kizza's review against another edition
2.0
Beautifully written, devastatingly dull.
There's a reason literary and fantasy fictions are not the same genre. In both genres the reader expects certain tropes and cliches. In literary fiction, there's a certain amount of navel gazing and just moving about the world somewhat pointlessly. In fantasy, there's the expectation of a plot that gives the characters a reason to move about the world. See where the disconnect lies? This book is literary fiction with fantasy window-dressing.
This is for literary fans who don't read much fantasy. Everyone else should avoid it or expect, in some way, to be disappointed.
There's a reason literary and fantasy fictions are not the same genre. In both genres the reader expects certain tropes and cliches. In literary fiction, there's a certain amount of navel gazing and just moving about the world somewhat pointlessly. In fantasy, there's the expectation of a plot that gives the characters a reason to move about the world. See where the disconnect lies? This book is literary fiction with fantasy window-dressing.
This is for literary fans who don't read much fantasy. Everyone else should avoid it or expect, in some way, to be disappointed.
jsmney's review
3.0
My undergrad writing TA gave this to me as a prize for doing something well (I forget). It took me a year to read it and it was so crazy and surreal. It had been such a long time since I'd been reading for fun, because of college, but it was a really interesting book. I would say it's a somewhat unique book in my memory.
martydah's review
4.0
This was a strange novel - I've heard it referred to as Steampunk, sci-fi, fantasy. Really, I think fantasy is a better description for it than anything else. It's the story of Gwynn, a gun-slinger and Raule, a doctor, former rebels who fought on the losing side of a revolution in the Copper Country. Both find new lives in the city of Ashamoil. Gwynn becomes a strong arm/assassin for a notorious slaver and Raule opens a hospital for the poor.
The novel becomes ever more strange: who or what is Beth Constantin, Gwynn's lover and maker of beautiful but bizarre etchings that seem to come alive and transport the viewer into other realms? What is causing all the strange deformed fetuses that Raule feels compelled to collect and study? The reader is never quite sure what is going on, anymore than the main characters are. And that's part of the appeal - Bishop never completely resolves the mysteries of the Etched City. The epilogue raises more questions than it answers. I thought this was a fascinating read and would like to see more work from this author.
The novel becomes ever more strange: who or what is Beth Constantin, Gwynn's lover and maker of beautiful but bizarre etchings that seem to come alive and transport the viewer into other realms? What is causing all the strange deformed fetuses that Raule feels compelled to collect and study? The reader is never quite sure what is going on, anymore than the main characters are. And that's part of the appeal - Bishop never completely resolves the mysteries of the Etched City. The epilogue raises more questions than it answers. I thought this was a fascinating read and would like to see more work from this author.
yak_attak's review against another edition
5.0
"What does it all mean?" Gwynn asked, intrigued
"An unnatural history of existence in a state of flux," she said. "The midden of an old world, surfacing after a frost. A new world in a nymph-state, before its mature form is decided."
"And how will it be decided?"
"With inspiration and passion, and perhaps a little tragedy. Or perhaps cynically, in back rooms, behind closed doors. Time will tell."
I don't typically highlight quotes with my reviews but it seemed poignant in this case for two reasons - first, you can tell from the short snippet how excellently Bishop's prose can be when it hits its highs, a marked strength for a debut novel, vast, imaginative, strange, but capturing the grimy underbelly of its lawless protagonists well. I think at times it lapses to either side - either too florid, or too simplistic, but on the whole, the book is completely captivating.... even if evasive.
Secondly, it gives you a hint at the vague metaphysical nonsense in store here, and I do mean that in the most complementary way possible - The Etched City is a story of a battle for the soul of a man, for the life in a city, for the new world emerging from the ashes of a war into a early 19th century mirror of our own. The old west, mobsters, etc. - despite its overarching strangeness and pervasive magic the setting and story of the book aren't that odd at all, lulling you into thinking there's not much fantastical going on.... But don't be concerned, this book oozes strangeness, New Weird via Epic Magical Realism. Or something.
All together, this is a fantastic work, one grappling with modernity, art, self, and like so many of the great novels that grapple with shit like modernity, art, and self, it's also kinda a pain in the ass and confusing at times. But that's part of the fun. Give in, enjoy the ride, and you'll find something special.
"An unnatural history of existence in a state of flux," she said. "The midden of an old world, surfacing after a frost. A new world in a nymph-state, before its mature form is decided."
"And how will it be decided?"
"With inspiration and passion, and perhaps a little tragedy. Or perhaps cynically, in back rooms, behind closed doors. Time will tell."
I don't typically highlight quotes with my reviews but it seemed poignant in this case for two reasons - first, you can tell from the short snippet how excellently Bishop's prose can be when it hits its highs, a marked strength for a debut novel, vast, imaginative, strange, but capturing the grimy underbelly of its lawless protagonists well. I think at times it lapses to either side - either too florid, or too simplistic, but on the whole, the book is completely captivating.... even if evasive.
Secondly, it gives you a hint at the vague metaphysical nonsense in store here, and I do mean that in the most complementary way possible - The Etched City is a story of a battle for the soul of a man, for the life in a city, for the new world emerging from the ashes of a war into a early 19th century mirror of our own. The old west, mobsters, etc. - despite its overarching strangeness and pervasive magic the setting and story of the book aren't that odd at all, lulling you into thinking there's not much fantastical going on.... But don't be concerned, this book oozes strangeness, New Weird via Epic Magical Realism. Or something.
All together, this is a fantastic work, one grappling with modernity, art, self, and like so many of the great novels that grapple with shit like modernity, art, and self, it's also kinda a pain in the ass and confusing at times. But that's part of the fun. Give in, enjoy the ride, and you'll find something special.
bdorf's review
1.0
This was easily the worst book I've read this year. Self indulgent garbage, with a side of casual racism and misogyny. Avoid at all costs.
megapolisomancy's review
5.0
You know, I just read another story of Bishop's in THE WEIRD and it struck me that I am dying for her to release another book and I'm not sure why I gave this one four stars instead of five so I am retroactively bumping it up.
------
It took M. John Harrison years and a good number of novels and stories to create a secondary fantasy world and then get disgusted with the idea of a secondary fantasy world and subvert and deconstruct the whole thing by reducing the characters to ghosts and surreal phantoms, but K. J. Bishop manages the same thing in the course of a single book. She also manages to attain his level of utterly opaque meaning, at times ("The Lamia and Lord Cromus" retains a special place in my memory for its sheer cursed inaccessibility, and actually now that I think of it the sphinx-Beth character in The Etched City bears some resemblance to the mythical lamia also. Do you see what this book has done to my brain?).
Ok anyway this book is about two comrades from a failed revolution journeying together across a desert to escape the triumphant general's troops.
No it isn't.
It's about the female wanderer, Raule, a doctor, who tries to save what's left of her conscience by taking a post as the lone capable doctor to the denizens of the poorest quarter of Ashamoil. Ashamoil being, of course, a city the two adventurers suddenly find themselves occupying, the characters seeming almost as disconnected as the readers, who have been given no transition from the above chase to these newly sedentary lives.
No it isn't.
It's about the male wanderer, Gwynn, a sharpshooter, who has become a hired goon for one of Ashamoil's crime lords, and his brutal descent into the underbelly of the city.
No it isn't.
It's about Gwynn's affair with the aforementioned Beth, who is human or isn't human or is perhaps both, simultaneously, and is an artist (and is perhaps, in some way, the author? and is also the only character in the novel with a typical real-world name, I believe) and who spends much of her scenes deconstructing Gwynn's thought regarding their place in the world, and then perhaps deconstructing his world entirely? Again, it's all very Harrisonesque. When you get down to it, this book is about stories, and it keeps switching up stories on you. In the end, it is Beth, who seems to create a different story altogether from the one Bishop is telling here, is wracked by thoughts that she doesn't belong in this world, having been brought here against her will as a child, and who then basically removes herself from the book, leaving Gwynn mystified and unsure of what his own story is or what is real or possible anymore. This is the constant slipping throughout the book: it's a desert escape story, then the chapter ends, and then the characters are already at their destination, and have been for some time. This narrative slipperiness/metatextuality/commentary on the role of stories (in both creation and telling) calls to mind Borges, and Bishop seems to acknowledge this by having one character (a crazy old man, no less) tell Gwynn what appears to be a reworked version of Borges' "The House of Asterion."
Aside from these conversations he has with Beth, Gwynn spends a good deal of time debating theology with The Rev (this title always just making me think of Monty Python for some reason). Within the context, though, this becomes a discursion about Bishop as much as it is about any other God. The Rev, we learn, was once a messiah figure able to perform miracles reminiscent of those attributed to Jesus, but he lost this ability years before. His loss of faith in the narrative mirrors that experienced by Beth and Gwynn, but where the Rev aims for redemption, Beth settles on escapism (quite literally) and Gwynn on nihilism.
I am, honestly, a bit mystified by the number of people on goodreads who seem to treat this book as just another New Weird excursion and complain about the lack of a plot, because if you don't read this as a kind of surrealist meditation on art and creation, then there... isn't much to it. Ha. I also didn't think there was much to Ashamoil or the larger world, but then again, by this reading, I don't think there was supposed to be-the whole thing was rather hazy and dreamlike. It seems that Bishop took notice of Harrison's rantings about world-building and escapism and the "clomping foot of nerdism," but she flips his oneiric approach to fantastical writing on its head.
I think, anyway.
Like I said... they are masters of obscurantism.
------
It took M. John Harrison years and a good number of novels and stories to create a secondary fantasy world and then get disgusted with the idea of a secondary fantasy world and subvert and deconstruct the whole thing by reducing the characters to ghosts and surreal phantoms, but K. J. Bishop manages the same thing in the course of a single book. She also manages to attain his level of utterly opaque meaning, at times ("The Lamia and Lord Cromus" retains a special place in my memory for its sheer cursed inaccessibility, and actually now that I think of it the sphinx-Beth character in The Etched City bears some resemblance to the mythical lamia also. Do you see what this book has done to my brain?).
Ok anyway this book is about two comrades from a failed revolution journeying together across a desert to escape the triumphant general's troops.
No it isn't.
It's about the female wanderer, Raule, a doctor, who tries to save what's left of her conscience by taking a post as the lone capable doctor to the denizens of the poorest quarter of Ashamoil. Ashamoil being, of course, a city the two adventurers suddenly find themselves occupying, the characters seeming almost as disconnected as the readers, who have been given no transition from the above chase to these newly sedentary lives.
No it isn't.
It's about the male wanderer, Gwynn, a sharpshooter, who has become a hired goon for one of Ashamoil's crime lords, and his brutal descent into the underbelly of the city.
No it isn't.
It's about Gwynn's affair with the aforementioned Beth, who is human or isn't human or is perhaps both, simultaneously, and is an artist (and is perhaps, in some way, the author? and is also the only character in the novel with a typical real-world name, I believe) and who spends much of her scenes deconstructing Gwynn's thought regarding their place in the world, and then perhaps deconstructing his world entirely? Again, it's all very Harrisonesque. When you get down to it, this book is about stories, and it keeps switching up stories on you. In the end, it is Beth, who seems to create a different story altogether from the one Bishop is telling here, is wracked by thoughts that she doesn't belong in this world, having been brought here against her will as a child, and who then basically removes herself from the book, leaving Gwynn mystified and unsure of what his own story is or what is real or possible anymore. This is the constant slipping throughout the book: it's a desert escape story, then the chapter ends, and then the characters are already at their destination, and have been for some time. This narrative slipperiness/metatextuality/commentary on the role of stories (in both creation and telling) calls to mind Borges, and Bishop seems to acknowledge this by having one character (a crazy old man, no less) tell Gwynn what appears to be a reworked version of Borges' "The House of Asterion."
Aside from these conversations he has with Beth, Gwynn spends a good deal of time debating theology with The Rev (this title always just making me think of Monty Python for some reason). Within the context, though, this becomes a discursion about Bishop as much as it is about any other God. The Rev, we learn, was once a messiah figure able to perform miracles reminiscent of those attributed to Jesus, but he lost this ability years before. His loss of faith in the narrative mirrors that experienced by Beth and Gwynn, but where the Rev aims for redemption, Beth settles on escapism (quite literally) and Gwynn on nihilism.
I am, honestly, a bit mystified by the number of people on goodreads who seem to treat this book as just another New Weird excursion and complain about the lack of a plot, because if you don't read this as a kind of surrealist meditation on art and creation, then there... isn't much to it. Ha. I also didn't think there was much to Ashamoil or the larger world, but then again, by this reading, I don't think there was supposed to be-the whole thing was rather hazy and dreamlike. It seems that Bishop took notice of Harrison's rantings about world-building and escapism and the "clomping foot of nerdism," but she flips his oneiric approach to fantastical writing on its head.
I think, anyway.
Like I said... they are masters of obscurantism.
leftylucyprivateeye's review
4.0
a strangely beautiful book, either fantasy masquerading as philosophy or vice versa. i definitely enjoyed it, i'm just not sure why.