The Shadow of the Torturer (Part One of The Book of the New Sun) by Gene Wolfe

Usually, once I finish a novel I have a clear idea about what it is, and how I feel about it. Not in this case. I’m still not sure if I like Gene Wolfe’s The Shadow of the Torturer and maybe that’s because I decided to read it on its own rather than looking at the tetralogy The Book of the New Sun as a whole. The Shadow of the Torturer was published in 1981 and stood by itself for a year until The Claw of the Conciliator, so it should stand by itself. Reviewing something labelled a ‘Masterwork’ is daunting because if you don’t like it, then there’s the feeling that there’s something wrong with you – that you didn’t ‘get it’ – rather than a problem with novel. Well, bugger that.

Paradoxically, I’ve found some of the best novels I’ve read are the ones I’ve put down several times and been drawn back to, forcing myself to get past the twists and turns of the rabbit hole during those first one hundred pages (strangely, this length is consistent) and then been drawn in and onwards through to the final page. I’m still not sure if The Book of the New Sun falls into this category.

Labelling it a Masterwork must have been relatively obvious, but classifying it as fantasy must have given some labelling machine at Orion an apoplexy. It’s set in the future, but hey it’s got swords, it’s got flying machines, but hey it’s got swords, it’s got advanced technology indistinguishable from magic, but hey it’s got, no wait, magic? Problem solved. But, this is not the time for genre debates and they’re all rather boring anyway, so on with the review.

The Book of the New Sun is the story of Severian of the Torturer’s Guild. Severian narrates his life in the first person when he is (I assume) an old man and has succeeded to the throne of the Commonwealth to become the Autarch.

Adopted into the Torturers’ Guild in the city of Nessus, he grows up learning the art of excruciation practiced on ‘clients’. The Guild acts at the Autarch’s command, not asking questions of why they must ask questions. There is little discussion about their aims in torturing their clients, at times it seems more like a place of punishment than a tool for truth-seeking.

The first chapters detail his early years in the guild and his growing loyalty with the revolutionary, Vodalus. A one-sided bond established after a chance encounter in a graveyard, it is never quite clear why Severian feels such admiration for Vodalus. Unsure of whether he belongs in the guild this fascination leads him into a strange relationship with one of his clients, a woman named Thecla, who is imprisoned due to her sister being Vodalus’ lover. I never quite believed in these emotional ties as Severian is an opaque character due to his own unreliable narration. This is consistent throughout the book as Wolfe rarely dwells on his characters’ motivations. They do what they do and that’s it. His act of mercy in helping Thecla commit suicide rather than continue being tortured sees him exiled to the distant city of Thrax and, at the same time, he is gifted with the sword Terminus Est. Alongside these plot points Severian explores the local area revealing an ancient city that has forgotten its own past except for a few lonely figures holding a candle up to history. The Citadel is a dark, brooding edifice filled with sects and guilds, yet strangely empty; more like a museum than a living city. Wolfe doesn’t dwell on detail yet creates an exceptionally vivid and realistic setting. My only problem here was that each scene/setting feels a little like the stage of a movie set, filled with props that hide the emptiness behind. Each place Severian travels through feels isolated and cut off like islands in the city-sea.

After leaving the Citadel a series of vignettes (a structure similar to that of Iain M. Banks Consider Pheblas), constructed as pseudo-parables, describe Severian’s journey from the Citadel of the Torturers to the borders of the city, Nessus. During his journey through the city, Severian grapples with uncertainty about whether he did the right thing as he leaves all that was familiar to him. He finds work as an executioner to earn money, which further confuses him as he becomes more and more what he thought he was not.

After being challenged to a duel, Severian, enters the Botanical Gardens where he has several strange encounters on his path to collecting his weapon for the fight, which is a poisonous plant called an avern. The Botanical Gardens is a wondrous creation, with various sections that somehow entrance visitors into not wanting to leave. It is here that Wolfe makes the setting of the distant future clear through a exhibit that Severian and his companions become a part of.

The build-up to the monmachy (single combat) takes around six chapters and the fight itself is over in a matter of paragraphs. I found it singularly unsatisfying, not because I wanted an overworked fight scene, but because Severian’s success doesn’t come from him, but from a deus ex machina immunity to the avern’s poison.

This was not the only thing I found slightly ‘off’ about The Shadow of the Torturer. Severian’s relationships with the various female characters are somewhat unconvincing. Although his age is never explicitly stated, I placed him in his mid to late teens and despite coming from the cloistered environs of the guild he still manages to be irresistible to the women he meets. He often talks of love, yet this never comes across as genuine. This may be intentional as Severian is narrating his own life and this how he interprets his memories, but it still jarred.

Wolfe is an incredibly literate writer; he uses language with purpose – you get the impression that every word is meticulously chosen – and this could be a barrier to some readers. I found myself reaching for the dictionary every couple of pages. The only other writer I’ve had to do that with is China Mieville, who counts Wolfe as one of his influences. 

The Book of the New Sun is not an accessible book and whether or not it is worth the work involved is up to the individual reader. I found myself searching for hidden meaning, but found it only rarely as I’m sure much of it went straight over my head. In a little metafictional tongue-twisting, Wolfe (via Severian) cops to his intentions.

“…everything, whatever happens, has three layers of meaning.”…

(I’m jumping ahead here to the third meaning)

“And the third meaning?” Dorcas asked.

“The third is the transsubstantial meaning. Since all objects have their ultimate origin in the Pancreator, and all were set in motion by him, so all must express his will – which is higher reality.”

“You’re saying that what we saw was a sign.”

I shook my head. “The book is saying that everything is a sign.”

From what I’ve read from others more Wolfe-wise than I, he is using the Book of the New Sun as allegorical vehicle for some proselytising. Now, I’ve got no problem with a little preaching. Hellfire and brimstone make great fantasy, but there’s still got to be a story. Now, as I’ve only read the first book, having decided to judge them individually as that was how they’re published, and not having read the Bible, I can’t say whether this is true, but if that’s your thing, then this may be the book for you. In the end, I’m still unsure if I actually like this book. There is no doubt that it is an important piece of literature, and has influenced many modern writers, but somehow by its end I felt like I had just read an academic text rather than a work of fiction. I will be reading onwards with the next books in the series: The Claw of the Conciliator, The Sword of the Lictor, The Citadel of the Autarch; and perhaps I will have a far different opinion at the end than I do now. And that may be a good thing, for anything worthwhile does not come easily or simply.  

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About the Reviewer: Craig Leyenaar is completing an MA (Writing) at Warwick University and then will be prostrating himself before the publishing world in hopes of being granted access. His television was taken away at a young age for no good reason, but was soon replaced with books. He has stuck with them ever since and now after twenty years of reading them he finally feels ready to comment. His tastes include everything from China Mieville and M John Harrison to Isaac Asimov and Peter F. Hamilton to David Gemmell and Terry Pratchett to - he better stop there otherwise there won't be room for anything else. 

The Blue Blazes by Chuck Wendig

Mookie Pearl works for the criminal underworld of New York City, dealing in the newest drug craze that’s come to the streets of the Big Apple: the Blue stuff, Cerulean, Peacock Powder. It comes straight from the bowels of Hell itself. This is a New York that lives alongside an opening to the real underworld. And Mookie works for both. Take a hit of the old peacock powder and you’ll see what you never saw before – everything that was once hidden in the cracks; the shadows; behind the eyes of people in the streets. It opens up a whole new side to the world around you – it opens up The Blue Blazes.

Chuck Wendig’s latest is an urban fantasy thriller that uses a setting that’s completely unique, and offers up a cast of characters who feel like a breath of fresh air to the genre. It’s almost like Wendig has taken the cast of Goodfellas and dragged them, kicking and screaming into a fantasy reality of New York, opened up the playground and let them run loose. The story seems at its roots to be typical gangland mafia fare, but with the real underworld alongside the criminal one, and the different “pigments” of hell serving as our drug-runners delight. The plot concerns Mookie Pearl’s quest to save the dying mafia leader by hunting out the fabled fifth pigment, Death’s Head: the purple pigment; the lifegiver. Along the way, Mookie encounters a range of different mythical beasts and bizarre creatures, as well as seeing whatever The Blue Blazes show him. But things get complicated (as ever!) when Mookie’s daughter, Nora, comes into the fray.

Wendig has really created a fascinating and original main character in Mookie Pearl. He’s physically enormous – a real, old fashioned street thug. But underneath is a quieter, more contemplative individual with some deep regrets about his past and a driving passion for charcuterie. (Yes – charcuterie.) The side characters are all very well realised and contribute to the frantic plot in ways which are continually surprising. But Mookie is the star of this novel, and it’s all the better for it. Wendig writes in a frenzied third person present tense which moves rapidly through the plot, and for most of the book Mookie acts as our POV character, with the occasional change to some of the other major players in the story. It’s an excellent style that had me gripped from page one and always dying to read just one more chapter.

Wendig’s writing style is quite specific to him – it’s a take-no-shit, balls-to-the-wall style that fits in with the setting and characters of The Blue Blazes well. Wendig doesn’t pull his punches when it comes to cursing and gore – and indeed, much of the humour derives straight from his swear-addled prose and blood-splashed pages. The dialogue is crisp and flows quickly, with a dark humour which Wendig relishes throughout. It’s a style which Wendig is well-known for and as my first Chuck Wendig novel, I found it to be a real breath of fresh air in a subgenre which sometimes feels a little stuffy and manufactured. But it won’t be for everyone – so beware.

The Blue Blazes was one of the most fun experiences I’ve had in fiction this year and it’s got me chomping at the bit for more from Mookie Pearl – hell, just more from Chuck Wendig. He shows us an urban fantasy world which we’ve not really seen before, and manages to breathe some much-needed life into some tired gangster movie style clichés, with a distinctive vision of both the real and criminal underworlds. The Blue Blazes shows us Hell in Technicolor, and each pigment jumps straight off the page in High Definition Wendig-Vision. It’s brilliant stuff, and I just hope there’s more to come from Mookie Pearl and the five pigments of the Underworld. 

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Thanks to Angry Robot for supplying me with an ARC of The Blue Blazes. 

Fell, Volume 1: Feral City by Warren Ellis and Ben Templesmith

Detective Richard Fell is transferred over the bridge from the big city to Snowtown, a feral district whose police investigations department numbers three and a half people (one detective has no legs). Dumped in this collapsing urban trashzone, Richard Fell is starting all over again. In a place where nothing seems to make any sense, Fell clings to the one thing he knows to be true: everybody's hiding something. Even him.

How to even begin describing Fell to the uninitiated? It’s equal parts disturbing, grim, insane, disturbing and horrific. Warren Ellis and Ben Templesmith together paint a city that screams to be put out of its misery. Just take Snowtown to the pound and put a bullet in its fucking head. Volatile, relentless, homicidal, diseased. Anything mean and nasty, Snowtown’s got it. Fell’s got it.

So why did I think this was an incredible, beautiful and joyous read?

Well.

I’m no expert in comic books. I’ve never been a particular fan of the medium and it’s only in the last few months that I’ve acquired a feigned interest in catching up with some of the modern classics that everyone I know keeps banging on about. More on that to come elsewhere in the coming weeks, but Fell is the first that I’ve read and actually said to myself: “YOU IDIOT!” -  I had no idea comics could do anything like this.

Fell is absolutely dripping, rotting, congealing, with atmosphere. Unlike anything I could ever experience in a novel, Fell literally paints a picture of a decrepit city, full of deranged criminals, hopeless citizens and mostly insane cops. The artwork is consistently outstanding. At times minimalist (to the point of barely drawn sketches) to fully detailed images of a city in decay. The pairing of Ellis and Templesmith is a genuine wonder to behold – one of those times when you have to put it down to some sort of (slightly disturbed) divine intervention that these two met to create such a work of art.

But atmosphere is just one element in this rich tapestry of urban horror. We have the city, the people, the atmosphere. But it needs something else – something to make you want to read; to stay in this place. And Fell has it. 

Fell is absolutely all of those things I’ve described. It’s disgusting, it’s volatile, it’s diseased. But at its core is something far more important.

Fell has a heart. A soul.

In Richard Fell we have a weathered cop. The man who has Snowtown thrust upon him like a plague. Our lens to this place. This is his story as much as it is that of Snowtown. We follow him through case after case of grinding depravity and insanity, but Richard never loses his cool. Moving through the various plots of Fell is a redemptive arc of someone we don’t know needs redemption. But he does. Richard Fell and Snowtown were built for each other. Only together can they redeem each other and that makes for a wonderful analogue that deserves to be experienced from start to finish.

There’s no overarching storyline in Fell, but that doesn’t matter. It’s about the people, the place, the man at the centre; the city at the core. As much as I may hope Ellis and Templesmith continue with another volume, I’m satisfied in the knowledge that I’ve experienced something which has opened my eyes to a whole new medium of storytelling. I can’t really ask for much more than that.  

Wolfhound Century by Peter Higgins

Investigator Vissarion Lom has been summoned to the capital in order to catch a terrorist - and ordered to report directly to the head of the secret police.

A totalitarian state, worn down by an endless war, must be seen to crush home-grown insurgents with an iron fist. But Lom discovers Mirgorod to be more corrupted than he imagined: a murky world of secret police and revolutionaries, cabaret clubs and doomed artists.

Lom has been chosen because he is an outsider, not involved in the struggle for power within the party. And because of the sliver of angel stone implanted in his head.

Wolfhound Century is the debut novel by author Peter Higgins. A weird tale of espionage in an alternate, fantastical Russia – it’s a bit like China Mieville had a party with John Le Carre. On acid.

The book follows Inspector Vissarion Lom, a small-town police detective who hasn’t done himself any favours when it comes to self-promotion with his superiors. But out of the blue for Lom, he’s summoned to the vast capital city of Mirgorod, a sort of Moscow/St. Petersburg/ New Crobuzon hybrid, to investigate the reappearance of a suspected terrorist. It is Lom’s ability to ask the right questions and stay in the dark that is required by the head of police in Mirgorod. So Wolfhound Century goes on to become a story about spies, artists, revolutionaries, gunfights and death-defying chases on the cool, wet streets of Mirgorod. So far, so James Bond.

But James Bond doesn’t have angels, sentient rain and giants. I don’t remember seeing many weird, walking trees and vast stone golems in Skyfall.

Higgins’ has managed to craft something truly different. It’s a neo-noir fantasy thriller that is filled to the brim with ideas and imagery that jumps off the page. His prose is honed to near perfection. His descriptions and style are so atmospheric that several scenes in particular are still clearly with me long after finishing the book. Seriously, the way Higgins describes rain is incredible:

“Two kinds of rain fell on Podchornok. There was steppe rain from the west, sharp and cold, blown a thousand versts across the continental plain in ragged shreds. And the other kind was forest rain. Forest rain came from the east in slow, weighty banks of nimbostratus that settled over the town for days at a time and shed their cargo in warm fat sheets. It fell and fell with dumb insistence, overbrimming the gutters and outflows and swelling the waters of the Yannis until it flowed fat and yellow and heavy with mud. In spring the forest rain was thick with yellow pollen that stuck in your hair and on your face and lips and had a strange taste. In autumn it smelled of resin and earth. This, today, this was forest rain.”

The plot never lets up, as you might expect from something so easily compared favorably to John Le Carre – it’s at times exciting, exhausting and terrifying to read. My only problem with the book was that its ending was so abrupt. Don’t get me wrong – I don’t mean to say there is a cliffhanger – but rather that it just ends, practically mid-scene. It’s a bizarre choice and in many ways left me with the feeling that this is only half of one greater novel. I’m under the assumption that there will be a sequel – otherwise I’d really have to reassess my feelings on Wolfhound Century.

So apart from that ending, Wolfhound Century is an extraordinarily accomplished debut from a real master of atmosphere. Peter Higgins has managed to create a completely unique fantasy world with a plot that wouldn’t be out of place in a modern day thriller. But what sets it apart (except for the angels, golems and sentient rain) is the sense that really, anything could happen. This is what good genre fiction can do – it can take the familiar and imbue it with the fantastic, creating something fresh, original and a real standout novel. Excellent stuff – now where’s Part Two?

Thanks to Gollancz for providing me with an advanced review copy of Wolfhound Century.

The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland In A Ship Of Her Own Making by Catherynne M. Valente

“Stories have a way of changing faces. They are unruly things , undisciplined, given to delinquency and the throwing of erasers. That is why we must close them up in thick, solid books, so they cannot get out and cause trouble.”

This is a beautiful book. It even looks beautiful, with curlicues and rich colours and dragons (who are not really dragons) all over the cover. It looks like the kind of book little fingers will grab hold of and refuse to let go except to relinquish it to their own children. It is the story of September, bored in Omaha with her father away at war and her mother working all hours to build aeroplanes. One night she steps out of the kitchen window into the embrace of the Green Wind and the Leopard of Small Breezes, and is whisked away to Fairyland, which has fallen under the thumb of a cruel, bureaucratic Marquess.  There she meets a host of wonderful creatures to help her on her quest; a lonely golem crafted from soap who washes her courage, a blue boy who must always submit, and the loveable A-through-L, a Wyverary (his mother was a wyvern, his father was a Library...)

September is wonderful. She would describe herself as irascible and ill-tempered, but she is also loyal, courageous and clever. She misses her home, but more than once she turns down the opportunity to go back because it would mean leaving her friends in danger. She sacrifices her dress to make a sail for her ship, and her own shadow to save the life of a little Pooka girl. She’s not immune to despair, and tantrums, and fatigue, and she seems very alive, a more empowered Alice, a less-than-perfect Dorothy.

“...Ship of her own Making” sails on the back of a rich tradition of children’s fantasy literature; there are shades of Alice in Wonderland, of Oz, of “At the Back of the North Wind” and Narnia. One of the delightful things about this book is its self awareness, which, in the hands of a less skilled writer, could have come across as arch or knowing. Here, it’s just a fact:

“There's more than one way between your world and ours. There's the changeling road, and there's the Ravishing, and there's those that Stumble through a gap in the hedgerows or a mushroom ring or a tornado or a wardrobe full of winter coats.”

The book is not without its sinister moments, or its gory ones, and the story of the embittered Marquess is tragic, as Fairyland slips through her fingers and she tries to keep it by controlling and restraining the very magic that makes it what it is. Perfect for anyone who has ever danced hopefully widdershins around a fairy ring, or double-checked the back of an old wardrobe, just in case...

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About the reviewer: Jo, the cake-obsessed chair of Bristolcon, is a reviewer, blogger and fantasy author whose fourth novel, "The Art Of Forgetting" is due out this summer from Kristell Ink. Her blog-ramblings can be found at www.hierath.co.uk, and you can track her down on Twitter too (@hierath77). She often frequents pubs and coffee shops, and she is very amenable to bribery.