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Hedrigall posted:I'm hoping he's secretly had another Bas-Lag book in the works and he'll announce it soon after this book is out. On amazon.com there's a reference to a book called "leviathan" and I remember seeing mention of a title for "Kraken" coming out in 2010 on some webpage or other. It's doubtful if these are actual titles, but perhaps there's a revisit to Armada in the works?
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Dec 2, 2008 19:40
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Hedrigall posted:I love that about China Miéville. He mentions so many intriguing little notes about Bas-Lag's history and geography then jumps right back to the story, leaving us wondering. Examples: the pirate wars, that city with the casino parliament, the "limb-farms" in the grindylow's city, and so on. This is probably the one thing that really hooked me about Mieville's Bas-lag novels, nothing is thrown away. While every story has features that seem like trivial fluff, they eventually become important features of other books. Bellis Coldwine is mentioned very tangentially in Perdido Street Station, Spiral Jacobs is mentioned in the Scar, and reference to the wandering ambassador of Tesh is made in Perdido Street Station. there are so many interesting characters and hinted at history with potential for entire novels, and with each novel the world just gets richer and richer.
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Dec 2, 2008 19:51
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Pious Pete posted:Is "Looking For Jake" worthwhile? I've enjoyed Perdido, The Scar, and Iron Council so far. Absolutely. Some of the stories are amazing. My favourites are the titular story and Reports Of Certain Events In London, which is told in a really unique way. cult_hero posted:On amazon.com there's a reference to a book called "leviathan" and I remember seeing mention of a title for "Kraken" coming out in 2010 on some webpage or other. It's doubtful if these are actual titles, but perhaps there's a revisit to Armada in the works? Leviathan is the French title for The Scar, and Kraken was a rumour that Miéville has confirmed never was a book title.
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Dec 2, 2008 21:11
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cult_hero posted:This is probably the one thing that really hooked me about Mieville's Bas-lag novels, nothing is thrown away. While every story has features that seem like trivial fluff, they eventually become important features of other books. Bellis Coldwine is mentioned very tangentially in Perdido Street Station, Spiral Jacobs is mentioned in the Scar, and reference to the wandering ambassador of Tesh is made in Perdido Street Station. there are so many interesting characters and hinted at history with potential for entire novels, and with each novel the world just gets richer and richer. Woah, when is Spiral mentioned in The Scar? I missed that one apparently!! I love the whole description Silas gives Bellis of his travels, and then later the stuff that Uther reveals about where he grew up. Mieville communicates the strangeness and mystery of these dark unknown places to the reader, drawing us in exactly the same way the characters are. In King Rat, there multiple monarchs of the species; we spend a lot of time with King Rat, Anansi the spider king, and Loplop the bird king, and they are all really cool characters. He also mentions two other monarchs, the "Queen Bitch" of the dogs and some sort of cat king, but they never make an appearance. It's his same style of creating a lot of really cool world details and then making the story a part of it, rather than the entirety.
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Dec 2, 2008 23:10
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Hedrigall posted:Reports Of Certain Events In London Crap, forgot about that one. First thing of his that I read, in a McSweeney's anthology, and it blew my freakin mind.
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Dec 2, 2008 23:13
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Turpitude posted:Woah, when is Spiral mentioned in The Scar? I missed that one apparently!! IIRC, Tanner Sack mentions buying drinks for Sprial Jacobs back in New Crobuzon. Can't remember what part of the book.
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Dec 3, 2008 08:56
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Hedrigall posted:IIRC, Tanner Sack mentions buying drinks for Sprial Jacobs back in New Crobuzon. Can't remember what part of the book. Tauros, the leader of the rebellion in Iron Council, is mentioned in passing (not by name of course  ) in Perdido as well.
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Dec 3, 2008 09:55
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I would like to thank this thread for reminding me that there are a few more of Miéville's books that I've yet to read, so I requested them from my library. I own PSS and The Scar, enjoying The Scar more than PSS. I wanted to like Perdido more, but it took a while for the main plot to rumble around, and I really disliked the ending (although I loved every part with The Weaver). There's something about his writing style that makes me enjoy even parts I don't like, though. (By the way, for you RPG nerds out there, the world of Bas-Lag was featured in issue #352 of Dragon magazine with input from Miéville himself. Really nice artwork, stats for the races and monsters, a nice explanation of the world and the city, and they even stat up the Possible Sword.)
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Dec 5, 2008 04:04
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MinionOfCthulhu posted:(By the way, for you RPG nerds out there, the world of Bas-Lag was featured in issue #352 of Dragon magazine with input from Miéville himself. Really nice artwork, stats for the races and monsters, a nice explanation of the world and the city, and they even stat up the Possible Sword.) I had a PDF of that issue, but I lost it when my hard drive crashed. Anyway, Adamant Entertainment is releasing "Tales of New Crobuzon" next autumn (N. Hemis.). Their news page doesn't have much info though... Adamant Entertainment posted:Fall 2009 will see the release of Tales of New Crobuzon our role-playing game based on the works of China Mieville. We'll be partnering with Cubicle 7 Entertainment on this one, with Adamant handling development and design, and Cubicle 7 handing distribution to the hobby and book trade. Edit: a press release from a while back: press release posted:Adamant Entertainment has reached an agreement with award-winning author China Miéville to license his fantasy setting of Bas-lag, which featured in the novels Perdido Street Station, The Scar and Iron Council. Adamant Entertainment will publish a roleplaying game that will allow fans of the series to have their own adventures in the city of New Crobuzon. Subsequent game books will continue to explore the setting and characters of the world of Bas-lag.
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Dec 14, 2008 13:04
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On the urging of this thread I went out looking for a Bas-Lag book and ended up buying The Scar last week. That book was amazing, I just couldn't put it down. I read it in 2 days and went right out and bought Perdido Street Station and Iron Council. I'm about 1/2 way through Perdido Street Station right now, and while it's definitely a differently paced book, it's no less good that The Scar. I love Mieville's writing, especially Isaac's scenes. The science and pseudo-science stuff really appeals to the geek in me. My only complaint is that I haven't heard about these books until now!
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Dec 18, 2008 18:51
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Substar posted:My only complaint is that I haven't heard about these books until now! This is such a cliche, but really do I wish I hadn't read them yet so that I could have the joy of that first reading all over again.
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Dec 18, 2008 19:01
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Hedrigall posted:Both, I think. More info here: http://www.randomhouse.com/catalog/display.pperl?isbn=9780345497512 I don't suppose you have the artwork for the other two books sans text? I think they'd make good iPhone wallpapers.  [edit] Nevermind, found them myself. The artist has them on his own website, along with several other illustrations of Bas-Lag amongst his galleries. http://www.edwardmiller.co.uk/index.php Just use the image search. BlackIce fucked around with this message at 17:09 on Dec 24, 2008 |
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Dec 24, 2008 16:59
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My college has a massive literary database, and as a distraction from one of my papers I started to type in the titles of some of my favorite books. I actually found a 21-page critical essay on Perdido Street Station from Science Fiction Studies - Volume 30. It's titled "Hybridity, Heterotopia, and Mateship in China Mieville" by Joan Gordon. It's very well written (page-long bibliography), and it's nice to see such a scholarly analysis on a book I feel really deserves it. Here's the introductory paragraph... quote:Ever since its publication in 2000, China Mieville's Ferdido Street Station has been a wonderful stimulus to the ongoing conversation of science fiction. Much of that conversation has centered around the novel's defiant unclassifiability. Is it fantasy? Horror? Science fiction? Steampunk? Weird fiction? Which is it?' All of them, of course, and in a complex conversation with one another. This article is itself part of the conversation, which is to say that, while my discussion will be extensive, it cannot be exhaustive, and it will suggest many further paths for the conversation to take. First, I plan to consider the ways in which Perdido Street Station exhibits its hybridity, by torturing the biological model and connecting notions of hybridity to those ofthe grotesque. Then I will consider how Perdido Street Station can be considered a heterotopia, starting from Foucault's usage and extending it a little bit. Finally, I want to see how its ideas of hybridity and heterotopia develop the friendly networks of the novel-its exploration of mateship. Thus, hybridity, heterotopia, and mateship-or farmings Foucault, and friends, as Mieville suggested (personal correspondence). These three paths form an interconnected and dynamic network, and this essay forms an exploration meant to be generative rather than complete. Also, thanks for the Looking for Jake recommendation. I got it for Christmas today and am really enjoying it. Merriest to all of you. Pious Pete fucked around with this message at 15:08 on Dec 26, 2008 |
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Dec 26, 2008 05:45
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US cover art is here! It's pretty much the same as the UK version but blue instead of red? Go figure. Only 4 months to go! 
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Jan 22, 2009 01:57
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stray posted:I don't agree with Miéville's Marxist politics, but the man can write a hell of a story.
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Jan 22, 2009 19:22
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Casimir Radon posted:How overt is it? It seems to depend how much of a red-hater you are. I barely even noticed, but then, I'm some kind of half-assed leftist myself, on the rare occasion I can bring myself to give a poo poo. It makes some people absolutely outraged, though.
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Jan 22, 2009 20:05
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I really like Miéville's stuff. I read Perdido since it was recommended in the Hall of Fame thread, and I really enjoyed it. A lot of people complain about the ending, but I think it's quite a good mind gently caress for the reader because when you sit down and think about it, everything happened because of the rape and that makes it even more depressing. I usually don't like such endings, but I thought it was fitting. The Scar was also a great book, but I missed the setting of New Crobuzon. Tanner Sack was a really great character and it was nice to have some Remade perspective in the novel. Iron Council was my least favorite of the three. I didn't find the main characters or main plot as engaging or interesting as the first two books, and I got kind of sick of reading about Cutter masturbating all the drat time. I'm definitely looking forward to more of the Bas-Lag series. I've seen his other books at the library, but just haven't grabbed them. I think I'll pick up King Rat next time I'm there though.
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Jan 23, 2009 00:35
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Casimir Radon posted:How overt is it? don't listen to the whiney bitchers, it's only really in the foreground in Iron Council, and even then it's treated critically, with many of the flaws of revolution being addressed.
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Jan 23, 2009 00:45
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Casimir Radon posted:How overt is it? It's there, especially in Iron Council. I don't know why people bitch about it, especially given the setting. It's clearly based on the late 1800s, with both the rear end in a top hat industrialists and the anarchists/communists taken to larger-than-life extremes. Not being able to handle a book written by an author who has views you don't agree with strikes me as bizarre too, but whatever.
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Jan 23, 2009 06:25
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^^^^ Holy poo poo, this times a hundred. If you can't stand politics in your imaginary fantasy land, then I'd highly suggest never reading fiction ever again. Growing up as a kid that read widely before he found fantasy books, then reading large piles of TSR-branded product, then growing vastly tired with the general morass of the genre and what people actually prop up as good fiction (ie, Jordan et al), I was so glad to find these books. I liked PSS okay, and thought of it as a bizarre Star Wars/DnD/Final Fantasy mashup, which was fine by me at the time. It definitely aided in my quest to find new types of fantasy. Most of the criticisms I have about it have been mentioned, but my own observation about it is this: China made the city its own character, and it's clear by the opening quote that he loves urbanity, and I love when people put that much care and detail into the environment like that. Haven't read The Scar yet, and I'm holding off for a while, but Iron Council was loving fantastic, for me. It does roll along slowly, and the delivery of it is strange at first, but again, the details and the imagery far outweigh the thin characters (even though Judah Low is one of the best anti-heroes ever). Although, there are plenty of folks that think Mieville is not all that. Here's an illucidating quote from over in one of the recommendation threads: Bell_Canto posted:Mieville is bad because he's NOT a competent writer. His prose is a knotted mess of unnecessary syllables that bad readers mistake for "lyrical" writing, and he makes awful use of comma splices in an attempt to make his descriptions seem more vivid and immediate. Also, I'm not sure how you think he's doing anything new; he takes genre tropes and combines them in unusual ways, but he doesn't have anything new to say. Finally, the comparison to Lovecraft is no defense at all. Lovecraft had many of the same literary faults as Mieville, especially his tendency toward over-inflated language. I did mention Lovecraft as a comparison, but not so much a defense. Anyway, apparently we're all of us 'bad readers' or some shite because for some reason I can stomach this but not most other fantasy. Also, it's pretty lols for someone to be complaining about Mieville doing nothing new in a thread where most of the recommendations are about the same old same old. Fantasy is all about merging and trying new ideas in fantastic settings, and I believe Mieville does it well, and his love of language comes across very well, if a little over-zealous. (Also, I noticed very few comma splices, so I don't know what this cat is talkin bout) (Also, he should go back to his lit theory class) Suffice it to say that this man and Martin have reaffirmed my love of the genre, and given me many, many ideas as well.
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Jan 23, 2009 07:20
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SaviourX posted:Haven't read The Scar yet, and I'm holding off for a while Dude, don't hold off, read it now! The Scar is an amazing loving novel. I'm going to read it for the third time sometime in the new couple of weeks.
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Jan 23, 2009 09:42
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SaviourX posted:If you can't stand politics in your imaginary fantasy land, then I'd highly suggest never reading fiction ever again.
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Feb 3, 2009 20:57
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Casimir Radon posted:Not what I was getting at. I was just wondering if a good story eclipses preachy bullshit. I don't agree with his politics and have an aversion to people who are so impressed with their own opinions that they must inject it into everything they do, but in my opinion the books are good enough that you can overlook it. It's been awhile since I read it, but he does an incredible job of giving you glimpses of things you want to know more about. Everything seems fleshed out, like Mieville wrote an encyclopedia about the people and histories of the world, then used that information to write a story. So, as somebody who doesn't like preachy bullshit at all in stories regardless of if I agree with it, I'd say give it a shot.
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Feb 3, 2009 23:49
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Can we discuss other New Weird here, too? I've read some other stuff lately that was pretty drat good, and I'd like to read some more. Jeffrey Thomas's Punktown stories are some of the better genre fiction I've read recently, and while he's definitely on the SF side of the spectrum he captures the same dark, desolate urban weirdness as China, just with aliens instead of China's animal/human hybrids. Punktown is almost as alive to me as New Crobuzon. Also worth checking out is Anne and Jeff VanderMeer's anthology, The New Weird. In true VanderMeer style it examines the roots of the movement, starting with some Moorcock, Ligotti and Barker before getting into the more contemporary stuff. It doesn't bat 1.000, of course, but I think any China fan would enjoy the majority of the stories. It also has a really good recommended reading section at the end.
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Feb 4, 2009 00:27
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I finished Perdido Street Station a few weeks ago and heartily enjoyed it (if the username wasn't enough of a tip-off). I'm planning on picking up The Scar soon, and although I'm sure I'm going to love it no matter what, I have to ask: are there any Weaver scenes?
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Feb 4, 2009 02:14
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^^^^ Haven't read it, but there sure is one in Iron Council. Casimir Radon posted:Not what I was getting at. I was just wondering if a good story eclipses preachy bullshit. Sorry, wasn't singling you out; it was much more generic bookrage. The thing I like the most about Mieville is, and I think a lot of critics don't seem to latch onto it, is that he loves language as well as fantasy and monsters. Each book is different in approach, and he tries to keep it interesting to himself, as well as to readers. I can see how that detriments character development, but everything else gets amped up in quality or just imagination. Kind of like Grant Morrison, really. It's the ideas that count, not the plot holes or (really not as overblown) politics that get caught up in the stories.
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Feb 4, 2009 02:29
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Grand Fromage posted:It's there, especially in Iron Council. I don't know why people bitch about it, especially given the setting. It's clearly based on the late 1800s, with both the rear end in a top hat industrialists and the anarchists/communists taken to larger-than-life extremes. Not being able to handle a book written by an author who has views you don't agree with strikes me as bizarre too, but whatever. I was a little jarred by it at the beginning, but then I thought about how many sf/f books are implicitly or explicitly on the other side of the political spectrum.
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Feb 4, 2009 02:42
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Just because Hedrigall asked, I'll crosspost my analysis of PSS from the "Unforgivable Endings" thread...Z. Autobahn posted:More thoughts regarding the ending of Perdido Street Station:
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Feb 23, 2009 00:47
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Z. Autobahn posted:Just because Hedrigall asked, I'll crosspost my analysis of PSS from the "Unforgivable Endings" thread... This is a very good post! Now do Iron Council please is it anti industrialism with the whole train through the swamp thing? What are the most Marxist parts of the book?
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Feb 23, 2009 02:42
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Thanks Z! On the subject of the Iron Council ending... I love it, all of it, but I've always been confused as to what exactly happens to Spiral Jacobs and his haints. The gender-ambiguous priest whose name I forget (Quaraban?) asks the Moment something, then says something to Jacobs and suddenly it's all over. I've read that scene three times and I can't follow it. Anyone have any thoughts?
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Feb 23, 2009 08:15
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I scored a ARC of The City and The City and finished it about a month ago. It's pretty awesome. Very different to his other books though. It's a lot smaller in scope, being a detective novel. As such, it follows the detective around, rather than jumping from character to character to character in a very epic way like his other books. (very general spoiler about the 'feel' of the book) He's still able to flesh out and develop a world better than almost any other author, that i can think of.
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Feb 23, 2009 12:36
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oh holy loving poo poo I am so jealous! Don't spoil anything, but, what's the fantasy aspect like? Is it weird and twisted like Bas-Lag, or more Gaiman-esque like King Rat and Un Lun Dun?
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Feb 23, 2009 12:39
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On the subject of King Rat, I got it a few days ago and tried to read it, but the entire time I couldn't shake off this feeling that I'd read it before with Gaiman's name on the cover. Only got like half a chapter or so in, though. Does it get better as it goes on?
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Feb 23, 2009 16:15
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NorphTehDwarf posted:On the subject of King Rat, I got it a few days ago and tried to read it, but the entire time I couldn't shake off this feeling that I'd read it before with Gaiman's name on the cover. Only got like half a chapter or so in, though. Does it get better as it goes on? Yes, it definitely gets better. There's a really intense chase scene in particular that takes up about half the book, which I really enjoyed.
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Feb 23, 2009 18:52
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Hedrigall posted:oh holy loving poo poo I am so jealous! Don't spoil anything, but, what's the fantasy aspect like? Is it weird and twisted like Bas-Lag, or more Gaiman-esque like King Rat and Un Lun Dun? There's very little fantasy at all. The book is set in a modern-day city, complete with the internet, references to the cold war, US governments and trade blocks, the war on terror (i think). It's a completely fantastic city whose premise is completely impossible, but one which is embedded in the 'real world'.
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Feb 24, 2009 03:26
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Turpitude posted:This is a very good post! Now do Iron Council please Here's my off-the-cuff rendering of the end of Iron Council, most likely missing out on some key things. Though I'm sure he didn't fully intend it to be, the book IC is split up into the distinct process of journey/exploration that is part of fantasy, and its resolution never really comes about. The train is always coming, always arriving in the end, and it's made out that all the characters were incidental (except, of course, Judah). No matter what they did, they weren't bigger than the composite whole of the myth of the Iron Council. The expectation of their return is always there, and it's played off against the industrialists, the workers, the guerilla/terrorist groups in Bas-Lag, etc. The Tesh war gets resolved almost unbeknownst to anyone, the murder of Stem-Fulcher means nothing, the uprisings are put down, and the expectation of the government that they will of course put the Council down is, for them, business as usual. The government itself is that necessary entity that is neither good nor evil, such that even though it's gone through a civil and international war, it grinds on and on, along its own path. The end puts a kink in this because of Judah, who was the only element out of place, thanks to his journey and his will to effect a real change at the end stopping the train. Judah's journey intersects with the motion of the train against the movements of the government and leaves things at perpetual stalemate. The train's journey then becomes this permanent message that means so much more than being casually wiped out by government troops would have. This leads into the perpetual motion of the printing presses of RR being started back up in the end. Although nothing ever really comes of it, there always needs to be something to show dissent, and now there is a permanent one in the form of the Council, even if it's a relatively small reminder. Maybe a bit simple, but the book being mostly about Judah and his version of The Hero's Journey kind of forces its hand that way. SaviourX fucked around with this message at 11:02 on Feb 24, 2009 |
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Feb 24, 2009 10:59
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SaviourX posted:Here's my off-the-cuff rendering of the end of Iron Council, most likely missing out on some key things. There's an excellent exchange online between Mieville and someone else talking about Iron Council in the context of Walter Benjamin's theory of history, if you can find it. Lots of stuff about how the historian/storyteller must necessarily do their subject a terrible disservice and erase the individuality and realness of the people involved in the history being recorded. I can't remember where to find it but it was good stuff and bears up well with subsequent readings of the book.
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Mar 7, 2009 07:19
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Mrs. Badcrumble posted:There's an excellent exchange online between Mieville and someone else talking about Iron Council in the context of Walter Benjamin's theory of history, if you can find it. Lots of stuff about how the historian/storyteller must necessarily do their subject a terrible disservice and erase the individuality and realness of the people involved in the history being recorded. I can't remember where to find it but it was good stuff and bears up well with subsequent readings of the book. Found it! http://crookedtimber.org/2005/01/11/debating-iron-council/ I think.
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Mar 7, 2009 20:40
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NorphTehDwarf posted:On the subject of King Rat, I got it a few days ago and tried to read it, but the entire time I couldn't shake off this feeling that I'd read it before with Gaiman's name on the cover. Only got like half a chapter or so in, though. Does it get better as it goes on? Haha, that's what I thought going into it, but by the end of it I found I liked it better than most of what I have read by Gaiman. Also I like drum and bass music so that helped too.
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Mar 9, 2009 05:43
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Well The City & The City comes out this week, in the UK at least. US should get it soon and Australian bookstores will only have the UK imported version until July - so it'll be expensive. I'm going to buy it online myself, it'll be much cheaper. Also, at the end of this month audiobooks of Perdido Street Station and the new book are coming out. Pretty sure they'll be download-only ones. Finally, I read an interview with Mieville's editor recently, where he/she said that Mieville handed in two manuscripts at once, and The City & The City is the first of those to be published. Apparently the other one is a fantasy story they'd been expecting from him. A new Bas-Lag book maybe?
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May 14, 2009 01:42
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