grateful to Catherine. Hester befriends the Morgans, and both in their way are moral beacons for her (even though they are not perfect people either.)

Hester herself is an energetic and intelligent girl, hoping to help her mother out by doing real work, such as teaching French to young women. She is also spirited enough to openly defy Catherine. The two set up as cordial enemies. And we realize that while Catherine's philanthropy is real, it is also a bit self-serving. And her attitude toward her beneficiaries, especially family members such as those in the Vernonry, is perceptibly condescending -- she fancies she can see through all their pretensions, and she probably can, but her response makes things no better.

Five years on comes the main action of the book. Hester is 19. She remains fiercely independent. But she has become something of a beauty. Harry's sister Ellen has married, and is setting herself up a social leader of the younger set in Redborough. Edward is inwardly chafing at his staid position as Catherine's more or less adopted son, and as her chosen leader of the bank; while publically he remains devoted, to the point of snubbing Hester at social events if Catherine is present while acting as if he is attracted to when they meet in other circumstances. Harry and Edward both are of an age they should probably marry, but there are precious few eligible women in their circle. Captain Morgan's grandson Roland is coming to visit him. 

So the stage is set. Harry is intrigued by Hester, but he is not at all an intellectual match for her. Edward begins to notice her more romantically, but she is troubled by his inability to honestly confront Catherine. Roland too is briefly an intriguing young man, but he is not terribly interested in marriage, and his grandfather is curiously cool to him -- it turns out, because his father was not a good person, and Captain Morgan fears he's ruined all his children, not to mention being a terrible husband to the Captain's daughter. And then Roland's sister Emma turns up -- and she is quite openly looking for her "chance" -- chance to marry, that is.

But I am making the novel seem like it has a marriage plot, as if the romance stories are the center of it. And that is not the case at all. For Hester does not want to be just a wife. She wants to do things. She wants to be a hero -- like, she ruefully acknowledges, her enemy Catherine Vernon was in saving the bank. And she also values truth, honesty. It's clear to the reader that whatever Edward's virtues, he is weak at the core, and not just in his treatment of Hester (and her mother.) And while Harry is pretty honest, he is also, as noted, a bit dull -- and not imaginative enough to give Hester scope for the life she may want. Roland himself is ambiguous -- his work is on the stock exchange, and that is suspicious, for it can involve dangerous speculation, and possibly outright dishonesty. And, indeed, he attracts the interest of Edward, and Harry, and Ellen's new husband -- will he play them for fools?

So -- the resolution beckons. Hester (even as the reader wants to warn her!) becomes intrigued by Edward's interest in her. Emma is angling for a proposal from another young man in Redborough. Roland has helped Ellen's husband, and Harry, and Edward, to make a bit of money with modest investments, but Edward wants to make a true fortune, so that he can escape Catherine's control. So Edward appropriates money that is truly owned by the bank, and starts to make risky investments, while hinting to Hester that they should marry and run away. And, inevitably, a crisis results ... I won't reveal the ending, though it's mostly not a surprise, if in some ways it defies expectations for this sort of novel. But it's involving and honest. 

What to say of the novel as a whole? It is truly delightful. Catherine and Hester are excellent characters. It's not much of a revelation to say that they are more like each other than either would like to admit. The minor characters are neat as well. The various residents of the Vernonry are a sort of chorus -- the nastier elements are comic relief, and Captain Morgan and his wife are oracles. The Morgans' granddaughter Emma is an excellent creation -- she is not likeable but she is understandable: she truly has been dealt a difficult hand as the youngest daughter of a genteel family sliding into poverty; and her grasping ways are both comic as displayed, and oddly forgiveable. Edward and Harry Vernon are perhaps closer to types, but useful and well-depicted types -- Edward the more intelligent but less honest, Harry quite definitely dull but true. Mrs. John Vernon is wonderfully portrayed -- a silly woman but a sweet woman.

And in the end, what we see, really, is an argument against the roles women in this society were forced into. Catherine escaped those roles -- but at some sacrifice. Mrs. John wholly accepted them, and ended up poor. Ellen tries to become a force in the only avenue available to her -- with some success but with a realization of that role's shallowness. And Hester -- Hester is left in almost tragic position. She is intelligent and strong and powerfully honest -- but there is no way for her to grow into her talents. The novel is also a successful social novel, portraying provincial life, and its limitations, along with the economic risks and injustices of 19th Century England.

Reviews of Brian Stableford's work, in his memory

Brian Stableford died yesterday, February 24, 2004, at age 75. I will have a fuller obituary elsewhere soon, but I thought to compile a number of reviews of his work I did, for 3SF magazine and for Locus.

The Omega Expedition (from 3SF, April 2003)

One of the most ambitious, coherent, and philosophically interesting Future Histories of recent years comes from the pen of Brian Stableford. This project began with his 1985 non-fiction book The Third Millennium, written with David Langford. In 1986 he published the first story set in that milieu, and throughout the 90s he published a quite a few further stories, set from the very near future to centuries ahead. 

He has capped this achievement with six novels: Inherit the Earth (1998), Architects of Emortality (1999), The Fountains of Youth (2000), The Cassandra Complex (2001), Dark Ararat (2002), and finally The Omega Expedition (2002). Most of the novels are expansions of earlier short stories. The central theme of the entire project is "emortality": the realization of the dream of indefinitely prolonged human life. The books and stories sketch a future in which human life is nearly destroyed by the Plague Wars of the 21st Century, and in which the entire ecosystem undergoes a nearly terminal crash. But from the ashes rises a near utopia: nanotechnology allows for greatly extended lifespans, while various biotechnological innovations rescue the biosphere. A variety of strategies for true "emortality" arise, including genetic changes, "cyborgization" -- integration of mechanical devices into the body, and even "chimerization" (based on the completely different biology of a different planet), which will allow people to adapt their bodies to radically different environments. But as The Omega Expedition opens, there is a long-term threat to this utopia, in the form of the "Afterlife", mindless beings that eat anything organic in their path. As it turns out, there is also another much nearer term threat.

The action in the book turns on the unfreezing of Adam Zimmerman, one of the key figures of the early 21st Century, a man obsessed with immortality, who finally had himself frozen with instructions that he be awakened when immortality was possible. The main viewpoint character, however, is Madoc Tamlin, who is awakened as a sort of trial run for Zimmerman. Tamlin had been kind of a "fixer" for a member of the ruling elite of the 22nd Century, and he was apparently frozen as punishment for some crime he can't remember. He soon learns that he has been roused by one faction of 31st century emortals, people who have their physical development arrested before puberty. Before long the other factions are involved as well, but then the small group of reawakened sleepers and advocates of various forms of emortality are kidnapped. 

From this point the main thrust of the novel revolves around the threat of devastating war, and a brave attempt to avert this war. But instead of action, we get lots of talk, arguably too much. I will say, though, that I found the talk interesting and quite thought provoking. Stableford uses this platform to discuss the meaning of life, the definition of intelligence, and how to make truly extended lives worthwhile. So, though the book is a bit static, on balance I found it absorbing and a very worthy capstone to an impressive feat of extended speculation.

Dark Ararat (3SF, December 2002)

Brian Stableford has spent some time working out an interesting "future history" based mostly on advanced biotechnology. In a number of stories, and a planned six novels, he has told of a 21st century under increasing ecological stress, eventually wracked by Plague Wars which threaten the survival of humanity. Biotech created the plagues, but biotech also created the solutions, which include practical "emortality" (arbitrarily extended lifespans) for humans, and a genetically engineered biosphere that will allow Earth to survive without ecocatastrophe.

Dark Ararat is the fifth novel in the series, and sort of an offshoot. At the beginning of the 22nd century as Earth seemed to face certain disaster, a series of generation ships were launched. One of these ships has arrived after hundreds of years at a new planet. Biologist and TV personality Matthew Fleury is awakened to find that things aren't going quite as planned. The crew of the ship, adapted over generations to onboard life, wants to drop off the colonists and continue traveling. But the first wave of colonists is not sure this new planet can be made habitable. And one of Fleury's colleagues has just been murdered. It is his job, along with a policeman revived along with him, to both investigate the murder, and to investigate the biological mysteries of the planet.

Not surprisingly it is the scientific mystery which dominates. Life on this planet is organized around a very different encoding molecule to DNA, and one result of this is that most organisms are some form of chimera. There are also hints of possible intelligent life, and there are hints that this chimerization may result in another form of emortality. Fleury investigates all these things, at the same time giving us a neat tour of the strange planet, while he and the policeman somewhat perfunctorily solve the murder mystery. The eventual scientific explanation is rather clever, though on a few grounds I was underwhelmed. One shortcoming may lie with me: I couldn't quite grasp all the scientific details. Another is quite common in my experience of Stableford: his portrayal of human relationships, especially romantic ones, is very distanced, and it is hard to get inside his characters. Finally, the wrapping up is very rapid, and perhaps too convenient. Still, it's in many ways a neat book – good SF for SF's sake.

From Locus, June 2002

Brian Stableford's "Taking the Piss" is a very amusing story about advances in bio-engineering. Stableford extrapolates from recent genetic modifications to animals to have their bodies create useful substances (I seem to recall that scientists have managed to get silk from sheep's milk). It turns out, in Stableford's future, that some biological engineering is best done using human hosts. This becomes a low class job, for folks such as Darren, the aimless young man who narrates this story. But the human body is a complex thing, and the specific proteins created from a certain genetic modification can be quite different from person to person. When Darren's engineered urine turns out to create something unexpected, he is potentially quite valuable. As such he is a target for industrial espionage, and also perhaps a national security asset. Stableford wraps some interesting extrapolation in a clever and quite funny story of competing economic interests.

From Locus, September 2002

January's issue of The Silver Web is their fifteenth. Editor Ann Kennedy chooses a decidedly slipstreamish mix. My favorite story this issue is Brian Stableford's "Oh Goat-Foot God of Arcady", which is mostly straight science fiction, with a (possibly metaphorical) intrusion of fantasy in the appearances of the title being, Pan, to the main character, a woman musing on her upcoming marriage to a man who is interested (and why?) in the possibilities of using genetic engineering to create human/animal chimeras. The tale is slyly told, and the mixture of the appearances of Pan with the conversational unfolding of the story behind the possible creation of chimeras works strikingly well. 

From Locus, February 2003

Brian Stableford does biological speculation as well as any writer. His latest is "A Chip off the Old Block", in which young Stevie turns out to have a potentially valuable genetic feature. But who owns his genes? Stevie becomes the focus of a bidding war, complicated by the fact that his mother and father are going through a divorce. This is a first rate look at not so much near future scientific progress as at the unexpected social consequences of such progress – and the laws surrounding it. 

From Locus, January 2004

Brian Stableford's "Nectar" is another of his stories set in a near-utopian future in which human lifespans have been enormously extended, and in which children (for that and other reasons) are very rare. Sara is an adolescent, one of only a few nearby. She gets fitted for an ornamental attachment -- a quasi-living rose. But it unexpectedly attracts not just butterflies, but shadowbats, a very new creation: more artificial life used as body art. She tracks down the old man who designed these particular creatures, hoping simply that he can fix them so they won't bother her. But her visit leads to more momentous discoveries, and changes. More solid work from one of the most consistently interesting writers of hard SF.

From Locus, July 2006

Plenty of solid reading in the August Asimov’s. The novella is a wild alternate history/fantasy from Brian Stableford, “The Plurality of Worlds”, in which a spaceship (or ethership) is constructed in late 16th Century England, for Queen Jane (presumably Lady Jane Grey survived). The five man crew are Thomas Digge, John Foxe, and three more familiar names: Francis Drake, Walter Raleigh, and Edward De Vere (Earl of Oxford, and perhaps the most fashionable current alternate Shakespeare). The possibility of making a spaceship in the 16th Century rather implies a different cosmology, and so this story supposes: the ether turns out to be breathable, and the planned trip to the moon results in an encounter with some very odd creatures, and a trip to a much farther star, where the humans learn something of man’s insignificance. 

From Locus, October 2006

Weird Tales continues a very strong year with an issue full of enjoyable stories. It opens with a long, gleefully mordant, story from Brian Stableford, “The Elixir of Youth”, in which a winemaker’s two sons fall out over the title potion. One ends up dead in a cask of wine, his body full of the elixir, which does remarkable things for the wine. But it does much worse things for the psyches of those people who find out about it: the winemaker and his surviving son, their liege lord and his heir, and so on. 

From Locus, February 2007

Brian Stableford’s “Dr. Muffet’s Island” (Asimovs, March), is a sequel to last year’s “The Plurality of Worlds”. In this one Francis Drake, having been branded a madman for his story of his adventures in space in that story, is attempting to find a large island in the central Pacific, based on a map drawn from space. But to his surprise he finds a British ship already there, with a small colony, and in particular a scientist attempting to breed spiders. All turns out to be related to schemes of a group of “celestial spiders”, enemies of the insect people from the previous story. It makes for enjoyable and outré storytelling … and likely more to come.

From Locus, February 2008

And Brian Stableford’s “Following the Pharmers” is a particularly good piece about a genetic engineering-dominated future. Radical genetic engineering is viewed with suspicion, both by the law and by the corporations (“Big Pharma”). The narrator is a small-time “pharmer”, living alone and cultivating psychotropic drugs. His privacy is threatened by a new neighbor, an activist who wants to change the rules, to force humans to become “masters of evolution”, to rectify the sloppiness of natural selection. She presses the narrator to help her – but he has a secret, involving his own past career, and his lost wife, and he is dangerous to push too far – not necessarily by his own desire.

Review: Fast Women, by Jennifer Crusie

Review: Fast Women, by Jennifer Crusie

by Rich Horton

Jennifer Crusie (real name Jennifer Smith) is a popular author of romance novels (with crime aspects). Her early career was as a teacher (in grade schools), and she has an MFA and taught in college and written criticism. She began writing category romances (i.e. from publishers like Harlequin) in the early '90s but broke out into general fiction in the later '90s.* Most of her books, at least after this switch, combine romance with mystery plots. In the past 20 years or so, most of her fiction has been collaborations, particularly with Bob Mayer.

I have read several of her novels in the past, but I hadn't read one in a while. I found Fast Women (2001) at a used book sale, and gave it to my wife, but after she finished it I figured it looked fun so I decided to read it too. 

The main character is Nell Dysart, whose husband left her, and who is looking for a job. She's in her early 40s, and after quitting college to marry, she worked as her husband's secretary/office manager -- and she likes working. She takes a temporary position with McKenna Investigations, a detective agency, and quickly brings her organizing skills to bear -- much to Gabe McKenna's displeasure, as he doesn't like change. I think all romance readers can see where that's going from (checking book) page 5. 

I said Nell is the main character, and that's true, but this novel is in many ways an ensemble book. Besides Nell and Gabe, there's Gabe's partner and cousin Riley, and Nell's best friend Suze, who is married to Jack Dysart, one of Gabe's most reliable clients. Add in Nell's other friend Margie, who was formerly married to Jack Dysart's former partner Stewart Ogilvie but is now living with Ogilvie and Dysart's accountant Budge. Plus Gabe's ex-wife Chloe, and their daughter Lu. And Nell's son Jase. Plus of course Marlene (a dachsund.) (I actually would have found a family tree for the characters very helpful!)

Nell learns quickly that her predecessor, Lynnie, had been embezzling from the McKennas. Plus Jack Dysart gets a blackmail call. And there's a mystery about Gabe's father Patrick, who had died a couple decades before, leaving Gabe the agency and a Porsche 911. Plus there are a variety of regular clients, all of whom seem serial adulterers or spouses of adulterers, and are given names like the Quarterly Report and the Hot Lunch. And a lot of strange things start to happen, including Nell stealing a dog, diamonds turning up in various places, dead people being found in freezers, and arson. And Nell, Suze, and Margie continually debate their love lives -- they all need a change, largely (it seems to me) because they got married way too young. Plus they buy a lot of china. 

It's a fun novel, but not a great one. The best part by far is the dialogue -- fast, witty, snarky. There's some sex, and some action. The crime plot, I thought, was a bit overextended, a bit too complicated, with some really gruesome stuff happening that oddly doesn't hit home enough. And the resolution was slightly labored. It was mostly a skeleton (indeed, a skeleton in a closet) on which to hang the romance plot. The romances are mostly about women in their 30s and 40s (with one exception) and that's kind of refreshing, and there is a lot of meditation on how to establish a mature and equitable relationship with your spouse. In the end, then -- enjoyable but quite light.

(*I say general fiction but more as a marketing distinction -- her novels remained similar in style and focus, though they got much longer and were published in hardcover.)