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3.61 AVERAGE
3.61 AVERAGE
adventurous
funny
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
I’m hovering between a 3.5 to a 4, for this one. Like my reading buddy partner Liv, I think the themes are wonderful and so relevant for our current age. I love this queer cyberpunk world and the discourse it explores. I also love the characters and their natural interactions (they felt less like stand-ins for major themes and more realistic). I’ve known people like Barron and Soq (minus the more extreme plot-points they’re involved in, of course).
We need more cyberpunk like this. I wish this was a duology so I could see how Qaanaq develops after the climax of this novel. I’m going to have to seek out “Calving” now and see how this narrative started as a short story.
Needless to say, I want to follow Miller’s work from here on out.
We need more cyberpunk like this. I wish this was a duology so I could see how Qaanaq develops after the climax of this novel. I’m going to have to seek out “Calving” now and see how this narrative started as a short story.
Needless to say, I want to follow Miller’s work from here on out.
adventurous
dark
mysterious
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
“Stories are where we find ourselves, where we find the others who are like us. Gather enough stories and soon you're not alone; you are an army.”
The set up:
An “Orca –mancer” rides into floating town on a killer whale with a polar bear.
A classic fable–like scenario including lots of noodles.
In a future earth, sea levels have risen. Qaanaaq is a floating city in the artic somewhere east of Greenland and north of Iceland. The design is like an asterisk with 8 arms, each a district that is operated by its own leader. But crime syndicates and landlords are the true rulers. The city itself in all its arctic squalor, has a fresh, cyperpunk feel ; a hovering metropolis in a cold, windy climate.
Book is told from the POV of a few characters:
Soq -gender-neutral “slide messenger” for the city, whose snarky dialogue addressed the gender social climate of Now.
Fill - a queer, rich kid looking for meaning in life, suffering from a curious disease. His father is a city shareholder.
Ankit – an admin assistant to a political leader of an arm. She seeks her mother who is in psyche facility called the Cabinet.
Kaev-mentally –ill “beam fighter” looking for a legitimate way of life.
These characters that have their own distinct plights and end up finding their selves intertwined in the plot by the end of the story. Another narrating POV chapter was the mysterious broadcast called “City without a Map”. At first these reminded me of another great book that came out the same year, KSR’s New York 2410 with its disembodied character voice that paints a picture of the city history that could elsewhere be served as mere “info-dumping”.
Some cool concepts in BLACKFISH CITY:
The breaks.
At first appears to a metaphor for HIV, but there is no physical symptoms, only psychological effect .Those afflicted see past memories of the one who infected them, and the one who infected them down on the line. Recurring encounters until their personality “breaks” down.
Nanobonding.
Neural connection that begins on a nano-level in a ceremonious, blood bonding way that connects a human to an animals. Most of these individuals are not around any longer.
Nano communication implants.
Some citizens have nanotech embedded into their mandible that allows wireless communication like smartphones. The interface works using jaw-taps and tongue to palate touching.
Personally, I was as not as compelled by the characters and did not feel for any one directly. At the end when it is revealed where all their energies are directed, they came together quite nicely. The set and setting is what appealed to me the most about SAM Miller’s novel as well as the social center of the conflict. Miller's work as a self professed "civil organizer" informs the plot very pointedly: Real estate-mongering shareholders, who corruptly freeze property so the tax and value goes up ultimately creating a homeless situation that becomes out of control.
Miller has a way of describing the city & those who interact with their environment in a way that reminded me of Samuel R Delaney…..Evocative world building within just a sentence that leaves a lot to your imagination.
An “Orca –mancer” rides into floating town on a killer whale with a polar bear.
A classic fable–like scenario including lots of noodles.
In a future earth, sea levels have risen. Qaanaaq is a floating city in the artic somewhere east of Greenland and north of Iceland. The design is like an asterisk with 8 arms, each a district that is operated by its own leader. But crime syndicates and landlords are the true rulers. The city itself in all its arctic squalor, has a fresh, cyperpunk feel ; a hovering metropolis in a cold, windy climate.
Book is told from the POV of a few characters:
Soq -gender-neutral “slide messenger” for the city, whose snarky dialogue addressed the gender social climate of Now.
Fill - a queer, rich kid looking for meaning in life, suffering from a curious disease. His father is a city shareholder.
Ankit – an admin assistant to a political leader of an arm. She seeks her mother who is in psyche facility called the Cabinet.
Kaev-mentally –ill “beam fighter” looking for a legitimate way of life.
These characters that have their own distinct plights and end up finding their selves intertwined in the plot by the end of the story. Another narrating POV chapter was the mysterious broadcast called “City without a Map”. At first these reminded me of another great book that came out the same year, KSR’s New York 2410 with its disembodied character voice that paints a picture of the city history that could elsewhere be served as mere “info-dumping”.
Some cool concepts in BLACKFISH CITY:
The breaks.
At first appears to a metaphor for HIV, but there is no physical symptoms, only psychological effect .Those afflicted see past memories of the one who infected them, and the one who infected them down on the line. Recurring encounters until their personality “breaks” down.
Nanobonding.
Neural connection that begins on a nano-level in a ceremonious, blood bonding way that connects a human to an animals. Most of these individuals are not around any longer.
Nano communication implants.
Some citizens have nanotech embedded into their mandible that allows wireless communication like smartphones. The interface works using jaw-taps and tongue to palate touching.
Personally, I was as not as compelled by the characters and did not feel for any one directly. At the end when it is revealed where all their energies are directed, they came together quite nicely. The set and setting is what appealed to me the most about SAM Miller’s novel as well as the social center of the conflict. Miller's work as a self professed "civil organizer" informs the plot very pointedly: Real estate-mongering shareholders, who corruptly freeze property so the tax and value goes up ultimately creating a homeless situation that becomes out of control.
Miller has a way of describing the city & those who interact with their environment in a way that reminded me of Samuel R Delaney…..Evocative world building within just a sentence that leaves a lot to your imagination.
adventurous
dark
Terrific writing, super entertaining plot and world building. Incredible cast of diverse characters (PoC, LGBTQ)
A beautifully crafted world and a squandered third act.
An excellent, thought-provoking mystery adventure set in a cyberpunk future.
The concept of this book was interesting, and for that, I gave it two stars instead of one, but I found the writing to be choppy, incongruous, and hard-to-follow. At times, I wasn't sure what was happening in the plot. The book takes the POV of all the main characters and they all sound the same. There isn't any differentiation in their voices, which again, makes it hard to follow and keep track of who is whom. The writing was just so juvenile that I could not get into a rhythm of any sort. In the end, I am not even *really* sure how the book concluded.