{"id":9880,"date":"2011-11-25T13:05:54","date_gmt":"2011-11-25T00:05:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/?p=9880"},"modified":"2011-11-28T14:36:23","modified_gmt":"2011-11-28T01:36:23","slug":"encountering-fantastic-worlds-part-3-scifi","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/2011\/11\/25\/encountering-fantastic-worlds-part-3-scifi\/","title":{"rendered":"Encountering Fantastic Worlds, Part 3: SciFi"},"content":{"rendered":"

On October 27<\/a> I embarked on a series of posts about encountering fantastic worlds, starting with worlds in Kids\/YA lit and progressing to adult fantasy-fiction on November 3<\/a> and November 4<\/a> respectively. It definitely felt like I was on a roll and I was looking forward to getting into the fantastic worlds of science fiction—when along came the first pass proof for the manuscript of The Gathering of the Lost<\/strong><\/em> (The Wall of Night, Book Two<\/strong>), and that, as the saying goes was that: for the next fortnight at least! So it’s turned out to be nearly a month from beginning the fantastic worlds’ posts until being able to turn my attention back to science fiction–but to contradict Aragorn in movie of The Return of the King<\/strong><\/em>: “today is … this day!”<\/p>\n

But what am I doing talking about high fantasy—today is about science fiction: from generation ships, to farflung space stations and worlds, as well as the civilizations of galactic futures; to near-future cyberpunk and medium future biopunk dystopias; from ‘almost fantasy’, through space opera, to hard scifi. Actually, it wasn’t until I started to write this post that I realised what a huge variety of worlds there were and how many of them have rocked my … um … ok … milieu. <\/em>(OK, ok, I give in, because of course Julian May’s ‘Galactic Milieu’ is another SF world!)<\/p>\n

I’ve decided that the only possible way to do this, given the array of fantastic worlds out there, is to stick with personal favourites—so complete subjectivity here I come! And as usual, we’re working through ’em in alphabetical order.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>D<\/strong> is for Dune<\/strong><\/em> by Frank Herbert<\/p>\n

As a young teen, innumerable peers and older readers assured me that I would love<\/em> this book. Needless to say, in the inimitable way of those in their early teens, I immediately resolved never<\/em> to read it. Besides, I didn’t like the cover–I thought it looked gloomy and bor<\/span>–ing<\/em>. I can’t recall what made me eventually give in. Perhaps I sneaked a look at the back cover copy and wavered on that “boring” verdict; maybe it was just that by that stage I had pretty much read my way through the whole school library and it was either give in or face that most awful of fates: having nothing<\/em> to read. But succumb I did—and from that very first, opening\u00a0 description of the water-rich world of Caladan, I was hooked by the fantastic world that is Frank Herbert’s Dune<\/em><\/strong>.<\/p>\n

Obviously it is the unforgiving desert planet of Arrakis, aka ‘Dune’, with its giant sandworms and fabulous spice wealth that is the core of the world in an “eco” sense, but for me world building is also about the societies and cultures, the mythologies and histories built around the physical worlds. In Dune<\/strong><\/em>, Frank Herbert gives us not just the warring great houses, such as the Atreides and the Harkonnen, but the secret political sisterhood of the Bene Gesserit with their messianic genetic manipulation programme, the Navigator’s Guild that uses the Arrakeen space to navigate across space-time, the fanatical Fremen who live in the deep deserts, and the Mentats, the human ‘computers’ who have evolevd in a universe that outlawed artifical intelligence. I think there are few worlds in SFF that have both the breadth and depth of Dune—and that is why I will always be grateful that I overcame my teen stubborness and read the book<\/em>!<\/p>\n

.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>E <\/strong>is for Earth<\/strong>—in William Gibson’s Neuromancer<\/strong><\/em> (and related novels)<\/p>\n

I am ashamed to admit that Neuromancer<\/em><\/strong> is another book that I resisted reading because I didn’t like the cover of the particular edition that resided on my then boyfriend’s book shelf. And because the several recommendations I’d received made it sound like a book based on what I term techno-babble. (And as I indicated in the SF-Signal Mind-Meld I did earlier this month, here<\/a>, I like my books to have story and character, not just a melange of ideas, interesting or otherwise.) But once again, I succumbed—in this case because I was stuck in a\u00a0 very provincial centre on a rainy night and Mona Lisa Overdrive<\/strong><\/em> (the third in the Neuromancer<\/strong><\/em> milieu) was definitely the best of a thin selection in the about-to-close local stationer’s.<\/p>\n

Well, I LOVED Mona Lisa Overdrive<\/strong><\/em> and cyberpunk SF William Gibson-style: this, dear readers, was definitely not techno-babble and I knew that I was going to have to read Neuromancer<\/strong><\/em> (and it’s sequel, Count Zero<\/strong><\/em>)\u00a0 now, at once, immediately!<\/em><\/p>\n

But although I read Mona Lisa Overdrive<\/strong><\/em> first, it has to be “Earth as in Neuromancer<\/strong><\/em>” because that is the novel that set up the world. This is a near-future milieu of what I call “grunge-dystopia”, where pollution, disease, and poverty are rife, nation states have fragmented, corporations are the world’s power brokers and data is its own currency. It’s a world where cyberspace itself is a\u00a0 ‘verse, one in which hackers and cyber pirates try to circumvent the “ice” (tecnological security) protecting corporate databanks; and where the backdrop culture comprises “black clinics” (for plastic surgery and genetic modification), data couriers, and “razor girls” (ronin assassins\/security guards.) The Earth of Neuromancer is also that of the ‘ghost in the machine’, emerging artificial intelligences and their interaction with the human society that created them—and where colonies have evolved onto orbiting space stations, mostly for the rich and privileged, but with such divergent additions as the “Rastafarian navy.” (Love<\/em> the Rastafarian navy!)<\/p>\n

It’s a fabulous, mindblowing world—to visit between the covers of a book if not to live in; although looking around at the way the world is going …<\/p>\n

.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>H <\/strong>is for the Hydri Reach<\/strong> in CJ Cherryh’s Serpent’s Reach<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

<\/em><\/strong>The quarantined Hydri or “Serpent’s” Reach is a star system comprising several planets that feature in the story, primarily Cerdin and Istra. But the interest of the Serpent’s Reach<\/strong><\/em> “world” is not in its physical parameters or individual planets but in the society it depicts. The system is home to the indigenous majat, an insectoid species—think giant ‘ants’ for ease of translation—that produce trade goods invaluable to wider human space culture. But that same culture is terrified of majat “breakout” and so the star system and the humans who pioneered trade there have been “quarantined”—literally forbidden to leave.<\/p>\n

Serpent’s Reach<\/strong><\/em> explores the fascinating “world” this creates: the majat “hive’ society and its symbiotic relationship with the rich, supremely powerful and longlived, but also corrupt Kontrin—the “hive friends” who act as envoys and intermediaries to the majat and the incredible wealth the hive trade generates. But the Kontrin have created their own supporting human society, in parallel with that of the majat: the Betas—what we would recognise as “normal” human beings—and the Azi, genetically engineered humans with an inbuilt termination date, who are bred as a source of slave labour for the majat; and incidentally the rest of human society.<\/p>\n

Serpent’s Reach <\/em><\/strong>has long been one of my favourite CJ Cherryh novels, because the dynamics of the ‘world’ that CJ Cherryh has created sets up a powerful—but also pschologically dark—story, one that includes strong horror elements when fratricidal infighting within the Kontrin spills over into their alliances with the majat and threatens the entire human society within the Hydri star system, a system where they are now trapped …<\/p>\n

—<\/p>\n

So that’s it for today, the first three of my fantastic worlds of SciFi. I will be back soon with another 3—or so, depending on whether I can limit myself to ‘just that.’\u00a0 \ud83d\ude09<\/p>\n

—<\/p>\n

To read the second instalment of Encountering Fantastic Worlds: SciFi<\/strong>, click here<\/strong><\/span><\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

On October 27 I embarked on a series of posts about encountering fantastic worlds, starting with worlds in Kids\/YA lit and progressing to adult fantasy-fiction on November 3 and November 4 respectively. It definitely felt like I was on a roll and I was looking forward to getting into the fantastic worlds of science fiction—when […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[30,19],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9880","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-epicfantasy","category-funstuff"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9880","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9880"}],"version-history":[{"count":48,"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9880\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10039,"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9880\/revisions\/10039"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9880"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9880"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9880"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}