Transformative fiction/China Mieville

(If I were to ever actually expend real time and effort on this blog, instead of posting in the wee hours, generally a little tipsy, and with all the love and pride of a lizard littering a nice clean hole in the ground with slimy eggs she then abandons, well, I'd think of a more clever way to generate a graphic than the "four-by" collage of things--you know, just smashing, say, book covers, together to imply I have in fact read more than one book, or a collage of actors, say, to imply I enjoy many persons appearing in a television program. But I am in fact a generally lazy person posting stuff I just off-the-wall like in a kind of how-ever-the-hell fashion, and thus, I guess I do just follow a dull-ass here's four of a thing, two times more visually interesting than just two of a thing, or obviously, four times more visually interesting than just one of a thing. I know it's probably a tic of mine, and I shall work on it. The above are the books I've actually read. I still haven't gotten to Iron Council --totally have it by my bed, though.)

So, like I may have explained before (um, I think in my "Highlander:The Source" post) my lengthy disclaimer(above), I get to things when I get to things. So just last year, it was finally pointed out to me that if I generally like steampunk and fantasy and great strange writing, I'd probably get a kick out of Mieville--this was right on. I started where one really should start--Perdido Street Station and was captivated by the strange transformations, the different races of the Bas-Lag world--with its humans, Khephri, Garuda, Catacae, Vodyanoi, and all--it's a more modern and complex kit of strange entities than your Tolkienian Middle-Earth cooks up--and with a more exotic history, lore, magic, and and in New Crobuzon, an especially cruel form of justice. This novel is deep, people. There's a kind of gritty urban acknowledgement of corruption, politics, decay, and considerations along the lines of what are loyalty, what is love, what is fairness. It hooked me in, with a great and poetic strangeness.

I read King Rat next--folklore was rarely more gritty nor more gripping--It was such a grand Rat's tail I didn't let go until I'd devoured it whole. I think this one would best appeal to a reader who is folk-lore savvy--but there is also this modern, rhythmic strain that pounds hypnotically against the Pan-pipes of its fanciful underpinning. Or something like that.

The stories of Looking for Jake are mostly really haunting, sometimes removing the reader (okay--me, but could be you, probably) altogether from a logical world--into a realm of dissonance, hostile imagos. Truly mean and roaming streets.

And the last, and really, a surprisingly involving read, I was engrossed by The Scar . Scars, wounds, lacunae, broken things and people, proliferate in this strange read. The protagonist, Bellis Coldwine, is not a warm and engaging character, nor even especially sysmpathetic, but her fault is that she sees herself as wise--as street-wise. But when taken out of her element, and introduced to a world where she finds herself having to make choices, to care, to be willing to be hurt--her story becomes more interesting, and her introversion, broken as she is made to interact with others, drives a tale rich in explanation, exposition, and dives into and explores a strange world.

I look forward to reading more.