Lucky's Harvest: The First Book of Mana

Mana #1

by Ian Watson

Kuckucks-Fluch - Das zweite Buch Mana - bk1259; Bastei Lübbe; Ian Watson; pocket_book; 1998

Genres: Science Fiction, Fantasy

544 pages, Hardcover

First published September 16, 1993

About the author

Librarian Note: There is more than one author by this name in the Goodreads database.

Reviews

[Tricia · Rating 1 out of 5]

This book wasn’t for me.

It is sort of a story with a lot of characters but by the time I got to the end I felt confused as to the point of the story.

[Socrate · Rating 3 out of 5]

Prin cartea de faţă, editura Pygmalion ne mijloceşte din nou contactul cu unul dintre cei mai buni scriitori contemporani de science-fiction, puţin sau deloc cunoscut la noi până acum, britanicul Ian Watson. La cei aproape 56 de ani, (s-a născut pe 20 aprilie 1943 în St. Albans) este deja autorul a 28 de romane, printre care The Embedding (Implantarea), Miracle Visitors (Vizitatorii miracolului), Ambasada extraterestră (editura Pygmalion 1995), şi a adunat nu mai puţin de 8 culegeri de povestiri.
Deoarece cititorul poate consulta cu folos o analiză pertinentă a operelor sale importante în prefaţa la romanul Ambasada extraterestră, de care pomeneam mai înainte, vom încerca, în cele ce urmează, să ne limităm la a scoate în evidenţă un element esenţial al operei sale, identificabil cu precădere în acest roman relativ recent, tradus la noi cu titlul generic Spaţiul Mana.

Am putea spune, fără teama de a greşi sau exagera cu ceva că, în toate scrierile sale, Ian Watson explorează ceea ce îndeobşte defineşte „relaţia dintre realitate şi conştiinţă”, găsind o largă varietate de mijloace prin care să trateze această temă, de la lingvistică la mitologia UFO. Scrisul său este dens şi cu precădere cerebral, un sentiment transcedental pluteşte peste opera sa, chiar şi peste articolele critice dedicate unor colegi de gen precum Philip K. Dick sau Ursula K. Le Guin. Adeseori prezintă concepte stranii într-un discurs ştiinţific obiectiv şi elaborat.

[George Costanza · Rating 4 out of 5]

Weird and interesting concepts and storytelling where reality, magic and folklore merge so it's hard to tell what's "real". There's a dream like tinge to everything, there's even a dream lord. There are several reoccurring themes; The power of stories along with duality. It takes place on the only human colonized planet, Kaleva, and to get there one must tell a story to the alien/being/ship Ukkos. There's proclaimers who have the power to alter the world to fit their words. The way the narrative jumps between characters feels dream like too, sticking with one character for 1, 10, or 100 pages at a time and jumping back to them later so that it doesn't feel like there is a main character outside of the world of Kaleva itself. Duality in the characters of Wex, Lucky's lost self, the Issi/Juttahats.

It's hard to write about the plot(s), there are several and occasionally interconnect with similar vibes. When I was reading it, I kept thinking I was in a 90s PC RPG, which still feels like my strongest visual description.

Good, weird SF/Fantasy, would recommend.

[Rosz · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read this many years ago... It's great, but it's more of a journey than a story with an end. It feels like a modern fairy tale, a little Baron Munchausen - has a lot of humour and strange, but real elements. It's not straight-forward, but the character and world-building are second-to-none.

[Cristian Tomescu · Rating 1 out of 5]

Couldn't finish.

[Roddy Williams · Rating 5 out of 5]

‘Lucky’s Harvest is the first in a two-volume epic – a work that rivals Frank Herbert’s ‘Dune’ in scale, richness and complexity.

Drawing his inspiration from the great Finnish saga the Kalevala, Ian Watson has created a totally realistic and wonderfully exotic alien world. On Kaleva, Earth’s first and only interstellar colony, the entite community is indebted to Lucky, whose encounter with the mysterious entity known as the Ukko transported them across space to a land of lake, sea and forest, Kaleva.

Unfortunately, by her 402nd birthday, Lucky is more than a little crazy, and an exiled daughter is seeking sanctuary.’

Blurb from the 1984 VGSF paperback edition.

Ian Watson, amongst other things, is probably for me the David Bowie of SF (If indeed Bowie himself isn’t already the David Bowie of SF) since he is consistently and proliferously creative, inventive and not afraid of changing his style, sometimes taking SF or fantasy conventions and reinventing them in interesting ways. This has often been seen in his short stories. His previous novels have been dense, complex and pushed the envelope of SF.
Here, in a two volume epic, Watson moves into another direction and takes the tropes of Science Fantasy to make his own.
The backstory: Lucky, a young asteroid miner, encounters an Ukko, an asteroid-sized ship with convoluted chambers and pathways resembling a giant ear. The Ukko takes a liking to Lucky and asks her for her stories. In return the Ukko gives her a fabulous gift, a world resembling the world of the tales she has been telling, plus the bonus of immortality for her and her chosen husband who are destined to be the rulers of this new world. Additionally the Ukko arranges for a shuttle service between Earth and the planet Kaleva, and bring settlers from Earth who in turn tell tales to the Ukko during their journey.
Watson’s narrative begins centuries later. Lucky is by now a little unbalanced, as is her husband, Bertel, tired of his unending life. Lucky has given birth to a succession of daughters, each of whom has Lucky’s gift of giving their husband immortality, although they themselves age normally and die.
Some years after the humans started colonising, the Ukkos began brining the Isi to Kaleva; huge intelligent serpents with their humanoid slaves, the Juttahats. Their motives are unclear, but they like to meddle in human affairs.
The fantasy elements of ‘Lucky’s Harvest’ comprise of the combination of feudal society with the phenomenon of Mana, being a force that permeates the Northern hemisphere and allows certain people to perform acts of ‘magic’.
Osmo, one of the central characters, is a young proclaimer. By the use of his voice he can ‘bespeak’ objects and people. Prior to the start of the novel the young Osmo confronted the sadistic proclaimer tyrant Tycho Cammon and turned him tos tone. The staue was then kept in an alcove on osmo’s ‘keep’ and occasionally brought out for Osmo to depetrify Tycho’s face for the entertainment of his guests.
Osmo gains the enmity of the militant proclaimer Juke and his one-eyed sister Eyeno.
One of Lucky’s daughters, Jatta, has been seduced by a genetically engineered Juttahat in order that the Serpents can engender a human/juttahat hybrid. The resulting child is fast-growing and appears to have proclaimerlike powers.
Meanwhile, some people begin to suspect that the Mana force is emanating from an Ukko child which is buried somewhere on the planet and feeding on the stories and the drama of the world beneath which it is gestating.
Most of the characters, it seems, are seeking something. Lucky is seeking her true self, which she believes is still being held by the Ukko. Her husband Bertel is seeking death. Osmo is seeking immortality, as is Minkie, the lecherous young lord. The immortal Lord Beck is seeking a way of connecting with his long-dead wife Anna.
Eyeno is seeking a new eye, and her brother Juke is seeking victory over Osmo for reasons unknown.
Watching over all are the cat-eared green-scaled cuckoos that fly about the realm carrying gossip and news.
Those with some knowledge of Scandinavian mythology may recognise some of the elements being described here, since Watson has based this wonderful work on the Finnish saga of The Kalevala, something which also provided inspiration for novels by Emil Petaja and for Tolkien's 'Silmarillion'

[Alien · Rating 2 out of 5]

I only read 50% because I really dislike the writer's style. I was somewhat curious how the story would continue, but the style kept me from feeling entertained. He constantly mixes important stuff and trivialities . After reading half the book, I still had no clue that this whole thing was all about. Where does the magic come from? Who (or what) sets its limits?

I have now tried several books of this author and disliked them all. I will not try any more. I gave away 2 other unread books of him that I had in my bookshelf.