false Okay, I'm starting to like this book, even though it doesn't seem to have a plot...as such. 0 2009-09-27T18:34:14-07:00 1369614 214 2009-09-27T18:34:14-07:00 Sparky Valentine, please stop talking to me and get on with your story. 0 2009-09-25T16:58:45-07:00 1361533 35 2009-09-25T16:58:45-07:00 3 1 false false Thu Oct 01 00:00:00 -0700 2009 Fri Sep 25 16:57:46 -0700 2009 Fri Oct 02 12:41:42 -0700 2009 Douglas Adams, Terry Pratchett, The Garbage Pail Kids, and Shakespeare. And it does several things that I normally won't tolerate.

It breaks the fourth wall, repeatedly; Sparky not only talks to the reader, he addresses the typesetter, requesting that they stop putting the flashbacks in italics. The extended flashbacks, of which there are many, are in third person, even though all but the news articles are narrated by Sparky, who is in first person for the rest of the book.

And, yet, those things are all done well, especially the flashbacks. I found myself liking this book despite its slow start and flimsy plot. It's all about the writing and the narrator, and I enjoyed both of them.

Things Varley does well: humor, descriptions of environments, technology, neighborhoods, all the details of space travel and living and working in space, the narrator's conversational, flippant tone.

Things Varley handwaves obnoxiously: culture, everyone speaks English because it just happened to work out that way after the "Invasion"; race, at this point no one's all black or all white -- apparently those are our only options?; sexuality and gender, Sparky, born male, has been modified so that he can change his outward gender at will. He makes a point of saying it's rare to be 100% heterosexual, yet all sexual encounters described or even hinted at are male/female. The one male/male encounter is during a production of Romeo and Juliet, with Sparky as Juliet. He and Romeo are supposed to have sex on stage, but his male partner, being 100% straight, can't get it up, even with Sparky physically female at the time. This would have been an excellent opportunity to examine the relationship between gender, sexuality, and the mind, but Varley totally passes it up. It's disappointing.

The ending comes with a one and a half twist, one which you might see coming, and half of one that sounds like something from the last five minutes of a Law and Order rerun. By that time I kind of didn't care what was going on anymore because it was already clear this isn't the kind of book that gives a concrete resolution.

Warnings for child abuse, grisly fight scenes, and animal harm.

Three stars. It took a while to get going, but I grew to like Sparky, or at least to be entertained by him. I'll be reading more by Varley. He gives good space.]]>