Priest - The Islanders [Jan 14, 2020]

[Jenna, I'd be free if not for Temper & Edgewalker]

The Islanders - Christopher Priest

January 14, 2020.
Requested by Saar the Book Owl.

[Beige]

Hi all, I'm saving a spot.

[Mayim]

Yay, the more the better.

[Timelord Iain, Tech Support]

I'm joining, too...

[Mayim]

I might start earlier because I just finished a book and don’t want to return to Assail yet.

[Beige]

I started today and I'm already chuffed I signed up for this one.

How does buddy reading etiquette work in this group. Can I comment as I go by listing chapters and using spoiler tags? Or is there another preferred method?

[Mayim]

Yes, chapters and spoilers are the way to go. I’m halfway through and totally in love with the book.

[Timelord Iain, Tech Support]

Beige wrote: "I started today and I'm already chuffed I signed up for this one.

How does buddy reading etiquette work in this group. Can I comment as I go by listing chapters and using spoiler tags? Or is there..."

Definitely the way to go... it creates good signposts to stop at and respond for other readers... just be careful when responding to spoilers... if the reply button cuts a spoiler tag off wrong, the spoiler you're responding to will be visible (at the top of your post in italics)... then someone notices, and you have to go back and edit your comment...

Not that that's ever happened to me... 100x...

[Beige]

Mayim wrote: "Yes, chapters and spoilers are the way to go. I’m halfway through and totally in love with the book."

Thanks! And I'm so glad you're loving it and it isn't likely to be a 1 star review. Although, your 1-star reviews give many of us a lot of joy.

[Beige]

Here goes....

Introduction: (view spoiler)[ How delightful! How very droll! I can't recall reading an introduction by a fictional character before. Especially one who has reluctantly taken on the job, doesn't mind making that painfully obvious and including a few critiques of the text along the way. Ha! (hide spoiler)]

[Mayim]

I think it’s a strong contender for the book of the year, Beige. I’m so hooked I don’t even have the time to post comments! I’ll reply to your tomorrow though.

[Timelord Iain, Tech Support]

Beige wrote: "Here goes....

Introduction: [spoilers removed]"

I haven't started yet, but (view spoiler)[Alcatraz vs. the Evil Librarians does similar, I think... the MC Alcatraz writes the YA series as a bit of a memoir of his adventures, and a warning to normal kids... but does so under the pseudonym "Brandon Sanderson"... the books also have a ton of meta-humor about chapter structure, people who read the last page of books before starting, etc) (hide spoiler)]

[Beige]

Chapter Aay:

I did read a non-spoiler review that suggested we should be ready for much discussion of (view spoiler)[ wind and sea currents. Chapter one glides right into it. I may watch more of the weather channel than the average human, but it didn't prepare me for the joys I'd experience reading this sublime mixture of meteorology, anthropology, art and history.

Words author used to describe sounds I'm familiar with but I wasn't aware they existed in the English language:

Soughing - who knew there was a word for the sounds trees made in the wind?

Coloratura - the vocal fireworks, or "elaborate ornamentation of a vocal melody". A fancy word for a fancy style.

Oh and I did ponder if the islands were possibly earth post climate change earth? The currency used on Aay suggests earth origin....Simoleon is apparently an old slang for a dollar and Thaler was "a silver coin used throughout Europe for almost four hundred years".

If the rest of the book is filled with little gems like this in going to be one happy camper.

(hide spoiler)]

P.S. I won't write this much for each chapter. Once I get sucked in, I usually go quiet ;)

[Timelord Iain, Tech Support]

Beige wrote: "Chapter Aay:..."

I try to avoid being mono-syllabic in my comments (and don't always succeed)...

I'm definitely more verbose when a book is pissing me off, tho... because at the end of each chapter/paragraph, I'm fuming and pausing, so I have nothing better to do than type :D

[Beige]

Timelord Iain wrote: "Beige wrote: "Chapter Aay:..."

I try to avoid being mono-syllabic in my comments (and don't always succeed)...

I'm definitely more verbose when a book is pissing me off, tho... because at the end..."

Ha! Yes, I'm guilty of the same. If I love a book I sometimes have to get up and walk around, maybe prance a little. But anger gets me typing.

[Mayim]

I am sorry but with this book I am hiding all my snark away and I'm respectfully bowing instead.

It's one of those authors that leave me so flabbergasted/impressed/destroyed/awed that all I can do is mumble "this book, wow...".

[Mayim]

Beige wrote: "Chapter Aay:

I did read a non-spoiler review that suggested we should be ready for much discussion of..."

For me the win word is "patois". I cannot believe I have not been using it on an everyday basis up to date!

[Beige]

Mayim wrote: "Beige wrote: "Chapter Aay:

For me the win word is "patois". I cannot believe I have not been using it ..."

Agreed. It is a lovely word to enunciate. It's used in my city but only in reference to Jamaican patois and not the many other cultures that live here.

I recently learned the term "false friends", which is when an English word exists in another language but has a totally different meaning. For example: Saying that you're in pain in a remote French village could result in a loaf of bread. I think it's a lovely title to give the experience.

[Beige]

So I'm 32% in and have begun the chapters starting with "G"

(view spoiler)[ At this point I can only stare in admiration of the sheer creativity of Mr. Priest.

The way he has woven in the world building! Gawd, so good. From the intro I thought the world had chosen to be limited in its technology, just surviving on each island's resources. But no, that's just the life choice of our mysterious novelist and bibliographer. Just as I'm wondering about elements of the world the next chapter seems to include an answer. Technology, economy, import/export, healthcare etc. But intriguing mysteries remain.......The internet exists, but there are no maps!?! What phenomenon prevents widespread air travel? And what are these rules and laws and how did they come about? Erotomane? Importunate?

Also, isn't it apt that the silicon valley is built in the deadliest cluster of islands? Deliciously dark humour. What hubris. Although, the same could be said for our own silicon valley given the risk of California earthquakes.

And and....the art descriptions are stellar. Seriously, how does he DO all of this?

(hide spoiler)]

[Timelord Iain, Tech Support]

So I started... Finished prologue and chapter 1, and started chapter 2... not sure what to think yet...

The writing reminds me of the overwordy Paarfi segment of Tiassa (Written, in character, by a scholar who likes to insert his opinions into the story and be hyperliterary)... but here, it's not overpowering the story, so it's not a problem, just a comment...

I also feel like there's more I should be getting, than I am... I think that's to be expected, so early in the story...

I just re-read the blurb, to make sure I hadn't misremembered...

Then, I scrolled down, and found out this is loosely part of a series?... I didn't realize that, and wonder if I should have read the other books first, since they were written in the 80s/90s/00s... apparently, all these books are set in this Dream Archipelago world that Christopher Priest has created?

The books I'm talking about are: The Affirmation, The Gradual, and The Dream Archipelago... and The Adjacent, to a lesser extent...

[Timelord Iain, Tech Support]

Looking at the book pages, I think we're all jumping into this book blind?... Guess we'll just make do... and from Mayim's reaction, it hasn't hindered enjoyment any...

Just means there are 4-5 other books we can maybe read in the future...

All have audio, except the Gradual... it seems like there was a push to release all of Christopher Priest's books on audio in 2012... Audible produced 10 of his 14 available audiobooks in November/December 2012... and all the Dream Archipelago ones have the same narrator... except The Adjacent, which I assume involved alternate dimensions, anyway...

[Timelord Iain, Tech Support]

Found a Christopher Priest comment on the subject:

The Dream Archipelago pops up in four of your novels, including the two new releases. What keeps you coming back to this setting?

I never really left it. The islands have been at the back of my mind, and informing some of the images in my non-Archipelago stuff, since the late 1970s, when I wrote the first five novellas. My 1981 novel, The Affirmation, which I think is not well known in the US, is what I call my ‘key’ novel. Everything I wrote before it leads into The Affirmation – everything I’ve written since depends on it. In The Affirmation I laid my cards on the table: I made it plain how I saw the Archipelago, and after that I thought I’d better not go back there. But the years passed, no one seemed at all bothered by the revelations in The Affirmation, so I tiptoed back into it.

Sounds like we should definitely read the Affirmation, at some point...

The same interview talks about how he wrote Islanders & Adjacent at the same time, inspired by similar ideas... https://litreactor.com/interviews/10-...

I'm going to get back to reading, now...

[Timelord Iain, Tech Support]

On chapter 12 now... some of the chapters are so small...

Chapter 5: (view spoiler)[maybe it's because we're used to this kind of injustice, and schooled in noticing it, but that confession seemed obviously forced, just reading the transcript... I felt so bad for him, even before the back story... (hide spoiler)]

What's this book supposed to be?... At first glance, it seems like a guidebook/travelogue to the Dream Archipelago / Islands... (view spoiler)[but it goes into so many details... is this the writer going off topic, or what the book is supposed to be?

I'm talking about the book within the book, I guess, which can be confusing... since we have a sense of narrative voice... (hide spoiler)]

Toruin/Torqui/et al... I hope something comes of this collection of confusing island names...

[Mayim]

Timelord Iain wrote: "Looking at the book pages, I think we're all jumping into this book blind?... Guess we'll just make do... and from Mayim's reaction, it hasn't hindered enjoyment any...

Just means there are 4-5 ot..."

I discovered it is a series by accident, reading some of the reviews. I am surprised that the fact it is a series has not been flagged up on Goodreads. Do you think it might be some sort of an omission? Initially, I thought the rest might be too scifi for me, but now the sheer genius of this author makes me want to gobble everything he has written (I have the same with Tchaikovsky - no other author could make me read -- and enjoy!!! -- a book about insects).

[Mayim]

Also, of course I am in for the buddy reads, just please, one per month as I cannot read at work :(

[Mayim]

Timelord Iain wrote: "Found a Christopher Priest comment on the subject:

The Dream Archipelago pops up in four of your novels, including the two new releases. What keeps you coming back to this setting?

I never really..."

he wrote THE AFFIRMATION!!!!! ?????


wow

(this regards the later chapters! I had no idea!)

[Timelord Iain, Tech Support]

Mayim wrote: "Timelord Iain wrote: "Found a Christopher Priest comment on the subject:

The Dream Archipelago pops up in four of your novels, including the two new releases. What keeps you coming back to this se..."

Yea, I just got through the part (view spoiler)[with the pen pal correspondence with the in-world author of The Affirmation... the nature of the book definitely gets more complicated as the story progresses... (hide spoiler)]

Mimes: (view spoiler)[I wouldn't be so suspicious of this second mime, if I hadn't seen parts of other people's reviews (Bradley's for example)... (hide spoiler)]

On chapter 17 now...

[Timelord Iain, Tech Support]

On some levels, this book reminds me of House of Leaves & Ship of Theseus for it's mind-bendy elements... I still need to go back and finish/re-read Ship of Theseus, sometimes... I was supposed to read it with Soo in another group, over a year ago, but fell off... we all did... you need to be a certain mindset for books like that...

This book isn't quite to that level, but is much more immersible, as a result, I think...

The 2 books I mentioned above have meta-layers...

[Timelord Iain, Tech Support]

Chapter 27 now: this chapter has me questioning so much...

I also find myself laughing all over the place, while listening...

[Timelord Iain, Tech Support]

Finished... and was just left with a sense of "what?!?"

I kinda feel like I need to read the book again, to catch (view spoiler)[the importance of all the elements told out of order...

It's kinda like that play, towards the end, that is best understood in reverse order, with genders occasionally swapped and scenes removed... (hide spoiler)]

Very interesting book... my comments about House of Leaves felt pretty apt, by the end...

[Saar The Book owl]

Beige wrote: "Here goes....

Introduction: [spoilers removed]"

Introduction: (view spoiler)[I've never read an introduction by a fictional character before too. It took me a few minutes to see that it was a fictional person. I found it a bit difficult about the geography. It was more like reading a non - fiction book. (hide spoiler)]

[Saar The Book owl]

Beige wrote: "Chapter Aay:

I did read a non-spoiler review that suggested we should be ready for much discussion of wind and sea currents. Chapter one glides right into it. I may watch more of the weather chan..."


It was interesting to read about the (view spoiler)[different faculties of the University of the 4 Winds. On how the faculties have obtained their different names. Also, I didn't know that you can write in a literary way about the winds. It's almost like they have human characteristiques. (hide spoiler)]

[Mayim]

Beige wrote: "Mayim wrote: "Beige wrote: "Chapter Aay:

For me the win word is "patois". I cannot believe I have not been using it ..."

Agreed. It is a lovely word to enunciate. It's used in my city but only in..."

As I am constantly surrounded by foreign languages moving from one country to another and I predominantly use English which is not my native, false friends are my best friends. I have a long, long list of them memorised *sigh*

[Mayim]

Timelord Iain wrote: "On some levels, this book reminds me of House of Leaves & Ship of Theseus for it's mind-bendy elements... I still need to go back and finish/re-read Ship of Theseus, so..."

Both books sound super interesting, thanks for the recommendation!

[Saar The Book owl]

Everyone is reading so fast! I can't keep up :(
I've finished the introduction and chapter 1. At first I found it sounding like a non - fiction book: the currents, the winds, the geopgraphics...But there's more underneath that.
If I understand correctly:
(view spoiler)[there are 2 main continents: the north and the south, who are at war with each other, and between that you have the islands, who don't get involved to much in the war. More a neutral position? I loved reading about the winds and about Aay and Muy, but I wonder why she left. She had a connection with Aay, but that wasn't enough to keep her. (hide spoiler)]

For now, I'm enjoying the book, but I don't understand some words, like: 'patois'?

I'll try to write more interesting and better revieww next time. The flu is messing with my attention....

[Mayim]

Saar, this book is simply so exciting that once I started I simply could not stop reading. Thank you so much for organising this BR!

As to Aay and Muy I think you will discover more about the main reason behind her departure and subsequent seclusion as you read on.

[Beige]

Timelord Iain wrote: "Looking at the book pages, I think we're all jumping into this book blind?... Guess we'll just make do... and from Mayim's reaction, it hasn't hindered enjoyment any...

Just means there are 4-5 ot..."

I wonder if it is intentional that GR doesn't list the series, this one certainly reads as a standalone, it assumes the reader knows nothing. I'm glad I didn't know because I might have been tempted to read them in order and then I probably wouldn't have gotten to this book for years!

[Beige]

Timelord Iain wrote: "On chapter 12......What's this book supposed to be?... At first glance, it seems like a guidebook/travelogue to the Dream Arch..."

Yes, in my GR update I likened the book to one of those old Magic Eye Images that went viral in the 90s

(view spoiler)[ (hide spoiler)]

Can you see it?

[Beige]

Saar The Book owl wrote: "It was interesting to read about the..."

The style and language seems to loosen up as you go. It doesn't feel so non-fiction-y after the first couple of chapters.

40% in a my favourite part is still from chapter 1 (view spoiler)[ ESPHOVEN MUY and the descriptions of the trees sounds in the winds. "an apple tree in blossom as a frivolous dance of clashing cymbals" Oh those frivolous apple trees! Haha, but I am partial to a little anthropomorphization :) (hide spoiler)]

[Beige]

Saar The Book owl wrote: "Everyone is reading so fast!..."

Right!? Haha. I started before Iain, turned away for a few hours and then he was done! 😮

Iain are you one of those double speed audio readers?

[Beige]

40% Chapter Goorn - I was surprised to find such a (view spoiler)[ lengthy chapter after all of the wee ones. I liked the style change, that suddenly we had a first person narrative. While there was the internet and cars, is still felt a bit like it was set in some despressed Edward Munch painting.

I liked that he only gave us glimpses of the mystery and didn't outright answer it. And then added a few more mysteries on his way: what was with all of the anger and were there actual ghosts or just a prank? (hide spoiler)]

[Timelord Iain, Tech Support]

Beige wrote: "Saar The Book owl wrote: "Everyone is reading so fast!..."

Right!? Haha. I started before Iain, turned away for a few hours and then he was done! 😮

Iain are you one of those double speed audio re..."

triple speed... I think I slowed this down to 2.5x...

[Timelord Iain, Tech Support]

Beige wrote: "Saar The Book owl wrote: "It was interesting to read about the..." ..."

Sound definitely plays through the book...

[Beige]

Timelord Iain wrote: "triple speed... I think I slowed this down to 2.5x ..."

😮😳😮😳😮

Wow! It just seems so foreign to me. The auditory side of my brain only has one setting and that is slow. Also, I don't like the sound of someone performing in my ear. That discomfort extends to live plays. I need the distance and pause-ability that books and film provide. With streaming came subtitles and I'm hooked now, I love not having to rely solely on the actors.

[Timelord Iain, Tech Support]

Beige wrote: "Timelord Iain wrote: "triple speed... I think I slowed this down to 2.5x ..."

😮😳😮😳😮

Wow! It just seems so foreign to me. The auditory side of my brain only has one setting and that is slow. Also,..."

It's very much an acquired skill... when I started speeding up, 2x seemed too fast... now there are some books i think I could do at 3.5-4x if I had the tools available...

And it's also very much an earbud/headphone experience... unplugging and listening on phone speaker (which I do, sometimes, to demonstrate 2x/3x speed to people who ask IRL) and it starts to sound like gibberish, again...

I listen to books, all day, almost every day, unless I have a headache or something... I listen while gaming, driving, at work, on a forklift... I basically always have earbuds ready at hand...

[Saar The Book owl]

Mayim wrote: "Saar, this book is simply so exciting that once I started I simply could not stop reading. Thank you so much for organising this BR!

As to Aay and Muy I think you will discover more about the mai..."

You're welcome :D

[Saar The Book owl]

For now my favorite chapter is the one about Jaem Aubrac. I wish the thryme was real, just to see how they look. I've found that this chapter was like something from a horror - movie and I could visualise it. It was written so vivid! Also, sadly, at the end the humans needed to destruct every thryme they found and make the island livable.

Also there's a connection between Muy and Yo and the islands: they are both artists who left their mark on the islands and then went on living on another island.

[Mayim]

I would be very hard-pressed to point out the favourite chapter. Not only because the flow into each other and so I often found myself reevaluating the previous ones in view of the new developments/pieces of information but also because each of them was a small masterpiece.

[Saar The Book owl]

There you have a point, but I haven't finished the book yet, so the favorites may change. I also like how the capters begin with a story about an islander and after that you get some general info like currency. It's like reading a sort of traveling guide.

[Saar The Book owl]

How's everyone's reading going so far?