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Chung Kuo #1
The Middle Kingdom
The Year is 2190. China has once again become a world unto itself and this time its only boundary is space . . . The world is City Earth, ruled by the Seven, China's new kings. Beautiful, controlled, sensual, this high-tech society is rushing toward war between the forces of West and East, between the rebels who hunger for change and the overlords who demand stability, between the very powers of darkness and light. It will be an era of violent conflagration destined to expose the basest elements of human nature . . . and the highest dreams. An epic that draws us into an alternative world so real, so complete that we become denizens of the new Middle Kingdom, touched by longings we never imagined. . . driven by forces as ancient as man's first breath. Not since Asminov's Foundation books and Herbert's Dune has there been such a majestic and powerful vision of a believable other world. . . seductive, chilling, unforge
700 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1989
21 people are currently reading
1572 people want to read
About the author
David Wingrove
51 books164 followersDavid Wingrove (born September 1954 in North Battersea, London) is a British science fiction writer. He is well-known as the author of the "Chung Kuo" novels (eight in total). He is also the co-author (with Rand and Robyn Miller) of the three "Myst" novels.
Wingrove worked in the banking industry for 7 years until he became fed up with it. He then attended the University of Kent, Canterbury, where he read English and American Literature.
He is married and, with his wife Susan, has four daughters Jessica, Amy, Georgia, and Francesca.
Between 1972 and 1982 he wrote over 300 unpublished short stories and 15 novels.
He started work on a new fictional project called A Perfect Art. Between 1984 and 1988, when it was first submitted, the title was changed twice, becoming first A Spring Day at the Edge of the World and then finally Chung Kuo, under which title it was sold to 18 publishers throughout the world.
A prequel to the Chung Kuo series, called When China Comes, was released in May 2009 by Quercus Publishing, which also re-released the entire series: "The series has been recast in nineteen volumes, including a new prequel and a new final volume. After a series launch in May 2009, Quercus will embark on an ambitious publishing programme that will see all nineteen volumes available by the end of 2012."
He has plans for a further a novels, a a first person character novel called Dawn in Stone City and three very different novels: The Beast with Two Backs, Heaven's Bright Sun, and Roads to Moscow.
Wingrove worked in the banking industry for 7 years until he became fed up with it. He then attended the University of Kent, Canterbury, where he read English and American Literature.
He is married and, with his wife Susan, has four daughters Jessica, Amy, Georgia, and Francesca.
Between 1972 and 1982 he wrote over 300 unpublished short stories and 15 novels.
He started work on a new fictional project called A Perfect Art. Between 1984 and 1988, when it was first submitted, the title was changed twice, becoming first A Spring Day at the Edge of the World and then finally Chung Kuo, under which title it was sold to 18 publishers throughout the world.
A prequel to the Chung Kuo series, called When China Comes, was released in May 2009 by Quercus Publishing, which also re-released the entire series: "The series has been recast in nineteen volumes, including a new prequel and a new final volume. After a series launch in May 2009, Quercus will embark on an ambitious publishing programme that will see all nineteen volumes available by the end of 2012."
He has plans for a further a novels, a a first person character novel called Dawn in Stone City and three very different novels: The Beast with Two Backs, Heaven's Bright Sun, and Roads to Moscow.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 82 reviews
September 5, 2017
My first attempt to read a SF series. I was innocent enough not to recognize any trope in fiction stories. It was indeed epic with many POV characters and at first I was overwhelmed. But now I cannot rate this book beyond two star because the story is overlong and I was confused with so many plots.
The background seems oversimplified, from present multi-nations Earth into single middle kingdom of Earth. The pace is slow and it doesn't help whenever the action scenes start, the author switch into another scene.
If A Game of Thrones excites readers with surprisingly round and sympathetic characters, TMK characters reactions frequently predictable and flat.
I prefer to call this story as a soap opera in SF setting.
The background seems oversimplified, from present multi-nations Earth into single middle kingdom of Earth. The pace is slow and it doesn't help whenever the action scenes start, the author switch into another scene.
If A Game of Thrones excites readers with surprisingly round and sympathetic characters, TMK characters reactions frequently predictable and flat.
I prefer to call this story as a soap opera in SF setting.
July 8, 2010
This was, hands down, one of the three most vile books I've ever read in my life. It's not science fiction or Chinoiserie, as it pretends to be; it's torture-porn of the very nastiest sort. Apart from that, it's quite poorly written, and as science fiction it's grade "Z" at best.
An absolutely disgusting book. I feel as if the author tried to molest me. I've never burned or destroyed a book in my life, and I can't bring myself to start now, but I will not continue reading it and I will never open its pages again.
I wish I could give negative stars, because this book deserves thousands of them. Only Jack Chalker and one of the authors of the "Wild Cards" series have ever equalled the utter vileness of Chung Kuo.
If you like seeing "heroes" discover bizarre new ways to torture and rape innocent characters, then Chung Kuo is the book for you. If so, I hope you'll seek therapy and stay away from children. The only positive thing I can say about the book is that the writing and characters are all so flat and lifeless that the details of the book didn't linger in my memory for too long. Except that even one SECOND was too long to have some of that crap in my head!
An absolutely disgusting book. I feel as if the author tried to molest me. I've never burned or destroyed a book in my life, and I can't bring myself to start now, but I will not continue reading it and I will never open its pages again.
I wish I could give negative stars, because this book deserves thousands of them. Only Jack Chalker and one of the authors of the "Wild Cards" series have ever equalled the utter vileness of Chung Kuo.
If you like seeing "heroes" discover bizarre new ways to torture and rape innocent characters, then Chung Kuo is the book for you. If so, I hope you'll seek therapy and stay away from children. The only positive thing I can say about the book is that the writing and characters are all so flat and lifeless that the details of the book didn't linger in my memory for too long. Except that even one SECOND was too long to have some of that crap in my head!
November 23, 2009
Wow, science fiction is known for being dismissive of women but this one takes the cake. Page 70 and the few (very few) women characters have ALL been whores, except one who dies in childbirth in a flashback. This is the future ... spare me.
March 2, 2008
Contains an excellent future world, ruled by the Chinese. But the story also contains more sex and brutality than I would have liked. The characters are flat, as if the author had too many to flesh out and could not give enough space (even in 600 pages) to any of them. None of the few female characters have important roles; they are like items at a banquet: described well but having no part to play.
June 4, 2010
A friend of mine recently told me he didn't like dystopias because they're too depressing, and I have to agree about this one. Not only is the world miserable, there isn't a single sympathetic character in the whole 600 pages.
I also wasn't thrilled with this guy's take on the Chinese; he indulges in a number of "exotic" stereotypes, and he insists (for reasons of "elegance") on using Wade-Giles romanization, and he's not even consistent about it. I barely finished this.
I also wasn't thrilled with this guy's take on the Chinese; he indulges in a number of "exotic" stereotypes, and he insists (for reasons of "elegance") on using Wade-Giles romanization, and he's not even consistent about it. I barely finished this.
October 3, 2009
Meh?
Look, he creates an interesting - if fairly unbelievable - world, but then he fills it with about half a billion characters many of whom never do anything interesting. The series has some fairly brutally violent sexual scenes in it, which I can cope with (barely) if they serve an integral part of the story being told, but here they seemed irrelevant, arbitrary, and gratuitous. And they did turn my stomach.
And it does not go unnoticed that the author claims that 90% of the earth has been covered by a ubiquitous city, and then about 1% of the novel actually happens there. Almost every major scene is set "somewhere else". So in the end we have to take this world-city almost on hearsay - with very little detail of it.
I finished it unenthralled; given that most reviewers seem to believe that the first was brilliant and the rest of the series went downhill, I'll be giving the rest a miss.
Look, he creates an interesting - if fairly unbelievable - world, but then he fills it with about half a billion characters many of whom never do anything interesting. The series has some fairly brutally violent sexual scenes in it, which I can cope with (barely) if they serve an integral part of the story being told, but here they seemed irrelevant, arbitrary, and gratuitous. And they did turn my stomach.
And it does not go unnoticed that the author claims that 90% of the earth has been covered by a ubiquitous city, and then about 1% of the novel actually happens there. Almost every major scene is set "somewhere else". So in the end we have to take this world-city almost on hearsay - with very little detail of it.
I finished it unenthralled; given that most reviewers seem to believe that the first was brilliant and the rest of the series went downhill, I'll be giving the rest a miss.
October 26, 2014
The beginning of David Wingrove's eight volume saga charting the collapse of a future earth civilisation where China has become the dominant power. The scope of the story is staggering, taking in the inherent oppression and tyranny of authoritarian rule and the destructive nature of revolution. Also, Wingrove creates an all time great villain in the deliciously unredeemed form of Major Devore. One of the most ambitious epics in sci-fi history and a remarkable feat of storytelling.
July 20, 2008
this is going to serve as my review for the entire "chung kuo" series. in brief, the first book is excellent (an "i can't put it down but i don't want it to end" kind of excellent) and the first half of the series is very good. after that, my interest waned. setting, plot, characters, etc. can be found here, so i'll just give my impressions.
wingrove successfully sketches a complex, interesting earth of two hundred years from now and sets up an epic conflict between forces pushing for change and those interested in stability. one of the most noteworthy aspects of the series (at its inception, at least) is that there are no good guys and no bad guys. neither side is necesarily right, and both can be brutal and uncaring in their methods. it's a convincing world-as-it-could-be that is inhabited by a large cast of well-rendered characters whose motivations seem very human (again, at its inception). grand schemes and intrigues, compelling to watch, play out over the course of the first few books and hint at so much more to come.
if the latter half of the series had maintained the breadth and humanity that characterized the first three books (and the fourth and fifth, to a lesser extent), it would be a classic. as it is, the final three books were disappointing to a greater or lesser degree. the series lost its focus as wingrove expands its scope (temporarily god-like ai, immortal chinese aliens, interplanetary/stellar/dimesional travel), and by the last book the parts of the first that i had most enjoyed had long since vanished.
wingrove successfully sketches a complex, interesting earth of two hundred years from now and sets up an epic conflict between forces pushing for change and those interested in stability. one of the most noteworthy aspects of the series (at its inception, at least) is that there are no good guys and no bad guys. neither side is necesarily right, and both can be brutal and uncaring in their methods. it's a convincing world-as-it-could-be that is inhabited by a large cast of well-rendered characters whose motivations seem very human (again, at its inception). grand schemes and intrigues, compelling to watch, play out over the course of the first few books and hint at so much more to come.
if the latter half of the series had maintained the breadth and humanity that characterized the first three books (and the fourth and fifth, to a lesser extent), it would be a classic. as it is, the final three books were disappointing to a greater or lesser degree. the series lost its focus as wingrove expands its scope (temporarily god-like ai, immortal chinese aliens, interplanetary/stellar/dimesional travel), and by the last book the parts of the first that i had most enjoyed had long since vanished.
October 8, 2008
I hate no-one enough to let them read this. When I finally threw the book down in disgust and dismay I called the friend who had loaned it to me to ask why he had done this thing. He replied that he had warned me not to read past page 200 or so; he just wanted me to see a small bit at the beginnning.
Don't even read those first 200 pages. There is nothing new or interesting in the setup, the characters are flat and undifferentiated, and you might make it up to the explicit, disgusting, and horribly-handled rape scene that will make you feel sympathetically dirty for the poor typesetter who didn't even have a part in choosing to inflict this travesty on the world.
Don't even read those first 200 pages. There is nothing new or interesting in the setup, the characters are flat and undifferentiated, and you might make it up to the explicit, disgusting, and horribly-handled rape scene that will make you feel sympathetically dirty for the poor typesetter who didn't even have a part in choosing to inflict this travesty on the world.
February 16, 2008
If only the other books in the series lived up to the promise of this one....
July 24, 2025
Chung Kuo: The Middle Kingdom (1989) is the first volume of David Wingrove's massive Chung Kuo science fiction series. I read most of the series a long time ago and recently decided to revisit the novel(s). After reading it the first time, I was fairly amazed that the series as a whole has gotten so little attention from scifi readers. After this read, I find it to be nearly as good as I remember--not a literary novel by any means, just solid, shoot-from-the-hip adventure and intrigue.
The novel is set in a future Earth where China (or at least Chinese culture) dominates the world. The events leading to this massive shift in world culture have not been made clear (though a prequel novel to be released soon might shed some light on how it originates). At any rate, the continents of Earth are ruled by a council of seven T'angs, who are akin to Chinese emperors and have absolute control over the life and death of the populace. The family of Li Shai Tung, the T'ang of Europe, is at the heart of the plot in Chung Kuo: TMK.
The entire population of Earth lives in a 300-story structure made of a super plastic material known only as Ice. Success in Chung Kuo (which is, incidentally, the ancient name for China itself, meaning 'The Middle Kingdom') is measured by where you reside in the structure: residents of the highest levels are those with the most power, while lowborn citizens are confined in the dirty, chaotic lower levels. Underneath Chung Kuo lies 'The Clay', where packs of humans live feral lives at best. The world-building in the novel is absolutely fantastic; Wingrove's Chung Kuo provides a wonderful setting in which the plot unfolds.
When we pick up the story, the T'angs are coming under increased pressure from a faction of wealthy industrialists and their political allies (known as the Dispersionists) for reforms. As seems to be the case with just about any entrenched ruler, the T'angs seek to avoid loosening their grip on power at any cost. They are particularly loathe to allow any sort of Western influence to work its way into society. This conflict in ideoology eventually leads to a bitter clash known as the 'War of Two Directions' for control of Chung Kuo and, with it, the population of Earth.
The novel tells the story from the viewpoints of a number of characters as they are swept into the unfolding struggle for power. As a result, we get a view of Chung Kuo society from the absolute top (the leaders of both factions) down to the lowest of the low (a Clay-born boy). There are a TON of characters in the novel and a lot of them have Chinese names. It is somewhat overwhelming at first, but the book has a handy cast of characters section to help readers keep them straight.
To be clear: Chung Kuo: TMK is not without its faults. Wingrove most definitely falls prey to a good dose of Orientalism every now and then (a definition from wikipedia: preconceived archetypes that envision all "Eastern" societies as fundamentally similar to one another, and fundamentally dissimilar to "Western" societies). Hmm...sounds a lot like the whole plot of the book, doesn't it? While the menace was always looming close, I feel like Wingrove only grossly fell prey to it on a few occasions. The reader will have to decide if this taints the whole novel--I don't think it does.
If you go to any book website and read reviews of Chung Kuo: TMK, you will see that much has been made about its violence. In fact, the most strident objections are raised over one sexually explicit scene in the book that lasts for maybe five pages. As with most anything you read on the internet, take these rather strangely impassioned reviews with a grain of salt. Yes, the scene is explicit. Yes, it is uncomfortable reading. BUT: the scene is not gratuitous and does serve a purpose. Namely, to cement in readers' minds the evilness of the leader of the Dispersionist faction, who, up until that point, may have turned out only to be an ideological hardliner. Who knows how many people have been scared away from reading what is a fairly good novel because of these reactionary reviews?
Despite some flaws, Chung Kuo: TMK is a great start to what can only be described as an epic science fiction series. As I said in the introduction--if you are looking for a deep book, put down Chung Kuo immediately and pick up the likes of Dan Simmons' Hyperion instead. Instead, if you go in expecting a well-written series with plenty of interesting characters and adventures, you won't be let down!
The novel is set in a future Earth where China (or at least Chinese culture) dominates the world. The events leading to this massive shift in world culture have not been made clear (though a prequel novel to be released soon might shed some light on how it originates). At any rate, the continents of Earth are ruled by a council of seven T'angs, who are akin to Chinese emperors and have absolute control over the life and death of the populace. The family of Li Shai Tung, the T'ang of Europe, is at the heart of the plot in Chung Kuo: TMK.
The entire population of Earth lives in a 300-story structure made of a super plastic material known only as Ice. Success in Chung Kuo (which is, incidentally, the ancient name for China itself, meaning 'The Middle Kingdom') is measured by where you reside in the structure: residents of the highest levels are those with the most power, while lowborn citizens are confined in the dirty, chaotic lower levels. Underneath Chung Kuo lies 'The Clay', where packs of humans live feral lives at best. The world-building in the novel is absolutely fantastic; Wingrove's Chung Kuo provides a wonderful setting in which the plot unfolds.
When we pick up the story, the T'angs are coming under increased pressure from a faction of wealthy industrialists and their political allies (known as the Dispersionists) for reforms. As seems to be the case with just about any entrenched ruler, the T'angs seek to avoid loosening their grip on power at any cost. They are particularly loathe to allow any sort of Western influence to work its way into society. This conflict in ideoology eventually leads to a bitter clash known as the 'War of Two Directions' for control of Chung Kuo and, with it, the population of Earth.
The novel tells the story from the viewpoints of a number of characters as they are swept into the unfolding struggle for power. As a result, we get a view of Chung Kuo society from the absolute top (the leaders of both factions) down to the lowest of the low (a Clay-born boy). There are a TON of characters in the novel and a lot of them have Chinese names. It is somewhat overwhelming at first, but the book has a handy cast of characters section to help readers keep them straight.
To be clear: Chung Kuo: TMK is not without its faults. Wingrove most definitely falls prey to a good dose of Orientalism every now and then (a definition from wikipedia: preconceived archetypes that envision all "Eastern" societies as fundamentally similar to one another, and fundamentally dissimilar to "Western" societies). Hmm...sounds a lot like the whole plot of the book, doesn't it? While the menace was always looming close, I feel like Wingrove only grossly fell prey to it on a few occasions. The reader will have to decide if this taints the whole novel--I don't think it does.
If you go to any book website and read reviews of Chung Kuo: TMK, you will see that much has been made about its violence. In fact, the most strident objections are raised over one sexually explicit scene in the book that lasts for maybe five pages. As with most anything you read on the internet, take these rather strangely impassioned reviews with a grain of salt. Yes, the scene is explicit. Yes, it is uncomfortable reading. BUT: the scene is not gratuitous and does serve a purpose. Namely, to cement in readers' minds the evilness of the leader of the Dispersionist faction, who, up until that point, may have turned out only to be an ideological hardliner. Who knows how many people have been scared away from reading what is a fairly good novel because of these reactionary reviews?
Despite some flaws, Chung Kuo: TMK is a great start to what can only be described as an epic science fiction series. As I said in the introduction--if you are looking for a deep book, put down Chung Kuo immediately and pick up the likes of Dan Simmons' Hyperion instead. Instead, if you go in expecting a well-written series with plenty of interesting characters and adventures, you won't be let down!
September 16, 2012
I'm really torn over how to review this book. It's certainly an intriguing concept - a future world in which the Chinese reign supreme, and in which they've constructed an elaborate false history to make it seem that things have always been that way - and the author's imagining of this strange, beehive-like world, positively seething and close to bursting at the seams, is definitely interesting. However, almost everything about his version of "future Han" culture feels off in some fashion, both within the confines of his created world (would certain ethnic slurs and modes of thought still exist inside the world of Chung Kuo? I don't think so ) and when viewed from the outside (it feels far more like an old-school Western fantasy about Chinese history and thought than anything approximating the complex reality, notwithstanding the author's obvious genuine knowledge of and affection for it). The characterisation is fairly stiff, and I've seldom come across child characters who felt less like real children than these ones. In addition to that, this book contains one of the most relentlessly male gazes I've seen in a long time, and it didn't escape my notice that we followed a string of brilliant (and ridiculously young) male characters, while there was not *one single* female character who existed as complete entity in and of herself. There was also some extremely nasty - and sexualised - violence that frequently felt gratuitous. In short, it was a hard book to slog through. And yet - and yet! - part of me is intrigued enough to contemplate reading the next book in the series. Maybe.
September 21, 2011
#32 CHUNG KUO: THE MIDDLE KINGDOM by David Wingrove: Durfee's top 50 novels countdown. The first book in a bloody, byzantine, intriguing 8 volume Sci-Fi epic. Part Blade Runner, part Star Wars, part Shogun. What Sci-fi should BE! But I don't know how it ended
December 15, 2013
Okay, so the rundown is as follows. Chung Kuo is a future history on an epic, operatic scale. The book traces the start of the "War of Two Directions", a conflict between the Confucianist stasis of the ruling Chinese empire and the upper-class Europeans who wish for progress, change, and to take back their birthright. The book features a huge cast of characters and a scope that, for the first book in a seven-book series, shows remarkable restraint and control while still spanning slightly over a decade in time.
The good points are that it takes next to no time at all to get off the ground and manages to cover the massive amount of territory despite a small lull in the action after the prologue, that it follows a huge cast of complex characters without ever once feeling like it's repeating itself or reusing characters, and that it keeps up a level of tension without having to resort too much to excessive vulgarity. It also keeps just enough uncertainty in the plot to make it interesting. The good guys are never on the verge of winning, and neither are the bad guys. And both sides are complex enough not to be "good" or "bad", but to be driven by their own motivations. Except one.
The bad parts are an ending that seems to arbitrarily set up the cliffhanger for the next book just so one side doesn't seem to be in too much of a position of strength, and a single character, Major Howard deVore. de Vore seems to be an unrepentant monster, manipulating both sides of the conflict for little more than his own gratification. He appears to derive pleasure from human suffering and sick power games, and thus stands out against the rest of the cast. Also, there are two or three scenes that get really brutal and nasty, so I feel like I should warn that they're there.
More, as always, below.
"I want change. Of any kind." - Edmund Wyatt
Grand-scale genre novels are a thing of rare beauty. While there are a lot of attempts to make big sagas, and it seems like just about every fantasy and sci-fi novel out there is part of a trilogy or a seven-book cycle or just can't seem to end no matter how spiteful and pointless it gets*, very few of them get it right. Barker's The Books of the Art, for example, fall apart once they get to the second book. And I've heard the same argument about Dune. There are a few truly grand-scale operatic fantasies and science fiction novels, but these are for the most part the exceptions and not actually the rule. It takes a lot of consistent worldbuilding, compelling characters, and attention to detail and history to get a series off the ground, and to get it to the point where it could very well be a classic is nigh-unfathomable. And while there are a few who aspire to epic status, at the same time, they don't reach the same grand, sweeping, operatic heights that they aspire to.
Which brings us to Chung Kuo: The Middle Kingdom. I actually found this book years ago when my father had it in paperback. He wouldn't let me read it, and didn't think much of it, and really the only reason I was interested in it was because I was going through a phase of asiaphilia and I thought the little full-color insert showing a wizened emperor on a futuristic throne looked "cool". It wasn't until years later that I learned it was the first book of an entire series, and that various libraries around the county very possibly had a full set of the things between them. But, since none seemed to have the first volume, and my dad got rid of his copy around the time I ripped the insert out so I could tape it to my wall, I was out of luck.
On my way through Santa Fe with a friend of mine once, though, I stopped at a local bookstore to use the bathroom, and found a hardcover copy of Middle Kingdom. While I tried reading it, there were also sixty or seventy other things going on, and at the time, reading a complex future-historical epic wasn't really one of them. Also, I got confused by the opening chapters, and felt like it seemed to stop everything dead. So the book languished on my shelf, through water damage and three separate moves to three separate houses, until finally I saw it there and realized that while it had remained on my shelf for about six years and a month, I hadn't read it once.
That is, until I decided that I'd start my hiatus off by reading it on the train to Virginia last month, as the length was more than perfect for the long train ride.
And it is brilliant.
Chung Kuo: The Middle Kingdom is the story of a future earth. After massive wars, China forms an imperialistic structure that now controls the entire planet, under the watchful gaze of seven T'angs, or kings, one for each continent. The people of each continent (save for a few exceptions) live in huge, tiered pyramid-shaped cities that are entirely self-contained. Below the Cities are the Net, an area of corruption and criminal excess similar to the average cyberpunk dystopia; and the Clay, an anarcho-primitive culture of savages that live in the darkness below the city, locked in brutal inter-tribal squabbling. Most of the book takes place in and around City Europe, ruled over by the oldest and most seasoned of the T'angs, Li Shai Tung. The world has settled into a sort of uneasy stasis. Yes, things may be moving towards instability as the population continues to rise, but everything is stable. Planned.
Until, of course, a group of top-tier European businessmen-- Pietr Lehmann, Edmund Wyatt, and Soren Berdichev-- decide that they need to bring about change and "take back their destinies". They form a faction known as the "Dispersionists" and promptly ascend to power in the house of representatives to directly oppose the T'angs and their doctrine of static governance.
And then things get nasty. But not particularly weird.
One of City Europe's chief ministers gets assassinated in a raid directed by Lehmann and the Dispersionist mole in the security forces, Howard de Vore. This starts a rather complicated political battle fought with assassinations, arrests, and flagrant disregard for both laws and human life. Allied against the Dispersionists and their monstrous servant/puppetmaster are Li Shai Tung, his general Knut Tolonen, and various ministers. But in the background of this conflict, a young man from The Clay finds his way into the upper levels and appears to pick up a talent for engineering. The assassins decide they're going to play a dangerous game of their own by blackmailing de Vore and Lehmann. The son of the T'ang's chief minister finds a dangerous secret about his family. And all of it seems to be spiraling, despite the best efforts of Li Shai Tung and General Tolonen, towards open warfare between this and other factions. It's the last thing they want. But it may be the only way.
First, the characters are amazing. Wingrove gives the main cast some very strong motivations, from Li Shai Tung's desire to move against his Dispersionist enemies but also keep the peace to Edmund Wyatt's occasional misgivings that he and his friends are doing the right thing. The supporting cast gets an equally complex coat of paint, in particular Chen, one of the two hired knives sent to assassinate the minister. My favorite, and the kind of stand-out here is General Tolonen, who spends part of the book as an old soldier, but shows that if he wishes, he's as dangerous, if not more dangerous, than anyone else he has to contend with. Wingrove just lets his characters be, and their motivations occur organically enough. The one outlier in this group is Howard de Vore**, but he seems to be more of a force for the other characters to rotate around and react to, than just a character. And, overall, that's the thing. The characters may all react to the force driving them, but they react organically enough it makes sense.
Second, the plotting is really dense and intricate, but never seems particularly hard to follow. This is most obvious in the way the plot can be described, but even in the above description, I just touched the surface of what goes on in the book. Explaining it all, even without spoilers, would take a lot of backgrounding and context I can't even begin to get into in the review (it's long enough as is), but it makes perfect sense from beginning to end. And this is what sets The Middle Kingdom apart from most of the books in the field that attempt epic status. While the plot can get complex, certainly, and is plenty dense, it is never particularly knotty in the sense that it's fairly easy to get from point A to point B.
And third, the worldbuilding is a thing to be praised. While The Bone Season had it all in expository dialogue, Wingrove lets the aesthetic work entirely for itself. He describes the structures in intricate detail, describes what people are wearing, and generally lets the world speak for itself. He also tends to show much more than tell, and even in a non-visual medium, this technique works incredibly well for him. You get a sense of City Europe and its orbital platform, from the treacherous terrain outside the city's walls to the brilliant tiers and digital sky of the city proper. It also leaves just enough to make people wonder and question what more there is, allowing them to dig deeper. This is another good feature. Worldbuilding should leave something up for chance, and this does. It leaves blanks to fill in with later volumes, and hopefully Wingrove does.
But there are some issues with this overall. For one thing, while there is a lot of energy, the pacing is definitely off. The pacing is set with the prologue, but then dives for a moment, releasing a lot of the built-up tension to have two new characters, different from the ones previously introduced, mess about in a wasteland for a few pages. While the pacing picks up again and these two characters do something pivotal, it does stop the book for a little bit. Also, I have issues with the ending, which causes just enough uncertainty and creates loose ends in the last chapter to lead into the next book. There's several quick victories pulled out of nowhere, and they don't feel natural
But all of this aside, Chung Kuo: The Middle Kingdom is a classic and a permanent part of my collection. It's exciting, suspenseful, dense, complex, and when it comes right down to it, very well put together. Buy this, or if you can't buy this, get it out of the library. I'm looking forward to the rest of the book series immensely.
NEXT WEEK
-Imajica by Clive Barker
- Possibly some short story/novella reviews
AND THEN
- IT by Stephen King
- Winter's Tale by Mark Helprin
AND MORE
*Not naming any names.
** I would just like to take a moment to say that I know a total of zero decent human beings with de Vore as a last name.
March 10, 2015
‘How many billions lived in the City that filled the great northern plains of Europe? The two men crab-scuttling across the dome that roofed the city neither knew nor cared. They thought only of the assassination that was their task.
Chung Kuo. For three thousand years the world-encompassing Empire of the Han had endured. War and famine long banished, the Council of Seven ruled with absolute authority. Their boast: that the Great Wheel of Change itself had ceased to turn.
Yet at that moment of supreme strength and confidence, Chung Kuo was suddenly vulnerable. A challenge had arisen from men who dreamed of Change – although Change would mean war and a return to all the old half-forgotten savageries of the past.’
Blurb from the 1990 NEL paperback edition.
In the 22nd Century, China has control of the Earth and has turned its continents into seven enclosed cities, each ruled by a Tang, one the Seven; the rulers of Chung Kuo, the Middle Kingdom.
Each city consists of many levels, socially and physically distinct and each citizen’s behaviour determines whether they rise or fall from their level.
The Seven control everything and impose Edicts against technological progress, seeking to keep the peace by maintaining a social status quo by halting the great wheel of change.
In this generation, however, there appear several individuals whose effect on society, for good or ill, will herald change.
Chinese are known as Han, and compose the majority of the ruling classes. Europeans or ‘Hung mao’, have been assimilated into Chinese culture to a large degree but there is a faction of Dispersionists who wish to build starships to colonise other stars, creating a society outside of the Tang’s control.
Major DeVore, originally a high-placed officer in the Tang’s forces, is part6 of the Dispersionists’ terrorist wing and organises the assassination of a Minister, which sets in motion a chain of political events; events which DeVore strategically controls and exploits for his own ends like a round of his favourite game, Wei-Chi.
This is the first volume of a very under-rated (although possibly ultimately flawed) epic. From Nineteen Eighty-Nine, it was ‘The Wire’ of its age, with its multi-character viewpoint covering all sectors of society from the wretched cannibal society of The Clay (the lightless bottom level) to the Tang himself.
Over the preceding century the Han have rewritten Earth history to suggest that Chung Kuo has always been the dominant civilisation and a ministry exists to ensure that any other historical alternative theory or account is treated as treason.
In this volume we follow several key characters; DeVore, Li Shai Tung, the Tang of City Europe; Li Yuan, the Tang’s son; Kim Ward, a scientific prodigy refugee from The Clay; Ben Shepherd; a cloned advisor to the Tang administration; Karr and Chen, trained fighters from the lower levels who now work for the Tang’s security forces.
It is certainly far more than an SF blockbuster thriller. The complex political manoeuvring and the interweaving individual storylines are handled very well, and the writing occasionally approaches the profound.
On its first publication there were complaints in the journal of the British Science Fiction Association about its sexual elements and one section in particular of extreme sexual violence, although one has to say that the section needs to be looked at in context. Is this merely an apt demonstration of DeVore’s methods of controlling people and the depths of his depravity?
The original series which ran to eight large volumes was marred by the publisher's insistence on ending the series with volume eight. The original ending was therefore, somewhat unsatisfactory. Wingrove has recently revised the entire series which is being released in twenty shorter volumes, the first volume of which is 'Son of Heaven' (2011).
Chung Kuo. For three thousand years the world-encompassing Empire of the Han had endured. War and famine long banished, the Council of Seven ruled with absolute authority. Their boast: that the Great Wheel of Change itself had ceased to turn.
Yet at that moment of supreme strength and confidence, Chung Kuo was suddenly vulnerable. A challenge had arisen from men who dreamed of Change – although Change would mean war and a return to all the old half-forgotten savageries of the past.’
Blurb from the 1990 NEL paperback edition.
In the 22nd Century, China has control of the Earth and has turned its continents into seven enclosed cities, each ruled by a Tang, one the Seven; the rulers of Chung Kuo, the Middle Kingdom.
Each city consists of many levels, socially and physically distinct and each citizen’s behaviour determines whether they rise or fall from their level.
The Seven control everything and impose Edicts against technological progress, seeking to keep the peace by maintaining a social status quo by halting the great wheel of change.
In this generation, however, there appear several individuals whose effect on society, for good or ill, will herald change.
Chinese are known as Han, and compose the majority of the ruling classes. Europeans or ‘Hung mao’, have been assimilated into Chinese culture to a large degree but there is a faction of Dispersionists who wish to build starships to colonise other stars, creating a society outside of the Tang’s control.
Major DeVore, originally a high-placed officer in the Tang’s forces, is part6 of the Dispersionists’ terrorist wing and organises the assassination of a Minister, which sets in motion a chain of political events; events which DeVore strategically controls and exploits for his own ends like a round of his favourite game, Wei-Chi.
This is the first volume of a very under-rated (although possibly ultimately flawed) epic. From Nineteen Eighty-Nine, it was ‘The Wire’ of its age, with its multi-character viewpoint covering all sectors of society from the wretched cannibal society of The Clay (the lightless bottom level) to the Tang himself.
Over the preceding century the Han have rewritten Earth history to suggest that Chung Kuo has always been the dominant civilisation and a ministry exists to ensure that any other historical alternative theory or account is treated as treason.
In this volume we follow several key characters; DeVore, Li Shai Tung, the Tang of City Europe; Li Yuan, the Tang’s son; Kim Ward, a scientific prodigy refugee from The Clay; Ben Shepherd; a cloned advisor to the Tang administration; Karr and Chen, trained fighters from the lower levels who now work for the Tang’s security forces.
It is certainly far more than an SF blockbuster thriller. The complex political manoeuvring and the interweaving individual storylines are handled very well, and the writing occasionally approaches the profound.
On its first publication there were complaints in the journal of the British Science Fiction Association about its sexual elements and one section in particular of extreme sexual violence, although one has to say that the section needs to be looked at in context. Is this merely an apt demonstration of DeVore’s methods of controlling people and the depths of his depravity?
The original series which ran to eight large volumes was marred by the publisher's insistence on ending the series with volume eight. The original ending was therefore, somewhat unsatisfactory. Wingrove has recently revised the entire series which is being released in twenty shorter volumes, the first volume of which is 'Son of Heaven' (2011).
May 8, 2008
I have no idea why this book isn't at the top of the list of sci fic canon. I was a little skeptical starting out- a future ruled by dynastic China? But man, it blew me away. The cultural stuff is a little shaky, possibly based more on orientalist style ideas of oldschool China than real history. But the writing was elegant bordering on beautiful, the world constructed was complex, thorough, at least passingly realistic, and interesting. the characters were human and believable. And there were almost no dull moments in the entire book. It moved smoothly from one interesting charater and situation to the next. It was also fairly nuanced- there are clear good guys and bad guys but they're not on the same side. For once, I was greatful that the author wrote a sequal. usually the suspesful "stay tuned" ending annoys me, but this time I was just blown away. I can't wait to read more, although I wish I had known to buy book two so I could've had it on hand when I finished the first one. Great.
May 22, 2010
This is the first doorstopper of a book in a multi-volume epic; I believe I read the first three or so, years ago. The basic premise is that the world is dominated in the future by a global Chinese empire. The setting is a high-tech futuristic one with a culture that has inexplicably reverted to dynastic China in its political structure. So there is lots of betrayal and treachery and the world is as violent, ugly, and brutal as it was in the middle ages, except soldiers have high tech weapons with which to torture and kill the masses. It held my interest for its somewhat original premise and the science fiction elements, but it's a long read and the names and storylines have not stuck with me.
March 3, 2009
I read this a few years back and ordered it through Alibris last summer....as good as ever. This is a world encompassing epic adventure that is only getting started in book one. A world grown corrupt and creaking is threatened by seeming nihlistic hot heads who really do plan to tear the whole thing down. But are they really as nihlistic as we think? Is the old order all that bad with its safety and security? This dude can really pull you into a world as alien as if it were another planet.
July 12, 2018
If you're looking for a Chinese epic, I would recommend Three Kingdoms. If you're looking for a sci-fi classic, I would recommend Dune. If you're looking for a mix of the two, I would recommend The Three-Body Problem by Liu Cixin. But I'm struggling to find a situation when I would recommend this book.
April 20, 2016
I only got to 33%.
I didn't get to the really misogynistic parts that everyone else complains about, but this book had already committed the gravest sin---it was *boring*.
I didn't get to the really misogynistic parts that everyone else complains about, but this book had already committed the gravest sin---it was *boring*.
December 22, 2017
Perfect plot, pacing, world building, character development.
February 23, 2021
as it happens, i JUST watched an interview of the writer OCTAVIA BUTLER by amy goodman & juan gonzales conducted before her death in 2006 on "democracy now" & replayed in memoriam in which she describes how she came to be a writer in her chosen genre "speculative dystopian fiction". there are far too few recorded interviews of her, a black woman working in a field dominated by white males for decades. i was weaned on sci-fi from the age of about 10 i think, starting w/the tom swift series & graduating continually to asimov, a.e. van vogt, bradbury, heinlein, then harlan ellison & phillip k. dick & ending up rooting thru my father's russian author cache. at some point (say around 22?), i became VERY disenchanted by the white male POV that so dominated the field & simply stopped reading. now & then i might check out an 'au courant' anthology just to see what younger fresh perspectives appeared. & somewhere along the line i read this book, probably because i had never seen ANYTHING in which CHINA played so dominant a role. within the 1st 10 pp or so i was flabbergasted at the author's conceit of simply ERASING AFRICA (too lazy to deal w/black characters? a racist? don't know, no longer care) violently & ultimately. as i read the 1 & 2 star reviews i now DO recall the extravagantly loathsome, vile & 'gratuitous' rape scene(s), jaw dropping in the sheer breath & depth of their venality & cringeworthyness. & as these same readers have noted, an inability or unwillingness to stay the course w/any character but instead meandering hither & yon until 1 simply loses track (& interest). how this book got published is a real puzzlement as it represents not only mediocre to BAD writing but sheer, depraved intellectual FILTH.
& yes, it SHOULD BE BURNED, i feel that strongly about it even now decades after having read it. & for those who might well ask, "well why did u read it?", well, i simply couldn't believe my eyes.
read OCTAVIA BUTLER & don't even use this as a doorstop. ugh, ugh, ugh.
& yes, it SHOULD BE BURNED, i feel that strongly about it even now decades after having read it. & for those who might well ask, "well why did u read it?", well, i simply couldn't believe my eyes.
read OCTAVIA BUTLER & don't even use this as a doorstop. ugh, ugh, ugh.
November 8, 2018
This review is for the entire series, not just the first volume. I barely remember this series; it has been twenty-three years since I read it. I remember the basic premise, and that it was one of the more disturbing 'dystopian future' novels I had read. I probably have not read anything else in that particular vein since- I have always had a vivid imagination (and the last nineteen years of the cold war were also the first nineteen years of my life), hence I do not need any help to imagine a dystopian future. I don't read slasher/supernatural horror books either, for essentially the same reason. This series is, obviously, genre-fiction; it is fairly creative and decently written genre-fiction, however. If you like science fiction, you will probably find this series worth reading...
...Some time later...
O.k., I seem to recall that there were six or seven books in this series, and that I read them all during the Fall of 1995, because my then-roommate, who was much more heavily into SF than I ever was, owned copies of the whole series (I thought it was the whole series, anyway, and as I remember so did he). Apparently there were eight volumes, and I'm damned if I can square the publishing dates with my aging memory (a task not made any easier by Amazon/Goodreads somewhat screwy policies on publishing dates). And in addition, now the author has completely re-written & massively expanded the series. Whatever. I'm not going to re-read it, because life is too short and there is far too much actual history yet to be read, but my above comments still stand. Maybe those books were imported copies of the U.K. paperbacks- my roommate did work in a comic shop after all, and that way the dates would make sense...
...Some time later...
O.k., I seem to recall that there were six or seven books in this series, and that I read them all during the Fall of 1995, because my then-roommate, who was much more heavily into SF than I ever was, owned copies of the whole series (I thought it was the whole series, anyway, and as I remember so did he). Apparently there were eight volumes, and I'm damned if I can square the publishing dates with my aging memory (a task not made any easier by Amazon/Goodreads somewhat screwy policies on publishing dates). And in addition, now the author has completely re-written & massively expanded the series. Whatever. I'm not going to re-read it, because life is too short and there is far too much actual history yet to be read, but my above comments still stand. Maybe those books were imported copies of the U.K. paperbacks- my roommate did work in a comic shop after all, and that way the dates would make sense...
Read
October 23, 2025The Year is 2190. China has once again become a world unto itself and this time its only boundary is space . . . The world is City Earth, ruled by the Seven, China's new kings. Beautiful, controlled, sensual, this high-tech society is rushing toward war between the forces of West and East, between the rebels who hunger for change and the overlords who demand stability, between the very powers of darkness and light. It will be an era of violent conflagration destined to expose the basest elements of human nature . . . and the highest dreams. An epic that draws us into an alternative world so real, so complete that we become denizens of the new Middle Kingdom, touched by longings we never imagined. . . driven by forces as ancient as man's first breath. Not since Asminov's Foundation books and Herbert's Dune has there been such a majestic and powerful vision of a believable other world. . . seductive, chilling, unforgettable!
March 19, 2019
This reads like an attempt at writing a book by a precocious but immature 17 year old boy, in his mom's basement.
The superficial amount of detail and information, the number of characters is sort of impressive, but there's no plausible depth to the world - literally billions of people are occasionally alluded to, but mainly ignored. a bit like a badly written"Quest" fantasy book where the path taken is the only thing that really seems to exist.
It's all about the leaders, who are all male, and pretty much all very Alpha. Even the less powerful males are *trying* to be alpha, it's the only scale on which they're measured. And the author is way too enthusiastic at praising the appeal of the bodies of very young girls (between 12 and 16, Eww), and the joy of having sex, sometimes violent sex, with them.
Not recommended.
BugBear
The superficial amount of detail and information, the number of characters is sort of impressive, but there's no plausible depth to the world - literally billions of people are occasionally alluded to, but mainly ignored. a bit like a badly written"Quest" fantasy book where the path taken is the only thing that really seems to exist.
It's all about the leaders, who are all male, and pretty much all very Alpha. Even the less powerful males are *trying* to be alpha, it's the only scale on which they're measured. And the author is way too enthusiastic at praising the appeal of the bodies of very young girls (between 12 and 16, Eww), and the joy of having sex, sometimes violent sex, with them.
Not recommended.
BugBear
January 29, 2018
This started off really interesting; the idea of the Chinese culture taking over the world, then essentially building a world on top of Earth was cool. Having a group of essentially Emperors, one per continent, working as a council of rulers was neat, and then having the status quo challenged was in-depth and neat.
I got over halfway through the book when I got to a point where there was a rape/torture scene that was so vile, and so unnecessary, that I just stopped. It was disgusting, and wrong, and did not appear to serve the story in any way shape or form; we already knew the bad guy was a bad guy for crying out loud! Wingrove didn't need to go to there! What was the point?
At that point I was just done, and it was too bad because it was an intriguing book up to that point.
I got over halfway through the book when I got to a point where there was a rape/torture scene that was so vile, and so unnecessary, that I just stopped. It was disgusting, and wrong, and did not appear to serve the story in any way shape or form; we already knew the bad guy was a bad guy for crying out loud! Wingrove didn't need to go to there! What was the point?
At that point I was just done, and it was too bad because it was an intriguing book up to that point.
October 13, 2019
Started reading this series as it first appeared and ended up reading the first 6 to 7 books, 2 different times. Years apart. So many weak minded people commenting. A shame you can't open your minds and keep going. Nothing is flat. I lived these books as I read them. That's how masterful the author was at creating characters and keeping them going.
December 26, 2020
One of my all time favorite books. I was thinking about it recently and looking for an audio version and realized it (like so many books) is not on my Goodreads shelves. I think I read it in the 90's. I'm not sure I'd like it as much today - I loved the world building, but am not sure I could take the darker parts.
January 21, 2021
A perhaps prescient view of a future world dominated by Chinese culture, considering it was written in 1990 and China continues to grow as a superpower under president Xi, erasing western influence in Hong Kong, etc. The story is a page turner, but the writing itself is not particularly great, and there are parts I could do completely without (gratuitous violence and sex).
September 23, 2017
This is a powerful and dangerous series and in many ways it has brilliance about it. However the sadistic rape of the plantation woman by DeVore was one of the most horrible things I have ever encountered in literature and frankly it went too far
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