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Tag - english

Fil des billets

lundi, mai 28 2012

Silverhair

J'ai retrouvé récemment dans le carton de livres non lus qu'il me restait depuis le déménagement un bouquin d'un auteur dont je ne connais absolument pas le nom. Et c'est vachement bien. Apparemment il collabore avec Arthur C. Clarke, et Terry Pratchett, donc il ne saurait être entièrement mauvais. Le bouquin en question se déroule dans un monde perdu, une ile près de la banquise dans laquelle quelque mammouths ont survécu, et est vu entièrement à travers leur perspective, y compris et surtout quand ils rencontrent des humains modernes. C'est pas mal du tout et le gars à l'air bien prolifique, j'en ai pris deux assez différents sur amazon, un omnibus de quatres romans de sf sur une grande guerre galactique entre l'humanité et les méchants, et un qui fait partie d'une trilogie dont les titres comprennent, dans cet ordre, les mots stone, bronze et iron. Ca a l'air intrigant et préhistorique, j'aime. Il s'agit de Stephen Baxter et je commenterai les livres plus en profondeur une autre fois.

Peeps

is a novel by Scott Westerfeld. I had already perused his "Uglies" series, which I had enjoyed quite a little bit. Like its sibling, the Peeps series is what could be termed perioditterature. These are books, yet they are read as fast as you read a periodical. This might be construed as distaste, but nothing is further from my mind. I actually enjoy the raw satanic power I derive from owning a book in one day. Sometimes I wake up at night, just to taunt the poor book that couldn't withstand my reading ardour the day before with sardonical laughs and exclamations of "Gotcha! And in one stupid little day too! Bwahaha!". Then I wake from my dream, yet the fact remains I love this easy-come-easy-go litterature.

Peeps explores the vampire subgenre of fantasy litterature, with an innovative twist. Well the twist is not entirely innovative, but its treatment by the author is. In this series, vampirism is caused by a parasite - it's neither clear what exactly this parasite is, a worm, a bacteria? but it is transmitted by bodily fluids. The hero, and strangely enough, only narrator in the first book of the series has been infected through unprotected casual sex by this parasite, and is one of the lucky few who don't become raving lunatics. He has then been recruited by a "Night Watch" to be a vampire hunter (Blade, anyone?). The main twist is that there is more to it than either the protagonist, or the Night Watch know. This twist is brought about halfway through the book, and it rises crescendo, up to the end leaving the reader hungry for the rest of the story. Nicely done, even if it's just a grab for my money, no really!

But what really made this book an interesting read for me was the development of the parasite twist. For starters, every two chapters or so, Westerfeld tells us a gruesome parasite story, the champion of which, in my eyes, is this bacteria that litterally shapes species. This particuliar parasite, wolbachia, apparently never leaves a host, except when the host implants a parasited eggs inside another animal (especially ichneumon wasps). Apart from this case, its only means of colonizing a new host, then, is that it colonizes the descendants of the host by parasiting the eggs. One species in particular, Trichogramma is now able to reproduce without males, thanks (?) to the action of the bacteria. Talk about mind-control, and worse! Which is precisely how the effect of paratism are described throughout the book, starting with the Dicrocoelium dendriticum story. This one really mind controls poor ants to climb long stalks of grass, so that sheep will be sure to eat them, and so that the parasite can go to the next stage of its lifecycle inside the sheep.

All these stories about parasites are real, and the author cleverly blends elements from each of them to enlighten the reader as to how, and why the vampirism parasite causes these effects in humans. Some parasites mind-control animals, some are useful, some change whole species, some are dangerous, some kill whole species. At the end of the book, we understand how and why humans and this particular parasite maintain their Darwinian relationship, which is coincidentally the twist I spoke of earlier, and we just have to read the second book.

A quick note for french readers: I only could find it on Numilog. Not my first choice of bookshops, in fact I had never heard of it before.

I only started the second tome, the only remark I have at this point is that, in stark contrast to the first one, each and every chapter is spoken through the voice of a different protagonist, four of them so far.

PS: Scott Westerfeld found his inspiration in a scientific vulgarisation book titled "Parasite Rex". More about this one when amazon ships it to me.

jeudi, mars 15 2012

The Black Arrow

It had been roughly thirty years since last I perused Stevenson's The Black Arrow. I remember wanting to skip school just to finish it, and a decided lack of interest in homework - though that, was maybe not related to this particular book, but more of a general trend. Swashbuckling, piracy, dukes, earls and whatnot, a romantic interest, and the nefarious Black Arrow gang of jolly forest brigands. There is nothing to dislike in there.
A young, not quite yet a, man, Richard Shelton is orphaned and in the tutelage of one Sir Daniel Brackley. Said Sir Daniel, through brigandous moves, gets a yound maid, Joana Sedley in his avaricious hands - the care of a young soul is the sale of its marriage. As the book goes, we learn that Sir Daniel lives for money, hence the rapt of Joana from her erstwhile tutor, the killing of Richard's father when he was but a boy, the disposession of numerous tenants of their assets, and more. Disgruntled tenants form a band of brigands, and vow to avenge these wrongs with a black arrow for each corrupt heart.
At the same time, the War of the Roses is running strong in England, and Sir Daniel is in no particular hurry to chose a camp, waiting to see who'll be the victor.
On these threads hangs Stevenson's tapestry, and it is sadly much more dilapidated than my boyish memories made it to be. One of the very first scenes in the book shows young Joana disguised as a boy through Sir Daniel's cunning try to evade his custody, and being rejoined by Richard who isn't the wiser as her true gender. He will proceed to be a bully to the frail and small boy he thinks she is, insulting, mocking, and finally menacing to lash her with his belt. On such shaky grounds is built Joana's love for Richard, which will endure until the happy end. Granted, Richard saves her from a patch of quicksand, but then she saves him from drowning. This premise seems fundamentally flawed and mars the rest of the reading. Until the main meal arrives.
The aforementioned outlaws bear some affection for Richard, as his dead father was friend of their leader, and died from their enemy's hand. For a while he lives with them, so that so, the leader gives him command of his men to rescue the maid. Imagine yourself hunted by the sheriff's men, eking a living out in the forest, an outlaw to man and God, taking a stray teenager in for sheer love, then making him lord it over your followers of many years? That's so unlikely as to make the possibility the writer of this blog being Albert Einstein nearing a hundred percent. And that's not the end of it - after a few adventures in Joana's liberty's name, our young Richard happens upon a fight where one hunchback defends against several assaulters. He only listens to his sense of justice (given his earlier bullying, I'd say "his lust for battle"), and joins the less numerous sight of the fray. They soundly rout the enemy, upon which it is revealed the lone fighter is none other than Richard the hunchback, soon to become III. Then, the incredulous reader has to, bemused and at a loss for words, witness this homonymous Richard give command of a hundred of his troops to young Richard during the assault of Shoreby.
The city is taken, Sir Daniel who had escaped harm all along, finally gets a black arrow in his black heart, they marry and live happily ever after.
Novels where teenagers are the main characters abound. A fair few of these are meant for an adult readership. But none pretend that, on a whim, an unknown teen gets command of many adults, nevermind if he is minor gentry. The Duke may die, making his already battle-hardened eldest, yet young, son the de-facto commander of the troops. After fighting gallantly upon the field for months, a young urchin might be promoted by a generous lord. But never in the history of litterature, has an untried teen been given command of a hundred on a whimsical fantasy, except in Stevenson's book.
I wonder if I'll ever read Treasure Island again, now. Bah!

mardi, février 21 2012

A Princess of Mars

''A Princess of Mars'' is Edgar Rice Burroughs first novel ever, having first appeared in print in 1917. Better known for his famous character Tarzan, Burroughs's the proverbial goose for the publishing profession, making it hard for us to get past their dedication to never letting their beloved shareholders lose the smile on their faces. Nonetheless a 1917 american novel is no longer protected by the almighty copyright, and as usual Project Gutenberg comes to the rescue.

Nineteen hundred and seventeen. Pulp Fiction[1] is at its apogee, and Burroughs is one of its biggest contributors, with a hundred novels or so before the half of the century. We have mentioned Tarzan already, his other famous series are the Barsoom and the Pellucidar series. Pellucidar belongs in the subterranean adventure genre, which has its protagonists explore underground complexes of caves and tunnels, and specifically in the hollow earth adventure genre where these caves and tunnels are so huge that, in fact, the interior of our planet is a gigantic cave, often with a solar-like body occupying its center, and providing light and warmth for the various living organisms occupying this interior world. Famous forerunners in these genres include Lewis Carroll in his Alice in Wonderland and Jules Verne in his Voyage au centre de la Terre. Barsoom, is the name by which the sentient inhabitants of the planet Mars, know their world. A pretty impressive planet, as far as 2012 sfx go[2], but this is another matter. A pretty impressive world, as far as 1917 science-fiction goes. Giant martians with six arms and legs, rifles that can shoot precisely upwards of two hundred miles, a (sic) "typical southern gentleman of the highest type" whose "slaves fairly worshipped the very ground he trod on" for a hero, a lot of Barsoom is ridiculously outdated. Yet the very flamboyance and exuberance of its early twentieth century science fiction tropes, as well as the impeccable manner in which Burroughs translates these in written language account for the undeniable charm of the novel even to this day. Just as (most) adults would never dream of using a bycycle as a top-of-the-line means of transportation, the very same ones litterally adulate bycycles, as long as their children occupy their saddles. Can we therefore not cast upon A Princess of Mars the same besotted, mushy drooling eyes the average parent casts on the prize of his life? I say we can, and we are then taken in for the ride of our lives on a top-of-the-line entertaining novel. Granted, slavery is not that hip anymore, happily, that's just John Carter's background - in fact, during the course of this and nine other novels, he will be a paragon of all the virtues of mankind, sometimes overdoing it, in our humble opinion. The plot of the novel is pretty basic, as such things go. By unexplained, barely alluded to means, John Carter finds himself transported from Arizona to Mars, where he discovers that his earthly muscles grant him almost divine strength in the lower martian gravity. Feats such as jumping a hundred feet in the air, or felling huge beasts with a simple punch are now his daily fare. Carter soon finds himself adopted by a barbarian tribe of martian men, as long as six-limbed, boar-tusked, green-skinned beings compete in the man category. I had read the book when a teenager, it felt even more ridiculous today than it did then, yet there is nothing to dislike about it, Burroughs delivers pure exhilarating entertainment. More when I finish it.

Notes

[1] Printed on unexpensive wood pulp paper.

[2] Upcoming movie