Waterstone's Liverpool One Science Fiction and Fantasy Book Club


Waterstones Liverpool One Science Fiction and Fantasy Book Club

"This is space. It's sometimes called the final frontier. (Except that of course you can't have a *final* frontier, because there'd be nothing for it to be a frontier *to*, but as frontiers go, it's pretty penultimate...)"
- Terry Pratchett, Moving Pictures

About Us


This is the official blog for the book club held in the book lounge of Waterstones Liverpool One.

The group meet at 6pm on the first Monday of the month to discuss their thoughts and opinions on the books selected. The books range from classic fantasy to brand new science fiction short story collections.

It's a fun and friendly atmosphere and all are welcome: from those who have never read any science fiction or fantasy before, to those who don't read anything else.

The group, and this blog, are administered by Glyn Morgan, the Bookseller responsible for the Science Fiction section of the store and an avid reader of SF who is currently studying for his PhD at the University of Liverpool.

If you would like to comment on any of the books we've read, this month or in the distant past, please feel free to contribute to the comments section of the relevant posts.

Visit this club's little sister: Coffee and Comics

Tuesday 8 March 2011

The Windup Girl by Paolo Bacigalupi

Synopsis

Anderson Lake is a company man, AgriGen's calorie representative in Thailand. Under cover as a factory manager, he combs Bangkok's street markets in search of foodstuffs long thought to be extinct. There he meets the windup girl - the beautiful and enigmatic Emiko - now abandoned to the slums. She is one of the New People, bred to suit the whims of the rich. Engineered as slaves, soldiers and toys, they are the new underclass in a chilling near future where oil has run out, calorie companies dominate nations and bio-engineered plagues run rampant across the globe. And as Lake becomes increasingly obsessed with Emiko, conspiracies breed in the heat and political tensions threaten to spiral out of control. Businessmen and ministry officials, wealthy foreigners and landless refugees all have their own agendas. But no one anticipates the devastating influence of the Windup Girl.

This astonishing debut novel was named 9th best book of 2009 in TIME magazine. It won the Nebula award for Best Novel, was joint-winner for the Hugo award for Best Novel (a tie with China MiƩville's The City and The City [which we've already read] and a plethora of other awards. It has been nominated for the 2010 British Science Fiction Award for Best Novel, results pending.

What Did We Think?

The first thing to point out is that despite the emphasis on Anderson Lake in the above synopsis, this novel doesn't really have a protagonist. There is no set "main character" but rather an ensemble cast of multiple characters whose lives intertwine and crossover to varying degrees. Another thing to note is that none of these characters are what we could call "good guys", there are no heroes in Bacigalupi's world. By the end of the novel we felt sorry for pretty much everyone because whilst there are no truly good people there are no truly evil people either (except perhaps the faceless organisations behind the scenes). The character development was subtle and effective. Despite hopping from character to character we never lost track of where we were or what was going on, something helped by the novel's strong pacing.

It was not universal praise as far as the characters were concerned however. The author's emphasis on Emiko (the eponymous Windup Girl) as a sexual object was hard hitting, especially in the rape scenes, but understandable. However, there were moments when we're alone with the character, inside her mind, and this emphasis on sexuality continues. This was problematic as it sends confusing  messages to the reader about how they should feel about Emiko. The worst instance of this was the "showering" scenes on the roof top where the flow of water and soap is described too sensually, detracting from the fact that this girl has just been violently and horrifically sexually assaulted and raped. That said, it was argued that Emiko's is the most effective character arc, that she grows more than any other character and, from some perspectives, comes closest to having a happy ending at the close of the novel as she is offered a possibility for something she never dreamed possible [he says edgily trying to spoil anything for those who have yet to read it].

This is a dystopia, the word biopunk has been bandied around, and it bears more than a passing resemblance to Oryx and Crake by Margaret Atwood (discussed by this book club already) thematically at least. More than anything this is a capitalist dystopia with layers of big business dominance, union politics, and the kind of arrogance we've come to see from our own capitalist leaders. This is also a rare example of a trade war being made to sound interesting in fiction.

Overall, The Windup Girl is a wonderfully written book, which evokes place and mood with a skill far beyond most debut novelists. It has interesting and relevant themes and realistically flawed characters that we can enjoy. Whilst almost everything is kept in a morally grey area (as in most dystopian fiction) - with the possible exception of Jaidee who casts a long shadow on the plot, despite being dead for most of it - this allows the reader to enjoy the plot without feeling put-upon and to form their own opinions. Bacigalupi mixes real science with touches of magical realism (the Cheshires, the ghosts) and a flavour of the far-east that comes across as genuine.
  
Votes were as follows: 1, 7, 8, 8, 8 ,8, 9, 9, 10


   

1 comment:

  1. this is indeed a very well writen book and has some excellent combination of characters, i do think to say that there is no hero is a touch remise, surely in this Captain Jaidee, and at the end of the book, Kanya would fit into this role. amongst the corrupt and poweful he is consious of his desire for doing the correct thing even though it eventually kills him, and his family. the characters are portrayed as all virtually bi-polar in their manner and poise. i think that what is missing is the role that Emiko plays. throughout the experience she is abused and looked down upon as the lowest of the low, i do think though that her role is underestimated here, she is not the innocent that she is portrayed. it is worth noting that she suffers the abuse from a female without much recorse for revenge just a hatred of the situation she is in. however, it is with the males that she offers vengful thoughts to the point where she assassinates the Somdet Chaopraya and also Lake himself. this is empahised by Gibbons who instantly recognises her for what she really is, hinting at something she does not understand. all in all a very good book and well written.

    would have scored it as a 8

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