The Windup Girl

Jul 08, 2010

Ceridwen rated it

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Recommended to Ceridwen by: Rob

Shelves: omg-were-all-going-to-die, sci-fi, the-future-is-now, ecopunk

I always feel a little stupid when I give books five stars*, because I should be cranky and worldly and save them up for something that's been vetted within an inch of its life & makes me look smart. Then when I do give something like this five stars, I have a whole stupid melt-down about what it means and why I'm justified in my pleasure. For this book, all of this seriously self-indulgent flailing was helped along by the totally fair criticisms lobbed this book's way by RandomAnthony. Lord kno...moreI always feel a little stupid when I give books five stars*, because I should be cranky and worldly and save them up for something that's been vetted within an inch of its life & makes me look smart. Then when I do give something like this five stars, I have a whole stupid melt-down about what it means and why I'm justified in my pleasure. For this book, all of this seriously self-indulgent flailing was helped along by the totally fair criticisms lobbed this book's way by RandomAnthony. Lord knows, I've been on the other end of this, shrugging my shoulders while fanfolk scream themselves hoarse about The Next Big Thing.

I read this in a bit of total insanity while sweating out every single drop of fluid I could push into my body. It was ungodly hot. I was at a family reunion in New Hampshire, although it was not my family, strictly speaking, but my husband's siblings and parents. I'm naturally an introvert, and all of these tendencies get much more pronounced in a situation where every single moment of my time is scheduled into family togetherness with a family I still feel decidedly uncomfortable with. I'm not saying they are assholes or anything - they aren't - but after 12 years of marriage, two kids, and roughly bi-yearly meet-ups, I can't tell where I stand. I read, like a coward, and I read hard. To this day, I have no idea whether Babel Tower is as good as I remember, or if it's just a trick of the light that first Christmas I spent with my husband's family, reading alone on an air mattress while he slept on the couch, because while we may have co-habitated for some time, very different rules applied in the parental homestead.

So, the book. Honestly, I was worried at first, because I think usually four pov characters is at least one too many. But the movement between the points of view was balletic and smoothly unsettling as I shifted between one character and another. I'm the kind of reader - and I think maybe most of us are - who tends to root for the protagonist, simply because he or she is the protagonist, and the way the same event kept lensing through different, and totally opposed, consciousnesses really slapped me around. I guess I have to admit I like being slapped around here, but opinions vary on the matter. I also liked that these characters were anything but sympathetic, for the most part, while they were entirely human and understandable. I hate when writers seem to identify too strongly with a character, and protect them when the narrative clearly calls for blood or change, or both of these at once. Bacigalupi makes some hard choices, letting characters go when it's called for, and drawing them close in horrible intimacies and ruptures when another writer would flinch.

The other thing that astounds me, given that this is a far-future Thailand with a rich history that is clearly thought-out, is that Bacigalupi never once resorts to the egregious infodump. Maybe this is faint-praise, but for me, having just been subjected to the worst infodump of all time in another Nebula winner, I'm incredibly impressed. There were times when maybe too hard a line was drawn under the historical experiences of the character - Hock Seng's experience with the green headbands, for example, kept being referred to in this frustratingly vague and similar way - but I'm willing to give this a pass, for no good reason.

The plot's very political machinations - coups and leverage and pregnant conversations, people with knives to their throats both literal and metaphoric, conflicting motivations, motivating conflicts. I love this kind of stuff, and I love it more when a good dash of the random peppers the movements of titans. At one point, a character acts out in this incredibly brutal way, and the rest are left pointing guns at each other and wondering why this has happened. As a reader, you want to scream at them: can't you see how the political IS the fucking personal? But that's not the way things work; we readers doodle along God-like, and all the characters, as limited as they are like we are before the story of our lives play out, cannot see in the broad strokes.

I was satisfied by this book. It melted like ice in the glass, quickly, leaving cold in my mouth when the solidity vanished. It cooled me in the heat of the day, quietly sitting on the back steps while the family moved and splashed in the kiddie pool, cooked food, talked. It's possible that introversion is a curse, but this salved me in just the right way so I could look up and engage when the time came. Five stars for that alone.

*Just kidding. I took a star away here several months hence - the flaws appeared in my mind like cracks in ice. Sorry. Still a good book though. (less)

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Jul 30, 2010

Michael rated it

Shelves: dystopia, goodest-reads-2010, science-fiction, 2000s, steampunk, meta-reviews, reviews-with-the-most-votes

Try to picture a world where big corporations own the rights to the food we eat, and engineer it specifically so that the seeds can't be reused. Picture a world where the natural resources are steadily depleting, but everyone is still trying to act as if nothing is wrong. Picture a world where technology is barely managing to address the problems of the moment, and perhaps won't be able to keep up in the face of unexpected catastrophes.

That wasn't too hard now, was it?

The...more

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Jul 08, 2010

RandomAnthony rated it

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Long, scorching days are science fiction/fantasy weather. Back when I was in middle school, after quitting baseball but not quite when I could take the L across town to Wax Trax, I would walk the four or five miles to the Harlem-Irving Plaza a couple times a week. The mall had a Waldenbooks, and off to the right about three quarters toward the back (if you were standing at the entrance) stood the science fiction/fantasy section. I would take my hard-earned cash from umpiring t-ball games (act...moreLong, scorching days are science fiction/fantasy weather. Back when I was in middle school, after quitting baseball but not quite when I could take the L across town to Wax Trax, I would walk the four or five miles to the Harlem-Irving Plaza a couple times a week. The mall had a Waldenbooks, and off to the right about three quarters toward the back (if you were standing at the entrance) stood the science fiction/fantasy section. I would take my hard-earned cash from umpiring t-ball games (actually, that was a great job) and purchase books from writers like Roger Zelazny and Phillip Jose Farmer. Then I would walk home, slip into the air conditioned house, and read for hours. Each summer since I pick up one or two science fiction/fantasy books come July, drifting toward William Gibson, Neil Gaiman, Stephenson, etc. A few weeks back I heard someone compare Bacigalupi to Gibson and noticed the novel face-forward displayed at Barnes and Noble. I checked the library reserve list and snagged one of the first copies in the system. Score.

Nah, only about half a score. The novel functions as an interlocking set of characters’ stories in Thailand after the “contraction”, in which the world’s people struggle to redefine existence without fossil fuels or an expansive food source after a series of plagues and famines. The United States is fractured into different republics and the Midwestern seed companies have risen to multinational power. Dirigibles carry genetically modified rice across the globe and scientists race to stay one step ahead of the next genetic disaster. Thailand is hot (as, um, the author reminds the reader about every third paragraph) and the rising water serves as a constant threat to a one of the last remaining cities in Southeast Asia. Bacigalupi creates a fascinating and realistic future complete with spring-technology (no oil, remember) and “Wind-Up New People” created by the Japanese. His vision retains elements of the past as if the elements were rusted, unidentifiable metal pieces in a vacant lot and scavengers were trying to assign them value.

Here’s the problem. Bacigalupi writes as if he’s a reporter. The Wind-Up Girl carries a bloodless, clinical quality that I couldn’t quite transcend. I didn’t care much about the characters and the money-shot plot developments weren’t that alluring. My heart didn’t race and, while I was interested in the storyline, I was interested in the “when the hell is this novel going to really start?” way. The middle third is probably the best, really, as I felt like the book picked up around page 100 but lost steam around page 325. I admired the framework and intellect inherent in The Wind-Up Girl, but I admire the same about, I don’t know, those doorstop best sellers from David McCullough about American history that I will never read. So The Wind-Up Girl is good, but not much fun, and I feel a little cheated. This might be my fault, to be fair, as I was looking for something like Snow Crash or Pattern Recognition and Bacigalupi is, well, Bacigalupi. He’s smart and talented, but were this book and me at a party, I would politely excuse myself before the novel started telling me a long story about what he heard on NPR that day or something.
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Apr 06, 2011

Tatiana rated it

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Shelves: nebula, 2011, dystopias-post-apocalyptic, hugo, locus

3.5 stars

Unfortunately, I ended up enjoying The Windup Girl significantly less I than I thought I would.

I blame it on two things:

1) the narrator read this novel way too slowly for my taste;

2) the world of the novel was a little too familiar after reading Ship Breaker and Pump Six and Other Stories. Bacigalupi's version of the future where natural resources are exhausted and the world is enslaved by genehacking "calorie men," who have total cont...more

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Jun 22, 2010

Richard rated it

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Recommends it for: Anyone wanting state-of-the-art complex SciFi

Recommended to Richard by: SciFi & Fantasy Group 2010-03 SciFi Selection

Shelves: bookclub, scifi, scifi-cyberpunk, scifi-dystopia, scifi-hardscience

The Windup Girl has been getting plaudits from all over, including here on Goodreads (Goodreads Choice Award Nominee for Science Fiction). It has been nominated for the 2009 Nebula Award as well as the 2010 Hugo Award, too. (Update: on May 15th, 2010, this novel won the Nebula award. Web over here for more details).

Frankly, I haven’t read many other novels recently that I think deserve to win more. This brings us Bangkok in the late twenty-second century, in a deeply textured mash-up...moreThe Windup Girl has been getting plaudits from all over, including here on Goodreads (Goodreads Choice Award Nominee for Science Fiction). It has been nominated for the 2009 Nebula Award as well as the 2010 Hugo Award, too. (Update: on May 15th, 2010, this novel won the Nebula award. Web over here for more details).

Frankly, I haven’t read many other novels recently that I think deserve to win more. This brings us Bangkok in the late twenty-second century, in a deeply textured mash-up reminiscent of both Ridley Scott’s Blade Runner and Graham Greene’s The Quiet American. Bacigalupi has delivered a magnificently wrought novel of the near future, and that makes it really stand out. Think about all the nasty challenges facing the world today, and then try to imagine what the world might look like if we fail to address them. That’s what The Windup Girl uses as its center and backdrop.

Think we might be altering the climate? Sure enough, the ocean levels have risen to drown most of the world’s coastal cities, and the Bangkok of this novel lies behind massive dikes and seawalls that barely hold back the towering sea. Think we might be getting close to running out of oil? Well, yeah, in this story human and animal power provide most of the motive force (computers are operated with treadles), while international trade is conducted with a new generation of clipper ships sailing under huge kites and using palm-oil polymer hulls. One central conceit is that springs are used to store energy — think the kind of wind-up springs used in children’s toys, but advanced with over a hundred years of technological focus.

Maybe the changing climate and collapse of fisheries might make food scarce? Oh yeah, this takes place in a “calorie economy”, where every joule of energy is eked out with an eye-dropper. And perhaps western corporate interests will capitalize on this? Sure, to the point that agribusiness fills the evil niche of global overlords that oil companies have in our time.

Maybe you’re worried that bioterrorism might cause problems, or that genetically modified organisms will backfire and cause problems? That, and more.

At the same time, Bacigalupi doesn’t make this a dogmatic lecture. The sins of our “Expansion Age” are the backdrop to the turmoil of a completely different civilization who have far too many worries to spend time bemoaning the foolishness of their ancestors. The story is one of politics, and no one in the large cast is without sin or without merit. Well, maybe a few of the denizens of the whorehouse are low-lifes, but in that setting they are more than plausible.

The wind up girl of the title is a delightful irony: she’s not quite human, but manages to be the most innocent and sympathetic of the major characters.

If you want a taste of the kind of world we might be creating for our great-great-great grandchildren, read this novel.
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Jun 19, 2011

Brandy rated it

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Tras las altas expectativas que se generaron a mi alrededor sobre este libro, reconozco que aunque no ha sido un placer, su lectura ha sido realmente gratificante ya que es un libro diferente en todos los sentidos. Bacigalupi no es ningún romántico y se aferra a una vena cruel donde todos sus personajes son marionetas de las circunstancias que los rodean.
El libro presenta una historia muy dura. Bacigalupi no da tregua al lector y me atrapó en un mundo casi apocalíptico que podría represent...more

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Jul 29, 2010

February Four rated it

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Recommended to February by: Hugo Awards

Caveat: I am Malaysian, and I am a Hugo voter who is reading the Hugo consideration edition. I hated the book so much I stopped reading it without even getting to the titular character Emiko. Make of that what you will.

Here is my biggest problem with this book: the name of my country is MALAYSIA. Not Malaya. MalaySIa. I don't mind as much if Andersen Lake gets it wrong--he's portrayed as an asshole who doesn't bother to get the local cultural details right anyway, and he seems q...moreCaveat: I am Malaysian, and I am a Hugo voter who is reading the Hugo consideration edition. I hated the book so much I stopped reading it without even getting to the titular character Emiko. Make of that what you will.

Here is my biggest problem with this book: the name of my country is MALAYSIA. Not Malaya. MalaySIa. I don't mind as much if Andersen Lake gets it wrong--he's portrayed as an asshole who doesn't bother to get the local cultural details right anyway, and he seems quite racist to me. That's fine; while he is wholly unsympathetic in my book, there's nothing wrong with writing an unsympathetic character.

However, Tan Hock Seng is another matter.

When is this book set anyway? Considering the technology, I would say the book is set sometime in the 21st century. Post-2000, then. How old is Tan Hock Seng? I shall be charitable and say that he is 70 years old, give or take a few. Assuming Tan Hock Seng was 70 in 2010, that would mean he was born in 1940.

Malaysia came into being in 1957 when we achieved independence from the British. While we were still called Malaya back in World War II, that was then. Since 1957 we have been Malaya. Tan Hock Seng would have been using "Malaysia" for YEARS after independence.

Malaya is what the British called us. Malaya is the name of a colonial territory. Malaya is not an independent nation. Malaysians call themselves Malaysians, not Malayans.

So WHY ON EARTH is TAN using MALAYA and not Malaysia? It says in the book he was a Big Deal (my emphasis) back in the day, before the riots. Big Deals do not use Malaya. They say Malaysia.

If this is AU and Malaysia never gained its independence back in the 1950s, then the history has not been laid out for me adequately. I can only go so far in the book (page 42 out of 312) before I stop and find I can go no further.

Did not finish, because reading this book makes me so very, very angry.

ETA: Zen and Eleanor pointed out separately to me that my dates are mixed up. Zen's comment in particular was instructive because of a link to an article that illustrates exactly the sort of indoctrination most Malaysians get: http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/106...

My error, unexpectedly, makes my point for me, but I felt the need for factual correction nonetheless. The year should have been 1963.(less)

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Sep 13, 2011

CasadeSlutne rated it

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Shelves: reviewed, hugo-novels

I feel like reviewing this book is very difficult.

There are a lot of problems:

-- The author dumps you into a completely envisioned future, with all of the resulting slang and history, with no explanations. It made figuring out what was going on in the beginning difficult.
-- I spent a lot of time trying to understand the world the author was creating, only to figure out that the majority of all of it, didn't matter to the story in the end.
-- I can't decide wh...moreI feel like reviewing this book is very difficult.

There are a lot of problems:

-- The author dumps you into a completely envisioned future, with all of the resulting slang and history, with no explanations. It made figuring out what was going on in the beginning difficult.
-- I spent a lot of time trying to understand the world the author was creating, only to figure out that the majority of all of it, didn't matter to the story in the end.
-- I can't decide whose story this book is suppose to be. Is it the Pinocchio-inspired story of Emiko? The calorie man? The revolution? The Chinese man? There are too many people in this story to keep track of sometimes.
-- The writing is seriously dry and the story takes awhile to actually start.

Even with all of those complaints, I still really enjoyed the book. I've never read Bacigalupi before and I was completely enthralled.

The world created is where the "Contraction" has happened. Oil is only available to the obscenely wealthy and powerful. Water is scarce. Disease has ravaged the crops of the world, which has made seeking out new seed stock a career and business field. Calories, both the consuming and burning of them, have become a daily struggle.

Thailand is one of the few countries to survive with it's political boundaries intact. But, as any country that protects itself by sealing it's borders, it's coming under attack from both internal and external forces. Emiko's story is a "human" symbol of the larger struggle, as her very nature comes under attack both internally and externally. Trying to give any more detail about the complex plot would make this review entirely too long.

I have to admit to a personal bias here. I don't like Monsanto and follow the Transition movement pretty closely. This book fed into my own doomsday fears and righteous indignation about the future and that definitely slanted me into enjoying the book. I'm not sure a reader who didn't have that bias already in place, would enjoy it as much as I did.

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Jun 14, 2011

Osho rated it

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Shelves: 2011, asia, fantasy-science-fiction

The reader of this audiobook was unbearably slow. I listened to the whole thing on higher speed.

There's not a lot of science fiction set in Southeast Asia, so I was happy to listen to this audiobook while I was there. It's a global warming biopunk story of uncomfortable heat, drippy, disgusting wetness, and terrible smells. It was a great pleasure to wander the gritty and sticky streets of downtown Phnom Penh, plugged in by one earbud, slowly deliquescing amid the rambutans and rotti...moreThe reader of this audiobook was unbearably slow. I listened to the whole thing on higher speed.

There's not a lot of science fiction set in Southeast Asia, so I was happy to listen to this audiobook while I was there. It's a global warming biopunk story of uncomfortable heat, drippy, disgusting wetness, and terrible smells. It was a great pleasure to wander the gritty and sticky streets of downtown Phnom Penh, plugged in by one earbud, slowly deliquescing amid the rambutans and rotting shellfish.

This is a novel about corporate greed and indifference, juxtaposed with the more intimate violence governments and individuals perpetrate upon one another. Corporations continue to whore for profit with no regard for the suffering and threat their behavior creates, and without considering their effects on people or holding any notion of altruism or benefit to the community. The chief commercial players here are the agribusinesses that create, cell and sabotage genetic stock, both animal and vegetable. The citizenry must be diligent as diseases and mutagens abound; at the same time, people grow complacent and lax and, as the story unfolds, are rather viciously corrected. Salaryman becomes calorieman.

Against this backdrop, we learn the story of the Japanese windup (genetically modified) girl, Emiko, abandoned in Thailand and, because she has been built to serve, prostituted. There's a certain amount of sexual brutality, though if The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo didn't bother you, this won't, either. Emiko intersects with other characters, including the agri-spy Anderson Lake. There are some confusing points in the plotting and sequence of action, but generally speaking the narrative holds together well. As tension mounts, Emiko, perhaps herself a viral entity or tool of sabotage, attempts to save herself. The identified villain is a Hannibal Lector/Emperor Tiberius sort of fellow, complete with cat (though in this case it's a mutant cat that changes color). The group of people present at the book's denouement struck me as very funny, and I laughed aloud while wandering the subtropical streets.

Prepare by reading Bananas!: How The United Fruit Company Shaped the World for agribusiness deceit, The Untold History of the Potato for blight-related musings, Bangkok 8 for Thai atmosphere, Leviathan (Westerfeld's, not Hobbes's) for biopunk/steampunk, and, later, Oryx and Crake for more gooey genetically-brokered dystopia. (less)

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Oct 18, 2011

Andrew Liptak rated it

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Paolo Bacigalupi’s debut novel The Windup Girl is a frightening, realistic and brilliant look at the near future of the world. Taking place in Thailand at some point in the future, Bacigalupi paints a picture of a world that is caught between several major problems: climate change has affected the lives of many people around the world, and in turn, has brought a rise in global agricultural corporations, and global energy resources have been depleted, forcing major changes in the way people live ...morePaolo Bacigalupi’s debut novel The Windup Girl is a frightening, realistic and brilliant look at the near future of the world. Taking place in Thailand at some point in the future, Bacigalupi paints a picture of a world that is caught between several major problems: climate change has affected the lives of many people around the world, and in turn, has brought a rise in global agricultural corporations, and global energy resources have been depleted, forcing major changes in the way people live their lives, and how a world-wide economy functions with different resources. Corporations have run amok with trying to maintain their profit margins, and released a number of plagues upon the world that devastated the planet’s ecology upon which we all depend, and because of their actions, remain just a single step ahead of the latest mutation of blister rust and other assorted plagues. Thailand is a country that has thus far weathered the storm – the Royal government has maintained a fierce isolationist policy to keep the country from succumbing. As a result, Thailand has a precious resource that western companies desperately want: a genebank, containing thousands of new strains of crops that could be utilized to combat the ongoing struggle against plagues and hunger world-wide.

The story follows several discrete storylines and characters, each with their own motivations and demons. Anderson is a ‘calorie man’, a westerner who ostensibly manages a factory that manufactures kink-springs, a renewable power source. Jaidee is a member of the Environmental Ministry, tasked with maintaining a barrier between Thailand and the rest of the world and the dangers that it poses. Emiko is a windup, a genetically engineered woman, designed by the Japanese for servitude and for sex, who has been abandoned in Thailand and fears that she will be mulched (killed and burned for energy). In addition to these main characters, there are a number of other background characters who are just as complex as their counterparts. In a nut-shell, Anderson has come to Thailand on the behalf of a major Agricorporation that is hoping to gain a foothold in the country in order to obtain rights to the country’s gene banks. While he is ostensibly looking for ways to combat the plagues, Thailand officials believe that the corporations have far more sinister and selfish motivations for the gene banks. While in the country, he has to walk a narrow line to stay in the country, as the Environmental Ministry intends to keep Thailand free.

Captain Jaidee is a leading member of the Environmental Ministry, and throughout the book, it is clear that the country is not necessarily unified in its position to remain away from the rest of the world. Limited trade and imports occur through the actions of the Trade Ministry, which is at frightening odds with the Environmental Ministry, to the point where open bloodshed and crimes are committed on both sides to try and force their position upon the rest of the country, which eventually interrupts into violence, which helps to push forward some of the plans that Anderson and others have laid to gain more traction into the country.

Emiko’s titular character is somewhere between the various storylines. As an artificial biological construct, she is a representation of what is wrong with the outside world in the eyes of a secular nation that believes heavily in the value of one’s soul and rebirth. To the Thai people, she is a soulless being, one who is against nature, and essentially lumped in with the problems of the world. Thus, Emiko, who is unsuited for Thailand’s climate with reduced pores (she overheats easily) and a body structure that makes her stutter while moving, which makes her a literal odd woman out, and thus a target to the Environmental Ministry (also known as White Shirts for their uniform) who see her as a threat to the country’s independence.

Futuristic worlds are a common element in Science Fiction, but it is very rare to have one that is so deeply realized as Bacugalupi’s Thailand, one that takes the current state of existence for the country and extrapolates into the future with hypothetical events. The portrait that he paints of the world is very scary indeed, and the constructed world has reacted accordingly though a number of levels. What makes this novel so interesting is just how everything fits together. There are economic elements that make sense, social, biological and political, all of which are not mere exposition in a prologue in the novel, but where they are an active part of the storyline. This, in a way is one of the best examples of show, don’t tell, a writing exercise that I remember from creative writing courses. What is even better (or sobering, depending on how you look at it), this world makes sense. I can see major corporations putting profit ahead of common sense, and I can see the world going to hell in much more vivid detail now. Furthermore, Bacugalupi posits the power struggle between various departments of government, each with their own agendas and motives, both at odds with one another, which trails up through to the very end of the book.

There’s a strong look at morality and ethics when it comes to bioengineering and the eventual fate of the species, and how our role fits within a society such as what we see in the future. Emiko, a Windup, is shunned, hated, in reaction to what she was, and what she represented: something highly unnatural. By the same token, there are holes in that sort of feeling, as one character confronts towards the end of the novel. One thing that particularly stuck in my mind was how much of evolution is an unnatural, random occurrence, verses how much of it is conscious decisions that any sort of creature makes that better enhances their chances of survival? In this world, survival is predicated on the work of gene rippers and scientists who remain just a couple of steps against plagues – it is noted that the windups are built for a purpose, and that they are immune to most problems in the world because of their unique design. Like the clashes in the Thailand government, there is a larger struggle at stake, survival, with both sides making valid arguments for their continued existence. In a sense, this story is a look at how the human race might choose to survive, and enter a new stage of development. To me, this is a very profound element to the story.

When all is said and done, there is one big theme that goes through and through with this book: survival. Each element of the book deals with this very issue, from the ultimate survival of the human race in a hostile world, to the immediate survival of several characters who are neck deep in political and economic conspiracy to the various branches of government who want to see their vision of the future for their country to survive the coming turmoil.

What truly stands out for this book is the rich detail and fantastic prose. I’ve purposely taken my time with this book so that I could absorb as much as I could. What Bacugalupi puts together is a superior story, one of the best science fiction novels that I have read in a long time, one that takes the best from well thought out characters, plausible economics and science and a complicated story.(less)

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Aug 14, 2010

BunWat rated it

Shelves: 2010, speculative-fiction

A very well thought out and well written tale about a thoroughly nasty future Thailand. In a post oil world subject to waves of plague, bio terrorism and just plain negligent design spawned by gene hackers - hordes of desperate people in a city on the edge of failure waste and destroy the last of their precious resources by fighting each other like rats drowning in a bucket. Meanwhile the eponymous Windup Girl - a genetically engineered companion abandoned in the mess by a Japanese corporate ex...more

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Mar 02, 2011

Lincoln rated it

So far this is incredible...writing is clean and effective, characters are well-drawn. The toughest thing about reading this is that while it IS science fiction, it isn't even slightly far-fetched.

So much futuristic fiction (including plenty that I adore) presents a future where technology has solved the problems we face today. Limitless clean power, readily available creature comforts and easily accessible personal fulfillment - all these are just around the corner in many authors...more

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Jan 23, 2011

Stacey rated it

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Shelves: science-fiction, all-time-favorites, post-apocalyptic, ebook, on-my-shelves-hardcovers

I think I've recommended this to more people than any other book I've read (except maybe American Gods,) and yet I had to let it tumble around in my mind for months before writing about it.

Sometimes it's like that, and I'm so smitten with a story, or the prose, or... something... that I have no clue what I want to say at the end. I think the idea of all of these people doing such ordinary things, day to day, in the background, as they struggle to just survive in a world that has gon...moreI think I've recommended this to more people than any other book I've read (except maybe American Gods,) and yet I had to let it tumble around in my mind for months before writing about it.

Sometimes it's like that, and I'm so smitten with a story, or the prose, or... something... that I have no clue what I want to say at the end. I think the idea of all of these people doing such ordinary things, day to day, in the background, as they struggle to just survive in a world that has gone so completely awry, through no fault of their own. People who are just pawns and bystanders in a calorie shell-game...

The best Post-Apocalyptic sci-fi, in my reading experience, is the type that could happen, if we don't get our collective heads out of our asses and stop the plundering of earth. We all want exactly what we want, when we want it, and tomorrow will be soon enough to reduce-reuse-recycle, and develop renewable energy sources, and quit dumping toxic refuse into rivers, and quit trying to create all these resistant GMO whatevers that crossbreed/pollinate/contaminate all the other whatevers in their immediate environment, etc, etc, etc.

I include myself in the collective, as I sit at my lovely laminate petroleum-based desk, in front of my two huge and gorgeous flatscreen monitors, and occasionally pat myself on the back because I turn off the lights, put on a sweater and recycle almost religiously.

There's a recurring plotline in Windup Girl regarding ice - it's the ultimate luxury in this hot, humid tale. Everything is hot and humid, over and over, until the heat itself becomes another character in the book, as much as Anderson Lake, or the Windup, or Hock Seng, and ice - ice that's nearly impossible to get - becomes a metaphor for the inevitability of what has been done to the planet, and how things will never be normal, and there will never be a new normal, not even if you can finally get your hands on the seeds from the old normal, not even if you can develop new sources of energy, you'll still be caught in the gears of inexorable decline.

Still, it's human nature to hope, and maybe the Garden of Eden still exists, out there hidden somewhere, even if there's no ice. (less)

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Mar 15, 2010

Mayakda rated it

· review of another edition

Shelves: sf, read-in-2010, hard-luck-heroes, explicit, read-in-2010-03

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here. I was torn between 4 & 5 stars and rated up, because I usually hate dystopian settings and yet the author managed to overcome my bias.
The dystopian setting for Windup Girl is all-too plausible, and drives the plot, but the author wisely focuses on the characters' individual stories and motivations to make it real.

Anderson Lake is the primary character and he is an Iowa "calorie man", an agent of one of the powerful agricultural companies whose genetically modified see...more

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Apr 08, 2011

Keith rated it

The setting is Thailand in the third millennium and as the story begins it feels like a strip from “Heavy Metal Magazine” from the 1970’s but without the artist’s illustrations to help simplify the upcoming complexities of the fantasy. Of course, as the novel continues and the plots and characters develop it takes on a form that’s more familiar. The world is a changed place but yet, so very, very familiar. The final “contraction” has created a post-oil, apocalyptic world that has managed to s...more

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Nov 16, 2011

Kate rated it

Recommends it for: All sci-fi, steam-punk fans!

Recommended to Kate by: Doug B. a coworker

What an excellent book! This is one of the best modern sci-fi/steam-punk books I have read in a very long time, as it reads like high literature with intriguing characters. The characters are very complex and Paolo Bacigalupi does an excellent job of showing the reader the many shades of gray each character inhabits. There are no blatently good, bad, black or white characters here.

There are two scenes with Emiko, the Windup Girl, that were hard to read and yet they are very necessary ...more

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Jan 09, 2011

Khairul H. rated it

· review of another edition

Recommends it for: no one

Shelves: science-fiction

Bored with it. It failed my '50-page' rule but I gave it the benefit of the doubt and stuck with it past page 100-something. It still failed to engage me. It's now in my 'books that bored me' shelf. None of the characters managed to make me care for them. The incorruptible Tiger of Bangkok was the most interesting (yes, more interesting than Emiko the sexbot) but even he failed to make me stay and finish the book. The premise was intriguing: global warming, gene splicing, human-like androids. An...more

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Nov 01, 2011

Nicole rated it

· review of another edition

Shelves: sci-fi-fantasy

If I could give this 0 stars I would. I really wanted to like the book. The premise, a post-apocalyptic world where bioengineering and climate change have made life barely functional, seemed an interesting angle. Unfortunately, the book was full of gratuitous foul language and then a couple chapters in there is a horrible, pornographic rape scene. I didn't need or want to read any more once it became clear that this was going to be the way things were done. It was also clear almost immediat...more

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Jan 13, 2010

Kemper rated it

· review of another edition

Shelves: sci-fi, playing-god

The wife got me a cool gadget for Christmas. It’s a LED flashlight that is powered by turning a little crank on it so I won’t be cursing a lack of fresh batteries when I need it. In The Windup Girl, I could make some money by cranking that flashlight for someone.

It’s set in Thailand after corporate warfare between agricultural firms went biological. In the process of trying to taint the other guy’s crops, most of the world’s food supply is now perpetually at risk of being overwhel...moreThe wife got me a cool gadget for Christmas. It’s a LED flashlight that is powered by turning a little crank on it so I won’t be cursing a lack of fresh batteries when I need it. In The Windup Girl, I could make some money by cranking that flashlight for someone.

It’s set in Thailand after corporate warfare between agricultural firms went biological. In the process of trying to taint the other guy’s crops, most of the world’s food supply is now perpetually at risk of being overwhelmed by the next genetic modification. Global warming is causing massive restrictions on carbon output and oil based fuels are gone. With limited coal and methane allowed to be burned, most energy comes from muscle power. Kinetic energy is harnessed in kink-springs and released as needed. The springs are wound by genetically modified elephants called megodonts or old fashioned human muscle power. With food limited and muscle power at a premium, calories are the new currency.

A ‘calorie man’ named Anderson Lake is under cover from one of the corporations trying to find untainted foodstuffs to use as the basis for further modifications, and he thinks he’s got a line on a rogue geneticist and Thailand’s seed bank. His life is complicated when he gets infatuated with a New Person named Emiko. She’s a windup girl, genetically engineered to serve by the Japanese and abandoned in Thailand by her former master, and she’s now essentially a slave at a sex club. Anderson’s ambition to get his hands on Thailand’s seed bank conflicts with several other characters such as a Thai environment official desperately trying to keep corruption from allowing his country to be overwhelmed like the rest of the world and an exiled Chinese factory foreman who wants to rebuild his shipping business by stealing plans for a new type of spring from the factory that Anderson runs as a cover.

Bacigalupi did some serious world building in this book. A Thai society that barely managed to save their food supplies when most of the rest of the world wasn’t so lucky, but is about to be undone by the corruption within it’s own government was fascinating in itself. Add in the idea of an energy starved world clinging to the remnants of high technology, and some unique and fully formed characters and you’ve got one helluva good sci-fi story.

My only real complaint is that the author never offers any explanation as to why solar or wind or water power aren’t utilized. He put so much thought into creating the rest of this rich and detailed setting that it’s a little odd that nothing is ever mentioned about it, but that’s a minor complaint about a great story.(less)

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Sep 25, 2011

Djinnjer rated it

· review of another edition

Shelves: 2011, bookclub, sciencefiction, reviewed

The world's premise was interesting -- a post-oil world afflicted with massive climate change, man-made agricultural plagues, and the collapse of the global economy. I liked the Tiger of Bangkok and his right-hand, Kanya, and Hock Seng, the refugee, was interesting and sympathetic if not particularly likeable. Here ends the positive part of this review.

The title character was a Japanese-created wind-up girl, who was brought as a translator to Thailand where she was abandoned and fo...more

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Sep 19, 2011

Matt rated it

· review of another edition

Shelves: science-fiction

I have mixed feelings about this book. Paolo Bacigalupi has a lot of talent but ultimately he doesn't say anything with it. He's clearly trying hard to make hip socially relevant commentary; but really, he should probably be trying harder to give his readers a reason to care about his story.

The setting of The Windup Girl is hiply, and predictably, dark and post apocalyptic. In this case, the cries of every liberal Cassandra over the last twenty or so years have gone unheeded and a...moreI have mixed feelings about this book. Paolo Bacigalupi has a lot of talent but ultimately he doesn't say anything with it. He's clearly trying hard to make hip socially relevant commentary; but really, he should probably be trying harder to give his readers a reason to care about his story.

The setting of The Windup Girl is hiply, and predictably, dark and post apocalyptic. In this case, the cries of every liberal Cassandra over the last twenty or so years have gone unheeded and all come to pass. The Earth is in the grips of global warming, the seas have risen and flooded the Earth, religious fanatics have taken over governments and forged brutal theocracies, most of the worlds species have gone extinct, capitalist greed has caused mass starvation, and biological plagues ravage the earth as unscurpulus transnational corporations unleash genetic terrors solely to ensure markets for their sterile transgeneic foods. Oh, and all of this massive unparalleled upheaval has managed to restore the world to the basic social order of 19th century colonialism. It's back to the future, and the future is angry... but not so angry or so futuristic that white folks aren't basically in charge and enjoying their priviledged station while sterotypical asians act like characters out of a 1930's movie. It's enough to make me take a second look at Edward Said.

Ok, may be that would be going to far.

Paolo tells his story - hiply - through the eyes of five main characters passing around his point of view to follow the action. He begins with the figure of Anderson Lake, the dashing executive and corporate spy, and duly protagonizes him with a first chapter action sequence that establishes Anderson's martial prowess. But Anderson can't be Paolo's protagonist because Anderson is a white American from a transnational agriculture company, and so, despite the sympathetic portrayal must ulimately be the bad guy. Or at least one of the many bad guys.

Ultimately, he ends up with a story that has no protagonist and truly no character who we can really empathize with. Not even the titular Windup Girl manages to rise above the level of titilating sexual object either at the level of how she serves in the story or in the meta level of her purpose within the story. However much we may want to see her humanity, she ultimately keeps coming off as a thing, continually pushed around by the whims of one patron after the other achieving independence only in the brief interludes after periods of bestial violence before some other patron comes along and uses her to their generally perverse ends.

I mean, I suppose at some level his characters are believable, it's just they never seemed believable to be anything but characters. You can't invest in them emotionally. I had a hard time seeing myself in any of them. They had all the traits like complexity, flaws, charisma and so forth that go into making a great character, it's just that none of them ever struck me as being someone you'd meet anywhere but in a book. And since I didn't particularly care what happened to them, that's where they stayed in my imagination - people in a book. And naturally, terrible things happen to them. I mean, this is a work of modern fiction, so what do you expect?

While I'm on the subject of hip, apparantly its become the hip thing to have a character conduct a dialogue with a dead character. This is the second book running that featured that trope, and it worked far far better in the previous book because you could see the character's sanity unravelling. Here it struck me that Scrubs had done a lot better job with the trope, and it showed up here as little more than a paint by numbers way to segue into using a hitherto minor character as a viewpoint character. I still didn't much care.

As you can tell from the stars and my normal stinginess with stars, it's not as bad as I'm making it sound. Attempts to be socially revelevant aside, the settings is richly drawn and filled with interest especially if you don't pay too much attention to the science of things like spring loaded machine guns when perfectly servicable chemical explosives are readily at hand. Each character has something of human feeling in them, some reason to see them as more than just sneering villains, and though they tale never really swept me along like a good page turner ought, it never really got unpleasantly dull either. And invoking Sylvester Graham in a somewhat sympathetic way as a middle ground between the West's current two great relgions (Christianity and Environmentalism) was I admit an interesting touch. Most of my angst in this review comes I think from the fact that this book is such a waste of good talent. Anyone that could write this book is capable of so much more than an angsty Luddite ennui filled whine. Seriously, if you are listening Paolo, I'm giving you the benefit of the doubt that you weren't just pandering to the opinions of others and that you really want to change the world. Do you think you are going to effect positive change in the world with this sort of decadent woe is us crap that ultimately, if romanticizes anything, ends up romanticizing brutal authoritarianism?(less)

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Oct 19, 2011

Kana rated it

· review of another edition

Shelves: steampunk, audiobook, science-fiction, fantasy, dystopia, mystery

Imagine a future where we've depleted the petroleum resources. Where calories are currency. Genetic manipulation, signature seed is not only common place but seen as wealth. Species, animal and plants are so manipulated that many naturally occurring species are extinct. Where there is a new breed of 'humans' (wind up's) genetically altered to be aesthetically pleasing, but vulnerable to the environment. And intentionally disabled with a distinctive jerking-motion, so people know they are a lesse...more

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Mar 06, 2011

Catie rated it

· review of another edition

Shelves: favorite-books, read-in-2011, sci-fi

This is the kind of book that unceremoniously dumps you in the middle of a teeming, noisy world and demands that you sink or swim. Oh, and that noise that I mentioned? Yeah, it’s all slang, and in about five different languages – none of which you can understand. My advice is just try to float with it. Don’t stress out if you can’t understand half the words, or the vague references to “the incident” or “the situation in Finland.” All will come clear…trust me.

This story is set in...moreThis is the kind of book that unceremoniously dumps you in the middle of a teeming, noisy world and demands that you sink or swim. Oh, and that noise that I mentioned? Yeah, it’s all slang, and in about five different languages – none of which you can understand. My advice is just try to float with it. Don’t stress out if you can’t understand half the words, or the vague references to “the incident” or “the situation in Finland.” All will come clear…trust me.

This story is set in a futuristic Thailand, which is one of the last countries “surviving”, after several plagues have wiped out the majority of human and plant life* and the sea levels have risen to cover most cities. Thailand has managed to endure by using levees and pumps (operated with spring-power, since all other fuels are scarce) to hold back the rising waters, and a hidden seed bank to provide new genetic material for food engineering. Unfortunately this makes it a nice fat target for the masses of human refugees, looking for a place to rebuild, and the greedy calorie corporations, which have already monopolized most of the world’s food supply by engineering plant species that can’t reproduce (thus ensuring that no one else will be able to grow them).

There are upwards of four main characters in this story (some of the minor characters take on larger roles later in the book) which seems like quite a lot. I think that the biggest danger with too many characters is that there won’t be enough time or energy devoted to any of them and in the end there’s no connection for the reader. I’ve definitely come across novels like that, where I just didn’t care enough about the characters because there wasn’t a chance to become attached to any of them (Guy Gavriel Kay’s Under Heaven comes to mind). There really wasn’t one single character in this book, no matter how minor, that I didn’t end up caring deeply about. One of the minor characters actually ended up becoming my favorite (Kanya!). All of these characters are deeply scarred (some more literally than others) by the years of famine and tragedy that they’ve gone through. Not one of them is a truly good person, and yet I cared for all of them and wanted them all to succeed (which was really hard, because they were often trying to manipulate and/or kill each other). It was powerfully moving to witness them all fight and flounder, and eventually realize that it doesn’t matter how much opium or how many jewels you’ve got stashed away in your bamboo walls, or how much you’ve betrayed everything you believe in just to get ahead – you can never escape the destructive power of nature, or your karma.

I can easily see how this book won’t be everyone’s cup o’ tea (Christina, I’m looking at you). There really isn’t very much action in this story (although I found myself frequently shocked by all the twists and turns). Instead there’s creepy political maneuvering and enough sinister machinations to get my evil laugh going and my fingers drumming together like Monty Burns. This is definitely more for those, like me, who are just as excited by psychological action as physical. The pacing is a bit slow, but I really enjoyed that – the writing is so good that I was happy to just float along and wallow in all the nice pretty words. This book was 100% right up my alley – I can even say that I genuinely enjoyed being confused for much of it. This one’s going on the favorites list!

*Brief scientist rant below:
One tiny little niggling problem I had with this book is the whole idea of viruses moving from plants to humans. While viruses frequently break through the animal/human barrier, I had always assumed that due to the differences in cell structure and modes of infection, plant viruses would be extremely unlikely to move to humans. However, I just googled this and found this article:

http://www.popsci.com/science/article/20...

Oh. My. God. It’s happening! Watch out everyone; it’s time to start hoarding baht and brushing up on your Thai!
(less)

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Sep 27, 2010

Erin rated it

Shelves: fantasy-sci-fi, 2010

This book had such potential, and while it's obvious Bacigalupi has some serious talent, I don't think it's fully realized yet. It took about 100-150 pages to set the stage. While that in itself is not a problem, it took awhile for the political landscape of his world to reveal itself. He reminds me of China Mieville in that he presents a well realized world through tantalizing details. The difference between the two is that Mieville knows how to create suspense without making one frustrated. In...more

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Sep 22, 2011

Norman Cook rated it

· review of another edition

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here. In a post-oil economy, calories have become the world’s currency. AgriGen calorie man Anderson Lake covertly searches Bangkok’s street markets for new and exotic foods that won’t succumb to the bio-engineered plagues that run rampant across the globe. Lake’s subordinate Hock Seng, a Chinese genocide survivor, has plans of his own to take advantage of Lake’s findings. Lake soon meets one of the New People, Emiko, known pejoratively as a Windup Girl (due to the jerky, clocklike movements she makes...moreIn a post-oil economy, calories have become the world’s currency. AgriGen calorie man Anderson Lake covertly searches Bangkok’s street markets for new and exotic foods that won’t succumb to the bio-engineered plagues that run rampant across the globe. Lake’s subordinate Hock Seng, a Chinese genocide survivor, has plans of his own to take advantage of Lake’s findings. Lake soon meets one of the New People, Emiko, known pejoratively as a Windup Girl (due to the jerky, clocklike movements she makes). Emiko looks and acts human, but is in fact genetically engineered, grown, and programmed as a high-priced call girl. Abandoned by a wealthy Japanese businessman in Bangkok, Emiko is now a virtual slave forced to perform decadent and degrading sexual acts as entertainment.

Incorruptible Captain Jaidee Rojjanasukchai, the Tiger of Bangkok, champion of the martial art muay thai, under the direction of corrupt General Pracha leads the Environment Ministry’s white shirt enforcers protecting the city from incursions of disease, foreign plants and animals, and artificial humans. Jaidee intercepts and destroys illegal imports to the consternation of powerful and influential smugglers. Lieutenant Kanya Chirathivat finds herself in a difficult situation when one of Jaidee’s raids goes awry.

Trade Minister Akkarat wants to expand relations with the rest of the world, while the Environment Ministry works to retain Thailand’s isolation. This conflict eventually spills into the lives of the eclectic cast of characters.

The shifting points of view create a mosaic that is rich in detail, requiring the reader’s full attention. To get the full impact of this novel, plan to read it in large chunks in a quiet room. Plan on going slowly in the beginning to grasp the intricacies of the plot and characters in a stylistic prose liberally sprinkled with Thai words. Otherwise, the story will be just interesting, not astounding, and harder to keep track of what’s happening.

This is an impressive first novel from an acclaimed short story writer. Take the time to absorb its delights and you will be rewarded with a rich tale that explores a very realistic possible future. This is a cautionary parable filled with complex and thought provoking ideas.(less)

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Jul 24, 2011

Jason rated it

· review of another edition

Shelves: fantasy, fiction, travel

PS NEARLY ONE YEAR LATER: I've thought a lot about this book since I read it. For some reason it has stayed with me. I feel the need to raise my rating from a 2 to a 3. I think my initial rating was a knee-jerk reaction to only certain elements of the book without taking in to account the greater whole. I truly do appreciate this unique twist on a futuristic, dystopic society. The writing style was engaging and intelligent. I look forward to reading more of Paolo's work!

I had a hard ...more

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Jul 27, 2010

Ben Babcock rated it

Shelves: ebook, 2010-read, science-fiction, post-apocalyptic, via-io9, hugo-winner, nebula-winner

I must start somewhere, and where better to begin than with the title? Why is this called The Windup Girl? Although Emiko's actions have a significant effect on the plot, I never felt like the book was about her or that she was as special as the title implies. As a creation, Emiko is fascinating. She is a slave, obedience instilled at genetic and conditioned levels, beauty bred into her. Smaller pores make for flawlessly smooth skin, but in Thailand's climate they also make her prone to ove...more

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Dec 31, 2011

Amanda rated it

· review of another edition

For some reason I just did not enjoy this book- I know everyone else loved it but i just don't. I think the whole kink-spring thing was kinda weird- i mean what about solar-power and wind-power, among other options? I also find it hard to believe that international trade would grind to a halt because of the absence of petro. I think other existing technologies would quickly be implemented. I don't know if this was the reason I couldn't get into it, but it didn't help.

I do beli...more

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Nov 18, 2009

John rated it

· review of another edition

One of the very few science-fiction book I've read that reads like high literature. Set maybe 150-200 years into the future, in Thailand, it feels very much like it's actually set in the past, many of the current tropes of civilization in what the characters call the "expansion" having vanished in the "contraction".
It also has the nerve not to tell you everything - the characters discuss events they know well that you are never party to, cleverly avoiding vast tracts o...more

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Aug 10, 2011

Casey rated it

· review of another edition

The Windup Girl is a truly unique fantasy experience, bringing to life a far flung future with advances both good and bad that you wouldn't expect. The story is thick and packed with detail, enjoyable and totally engrossing. For being my first Bacigalupi book, I'd now call myself a fan!

This one took me a while to get through, simply because the book is densely packed and presents a world that is both natural, yet alien to those of us here in the States at any rate. Challenging y...more

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