Playing catch up
Climb back on that horse...
While the dust still hasn't settled up here, it's clear that it won't for a while. Now that I have a stable internet connection and even if the computer is still a self-stopping space heater, there isn't much excuse for either blogging or getting off the pot. One of the mental blocks is that every time I come up with a notion to write about, I shelve it behind the others that I was going to write about before I was without connectivity. So I need to clear the backlog with two or three entries to open things up again.
One of the things I was going to write about was Neal Stephenson's "Cryptonomicon," a massive book found for some reason in the science fiction section. Stuck in the temporary apartment waiting for our house to be ready, I wanted to find a really big and involved book, something like James Clavell's "Shogun," and then submerse myself in it.
I wasn't sure what to get but I started out by looking for Dan Simmons' "Ilium" but they didn't have it. Then I saw the Stephenson and since I've heard about the book before, and was aware that he'd followed it up recently with a trilogy of equally massive books that were getting some attention, and bought it.
Whatever pithy things I had to say a few months ago have receded into the depths but I can still summarize my thoughts: it kinda sucked. It does so many things wrong that in a work of this size simply call themselves out in a white flaring light. Small cracks become gaping defects.
In short, the main character is not consistent. He is portrayed through exposition as a socially awkward genius yet in every interaction or speech he's more adroit than James Bond. Secondly, in the midst of serious fictional characters, he throws in a cartoon depiction of Douglas MacArthur that simply doesn't fit. Gene Kelly dancing with Jerry (or is it Tom? Whichever one is the mouse...) works because of the kind of movie he made; it wouldn't have come off in "Gone With the Wind." This isn't the book for it.
Third, a twenty page speech by a major character with a seriously annoying name (he's almost always referred to by his full name) shows perhaps the worst sin of all: the author is too in love with his characters. He clearly finds them and their lives and opinions more interesting than his own story. This leads to a truly silly (anti) climax where a barely mentioned character from the protagonist's past is gunned down in the jungle in his best formal wear. Where he came from is barely established, his motivations sketchy at best, and the fact that he exists at all is another sign that Stephenson, while a prolific typist, is not comfortable with his own story. Typing a lot doesn't equate to quality plot creation.
In the end the book, for all its length, is barely interesting and nowhere near the immersive experience anything over a thousand pages demands to be. This would have been an okay three hundred page novel. As it is, it's an overused tea bag supplemented with some ketsup soup. And his following trilogy, what he calls his Baroque Cycle, uses these characters' ancestors on trip through history. You can have it. The thing is, the actual length of the books, at least "Cryptonomicon," is not the problem (with apologies to the appropriate tree loving organizations), it's the quality of the writing they contain. I really do want to keep reading LONG books that work, that NEED to be long, like the aforementioned "Shogun."
Hmmm. My old paperback copy has disappeared. But there is a bookstore in town. And maybe now they're stocking the Dan Simmons books. Maybe I'm just a sucker.
While the dust still hasn't settled up here, it's clear that it won't for a while. Now that I have a stable internet connection and even if the computer is still a self-stopping space heater, there isn't much excuse for either blogging or getting off the pot. One of the mental blocks is that every time I come up with a notion to write about, I shelve it behind the others that I was going to write about before I was without connectivity. So I need to clear the backlog with two or three entries to open things up again.
One of the things I was going to write about was Neal Stephenson's "Cryptonomicon," a massive book found for some reason in the science fiction section. Stuck in the temporary apartment waiting for our house to be ready, I wanted to find a really big and involved book, something like James Clavell's "Shogun," and then submerse myself in it.
I wasn't sure what to get but I started out by looking for Dan Simmons' "Ilium" but they didn't have it. Then I saw the Stephenson and since I've heard about the book before, and was aware that he'd followed it up recently with a trilogy of equally massive books that were getting some attention, and bought it.
Whatever pithy things I had to say a few months ago have receded into the depths but I can still summarize my thoughts: it kinda sucked. It does so many things wrong that in a work of this size simply call themselves out in a white flaring light. Small cracks become gaping defects.
In short, the main character is not consistent. He is portrayed through exposition as a socially awkward genius yet in every interaction or speech he's more adroit than James Bond. Secondly, in the midst of serious fictional characters, he throws in a cartoon depiction of Douglas MacArthur that simply doesn't fit. Gene Kelly dancing with Jerry (or is it Tom? Whichever one is the mouse...) works because of the kind of movie he made; it wouldn't have come off in "Gone With the Wind." This isn't the book for it.
Third, a twenty page speech by a major character with a seriously annoying name (he's almost always referred to by his full name) shows perhaps the worst sin of all: the author is too in love with his characters. He clearly finds them and their lives and opinions more interesting than his own story. This leads to a truly silly (anti) climax where a barely mentioned character from the protagonist's past is gunned down in the jungle in his best formal wear. Where he came from is barely established, his motivations sketchy at best, and the fact that he exists at all is another sign that Stephenson, while a prolific typist, is not comfortable with his own story. Typing a lot doesn't equate to quality plot creation.
In the end the book, for all its length, is barely interesting and nowhere near the immersive experience anything over a thousand pages demands to be. This would have been an okay three hundred page novel. As it is, it's an overused tea bag supplemented with some ketsup soup. And his following trilogy, what he calls his Baroque Cycle, uses these characters' ancestors on trip through history. You can have it. The thing is, the actual length of the books, at least "Cryptonomicon," is not the problem (with apologies to the appropriate tree loving organizations), it's the quality of the writing they contain. I really do want to keep reading LONG books that work, that NEED to be long, like the aforementioned "Shogun."
Hmmm. My old paperback copy has disappeared. But there is a bookstore in town. And maybe now they're stocking the Dan Simmons books. Maybe I'm just a sucker.
posted by Rick Ollerman at 2:29 PM
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