Reviews tagging 'Cannibalism'

Eiswelt by Jasper Fforde

11 reviews

crufts's review against another edition

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adventurous mysterious tense slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Plot
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? No

4.0

 
Early Riser is a science-fiction novel about a world where temperatures plunge dramatically every winter. As a result, humans have adapted to hibernate. But what are the true effects of Morphenox, the drug widely used to make hibernation safer by suppressing dreams?

I should emphasize that Early Riser really is science fiction: you should be prepared to learn the new terminology from this sci-fi world. I mention this because Jasper Fforde's easy, breezy style of writing can charm you into forgetting this point. Sometimes I found the provided lists of slang terms interesting and useful for setting the world; other times, it seemed like extraneous detail that distracted from what was going on. I found it hard to keep track of the many concepts in play, even though I took notes as I read.

Actually, scene-setting and world-building was the novel's strongest point. I really enjoyed the verbal paintings of the desolate winter landscape, the looping dream world, and the general vibe of the cold season. It got to the point where I read this line:
I struck a match and the newspaper flared as it caught.
... and felt the delight and warmth of the flames, because the feeling of everpresent cold was described so well.
Several sci-fi concepts in the story are also great fun and very clever. Similarly, the mentions of rhymes and slogans were terrific for making me feel like I was right there in the world, e.g. the cautionary rhyme about ending up dead in sleep if you didn't take bulking seriously - something that people would murmur to eachother as they prepared to hibernate.

While I enjoyed these, I did have some problems with the book as well. Nothing show-stopping, but imperfections nonetheless. These can't be discussed without spoilers, and my comments are lengthy, so I'll leave them in the tag below.

(1) The gender of the protagonist, Charlie Worthing, is never explicitly stated or clarified. At first I found this charming, but over time it grew increasingly hard to justify in the setting. Because the sci-fi world's gender roles are especially rigid (due to wastage, women have an increased burden of expected childbirth), it became difficult to suspend disbelief that Charlie's gender wasn't having any noticeable impact on the demands society placed on them.
It may have been that Charlie's skull deformity knocked them off the list of expected parents, or some similar justification. But nothing like this is ever mentioned.

On the same note, there are a number of conflicting pieces of evidence for Charlie's gender (or at least their assigned sex). Their serial number ends with "F", implying female. A comparison of their appearance conforming with a man in a painting implies male. A description of their unclothed body by a bystander sounds female. The genders of the people who are attracted to them during the book (all women) statistically suggests they're male. And so on. And there's also the fact that Charlie was called "Wonky" as a child, having changed their name to "Charlie" later.
Now, I read this and think: "Oh, that's neat, perhaps this character is trans, perhaps they're non-binary, and that's why they changed their name and have all these conflicting descriptors." But when Charlie meets a trans man during the story, they ask: "Can I ask why (...) you're something you're not?"
This is not something a trans person would say to another trans person. Concluding that Charlie is cis, just of an unspecified gender, we have a problem: these conflicting gender cues are now simply breaking the consistency of the story, which breaks my suspension of disbelief.
Lastly, there were times when the dialogue seemed to be contorting in an attempt not to use any pronouns for Charlie: it's "Worthing here", Worthing this", "Worthing that", until it just sounded awkward.

(2) While we're on the topic of gender, let's talk about the trans man character. He's described as tall, rugged and muscular: one thing we can be sure about is that he's very happy to be in a male role in this society. Indeed, the author comments on his website:
As regards the trans nature of Fodder, it seemed right and just and fair and proper to have him so. It sprung from the idea that there would be quite a few like Fodder, who either keep their gender secret, presumably based on the fact that the pressures to reproduce are so strong, or feel that they would prefer to be a man in what is essentially a female dominated society. The difference between a 'hider' and Fodder was never mentioned in the book, so as not to complicate matters, but it seems to me that Fodder feels considerably more happy as a bloke.
- Reference: https://jasperfforde.com/riser/worda.html

So far, so good, right?
But then at the height of a conflict that puts Charlie's life in danger, Fodder resolves the conflict by... selling his body as a surrogate incubator, on the basis that he's reproductively female. Which just doesn't make sense:
- If Fodder is a trans man and prefers to have a male body (as is implied by whatever efforts he's made to make it so) it's extremely unlikely he would be willing to be pregnant. Nope, not even to save a life. If you surveyed a group of trans men in real life, you would find this out in about five seconds: nearly all would consider it to be an extensive psychological torture (ending in lifelong deformities) to be avoided at all costs, with some to the level of "I would genuinely rather die". I don't believe that Fodder would endure this, no matter how much of a self-sacrificing soldier he might be.
- If Fodder simply preferred a male social role because he wanted to avoid the childbearing expected of women in this sci-fi world, it makes even less sense that he would be willing to be pregnant.

All this could be solved if we simply made Fodder a tough cis woman instead of a tough trans man. Don't get me wrong, I love the fact that the trans man character is one of the good guys, as well as one of the most physically-built people in the book. But altogether, the Fodder reveal came off as an attempt at a clever solution for a conflict scene that hadn't been properly thought through.

(3) On the topic of muscular characters: why is pre-hibernation exercise considered a sin across the board? The in-book justification was that exercise burns precious energy stores, but people in real life do weightlifting with the expectation that they'll add weight to their bodies in the form of muscle, which would surely be an advantage to the hibernating people.

(4) The Villains being called "Villains" - just the original word with no modification, simply capitalized, not even an extra letter added (say, "Villaines"). This was a bit on-the-nose for these characters who are a source of conflict in the book.

(5) Unnecessary proliferation of named characters. It wasn't necessary to name the eight other Consuls that Charlie entered the Winter with. It wasn't necessary to name Charlie's childhood acquaintances/half-siblings who we only see once. The more of these people turn up, the less attention we have for the characters that actually matter.

(6) Inconsistent statistics on the Morphenox. Do you get one nightwalker for every 2,000 people, or for every 3,000 people? Depends which page you read.

(7) The turnaround where Jonesy and Toccata become allies is a little fast. I found it hard to believe that Charlie would suddenly reveal the secret dream's information to them, even if they really were on the good side, simply because I'd expect Charlie to take some time to adapt to the 180-degree turn in the situation.

(8) The story's conclusion was underexplained. Why did the 61 nightwalkers wake up? This is the climactic end of the story, it's not satisfying to say "it just happened"!
Also, if this was just a one-off event, and future nightwalkers remained stuck in the dreamscape, wouldn't it be easy for the ever-powerful HiberTech company to sell the lie that those past nightwalkers were alive, but these new nightwalkers were as dead as ever?
And if it wasn't a one-off event - if people were forever cured from being stuck in the dreamscape as Nightwalkers - wouldn't HiberTech just say "Great! Morphenox is 100% safe now!"?


Overall, an enjoyable read despite its flaws. I'm glad Jasper Fforde is writing again. :) 
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