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A review by flying_monkey
Beneath the World, a Sea by Chris Beckett
4.0
I've been reading Chris Beckett's science fiction since he started being published by British Magazine, Interzone, back in the 1990s. Ironically, this book is very much about an 'interzone' - a place between. The novel has a clear mix of influences including Conrad's Heart of Darkness / Coppola's Apocalyse Now, J.G. Ballard's Drowned World, and the Strugatsky Brothers' Roadside Picnic (AKA 'Stalker') - one bit-part player in the novel is even called 'Strugatsky' - and most recently, Jeff VanderMeer's Southern Reach Trilogy (Annihilation etc.).
However, as you might imagine with those kinds of influences, the novel is far from clear. The location is the Submundo Delta, a place that may be in Brazil somewhere, or at least can be reached from Brazil, but only by passing through the Zone of Oblivion, down the River Lethe (you get the picture). The Delta is unlike any other on Earth, with purple fractal plants and a variety of weird wildlife, which may or may not be simply other aspects of the trees. Creepiest of all are the Duende, beings that seem to look something like a thin seal with gecko-like hands and feet, and which seem drawn to human beings, but whose unblinking (and literally disgusting) presence causes people to become totally open to all their most hidden thoughts and fears.
The earliest human population of the Delta, colonists put in place by the Portuguese, have developed a culture that involves both worship of Duende-like gods and the slaughter of any Duende they see, and decorating their houses with the heads of ther victims. Now the United Nations has decided that the Duende are people and that the murder must stop. So a senior London police detective, Ben Ronson, has been sent by the United Nations to investigate. He encounters a variety of bemused locals, damaged scientists and visitors, and of course, the Duende and their forest, and is forced to confront issues around colonialism, progress and development, and most importantly of all, the worst of himself, and in particular, what he might have done that he forgotten, in the Zone of Oblivion (yes, I can hear Brando whispering "the horror, the horror" too...).
If Jeff VanderMeer hadn't written the Southern Reach Trilogy, this would seem an outstanding and unusual work. As it is, it hasn't attracted much notice since it was published in 2019 (Beckett barely gets sold in North American anyway), and that's a shame, because for all that it wears its influences on its sleeve, this is still an effective and thought-provoking slipstream-influenced science fiction novel.
However, as you might imagine with those kinds of influences, the novel is far from clear. The location is the Submundo Delta, a place that may be in Brazil somewhere, or at least can be reached from Brazil, but only by passing through the Zone of Oblivion, down the River Lethe (you get the picture). The Delta is unlike any other on Earth, with purple fractal plants and a variety of weird wildlife, which may or may not be simply other aspects of the trees. Creepiest of all are the Duende, beings that seem to look something like a thin seal with gecko-like hands and feet, and which seem drawn to human beings, but whose unblinking (and literally disgusting) presence causes people to become totally open to all their most hidden thoughts and fears.
The earliest human population of the Delta, colonists put in place by the Portuguese, have developed a culture that involves both worship of Duende-like gods and the slaughter of any Duende they see, and decorating their houses with the heads of ther victims. Now the United Nations has decided that the Duende are people and that the murder must stop. So a senior London police detective, Ben Ronson, has been sent by the United Nations to investigate. He encounters a variety of bemused locals, damaged scientists and visitors, and of course, the Duende and their forest, and is forced to confront issues around colonialism, progress and development, and most importantly of all, the worst of himself, and in particular, what he might have done that he forgotten, in the Zone of Oblivion (yes, I can hear Brando whispering "the horror, the horror" too...).
If Jeff VanderMeer hadn't written the Southern Reach Trilogy, this would seem an outstanding and unusual work. As it is, it hasn't attracted much notice since it was published in 2019 (Beckett barely gets sold in North American anyway), and that's a shame, because for all that it wears its influences on its sleeve, this is still an effective and thought-provoking slipstream-influenced science fiction novel.