Nisi Shawl - Everfair (2016)

The start of this year has been slow for me, but in February I have reviewed 'Everfair', Nisi Shawl's steampunk alternate history in which the British socialist Fabian society and African American missionaries set up a Utopian society in the Belgian Congo for the victims of King Leopold II’s atrocities and escapees from the slave trade. It is a novel full of hope that nevertheless explores its characters' relationships with unflinching honesty. Read more through at the link.

Genevieve Cogman - The Invisible Library (2015)

"That was the whole point of the Library: as far as she'd been taught, anyway. It wasn't about a higher mission to save worlds. It was about finding unique works of fiction and saving them in a place out of time and space. Perhaps some people might think that was a petty way to spend eternity, but Irene was happy with her choice. Anyone who really loved a good story would understand."

'The Invisible Library' by Genevieve Cogman is a thoroughly enjoyable Fantasy adventure featuring alternate worlds, a steampunkish setting, great detectives, fairies, dragons, strong female characters and books, not to mention a compelling central concept. In its inventive use of alternate realities as a series of settings for the ongoing conflict between rival forces of order and chaos, it harks back to classic Fantasy works such as 'Three Hearts And Three Lions' by Poul Anderson or Michael Moorcock's Eternal Champion books. It is held together by its overarching love of fiction, and its steadfast belief in the value and importance of books; that stories are worth preserving because they tell us something important about the culture that produced them, and simply for the joy a good story brings.
   At the centre of 'The Invisible Library' is the Library itself, a vast, interdimensional space that a secret society of immortal dimension-hopping Librarians use to store fiction from alternate realities. It's an inspired creation, drawing on both Borges' infinite library and Edgewood, the house that acts as a portal between the worlds of humans and fairies from John Crowley's 'Little Big'. The Librarians themselves are a classic manipulative secret society, a force on the side of order but filled with dark secrets and arcane power games. Appropriately for a book about libraries, 'The Invisible Library' treats fiction as its playground, cheerfully mixing up Moorcockian Fantasy in its use of alternate dimensions and sinister, chaos-worshiping Fae, the Sherlock Holmes stories beloved of protagonist Irene in the form of the great detective Vale, and the scientific romances of H. G. Wells and Jules Verne in its steam-powered, Victorian-esque London. There are even elements of Lovecraftian cosmic horror in the villain Alberic, a rogue Librarian who has turned to the side of chaos to sustain his immortality. Cogman meshes all these disparate elements together seamlessly, and the book has gonzo invention to spare with its giant mechanical insects and clans of warring werewolves, vampires and fairies. It recalls the mad alchemy of the original steampunk novels by Tim Powers, James Blaylock and K. W. Jeter, rather than the more tired and cynical trappings of the genre that have been overused since.
   In keeping with the book's faith in the power of language, the Librarian's magical powers stem from language itself. The Librarians can speak the Language and force the physical components of reality around them to do their bidding, a literalised form of reification, which links thematically back to Borges. Cogman makes good use of the concept, exploring both the limitations of the technique - you have to phrase your requests very specifically for it to be useful, thus limiting its use as a 'get out of jail free' card for the heroes - and the extent to which it could be abused, in a troubling scene in which Irene uses the Language on a person to hijack an airship.
   As well as an intriguing set-up, 'The Invisible Library' also has well drawn and memorable characters. Vale, the Holmes-esque detective and Kai, Irene's assistant, trainee and secret dragon in human form, are compelling characters, all the more so for having the ability to act against Irene's and each other's interests when appropriate. Much of the philosophical weight of the book comes from Irene's attempts to keep Vale on her side. Vale is a rational and caring person who believes that the Library should use its powers to help people rather than just preserving books. One of the good things about 'The Invisible Library' is that, while the Librarians are unquestionably on the side of order, this does not necessarily mean that they are all good or nice; some of the Librarians will use any means necessary to acquire the books they are after, no matter how damaging the consequences to bystanders. We see this personified in the most interesting relationship in the book, between Irene and her ex-mentor Bradamant. Bradamant cares about completing her mission at any cost, and has thrown Irene under the train in the past to achieve this; as a result, Irene is especially conscious of how her actions affect other people, and wants to do her job without causing harm and to help people on the way if she can. Irene has to prove that she can get results whilst showing Vale that she is ultimately a moral person, unlike Bradamant. Cogman handles Bradamant and Irene's relationship very well; there's no denying that Bradamant is incredibly selfish, manipulative and unpleasant, even going so far as to drug Irene at the climax so that she can finish the job her way without Irene's interference, but she isn't the main villain, and by the end of the book there's a sense that she has learned to respect Irene, whilst Irene, by showing that she is both moral and competent is able to leave behind her hangups about being in Bradamant's shadow.

Gareth L. Powell - Ack-Ack Macaque (2013)

"Everybody loves the monkey."

'Ack-Ack Macaque' is a combination of pulpy adventure story and modern technological concerns. It is set in an alternate history Europe in which Britain and France formed a political union in 1959. One hundred years later, the world has taken on a distinctly diesel-punk tone, with nuclear zeppelins existing alongside sleek computers and tablets. This allows Gareth L. Powell to write a story with a vaguely steampunk setting that captures all the fun and action of 50's pulp adventures whilst exploring themes and ideas more usually found in cutting edge hard SF. The end result is a book that's an absolute blast and a total breeze but packs more of a philosophical punch than one might initially imagine. Also, there's a talking monkey, which science shows makes everything at least twenty percent better.
   Ack-Ack Macaque is a popular character in a MMORPG, a cynical, cigar-chomping, gun-toting talking monkey who pilots a Spitfire in a virtual World War II. Just before the centennial celebrations of the formation of the Anglo-France union, Prince Merovech, heir to the throne, finds himself caught up in a plot by radicals to free the artificial intelligence Ack-Ack Macaque from the game. The only hitch is, Ack-Ack Macaque isn't an AI, he's an artificially uplifted monkey with electronic gelware surgically enhancing his brain. Meanwhile Victoria Valois, an ex-journalist whose life was saved by replacing large sections of her brain with gelware, finds her husband murdered and the electronic back up in his head stolen, and her investigation into his death leads her to uncover a conspiracy involving Prince Merovech's mother, Duchess Celestine, and the surgeon who operated on herself, Ack-Ack Macaque, and Prince Merovech, Dr. Nguyen.
   While 'Ack-Ack Macaque' has all the stylistic trappings of steampunk, (I know said diesel punk at the beginning of the review, but I really think we as a people need to stop using '-punk' as a suffix), in the pulpy atmosphere and the retro-futurist setting, it's really cyberpunk masquerading as steampunk. The book is really about the sinister multinational corporation Celeste Tech's plan to manipulate the Anglo-France union into nuclear war with China so that its cult of transhumanists can upload their brains into new android bodies and rule the world. Mind uploading and the singularity are arguably the central theme of modern SF, but rarely are they dealt with as seriously as they here. Powell explores the existential, moral and ethical doubts that are frequently swept aside so we can vicariously enjoy the rapture of the nerds. Digital consciousness raises a whole host of ways in which people might be taken advantage of. The ability to digitally scan and upload the contents of our minds doesn't necessarily mean that the individual scanned will experience continuity, arguably what you are doing is creating another, totally sentient copy of the original. Then there is the matter of self copyright; Dr. Nguyen makes a digital copy of Victoria without her consent. Celeste Tech also plan to build an army of android slaves - this is the origin of the experiments that gave rise to Ack-Ack Macaque. Thus they have built over-ride codes into the electronic brains of Victoria and Ack-Ack Macaque, allowing Dr. Nguyen to render them helpless and servile with a few words. Rather than a utopian future in which everyone is remade equal, the singularity as imagined by Celeste Tech is simply a new arena in which the powerful will be able to exploit others.
   'Ack-Ack Macaque' also manages to subvert the expectations of its steampunk settings in other ways. From its setting you might expect all the characters to run around in petticoats, top hats and the like. Yet everyone spends the whole book in sensible, practical, modern clothes. Prince Merovech spends most of the story in a hoodie and jeans. More importantly, the book subverts the normally passive roles of female characters in the 50's pulps it draws on. Victoria is a character with action and agency, intelligent and good in a fight, who has her husband fridged to motivate her rather than the other way round, and the author doesn't dwell on her looks when describing her. Julie, the Prince's love interest, refuses to let him save her from her abusive father, instead choosing to stand up to him herself. I also like that the police are proved totally wrong in their assumption that Paul, Victoria's bisexual husband, was murdered by his gay lover. And though by the nature of its format, both of the villains are somewhat one dimensional and hysterical, I like that the book tries to add depth to Dr. Nguyen anyway. The man is a total creep and a truly nasty piece of work, but he does what he does because he sees it as part of his role as a doctor to 'fix' humanity by uploading everyone into android bodies.
   Then there is Ack-Ack Macaque himself. A larger than life talking monkey is exactly the kind of thing that falls flat on its face if you half ass it, but through Powell's commitment to his creation and the character's boundless energy, he is utterly charming and nonstop fun. Part of the reason why he works so well is that despite the daffiness of the idea Powell takes Ack-Ack Macaque seriously as a character. Ack-Ack Macaque started out as a monkey used in illegal animal fights before being artificially uplifted and placed in a computerised world he was convinced was real, where he had to experience all his comrades being killed off one by one. We understand where Ack-Ack Macaque is coming from as a character, and we sympathise with his genuinely traumatic past, so when he goes in guns-a-blazing and pulls off another ludicrous escape not only is it ridiculously fun, it matters that much more. What looks like a slight, fun idea on paper hides a darker truth. As such he is a perfect metaphor for the book that takes his name.
 
 

K. W. Jeter – Infernal Devices (1987)

“I have seen the gears and furious machinery of the world that lies unreckoned beneath our feet. No longer can I note, as other men do, the passing hours upon the heavens’ gilded face, without a vision of a hidden master-spring uncoiling to its final silence. I await the day when all clocks shall stop, including the one that ticks within my breast. Do thou the same, Reader, and profit from my example.”

K. W. Jeter coined the term ‘steampunk’, somewhat in jest, to describe the warped alternate history Victorian feel of the books he, James P. Blaylock and Tim Powers were writing. Although the term has since taken on a life of its own, the books they were writing at the time – specifically ‘Homunculus’ and ‘Lord Kelvin’s Machine’ by Blaylock, ‘The Anubis Gates’ and ‘On Stranger Tides’ by Powers and ‘Morlock Night’ and ‘Infernal Devices’ by Jeter – retain a strange alchemical magic that sets them apart from everything that has come under the label since. Indeed, Jeter, Blaylock and Powers remain difficult to classify by any rubric, and despite being the forefathers of the genre all three of them have written a wide range of stories that cannot be so easily classified under steampunk or any other heading. While those core six books are a lot stranger than most steampunk fare, they also contain many of the key elements of the genre, most prominently the recognisable but noticeably alien Victorian (or thereabouts) London, and steam technology run amuck. Out of all of them, Jeter’s ‘Infernal Devices’ is the most quintessentially steampunk, and the one that pre-empts so much of what would come later. Despite similar ground being well trod since, the original retains much of its charm, and has enough characteristic Jeter weirdness to still surprise and entertain. Much criticism is justifiably thrown at steampunk that it glamourises the Victorian age whilst ignoring all the exploitation, jingoism and racism that fueled the British Empire. However, the original works by Jeter, Power and Blaylock avoid this pitfall due to their focus on poor, down and out and disenfranchised characters and their healthy cynicism towards the upper classes.

   ‘Infernal Devices’ is a rollicking adventure story about George Dower, the very normal son of a genius clockmaker and inventor, who manages to gets swept up in a plot to destroy the world, shenanigans with a clockwork double and petty criminals who can see the future, human-fish hybrids straight out of H. P. Lovecraft’s ‘The Shadow Out Of Innsmouth’, and an attempt to save a dying race of selkies. It’s written in convincing mock-Victorian style. Yet the reason it succeeds so well is because it questions the assumptions of the time it emulates. George Dower, our viewpoint character, maybe a model level-headed and morally upright English citizen, but he is almost Bertie Wooster-ish in his bumbling incompetence. He spends the whole book being manipulated by more savvy characters, and only really figures out what’s going on right at the end. The only lord in the book, Lord Bendray, is a dangerous lunatic bent on destroying the world, while the only other upperclass character is a well-intentioned extremist who spends most of the book trying to kill Dower for the greater good. Dower’s most trustworthy (well, it’s a relative term) companions wind up being a pair of petty criminals. Scape and Miss McThane may be confidence tricksters playing everyone for everything their worth, but they wind up being the most charming characters in the story, and are one of the few people who, for the most part, never wish Dower any harm and team up with him on several occasions. Their modern, slang-heavy speech, learned through hours spent looking into the future, offers a nice counterpoint to Dower’s formal old fashioned style.

   Crucially, ‘Infernal Devices’ doesn't shy away from either depicting the ingrained racism of the time or commenting on it. When the Brown Leather Man – actually the sole remaining selkie in an environmental suit – first pays Dower a visit and so sets the plot in motion, Dower’s butler mistakes him for a person of colour and makes some standardly racist assumptions – that the man is there to rob them, and is drunk – and is immediately deflated by Dower, who for all his daftness knows better than to stereotype people.

   ‘Infernal Devices’ also explores the environmental impact of the industrial age, another thing rarely given consideration in steampunk. The reason for the Brown Leather Man’s villainy is that the entire species of selkies save him have been wiped out because a seaweed harvesting device invented by Dower’s father destroyed their breeding ground. Like the classic scientific romances by H. G. Wells and Jules Verne it emulates – the final chapter is even titled ‘Mr. Dower Sees It Through’ in a blatant shout out and an echo of the same device in ‘Morlock Night’ – ‘Infernal Devices’ warns against science unchecked by morality. Dower senior is the very figure of scientific progress regardless of the cost – the doomsday device he built Lord Bendray actually works because the man was too arrogant to pass off a non-functioning piece of work even when scamming a delusional lord. It is this hubris that allows everything else in the plot, all the other characters’ various schemes, to take place. The old man’s folly is only prevented from destroying the world at the price of his son’s innocence.