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Hedrigall
Mar 27, 2008

by vyelkin

Grimfate posted:

I went to the signing on Tuesday, and it was a cool experience. We did had a few slimy nerds ask some retarded non-questions though. China mentioned that he has no plans to write another bas-lag story unless he is certain he can top iron council, which he considers his best work so far, and that he was worried of running the series into the ground, and would prefer it to be unfinished than overdone.

drat. But he's right, Iron Council was loving brilliant and it will take a mother of a story to outdo that.

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Saerdna
Aug 8, 2004
I thought TC&TC was a fun read, although pretty badly written. It seems like China is never sure what voice to use in any of his books and always picks one that is never quite natural. I really liked that there was nothing supernatural, although it took some suspension of disbelief to accept this city could ever exist - it would have been pretty easy to cross from one city to the other without being detected, and smugglers especially would have done it all the time with impunity, and people would commit crimes in one city and then go back to their own to evade police all the time as well.

Notahippie
Feb 4, 2003

Kids, it's not cool to have Shane MacGowan teeth

Saerdna posted:

I thought TC&TC was a fun read, although pretty badly written. It seems like China is never sure what voice to use in any of his books and always picks one that is never quite natural. I really liked that there was nothing supernatural, although it took some suspension of disbelief to accept this city could ever exist - it would have been pretty easy to cross from one city to the other without being detected, and smugglers especially would have done it all the time with impunity, and people would commit crimes in one city and then go back to their own to evade police all the time as well.

By my read, Mieville is obviously interested in hidden social control - look at the militia from the first two Bas Lag books. He likes the idea that hidden spooky forces can force people to police themselves much more strongly than open and overt forces, and I think that this book is him taking that idea and pushing it as far as he can. So it's deliberately pretty out there in terms of whether it would happen in reality. On the other hand, the idea of unseeing things that don't fit into your world can be read as a pretty drat vicious criticism of the way that most of us go about our normal daily lives in urban areas, and I don't think it's too off beat. I think he wants us to ask how many different cities we live next to and don't see.

Apkallu
May 8, 2007
I'm about 2/3 through TC&TC, and I'm somewhat disappointed. Maybe it's because in my previous life I was an anthropologist, and I feel like I'm being beaten about the head with social construction issues in TC&TC.

For a while I was holding onto a theory for TC&TC like that in one of the stories in 'Looking for Jake': 'Reports of Certain Events in London', with the streets that would come and go from view, but it's pretty obvious now that that's not the case. If it is, that means the disappearing streets are now less cool, since it's just a product of my world-view. I'd much rather have some fantastic left in the world.

Oasx
Oct 11, 2006

Freshly Squeezed
Just finished TC&TC, at first i was a little disappointed that there was no fantastic element, just because i have come to expect that from Miéville, but i was pretty happy with it at the end, interesting premise.

Breach confused me though There just seemed to few members of Breach and their resources were too mundane, it didnt seem to me that the book explained how they were able to keep watch on everything, or how they could suddenly appear out of nowhere when someone breached.

Notahippie
Feb 4, 2003

Kids, it's not cool to have Shane MacGowan teeth

Oasx posted:

Just finished TC&TC, at first i was a little disappointed that there was no fantastic element, just because i have come to expect that from Miéville, but i was pretty happy with it at the end, interesting premise.

Breach confused me though There just seemed to few members of Breach and their resources were too mundane, it didnt seem to me that the book explained how they were able to keep watch on everything, or how they could suddenly appear out of nowhere when someone breached.

They appear out of nowhere because they've perfected that manner of walking that makes everyone assume they belong to the other city and so they're unseen. I guess they somehow drop that when they want to "phase in" to one city versus another. As for the coverage, I think he did some hand-waving there. There are a couple of lines about Breach having a lot of cameras and such, but it's never really addressed much.

Pompous Rhombus
Mar 11, 2007
I just got The City and The City from the library - the hardback had a waiting list but luckily nobody seemed interested in the audiobook. Really enjoying it so far, but maybe that's because it kept me entertained through two hours of stripping wallpaper this morning :v: For anyone interested, the reader is pretty good; not amazing, but not bad either.

Maybe I'm just not noticing it as much since it's spoken, but does it seem like he's toned down his prose to anyone else?

Would love to hear how he handled those nerd questions at the Q&A.

Hedrigall
Mar 27, 2008

by vyelkin
http://www.goodreads.com/interviews/show/38.China_Mi_ville?utm_medium=email&utm_source=Jun_newsletter

China Mieville posted:

I'm doing a bit of last editing on a manuscript that is much more like the more baroque stuff in the Bas Lag books, and then I have a couple of texts that are in a slightly less completed phase. There's a couple of young-adult things I'm thinking about, and some stuff about ghosts, and an early version of a Bas Lag book. And some nonfiction, some literary criticism on early Weird Fiction stuff.

:3:

Still halfway through TC&TC myself. Stupid exams taking up all my time.

Megazver
Jan 13, 2006

Pompous Rhombus posted:

I just got The City and The City from the library - the hardback had a waiting list but luckily nobody seemed interested in the audiobook. Really enjoying it so far, but maybe that's because it kept me entertained through two hours of stripping wallpaper this morning :v: For anyone interested, the reader is pretty good; not amazing, but not bad either.

Maybe I'm just not noticing it as much since it's spoken, but does it seem like he's toned down his prose to anyone else?

Yeah, he went for first person, slightly hardboiled narrative voice. I thank him for it.

Hedrigall
Mar 27, 2008

by vyelkin
Just finished TC&TC, I liked it. People here are saying that it turned out there were no supernatural elements at all, but i'd like to know how Breach knows even when you simply look at something in the other city. Clearly Breach has some sort of power that goes unexplained.

Did anyone else get Dark City vibes at points during the book? They would've been a lot stronger if Orciny turned out to be real but the general conspiratorial tone of the book and the urban weirdness gave me those feelings a lot. I want to watch that movie now :)

Ballsworthy
Apr 30, 2008

yup

Hedrigall posted:

Just finished TC&TC, I liked it. People here are saying that it turned out there were no supernatural elements at all, but i'd like to know how Breach knows even when you simply look at something in the other city. Clearly Breach has some sort of power that goes unexplained.

I don't think Breach was that powerful, a lot of that unseeing stuff was more in the heads of the citizens than anything, but they had extremely good surveillance and response time in the case of anything actually happening, i.e. the car accident mentioned early in the book. I may be wrong but I don't remember any reference to Breach actually nailing someone who just saw what they shouldn't, and in fact I think Tyador mentions something about how you could get away with a quick glance if you were careful.

PeptoGizmo
Jul 15, 2004

by elpintogrande
I just assumed that the POV character was being misled as to the extent of Breach's powers. There's the bit with his capture/right after his capture that really seems supernatural, as while as their near-perfect surveillance.

Hedrigall
Mar 27, 2008

by vyelkin
:siren: NEW BOOK :siren:

http://www.randomhouse.com/catalog/display.pperl?isbn=9780345497499

Kraken exists, and it's going to be published in May 2010. That's the second new China Miéville novel in the span of a year! Hopefully a Bas-Lag story will follow this one.

adamarama
Mar 20, 2009
Woah, I didn't realise there was a thread. I just finished Perdido St Station, on the recommendation of a friend. Very surreal, the guy has one hell of an imagination. Really enjoyed it though, hoping to get into more of his stuff again shortly.

Hedrigall
Mar 27, 2008

by vyelkin

adamarama posted:

Woah, I didn't realise there was a thread. I just finished Perdido St Station, on the recommendation of a friend. Very surreal, the guy has one hell of an imagination. Really enjoyed it though, hoping to get into more of his stuff again shortly.

You're gonna love the other two Bas-Lag books. Read them ASAP and report back here with your thoughts.


At the moment I'm on my third "read" of PSS - not really a read though as I'm listening to the audiobook this time around. It's really well narrated, and whoever does it does excellent character voices too (especially for Yagherek: that particular bit of voice acting is a feat in itself).

The only thing is some of the pronounciations are a bit weird. For example, the dude says Bas-Lag as "Bah-lag", whereas I swear I've heard China say it "Baz-lag" before. And also he pronounces Isaac's last name "Grim-neh-BOO-lin" rather than "Grim-NEB-you-lin", which I thought was the obvious pronounciation.

Aussie Crawl
Aug 21, 2007
Contains Opinions Which May Offend
The voice actor is John Lee, his voice does a good job of lending everything he reads a sense of gravitas and importance, he also does a much better job of conveying emotion than a lot of audiobook readers. The only real problem with his work is that if you listen to a lot of the books he's read he tends to reuse his vocal repertoire , but i guess there's only so much you can do with one voice really.

Having finished TC&TC recently i've got to say i was rather unimpressed with it. There just wasn't enough meat on that story to justify an entire novel.

The driving plot for the majority of it just didn't have the legs it needed to go the distance and the characters all came across as rather flat and uninteresting. It would have been a more interesting book if he'd abandoned the whole murder mystery aspect of the story and instead focused on one of the Unificationists and given more information on the distinct character of each city. As it was it just seemed like a rather boring Ex-Soviet Union craphole sharing space with generic Middle Eastern City for no very good reason being used as a backdrop for characters i didn't know or care about following up a murder mystery that wasn't very interesting.

I'd give this one about a 2 out of 5.

qbert
Oct 23, 2003

It's both thrilling and terrifying.
Perdido Street Station is probably one of the best sci-fi/fantasy novels I've read in years. I immediately read that and The Scar a few years ago and got about halfway through Iron Council before stopping for some reason I can't recall. I've been meaning to pick it up again and finish it for ages...I don't know what's been stopping me. I think his mastery and use of prose is one of the best in the genre.

Megazver
Jan 13, 2006

qbert posted:

Perdido Street Station is probably one of the best sci-fi/fantasy novels I've read in years. I immediately read that and The Scar a few years ago and got about halfway through Iron Council before stopping for some reason I can't recall. I've been meaning to pick it up again and finish it for ages...I don't know what's been stopping me. I think his mastery and use of prose is one of the best in the genre.

I stopped reading Iron Council because people lugging a train around by pulling up the tracks behind it and laying them in front of it for no reason whatsoever that I can discern was effing ridiculous.

Take the plunge! Okay!
Feb 24, 2007



Megazver posted:

I stopped reading Iron Council because people lugging a train around by pulling up the tracks behind it and laying them in front of it for no reason whatsoever that I can discern was effing ridiculous.

But it's a metaphor for cyclical unemployment of the lumpenproletariat! Or something. Honestly, I hated that concept as well and couldn't finish the book although Scar is one of my favorite fantasy novels.

SaviourX
Sep 30, 2003

The only true Catwoman is Julie Newmar, Lee Meriwether, or Eartha Kitt.

Megazver posted:

I stopped reading Iron Council because people lugging a train around by pulling up the tracks behind it and laying them in front of it for no reason whatsoever that I can discern was effing ridiculous.


Spoilers Below!



Because there was nowhere else they could go, and because they had nothing else better to do and had nothing in common but the godamn railroad?

Also, considering it's the only one in the world (rail and engine and all) kind of makes it extremely valuable. Not to mention reMade freeing themselves from being social pariahs but not being very smart in the process made it so they had to live like nomads?

I'm pretty sure in a fantasy novel you have to allow a few stretches, come on. It's not like it came out of nowhere and didn't have any context and it's not like they actually are sedentary when Judah finds them again or anything.

Lowly
Aug 13, 2009

Wow, I loved Iron Council, especially the end, and I find it weird that given the fantastic setting of the books that someone would have a problem with this detail of all things, given all the stuff that happens in other books. I mean ... in the previous book weren't they trying to attach a city of ships to a giant sea monster to pull them around? That's okay, but building a railroad as you go ... no that's just too far out of bounds!

Anyway, the ending is what sealed it for me with that book. The ending was pretty amazing and I agree that it would be hard to go on and write more in the same setting after that.

I haven't read TC&TC yet, but I definitely want to. It plays with a lot of ideas I have found fascinating for years, so I'm interested to see what he does with it.

The John Bull
Sep 15, 2008

Fucking zombies.
I just finished rereading Perdido Street Station, and noticed something; The Runagate Rampant and others talk about the 'Eyespy Killer', who kills poor people, gouges out their eyes, and then dumps them in the river. This is what eventually happens to Ben Flex; after he is captured by the Militia and tortured, his body turns up without the eyes, and the Eyespy Killer has struck again. Then later on, when the Mayor makes the agreement with the Handlingers about trying to hunt down the moths, Stem-Fulcher asks Rudgutter how his eyes are doing. "Going," he said sadly. "We just can't solve the problem of rejection. It's about time for a fresh set". Obviously, Rudgutter / the Militia is behind the Eyespy murders, but I don't remember seeing anything in reference to it elsewhere. Did I miss something, or is this another thing put in to enforce the weirdness of the world and the brutality of New Crobuzon?

Hedrigall
Mar 27, 2008

by vyelkin

The John Bull posted:

I just finished rereading Perdido Street Station, and noticed something; The Runagate Rampant and others talk about the 'Eyespy Killer', who kills poor people, gouges out their eyes, and then dumps them in the river. This is what eventually happens to Ben Flex; after he is captured by the Militia and tortured, his body turns up without the eyes, and the Eyespy Killer has struck again. Then later on, when the Mayor makes the agreement with the Handlingers about trying to hunt down the moths, Stem-Fulcher asks Rudgutter how his eyes are doing. "Going," he said sadly. "We just can't solve the problem of rejection. It's about time for a fresh set". Obviously, Rudgutter / the Militia is behind the Eyespy murders, but I don't remember seeing anything in reference to it elsewhere. Did I miss something, or is this another thing put in to enforce the weirdness of the world and the brutality of New Crobuzon?

Yeah it's quite carefully hinted at that Rudgutter is the killer. Pretty clever little detail :)

eunos
Nov 27, 2003
Just in case anyone's wondering whether to pull the trigger on Perdido Street Station, it appears to be a free download on kindle through amazon. I'm not sure how long it'll last.

SaviourX
Sep 30, 2003

The only true Catwoman is Julie Newmar, Lee Meriwether, or Eartha Kitt.

gently caress yes, just got City and the City from the liberry.

And on his works I've read, readers should get Perdido expecting an introduction to a world and setting and an ok story about monster-hunting, then move on to either The Scar or, if you can stand experimental and politicized stories, Iron Council, because either are better than the first, though you kind of need the first to know what's going on.

Hedrigall
Mar 27, 2008

by vyelkin

SaviourX posted:

gently caress yes, just got City and the City from the liberry.

And on his works I've read, readers should get Perdido expecting an introduction to a world and setting and an ok story about monster-hunting, then move on to either The Scar or, if you can stand experimental and politicized stories, Iron Council, because either are better than the first, though you kind of need the first to know what's going on.

That's true for Iron Council maybe, but The Scar you can read with no knowledge whatsoever of New Crobuzon. It was the first Bas-Lag book I read.

02-6611-0142-1
Sep 30, 2004

I've now clocked the three Bas-Lag novels and TC&TC. I think Iron Council is probably his best written work, but the other two Bas-Lag novels had far more interesting settings so overall I found it a bit of a struggle. At the same time, I felt there were a lot of clever little crossovers between the books that I wouldn't pick up until I reread them.

There was a point in the middle of Iron Council where my brain said "this feels like Deadhouse Gates but I don't care about any of the characters", which probably didn't help either. But yeah, China's power seems to be in making really fascinating settings, and as soon as he reuses one the magic dies a little.

Aussie Crawl
Aug 21, 2007
Contains Opinions Which May Offend

SaviourX posted:

gently caress yes, just got City and the City from the liberry.

Prepare to be disappointed.

Hedrigall
Mar 27, 2008

by vyelkin

Aussie Crawl posted:

Prepare to be disappointed.

Dont listen to this dude ^^^^^

It was a good book. It was just no Scar/Iron Council.

Here's some content: the Czech cover for TC&TC:



Again it's done by Edward Miller, who did the British PSS & Scar covers. Check out a gallery of his book covers here: http://www.laser-books.cz/neweird.html


Anyway I can't wait until after my exams are over. I'm going to read the Scar again :3:

Hedrigall fucked around with this message at 12:38 on Oct 11, 2009

Hedrigall
Mar 27, 2008

by vyelkin
Also if any mod reads this could they please append the thread title as so: "China Miéville/Bas-Lag megathread: Kraken coming 7 May 2010!" Thanks in advance :)

thecallahan
Nov 15, 2004

Since I was five Tara, all I've ever wanted was a Harley and cut.
Thanks to the anticipation thread I got to this one and I wanted to let everyone know Perdido Street Station is free right now for Kindle. I'm not sure if it's a special or not but this is the perfect opportunity to jump into this author's work for the first time.

Pompous Rhombus
Mar 11, 2007

thecallahan posted:

Thanks to the anticipation thread I got to this one and I wanted to let everyone know Perdido Street Station is free right now for Kindle. I'm not sure if it's a special or not but this is the perfect opportunity to jump into this author's work for the first time.

Cool, I've got (and have read) PSS in paperback and don't even own a Kindle, but would like to get one in the near future.
Will use this as a test-drive for the Kindle app on my iPod.

Pompous Rhombus fucked around with this message at 23:37 on Oct 22, 2009

Tabbran
Jun 19, 2004

It's also up for free on Shortpages, too.

Grand Prize Winner
Feb 19, 2007


What's Shortpages? Google gave me nothing. I'd love to have a copy floating around in case I lend, lose, or destroy my paperback.

Tabbran
Jun 19, 2004

Err, I'm sorry, I meant Short Covers.

But it might be free on other eBook sites, too.

Crisco Kid
Jan 14, 2008

Where does the wind come from that blows upon your face, that fans the pages of your book?
I just finished The Scar, then immediately went out and bought three more copies as gifts. I've been listening to "I'm On A Boat" ever since. :coolfish:

Bellis wasn't the most engaging protagonist, but I was sold forever as soon as I realized Bastard John was a dolphin. Not a man-dolphin, just a damned dolphin.

Hedrigall
Mar 27, 2008

by vyelkin

Crisco Kid posted:

I just finished The Scar, then immediately went out and bought three more copies as gifts. I've been listening to "I'm On A Boat" ever since. :coolfish:

Bellis wasn't the most engaging protagonist, but I was sold forever as soon as I realized Bastard John was a dolphin. Not a man-dolphin, just a damned dolphin.

Such a loving awesome book. Hence my username :3:

Another song which always reminds me of The Scar is Mosquito Song by Queens of the Stone Age. Listen to it here, it suits the Anophelii island sequence perfectly: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UiLsvRSU5H8

Hedrigall
Mar 27, 2008

by vyelkin
Are you motherfuckers ready for a blurb?

The Natural History Museum's prize exhibit - a giant squid - suddenly disappears. This audacious theft leads Clem, the research scientist who has recently finished preserving the exhibit, into a dark urban underworld of warring cults and surreal magic. It seems that for some, the squid represents a god and should be worshiped as such. Clem gradually comes to realise that someone may be attempting to use the squid to trigger an apocalypse. And so it is now up to him and a renegade squid-worshiper named Dean to find a way of stopping the destruction of the world as they know it whilst themselves surviving the all out-gang warfare that they have unwittingly been drawn into...

SaviourX
Sep 30, 2003

The only true Catwoman is Julie Newmar, Lee Meriwether, or Eartha Kitt.

Had me at "renegade squid-worshiper".

But I do hope it isn't couched in the stilted, byzantine prose of TC&TC. How can there be 100 pages left?!

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RoboCicero
Oct 22, 2009

"I'm sick and tired of reading these posts!"

Hedrigall posted:

Are you motherfuckers ready for a blurb?

The Natural History Museum's prize exhibit - a giant squid - suddenly disappears. This audacious theft leads Clem, the research scientist who has recently finished preserving the exhibit, into a dark urban underworld of warring cults and surreal magic. It seems that for some, the squid represents a god and should be worshiped as such. Clem gradually comes to realise that someone may be attempting to use the squid to trigger an apocalypse. And so it is now up to him and a renegade squid-worshiper named Dean to find a way of stopping the destruction of the world as they know it whilst themselves surviving the all out-gang warfare that they have unwittingly been drawn into...

Hell yeah! I was sort of disappointed when, in The City and The City, Orciny didn't show up, so I'm ready for some Dark Magic and Terrifying Machinations. I recall vaguely that he mentioned how he wanted to do a different genre with each successive book -- what's this one going to be?

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