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3.49 AVERAGE
3.49 AVERAGE
Rebel wakes in the colonies to find she has died—again—and this time finds herself in a new body, with its own residual memories and inclinations taking up mind space. She falls in with a man who is actually four personalities working synchronously, and gets pulled into his mission to undermine the expansion of The Comprise—the entire population of Earth, which now exists as a shared hive-mind.
The world-building here is nutty, and a lot of fun. It has a lot of the grit of the cyberpunk movement, but becomes something more of a space opera in its scope. It’s comfortable in weird spaces and comfortable with sex, without ever falling into the pitfalls of many 80’s works in which women are defined by their sexual availability (in fact that dynamic gets playfully turned on its head here a fair amount).
I don’t think everything works, but so much does, and it’s so ambitious, that I just really enjoyed the ride throughout. A+
Back in the golden age of SF, it was believed that you couldn't introduce more than one innovation in a story. Swanwick breaks that rule at least 5 times on every page of this novel. This is world building at its finest. It's also a little overwhelming. Swanwick explains very little, expecting you to pick it up from the clues he drops. The novel has a steep learning curve and honestly, I almost gave up about a quarter of the way through. I'm glad I did because the novel intensely gratifying. I imagine that it would get even better with a second or a third reading, but with all the great books out there waiting to be discovered, who has time for that?
Cyberpunk/space opera crossover, in which a Mindwiped and wetware reprogrammed woman experiences a Split-Personality Merge whilst evading a MegaCorp's minions and the Hive Mind that has taken over the Earth by fleeing across the solar system.
A cislunar hongkong
My yellow paged, dead tree, paperback version was a modest 248-pages. It had a US 1987 copyright.
Michael Swanwick is an American fantasy and science fiction author. He has written more than ten novels, and numerous works of short fiction. This was the author’s second novel. I can’t recall the last book I read by the author, although I know I have in the dim past.
I found this paperback on the dusty, plank, shelf of a used book store. In a wild-assed moment, I decided to take a page from my esteemed GR colleagues that only read books which are 25-years or more old and may (or likely not) have stood the test of time. It’s also vintage cyberpunk, a genre as lost an art as cursive writing. And, at a scant 250 pages, it promised to be a quick read.
TL;DR Synopsis
Eucrasia Walsh was a talented wetware programmer. She lives in an era when the solar system has been colonized and where folks could be quickly and easily programmed with new skills and even personalities. This can be done almost as easily as they can change what little clothes they wear. Rebel Elizabeth Mudlark is the IP of a MegaCorp. She’s an state-of-the-art, in-development, blockbuster, adventuress persona. Whilst Walsh was doing some test and development on Mudlark, with herself, Mudlark escapes into the wild in Walsh’s body. Mudlark leaves wearing the MegaCorp’s only Mudlark copy.
Meanwhile, the Earth has long become a Hive Mind. This occurred through the sharing of personas, corollary of the wetware programming. However, the Earth mind’s cohesion is limited by the speed-of-light of the transceivers that link the Earth mind’s billions. Individuals, or groups in ‘dead zones’, like outer space quickly go insane or found rival minds. The persistence of the Mudlark mind interests the Earth mind.
Mudlark leads the minions of the MegaCorp and the agents of the Earth mind a merry chase across the solar system, through space habitats, minor moons, asteroids and orbital ghettos, and finally Earth itself as Eucrasia and Rebel fight for dominance in their shared body.
The Review
Vacuum Flowers is vintage cyberpunk. It starts with the classic disorientation of the reader à la [a:William Gibson|9226|William Gibson|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1373826214p2/9226.jpg]. They’re thrown into the world building pool with their clothes on, and their mobile still in-pocket. The reader has to figure it out for themselves—fast. The MegaCorp, Deutsche Nakasone GmbH are the bad guys. Mudlark finds Walsh’s friends, or are they? The Earth mind, called The Comprise, is drawn in. Toggling back and forth using Mudlark’s skillz and Walsh’s memories help them evade capture and mindwiping while on a cook’s tour of the inner solar system.
Writing was good. Descriptive narration was inventive and very well done. For example, through genericism lodgings for travelers have become “sheratons”. Action was likewise good. Dialog was terse in comparison. In addition, the writing was well-groomed. I found only two mistakes. The old Timey Arbor House publishers had some good editors. Swanwick was real good at drawing the reader along. I was learning whilst reading, and Getting it. However, I must admit to having benefitted from having seen it all before. (After 35-years, many of the story’s plot elements have since become common sf tropes.)
One thing I noticed with this 35+ year old novel, was how much ‘ground’ the author covered in only 250 pages. Having a single POV (mostly Mudlark), makes for very compact stories.
Unfortunately, the plotting wobbles. Mudlark/Walsh visits more than a half-dozen environments, from Culture-like, cylindrical habitats, tunneled asteroids, to a re-sculpted Earth. Anyone two of them would have been an appropriate scene for the story. The story would have been tighter without the large number of changes of venue. Towards the end, I was whiplashed by a crucial reveal, and the bums rush to the end.
Note there was: “Sex, drugs, and rock’n roll music, along with violence in the story.
Folks had sex, both hetro and gay. It was tastefully done, although it a bit more graphic in-style than the modern flavor of sf. Intoxicants, particularly synthetic drugs were widely in use. Alcohol was consumed in social settings, sometimes in excess. Music was almost pervasive in social situations, but was oddly never described.
The body count was high. I frankly thought that there would likely have been more deaths by misadventure? Folks were very casual about EVA processes and procedures as well habitat maintenance. Vacuum Kills. Most of the violence in space vessels or habitats was physical, or impact weapons to avoid holing the environment. Low velocity air rifles were used inside habs. The violence was moderately graphic.
World building was excellent. However, it suffered from its great variety. (I find it hard to complain about a story being too heavy on ideas.) Several of the technologies were “sufficiently advanced technologies indistinguishable from magic”. These exist alongside more prosaic future technologies that are nearer now than they were in the story.
BTW, the titular Vacuum Flowers are an escaped example of the biotech which has infected the inner system. They're a metaphoric plot element within the story. Designed to decompose space garbage into a harvestable form by leaching out the reusable molecules into a re-cyclable 'space' flower, they escaped into the void. They're now attached to the outside of habitats and vessels eventually weakening their structure.
Summary
I’m a fan of old timey cyberpunk. This book was like a walk down Memory Lane. It’s a story contemporary with [b:Neuromancer|6088007|Neuromancer (Sprawl, #1)|William Gibson|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1554437249l/6088007._SY75_.jpg|909457], although its more like [b:Schismatrix Plus|161296|Schismatrix Plus|Bruce Sterling|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1309282782l/161296._SY75_.jpg|155668] in its space opera aspect.
I was amazed that the author was able to pack so many ideas in 250-pages. I mentally noted, this book would have been four books in the hands of a modern, cretinous, self-publishing, sf, author of Serial Fiction-- it was so rich with ideas.
I'm also very forgiving when reading old timey sf, whose then new ideas have devolved into common tropes.
However, the story was an embarrassment of riches. The author was too driven in covering all of them in one go. He should have slowed down, less than half-way through, and augured into what was on the plate. That would have avoided the too quick ending.
Still I really liked it. It was a marvelous, near indigestible, chunk of sf ideas, and a great piece of narrative craftsmanship.
Otherwise, having read this, I’m going back to read Schismatrix sometime soon.
A cislunar hongkong
My yellow paged, dead tree, paperback version was a modest 248-pages. It had a US 1987 copyright.
Michael Swanwick is an American fantasy and science fiction author. He has written more than ten novels, and numerous works of short fiction. This was the author’s second novel. I can’t recall the last book I read by the author, although I know I have in the dim past.
I found this paperback on the dusty, plank, shelf of a used book store. In a wild-assed moment, I decided to take a page from my esteemed GR colleagues that only read books which are 25-years or more old and may (or likely not) have stood the test of time. It’s also vintage cyberpunk, a genre as lost an art as cursive writing. And, at a scant 250 pages, it promised to be a quick read.
TL;DR Synopsis
Eucrasia Walsh was a talented wetware programmer. She lives in an era when the solar system has been colonized and where folks could be quickly and easily programmed with new skills and even personalities. This can be done almost as easily as they can change what little clothes they wear. Rebel Elizabeth Mudlark is the IP of a MegaCorp. She’s an state-of-the-art, in-development, blockbuster, adventuress persona. Whilst Walsh was doing some test and development on Mudlark, with herself, Mudlark escapes into the wild in Walsh’s body. Mudlark leaves wearing the MegaCorp’s only Mudlark copy.
Meanwhile, the Earth has long become a Hive Mind. This occurred through the sharing of personas, corollary of the wetware programming. However, the Earth mind’s cohesion is limited by the speed-of-light of the transceivers that link the Earth mind’s billions. Individuals, or groups in ‘dead zones’, like outer space quickly go insane or found rival minds. The persistence of the Mudlark mind interests the Earth mind.
Mudlark leads the minions of the MegaCorp and the agents of the Earth mind a merry chase across the solar system, through space habitats, minor moons, asteroids and orbital ghettos, and finally Earth itself as Eucrasia and Rebel fight for dominance in their shared body.
The Review
Vacuum Flowers is vintage cyberpunk. It starts with the classic disorientation of the reader à la [a:William Gibson|9226|William Gibson|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1373826214p2/9226.jpg]. They’re thrown into the world building pool with their clothes on, and their mobile still in-pocket. The reader has to figure it out for themselves—fast. The MegaCorp, Deutsche Nakasone GmbH are the bad guys. Mudlark finds Walsh’s friends, or are they? The Earth mind, called The Comprise, is drawn in. Toggling back and forth using Mudlark’s skillz and Walsh’s memories help them evade capture and mindwiping while on a cook’s tour of the inner solar system.
Writing was good. Descriptive narration was inventive and very well done. For example, through genericism lodgings for travelers have become “sheratons”. Action was likewise good. Dialog was terse in comparison. In addition, the writing was well-groomed. I found only two mistakes. The old Timey Arbor House publishers had some good editors. Swanwick was real good at drawing the reader along. I was learning whilst reading, and Getting it. However, I must admit to having benefitted from having seen it all before. (After 35-years, many of the story’s plot elements have since become common sf tropes.)
One thing I noticed with this 35+ year old novel, was how much ‘ground’ the author covered in only 250 pages. Having a single POV (mostly Mudlark), makes for very compact stories.
Unfortunately, the plotting wobbles. Mudlark/Walsh visits more than a half-dozen environments, from Culture-like, cylindrical habitats, tunneled asteroids, to a re-sculpted Earth. Any
Note there was: “Sex, drugs, and rock’n roll music, along with violence in the story.
Folks had sex, both hetro and gay. It was tastefully done, although it a bit more graphic in-style than the modern flavor of sf. Intoxicants, particularly synthetic drugs were widely in use. Alcohol was consumed in social settings, sometimes in excess. Music was almost pervasive in social situations, but was oddly never described.
The body count was high. I frankly thought that there would likely have been more deaths by misadventure? Folks were very casual about EVA processes and procedures as well habitat maintenance. Vacuum Kills. Most of the violence in space vessels or habitats was physical, or impact weapons to avoid holing the environment. Low velocity air rifles were used inside habs. The violence was moderately graphic.
World building was excellent. However, it suffered from its great variety. (I find it hard to complain about a story being too heavy on ideas.) Several of the technologies were “sufficiently advanced technologies indistinguishable from magic”. These exist alongside more prosaic future technologies that are nearer now than they were in the story.
BTW, the titular Vacuum Flowers are an escaped example of the biotech which has infected the inner system. They're a metaphoric plot element within the story. Designed to decompose space garbage into a harvestable form by leaching out the reusable molecules into a re-cyclable 'space' flower, they escaped into the void. They're now attached to the outside of habitats and vessels eventually weakening their structure.
Summary
I’m a fan of old timey cyberpunk. This book was like a walk down Memory Lane. It’s a story contemporary with [b:Neuromancer|6088007|Neuromancer (Sprawl, #1)|William Gibson|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1554437249l/6088007._SY75_.jpg|909457], although its more like [b:Schismatrix Plus|161296|Schismatrix Plus|Bruce Sterling|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1309282782l/161296._SY75_.jpg|155668] in its space opera aspect.
I was amazed that the author was able to pack so many ideas in 250-pages. I mentally noted, this book would have been four books in the hands of a modern, cretinous, self-publishing, sf, author of Serial Fiction-- it was so rich with ideas.
I'm also very forgiving when reading old timey sf, whose then new ideas have devolved into common tropes.
However, the story was an embarrassment of riches. The author was too driven in covering all of them in one go. He should have slowed down, less than half-way through, and augured into what was on the plate. That would have avoided the too quick ending.
Still I really liked it. It was a marvelous, near indigestible, chunk of sf ideas, and a great piece of narrative craftsmanship.
Otherwise, having read this, I’m going back to read Schismatrix sometime soon.
Cool concepts (Earth becoming a hive mind is novel) buried underneath seas of useless jargon made up just to seem futuristic.
Only 248 pages, but what a slog to get through. Read Neuromancer instead.
Only 248 pages, but what a slog to get through. Read Neuromancer instead.
Cyberpunk is my least favourite SF sub-genre and I find Swanwick's writing to be a little dull in general.
First novel of Swanwick and I didn’t like it. He was not a good author those days. Writing is not so well. Plot is kaleidoscopesque.
I wanted to like this book so much. But no parts of it related to other parts of it at all. And the primary description of any new woman is just a description of her nipples.
This book brings up many interesting ideas of how the future of earth and humanity could look like. Can't believe this book was written in 1987, at some point Swanwick even hints at cloud computing.
Starts weak, but then improves substantially. I really love some of the ideas: the Comprise, the accelerator rings, the Dysonworlders. And there’s something salutary about confining space opera to the solar system.