Buddy Read for March 2020: Kathe Koja's The Cipher

[Bill]

Marie-Therese and I have selected one of the March 2020 poll runner-ups for our March buddy read: Kathe Koja's The Cipher.

The Cipher is available as a paperback and an ebook. A couple reviews:

http://www.conceptualfiction.com/the_...
https://litreactor.com/columns/fun-in...

When shall we start? I'm ready whenever, really.

[Tim]

I'll participate in both this and the main read for this month. As a heads up to everyone, it looks like the paperback may be currently out of print (and going for a ridiculous price on amazon at least until the rerelease in September), but it is currently only $3.99 for the Kindle edition.

[Marie-Therese]

Tim wrote: "I'll participate in both this and the main read for this month."

Great! I'll be reading both as well. I hope Randolph will join us for this buddy read too as he earlier expressed interest in reading this book.

Most of Koja's earlier work is out of print in hard copy editions but available for reasonable prices as ebooks. I'll be reading the Kindle edition.

[Bill]

Great. Any preferences for when we should start?

[Marie-Therese]

Bill wrote: "Great. Any preferences for when we should start?"

I'm ready whenever as I have the ebook. Just say the word.

Randolph, very glad to see you'll be reading along with us too!

[Bill]

Ok, how about we take a couple days to tidy up ongoing reading projects, then start say Tuesday-ish?

[Scott]

I read this many years ago and loved it, but unfortunately don't remember much now. Maybe it'll come back to me.

[Bill]

Just finished the first chapter. The writing is a bit cluttered for my taste these days, but it's not uncommon for the period; I probably wouldn't have minded it at all back in the day. The central idea is quite original and fascinating, a kind of subtly wrong object in a mundane setting, the kind of thing I enjoy. Obviously I'm trying to find a pattern in the transformations brought on by the Funhole, though I'm not sure there is one.

By chance I'd just watched Larry Fessenden's Habit https://letterboxd.com/film/habit/ , which was something of an indie horror classic in its day, made a few years after The Cipher. They both invoke underemployed young hipsters in decaying urban settings, stumbling on dark events, occasionally having ambivalent sexual encounters. I would have loved both if I'd come across them 25 years ago.

[Scott]

I loved Koja's stream-of-consciousness style back then; not sure I'd have the patience or tolerance for it now.

[Bill]

Scott wrote: "I loved Koja's stream-of-consciousness style back then; not sure I'd have the patience or tolerance for it now."

I have to admit I skimmed through some Koja books in the last few years, and was turned off by the style. But after I sat down and made myself sink into The Cipher, it was ok.

[Marie-Therese]

The last book I read by Koja was Under the Poppy and I absolutely loved it. It's decidedly more baroque than this one, set in the past, and very queer; more dark fantasy than horror, perhaps.

I'm about 10% through 'The Cipher' now. It's very gritty/grotty, despite the rather ornate prose, and frequently surprisingly funny*. Creepy setup; I'm really wondering where this story will go from here.

*The ugly urban setting and struggling artist characters remind me quite a bit of Koja's Skin. They're definitely more straight in 'The Cipher', though, so far.

[Bill]

I finished Chapter 4. Still enjoying this, though events develop more slowly than I would like, and Nicholas muses on and on. It would help if the Funhole takes a more central role as an architectural anomaly (as in, say, Danielewski's House of Leaves). At this point, focus is more on the transformations on the characters and their accessories.

Where is everyone on this? Happy to take a break and (for instance) switch to some Lisa Tuttle.

[Tim]

I've just started chapter 4. This is one of the most... 90s horror I've ever read. It really doesn't feel like it could have been written at any other time to me. I keep on feeling like I should be listening to Nine Inch Nails while reading just to complete the experience.

Joking aside, thus far I like it, though I am personally not a big fan of the stream of conscious style typically (this is an exception rather than the rule in terms of my enjoyment). I find the book subtly unnerving. Never particularly a "scary" read, but one with just enough off to be uncomfortable.

So far there's been two quotes that I've really liked: "A good morning is still a good morning, even if it leads to apocalypse at night." - A wonderful quote that somehow sounds optimistic, but didn't feel that way.

"I was so tired of hating myself. But I was so good at it, it was such a comfortable way to be, goddamn fucking flotsam on the high seas, the low tide, a little wad of nothing shrugging and saying Hey, sorry, I didn’t mean it, I didn’t know it was loaded, I didn’t think things would turn out this way. It’s so easy to be nothing. It requires very little thought or afterthought, you can always find people to drink with you, hang out with you, everybody needs a little nothing in their life, right?”

[Scott]

Unnerving or unsettling is a good way to describe her stories.

[Bill]

"I was so tired of hating myself. But I was so good at it, it was such a comfortable way to be..."
Back in the 90s, I would have been totally fine with this. Now I just want to hand Nicholas a valium and send him to a therapist.

I'm going to pause for a bit (after Chapter 4) and let everyone comment.

[Marie-Therese]

Well, I've finished this. It was...interesting. Weirdly compelling (in that train-wreck, can't look away manner). I think Tim has it right in that this is very 90s. Lots of body horror, lots of posing, a dearth of real emotion and meaning. I don't think it's aged all that well.

I think this story might actually have worked at a much faster pace in a much more confined form/shorter length. But this is so long and so repetitive and, by the end, so tiresome. No amount of pungent gross-out prose can save the last few chapters from inertia. Nothing new happens, nothing new can happen given the excessively close focus Koja's established early on. (view spoiler)[We might just as well be back at the beginning, as everything that happens beyond the first few chapters seems superfluous. Perhaps that's the lesson, the story, but it's just not enough to make a good book. (hide spoiler)]

[Tim]

So I’m around 60% through with it, and while I will finish, I can’t say that I’m enjoying it much anymore. It feels extremely repetitive at this point and really feels like it would have worked better trimming it down to short story length.

Also, (view spoiler)[I’m tired of the mood swings. “Let’s goof off with this portal to who knows where” then two pages later “no one’s taking this seriously but me.” The changes in thought process are too rapid and inconsistent for my liking. Also the fact that our lead here remains passive the entire time (except for rare moments when he doesn’t and they are all moments where frankly it doesn’t seem to matter) is just getting irritating to me. (hide spoiler)]

[Marie-Therese]

Tim wrote: "So I’m around 60% through with it, and while I will finish, I can’t say that I’m enjoying it much anymore. It feels extremely repetitive at this point and really feels like it would have worked better trimming it down to short story length."

I completely agree with both this and your views in your spoiler. The last few chapters are a real slog and I won't blame or censure anyone who chooses to DNF this after the halfway point.

[Tim]

Randolph wrote: "It’s like a bad Philip Dick novel,."
I disagree with this. Even at his worst, Dick would have about 12 different plotlines going at once and be suffering from too much plot in too short of a book. In contrast this is too long for a book where there is so little in terms of plot actually happening.

I'll agree with the rest of your assessment though. :)

[Bill]

Randolph wrote: "I meant more Dick’s alternate reality portal type themes."

Ok, but lots of interesting things actually happen when one passes through Dick's portals. Not in The Cipher.

I gave up at about the 60% point. I couldn't take more from Malcolm and his crew.

Is anyone still working on this? Just curious.

Since it's relatively early in the month, I'd like to point out this new volume: Shadows & Tall Trees 8. Any interest in pivoting to this in our buddy read, or for the next monthly read?

[Bill]

Last call for April monthly read nominations. I'd like to set up the poll later today. Please post suggestions here:
https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...

[Bill]

April 2020 poll is up!
https://www.goodreads.com/poll/show/1...

Since we only had two nominations, I took the liberty of including a couple items from the last two polls.

Please chime in by Saturday. Again, please keep in mind that if you vote, and your choice wins, you will commit to participating in the discussion.

[Bill]

Poll for our May monthly read is up:
https://www.goodreads.com/poll/show/2...

Please vote by Friday (May Day)!

A reminder: if you vote for a book and it wins, you are committing to participate in the discussions.