Kraken in Around the World in 80 Books

Oct 03, 2017 Nadine in NY Jones rated it really liked it

Shelves: mystery, audio, encroaching-ocean, suspense-thriller, fantasy-and-sci-fi, gods-known-and-unknown

Who the hell could understand the sea’s motivations, anyway? And who would be so lunatic as to challenge it? No one could fight that.

Bat. Shit. Crazy. Also: Brilliant.

4.5 stars - it lost one-half star because the motivation of a few characters was never clear to me.

This is as far as it's possible to get from "normal" and still make some kind of sense. It's not gibberish, or "stream of consciousness," or "magical realism," or whatever. I generally dislike all of those things. This is sharp, a

Who the hell could understand the sea’s motivations, anyway? And who would be so lunatic as to challenge it? No one could fight that.

Bat. Shit. Crazy. Also: Brilliant.

4.5 stars - it lost one-half star because the motivation of a few characters was never clear to me.

This is as far as it's possible to get from "normal" and still make some kind of sense. It's not gibberish, or "stream of consciousness," or "magical realism," or whatever. I generally dislike all of those things. This is sharp, and brilliant, and horrific, with scenes of startling violence, and also very funny. There were lines that made me literally laugh out loud. I rarely understood what was going on, and I didn't care.

The mystery is that type that leads from one clue to another clue, a sort of scavenger hunt. At heart, the story is reasonably linear and straightforward, but there are so many different groups following different threads of clues, sometimes working together and sometimes not, that it's difficult to keep track of it all.

The story starts with Billy, of course, and Dane, and the Teuthex with the Church of God Kraken. Then there are: the police (Collingswood, Barron, and Vardy of the FSRC), Marge & Leon, Goss & Subby, Fitch & Saira with the Londonmancers, the Tattoo, Grisamentum, Wati & his union of familiars (the UMA, Union of Magicked Assistants). Those are just the main groups! There are others, brought in to help and then leaving again, often to return much later in the plot .... the Knuckleheads, the Chaos Nazis, the Brotherhood of the Blessed Flood, the ocean itself, Jason the chameleon, Cole the pyromancer, Simon the porter, plus gunfarmers, Dharmapalite supremacists, the Brood, Monsterherders, and the mnemophylaxes (Angels of Memory). It's a large cast of characters.

There are a lot of popculture references, and I worried that they would date the story, but they don't. I think in ten or twenty years they will securely anchor this story in its time, as historical fiction. But for now, in the present, they made me laugh in surprise. You're just not expecting to hear about Leo DiCaprio or G.G. Allin in a book about a squid god!

"... Have you heard of G.G. Allin?"

"Who the eff's that?"

"Search me. Luckily, Dr. Harris is a dab hand with Google. He was a singer, says here. Though it also says that stretches the definition. Delightful. 'Scum-rocker,' it says here. More of a Queen man, myself."

John Lee's frenetic narration is the perfect complement to Mieville's out-sized writing style. For hours (even days) after listening, snippets and random words and names would echo in my head, with Lee's enthusiastic emphasis: "Subby and Goss, Goss and fucking Subbayyy" ... archiTOOTHus ... the Teuthex ... My one complaint is that some of his character voices sound too similar. I often had trouble different roaring between Billy, Dane, and Collingswood - usually Dane had a vaguely Scottish accent but that would sometimes disappear and they would both sound the same and I would not be sure who was talking. ...more

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Feb 08, 2012 Jessica rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: speculative-fiction, england, religion

I wanted to like this one much better than I did - it's just so overwhelmingly all over the place that it's hard to love. I appreciate the twists and turns, but ultimately felt like it was too much of the same stuffed into a too-small package. He's definitely a highly talented writer, but I don't think this is his best. ...more

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Nov 03, 2015 Oblomov rated it really liked it

Mieville goes to Gaiman territory. The first giant squid specimen is put on display in London and is then stolen, and the curator finds himself drawn into a nether world of cults, alternative religions and a very unusual squad within the UK police. A fun read with a twist I did not see coming.

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Jan 04, 2013 Oana rated it really liked it

Easy to get into and a story that simmers along, immersing the reader into an alternative London full of bizarre religions and cults. Mieville usually has a pet word in each book; this time it's concatenate. ...more

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