Sunyi Dean's Blog, page 5
July 30, 2019
A Possible Serenity reprint
This is the only other story I’ll “reprint” on here at present, as it’s the only other story which was been locked into a print-only magazine.
A Possible Serenity
https://nycteris.com/publications/short-fiction/a-possible-serenity/
Deserted Lies the City reprint
Feel silly listing this as a Publications but here we are anyway 
July 15, 2019
THE GIRL ON THE TRAIN by Paula Hawkins
The Girl on the Train by Paula Hawkins
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
Intriguing and nuanced
I stayed up late to finish this, which is always a good sign!
Extremely well done, and much better than Gone Girl (imo). I am reluctant to give spoilers so won’t; the twists were less plotty than i was expecting and far more nuanced. Fantastic character study and brilliant unreliable narrators, though i think one of male characters needed more of a wrap up at the end. Still, good as this was, I’m dying to read something speculative again, so will need a breather from all these thrillers with my next read.
Apologies for the short review but it’s such a famous novel that everyone will either have read it, or else not want spoilers.
July 9, 2019
LWC 2019 Dialogue Comp
Grats to the lovely winners of the dialogue competition! Another great event with friendly writers and thoughtful judging.
via Competitions
July 7, 2019
Query Construction: PAPERFLESH
I thought it might be of interest to talk a little bit about the semi-template I use for drafting queries. For those who are wondering, yes you still benefit from writing query letters, even after finding an agent
GONE GIRL by Gillian Flynn
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
It was perhaps a mistake to embark on a novel which is, one way or another, centered on a tumultuous marriage, particularly when your own marriage is somewhat tumultuous. Still, I suppose it speaks to the relatability of the novel that, despite its bizarre and extreme circumstances, the story nonetheless is depressingly familiar in its characterisation of relationship struggles.
On to GONE GIRL: a book I initially read for market research purposes, but was genuinely impressed by.
NB: This review will be rife with spoilers and deconstruction, so if you–like I–have somehow dodged this book and its subsequent film until now, don’t read any further. Regardless of what you think of the plot twists, the experience of this novel will certainly be spoilt by knowing them in advance.
Donald Maass, in his non-fiction craft book “The Emotional Craft of Fiction”, described Gone Girl has having one of the best plot twists in modern times, but the “mega” plot twist itself was lack-lustre for me. It’s not so much that I even saw it coming, as I had actually assumed from the start that the plot would take this shape (ie, that the woman was faking her own death). I assumed this due to the length of the book, and the fact that if she really were dead, the novel would have to be significantly shorter than it was. From a plot perspective, I wasn’t hugely wowed.
The characterisations of the two POVs were brilliant, though. Neither were remotely likable, and there are few things I enjoy more than miserable nasty bastards done well. Check that box, and then check it a few more times. Amy is breathtakingly vile, and her husband is a bottomless pit of unsatisfying Mediocre Man with a heavy dash of self awareness. Together, they are a pretty little car crash you can’t look away from.
In short, there was a lot to like (or to enjoy disliking, depending on your point of view) and I inhaled the novel in just over a day. The crux of this review, as my reviews so often seem to do, comes down to this: why 4 stars, and not 5?
A few different things stood out to me. Not enough to spoil my enjoyment in a significant way, but enough to knock a star off an otherwise very engaging book.
Forensics–probably is straightforward to say that they aren’t particularly accurate >.> but I mostly overlook that kind of thing in these books, since I’m not a scientist, so it doesn’t bug me.
The lying of the MCs. In crime fiction you have this golden rule about first person perspectives and how much they’re allowed to obfuscate from the reader; this is the reason why Sherlock Holmes is narrated by Watson, and Poirot is narrated by Hastings, for example, or else kept to third person for each of those. When you have a character who is deliberately withholding information, it creates false tension. I wasn’t keen on Nick’s false tension.
The reason it works to do that with a sidekick is it creates character tension between the detective and sidekick, which we are privy to, rather than being in direct conflict with the narrator. And the reason it DOESN’T work in most other cases is the narrator can just withhold indefinitely. It’s cheating, you might say. There’s quite a lot I could go on about with this subject to explain my pov and clarify this, but I don’t want to waffle on endlessly. Suffice to say the topic of how much a narrator can conceal from the audience, and why, is deeply interesting to this nerdy supergeek–and probably a bit outside the scope of just a review.
The salient point is that plot reveals occurred not through clever construction, but through frequent obfuscation. It’s hard for me to explain concisely exactly what I mean but effect was very staged. I give Amy a pass because her diary was supposed to conceal, but I am unclear on who the narrator is supposed to be, for Nick.
Pacing wise, I found the first half a little slow, and the second half slightly padded. This may be personal preference, though, and overall the structure worked. I am just very picky and like a tight, leak-free novel when possible.
June 18, 2019
TOUCH by Claire North
My rating: 3 of 5 stars
I have enormous respect for Claire North’s writing. She has fascinating ideas, beautiful prose, poignant characterisations, a lively yet literary style, and keen observations on society/humanity.
However, I didn’t love this novel as I hoped I would. I started off thinking it would be a 4 star rating, then a 5 star, but at some point my satisfaction dropped sharply, especially towards the end, and I am concluding on a 3 star review.
MAJOR SPOILERS AHEAD, read at your own risk.
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The novel is about an entity, mostly referred to as Kepler, who was born a human but–upon their death, many centuries ago–discovered that they were able to inhabit the bodies of other humans. While in possession of another person’s body, Kepler’s hosts have no memory or sense of the passage of time. They lose seconds, minutes, years of their lives–however long they are inhabited by a “ghost” entity. TOUCH makes use of a dual timeline narrative structure, flipping between past events that Kepler has lived, and present-day troubles which expand on the plot.
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Things I enjoyed:
The set up is fascinating and daunting in its ambition, with scope for a host of exploration. The prose runs smooth and clean and the execution of body-hopping is brilliantly done; North captures the exhilaration and ennui of a free-wheeling spirit, taking advantage to explore the circumstances Kepler can exploit.
The novel’s strength lay in North’s amazing ability to infuse Kepler with the personalities of those they inhabited while keeping Kepler’s unique self intact in each one: a brilliant fusion of psyches, and a fascinating–if somewhat understated–examination of how our physical form manifests, interacts with, and reshapes our psychology. Questions of gender, identity, sexuality, and personality are all present, deftly examined with a surgical level of skill.
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Things I found lacking:
The MC has a motivation problem, imo. North sort of addresses this by building up how much ghosts care for the skins they inhabit, or at least can do in some cases, but when that is more or less the sum total of the MC’s motivation for most of the book it starts to stretch a little thin. Kepler is quite right to point out that they could simply abscond into the night, or run. Or any number of options. It did mostly work but felt forced at points, and because the motivations of the other ghosts felt likewise thin, the whole driving force of the narrative was a little anemic.
At the heart of this issue with MC motivation is (again, imo) a power imbalance in the worldbuilding. Kepler is just too strong for anything to be much of a threat, so threats and emotional obstacles have to be generated in a way that feels slightly forced.
Kepler’s relative strength in worldbuilding terms means that no human antagonist is ever going to be much of a threat. Therefore, I was unsurprised to find another ghost-entity in the antagonist’s driving seat–and unfortunately, of all the characters in the novel, Galileo felt the least real. Kepler, despite his insubstantial nature, felt very real and very visceral, even when inhabiting other bodies. Galileo did not. Antagonists don’t always have to be compelling, but it stood out to me in a book where almost everyone–including brief snapshots of myriad random passerbys–were otherweise so well drawn.
Going back to the power balance issue, I think if any of Galileo’s plans had born fruit, a better-detailed human antagonist could have worked. For example, if someone really had developed a vaccine against ghosts, or figured out how to reliably create more, then Kepler really could have been in trouble.
As it was, the interpersonal drama between Kepler and Coyle (a human character) felt much more at the forefront, whereas the stuff with Galileo receded almost to the background at times, or at least felt that way because of lackluster stakes (and the lackluster stakes themselves being the result of sketchy character motivations. And novels need stakes!!)
All that to say, the final confrontation lacked punch. I didn’t care much for Galileo, and there were very few surprises in the present-day timeline (almost all of the reveals occurred in the past-timeline). The final fight seemed extraordinarily drawn out, again with no surprises for the ending, and more weak character motivations that were seemingly dredged up at the last-minute to complicate an otherwise straightforward situation.
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TLDR: I do still think the novel was worth reading and very enjoyable but I found myself frustrated by structural/craft issues at a number of crucial moments.
In the final analysis, it felt like a worse version of 15 Lives of Harry August, in that it contained similar themes and a similarish type character/plot set up, but was overall far weaker in execution, although much faster paced.
June 15, 2019
The Best Of Gene Wolfe by Gene Wolfe
The Best of Gene Wolfe by Gene Wolfe
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
Awesome
Obviously, I loved it. My favorite was The Eyeflash Miracles. Absolutely stunning story on every level.
Here were my other standout stories:
“The Island of Doctor Death and Other Stories,” copyright © 1970 by Gene Wolfe; first appeared in Orbit 7.
“The Fifth Head of Cerberus” copyright © 1972 by Damon Knight; first appeared in Orbit.
“The Death of Dr. Island,” copyright © 1973 by Gene Wolfe; first appeared in Universe 3.
“Forlesen,” copyright © 1974 by Gene Wolfe; first appeared in Orbit 14. “Westwind,” copyright © 1973 by Gene Wolfe; first appeared in Worlds of IF. “The Hero as Werwolf,” copyright © 1975 by Gene Wolfe; first appeared in The New Improved Sun.
“The Eyeflash Miracles,” copyright © 1976 by Gene Wolfe; first appeared in Future Power.
“The Detective of Dreams,” copyright © 1980 by Gene Wolfe; first appeared in Dark Forces, edited by Kirby McCaul
“On the Train,” copyright © 1983 by Gene Wolfe; first appeared in The New Yorker. “From the Desk of Gilmer C. Merton,” copyright © 1983 by Gene Wolfe
“Death of the Island Doctor,” copyright © 1983 by Gene Wolfe; first appeared in The Wolfe Archipelago by Gene Wolfe.
“Bed and Breakfast,” copyright © 1995 by Gene Wolfe; first appeared in Dante’s Disciples.
“The Tree Is My Hat,” copyright © 1999 by Gene Wolfe; first appeared in 999.
“A Cabin on the Coast,” copyright © 1981 by Gene Wolfe; first appeared in Zu den Sternen, edited by Peter Wilfert (Munich: Goldmann Verlag, 1981).
June 13, 2019
Station Eleven by Emily St John Mandel
Station Eleven by Emily St. John Mandel
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
A cautious but thorough endorsement
I had to consider for quite awhile what rating i wanted to give this novel. The fact I had to think about it is, of course, its own sort of endorsement.
Let’s start with some context. I am generally dubious of literary novels that try to reinvent the proverbial wheel when it comes to sff. This is something which happens a fair amount and is endlessly exasperating to prolific sff readers.
Reading through Station 11, I am still not entirely sure why some novels (eg Book of the Unnamed Midwife) are genre fiction while Station 11 or The Road get shelved as literary. They all carry, imo, a similar amount of depth and character exploration. BotUM probably has slightly better structure over all (again, subjective opinion here).
Nonetheless, however the book is shelved out in the wild, it was perfectly engaging to me and reads literary. The characters were well drawn and intriguing each onendrigen by a complex knot of motivations and experiences and each one clearly distinguished from the others. None were forgettable and there weren’t, for me, any “ugh” points of view. (This is always a potential pitfall in multi pov.)
The relationship between those characters was complex and nuancex but at times stretchex believability. So many coincidences and so much delicate timing had to line up for certain events to occur in the way that they did. Still, stranger things have happened in real life, and part of the novel’s themes is exploring the subtle network that runs between humans, and examining the ways in which we are all far more connected than we realise. So in that sense, perhaps the coincidences are themselves the point.
The other thing that made me waver in my rating was the fact that some of the storylines seemed to peter out. Mild spoilers: one of the main antagonists seems to fade abruptly from the storyline while one of the first pov characters from early on also seems to skirt most of the story. How much that bothers other readers will vary; i think i am probably being nitpicky, though.
The interweaving of the Station 11 comics was brilliantly done, though, and one of the main aspects which tipped me in favour of 5 stars instead of 4 was the overall hopefulness of the narrative. BotUM is extremely bleak and relentless in its portrayal of sexual violence; Station 11 handles such topics with deft redirection.
I suppose some readers will feel justified in saying that the violence and horror of a post apocalyptic world has been glossed over in their novel. But my counter is that we already have dozens of books which ‘wax eloquent’ on every facet of human misery. When it comes to novels which emphasise the possibility of rebirth, renewal, and healing, there are not so many in this genre.
May 30, 2019
Tales of the Fantastic — Leeds Writers Circle
Success comes in many shapes and sizes and we like to celebrate everything achieved by members here, whatever form that takes – a hint that we can’t publish those achievements unless you tell us about them. Don’t be shy. We’ve already celebrated some big successes this year and we now have a few others. Sarah […]
