Lords and Ladies

Terry Pratchett's Lords and Ladies is one part of an extensive series (thirty eight total novels, according to Wikipedia), but I was able to read it as a stand alone novel, without being familiar with the rest of the series, or its extensive mythology. This is a major point in its favor, as many series can be impenetrable if the reader isn't familiar with the basic premise and previous plotting.

Lords and Ladies is pretty standard comic fantasy (although Pratchett is one of the originators of the genre, so maybe that's not a totally fair criticism) with witches, elves, dwarves, trolls, wizards, and a jester who has become king. The conflicts are predictable, but the resolution not quite so. A worthwhile way to spend some time, although I have little desire to read the rest of the series. (It is, however, a comforting thought that if I were struck so, it would not take me an inordinate amount of time).

City of Thieves

David Benioff's City of Thieves begins with a conceit; that the author is relating his grandfather's experiences during the siege of Leningrad. This is, of course, patently false, but it might be a better hook than a typical cold open. Benioff has the good sense to stay out of his own way after this -- there's no interlude where he asks his grandfather "and then what happened," as they both sip tea or vodka.

This is a plot-driven novel, which certainly isn't bad -- it's easy reading, and I was able to finish it over the course of a few hours. Our protagonist is Lev, a malnourished seventeen year old boy, stuck in Leningrad during the siege. When a dead German pilot falls from the sky, Lev and his friends loot the body, and Lev is arrested by the NKVD. Rather than shooting him on the spot, they take him to prison, where he meets Kolya, a deserter with literary pretensions.

After spending the night in prison, Kolya and Lev are delivered to a colonel, who offers them their freedom for a price -- his daughter is getting married in a week, and he needs a dozen eggs so she can have a wedding cake. It's a surreal request, in a city where people eat dirt (from underneath a sugar factory), the bindings of books, "bread" made from bark flour, and where rumors of cannibalism abound (and are horrifyingly confirmed, here). With no other options, Kolya and Lev agree to the colonel's request, and are set back into the city, sans their ration cards. Without the ration cards, they will be unable to obtain even the meager amount of food that is available in the city.

This all occurs in the first forty pages. The remaining ~220 are devoted to the pair's increasingly difficult quest, as they meet numerous dead ends, and deal with various obstacles -- literature, an amateur butcher, a rooftop henhouse, German shelling, Kolya's libido, Russian troops, the winter, partisans, kept whores, the Einsatzgruppen, and chess. It's a fun adventure, and worth seeking out.

Heat

Bill Buford's Heat is the story of one man's descent into madness. Buford meets Mario Batali, the celebrity chef, and proceeds to insinuate himself in the kitchen of one of Mario's restaurants, Babbo. Buford's goal is to soak up culinary knowledge for his own benefit, to be a better cook at home. Buford begins in the prep kitchen, where food is initially prepared (dicing carrots, trimming fat and bone from cuts of meat, preparing herbs) so the service in the evening just has to cook. From there, he moves around the kitchen, working the grill, the pasta station, and plating food.

After a year in the kitchen, Buford wants more. Despite his proficiency (he's already quit his job as an editor, and is working full time as a line cook), he takes some time off from the restaurant to spend time in Italy with the family who taught Mario how to make pasta. The family is only too happy to take on a friend of Mario's, and Buford makes several trips, becoming quite close to the family, who live in a backwater Italian town. He is even shown a tortellini recipe on the condition that he keeps it from Mario.

This still isn't enough for Buford, and he returns to Italy (with his long-suffering wife, who he has convinced to quit her job as well) to work with a Tuscan butcher, who Mario's father had worked with. The butcher is a larger than life individual, much like Mario -- at Buford's first encounter with him, everyone in the shop is drinking, and the butcher is declaiming the Divine Comedy. At the butcher shop, Buford is instructed by the butcher's mentor, and learns that not all countries have the same cuts of meat -- he's relating to Mario the various cuts he's learned on the leg, and Mario stops him, laughing, with the revelation that he's never heard of these cuts. The student has, while not quite surpassed the master, become something different.

The book ends with Buford and Mario enjoying a night on the town, and Mario offering to help Buford start a restaurant. Buford demurs, saying now that he's master Italian cooking, he needs to follow the example of Catherine di Medici, and master French.

The Counterfeiters

I was brought to Andre Gide’s The Counterfeiters by Roberto Bolaño’s The Savage Detectives (at least that’s how I remember it – will have to double check). Upon doing so, I realize I was likely led to Gide through a NY Times review of Bolaño’s novel.

The Counterfeiters is an intricate, layered novel of many intertwined and interrelated characters, which never fully starts or stops. It focuses on Edouard, a thirty eight year old novelist, who, while critically acclaimed, has not had the literary success of some of his fellows. As the novel progresses, it becomes clear that Edouard is a stand-in for the author himself, as he observes the scandals of his young friends and relations. Although he's involved, he's more of a benevolent overseer than an active participant.

The point of view is interesting – while it’s third person omniscient, it is so in an unconventional way, as events are related from a limited point of view, and then switching to limited from the viewpoint of another character. Events and new characters are often introduced obliquely.

Perhaps the biggest criticism that can be made of the work is that Gide lays out so much of his philosophy of art in the speech of the characters -- Edouard has long discussions and journal entries on the novel he is planning on writing (also called The Counterfeiters) which mirror Gide's journal, which is included at the end of this translation of the novel. This is another sticking point -- Gide seems like he could have lifted nearly all of Edouard's journal from his own journal. Should an author have such a transparent avatar?

Midway through, it's revealed that Edouard is working on his next novel -- also titled "The Coutnerfeiters", and dealing with the same themes as the novel we're reading. This is what allows Gide to insert so much of his thoughts on art and literature into the novel, since Edouard is working at the same business Gide is -- creation. It's not quite ham-handed, but it's not exactly subtle, either.

The Counterfeiters ends the way Edouard had been planning on ending his novel -- abruptly, in midstream, leaving itself open for a sequel, but not demanding one. It's a worthwhile novel, and an interesting exercise in metafiction. I won't be re-reading it anytime soon, but I'm glad that I finished it.

Starlight

Alfred Bester's Starlight is a worthwhile science fiction short story collection. My only previous exposure to Bester's short fiction was the excellent "Fondly Fahrenheit", which is included here, and is a highlight. Like many retrospectives, there's extensive commentary by Bester, as he introduces each story. In the hands of other authors, this is occasionally tedious, but Bester sets the stage for each story well, and explains what he's doing.

As with many collections, Starlight is a bit uneven. There's gems like the aforementioned "Fondly Fahrenheit," and typical sci-fi fare like "Adam and No Eve" and "The Four Hour Fugue." "Of Time and Third Avenue" could very well be an Arthur C. Clarke story. Of course, there's clunkers as well, like "Hell is Forever", the longest story in the book, which inspires Bester to opine on himself at the time he wrote the story:

"I feel like a father to that kid, and I think he shows promise in 'Hell is Forever.' He makes mistakes, he's green and gauche, his knowledge and understanding of character is minimal, he has a lot to learn, but I think he ought to stay with it. He might become a pro some day."

Tough to argue with that, but "Hell is Forever" really drags. Luckily, most of the collection isn't Bester growing and developing, but is rather high caliber science fiction stories. I would recommend, but it's probably worth picking up The Demolished Man first. That said, it's easy to see how Bester became disillusioned with science fiction, and decided to move on during the 1960s. While the work here is something that any science fiction fan should be aware of, it's very much rooted in the 1940s and 1950s, and there's only so much that can be done there without tedious repetition. Bester had a hell of a career, and this is not a bad coda.

By Night in Chile

Roberto Bolaño’s By Night in Chile is a critical look at the behavior of the country's intelligentsia during the military coup led by Augusto Pinochet. The novel is a dramatic deathbed confession by a priest and literary critic, Father Urrutia, who had turned a blind eye to the misdeeds, assassinations, and censorship of the regime, and is now filled with regret, and a desire that he not be misunderstood, that his story be told. He depicts himself as pursued by "the wizened youth", who, it becomes clear as the novel progresses, is a younger Urrutia, who has not yet debased himself.

Although the coup is mentioned (and our priest is an instructor to Pinochet himself!), the novel's most powerful political passage is in metaphor -- Urrutia is sent to Europe, ostensibly on church business, by government agents. He is to write a report on the preservation of churches, as the churches in Europe are much older than the churches in Chile, so there's been significantly more research on the Old Continent. After his arrival, the priest is surprised to find that "the principal threat to the major examples of Romanesque and Gothic architecture was pollution caused not by humans but by animals, specifically pigeon shit," and the priests have all taken up falconry as a solution. The passages that follow, describing how two falcons cannot coexist in one city, or how a falcon takes a dove that had been released to celebrate a festival, are clear metaphors for fascism.

The complicity of the intellectuals in the coup is made explicit towards the end of the novel, as our priest relates how a certain woman was able to give parties for writers and artists despite the curfew imposed by the regime. He speaks of how she wasn't exactly in the community due to her efforts, but due to her willingness to host the gatherings. Eventually, it is discovered that her husband is not a traveling salesman, but is a high level functionary in the secret police, and is torturing suspects in the house, sometimes even while the parties are going on. Again, in a metaphor, the poet who finds this out does not raise the alarm, but quietly slinks back to the party and rejoins his fellows.

Unlike this post, By Night in Chile lacks paragraph breaks, or regular sentences -- Bolaño has captured the spirit of a rant, as Urrutia digresses, hallucinates, catches himself, and plunges onward, pausing only to wheeze and draw breath, before the storm of shit begins.

Creatures of Light and Darkness

The most cogent criticism of Roger Zelazny's Creatures of Light and Darkness is that it has a very similar premise to Lord of Light, published two years previous. (In Zelazny's defense, he had not planned on publishing this novel, creating it as a writing exercise, and only publishing it after a friend of his had told the publishing house to request the manuscript). Creatures of Light and Darkness has a slightly greater scope than Lord of Light -- rather than people styling themselves after Hindu deities controlling a planet, people styling themselves after Egyptian deities control the known universe. Like the previous book, this is accomplished with both the means of technology (robotics/genetic manipulation), and possible supernatural abilities.

Perhaps the second biggest criticism one can make of this novel is that due to its birth as a writing exercise, the characters are not as fleshed out as in Lord of Light, with their motivations, origins, and histories often reduced to a few line explanation immediately prior to their introduction. As an example, the protagonist (the Prince Who Was a Thousand) reads much like a two-dimensional version of Sam.

Despite its weaknesses, Creatures of Light and Darkness is an engaging novel, featuring at least one memorable character -- Typhon, who despite originating in Greek mythology, is associated with Set. Appearing as a massive shadow of a horse, he inspires abject terror in all the other characters, as none can stand against him. (He's speculated as drawing his power from a black hole, although around the time Zelazny wrote the novel, the term was not in common use). Additionally, despite the plot of the novel not being quite as compelling as its predecessor, the action moves along at a quick pace.

Although it's not Lord of Light, this is by no means a bad novel -- it's fast-paced, engaging, written in a relatively accessible style, featuring memorable characters, a new martial art, and an evocative ending. Recommended to fans of Zelazny, as well as anyone interested in Egyptian mythology, or quirky sci-fi/fantasy. (Zelazny not at his best is still better than most authors in the genre)