The Luminaries - Eleanor Catton (2013)

By now most avid readers would know at least something about Eleanor Catton’s mammoth Man Booker prize winning novel The Luminaries. Catton is the youngest writer to ever win the award and at 830 pages it is also the longest winning novel. The Luminaries is set in the 1860’s on the west coast of the southern island of New Zealand during that era’s gold rushes. It is a complex novel, with a large ensemble of characters coupled with an innovative structure. These attributes may put many potential readers off, but rest assured The Luminaries is well worth reading.

The Luminaries is such a long and complex novel that it is futile to try and describe its plot and structure in any great detail. Perhaps uniquely the novel manages to be both backward looking and innovative at the same time. Catton writes in the Victorian narrative style used by many authors at the time in which the novel is set; however the novel’s structure is a modern contrivance built around the signs of the zodiac and the movements of the planets. Twelve of the characters are associated with the zodiac and are assigned to the Stellar section of the character chart at the beginning of the novel. Another eight are in the Planetary section and are given related influences such as reason, desire and force. The first chapter, entitled ‘A sphere within a Sphere,’ is as long as an average book (360 pages) and like the cycle of the moon, each successive chapter wanes until the final group of chapters are only a few pages long. Fortunately due to the novel’s other quality attributes the reader can get by without paying much attention to its convoluted form, which is something that I mostly chose to do.

One of The Luminaries great strengths is Catton’s ability to write believable characters that live and breath on the page. When coupled with the mysteries at the novel’s core, it makes for strangely compelling reading. I say strangely compelling because at one point it occurred to me that despite the novel’s slow moving narrative, fragmentation and complexity, I found myself completely drawn into the world inhabited by the characters and the mysteries they were grappling with. This is masterful story-telling coupled with beautiful writing and it is no wonder the judges of the Man Booker awarded the prize to The Luminaries.

Considering the amount of research and planning that must have gone into writing the novel, winning the Man Booker Prize is a just reward for Catton. It is, however, a novel that requires intense focus on the part of the reader. Fragmented across time and told from multiple perspectives over a complex narrative structure, it demands a certain level of commitment. After I finished The Luminaries I wondered what the average reader would make of its conventions and pretensions? My book club members, for example, mostly appreciated the novel, even if they didn’t all necessarily enjoy it. As serendipity would have it at the same time a work college referred me to an essay called The Novel is Dead (this time it’s for real), written by Will Self, in which he discusses the decline of not just what he calls the paper oriented ‘Gutenberg mind,’ (as opposed to the digital mind - my words, not his) but also of the novel as a living medium (it’s a zombie art form, moribund since Joyce's Finnegan’s Wake (1939) according to Self) and in particular the ‘difficult novel.’ Self puts forward that the novel as an important medium is in terminal decline and serious literature will become the domain of the minority, both in terms of authors and readers. Is a novel such as The Luminaries a way forward, or merely the last gasp of a zombie art form with declining readership? Do people want to read novels like The Luminaries any more, or is it just going to be vampire romance and about a million shades of grey?

Such questions once again bring to bear the worth of prizes such as the Man Booker. No doubt there has been huge sales of The Luminaries since it won the coveted prize, but just how many of them would have been read all the way through? Is the Man Booker making things worse by rewarding a difficult novel that may be unpalatable to most readers? Or will it inspire people to reach beyond their comfort zone and help keep alive one of the most important cultural artifacts humans have ever devised? Personally I thoroughly enjoyed The Luminaries and am confident that the so called difficult novel has a bright future beyond this era of wizards, vampires and all those shades of grey. I believe that there will always be enough people intent on exploring the limits of literature and be willing to go beyond their comfort zones. As the demands on our time is taken up by more and more frivolous digital pursuits I believe that serious literature will come to be appreciated much more readily as an antidote to cultural superficiality. Self may be pessimistic about the future of the novel, but I wouldn’t bet on it being a spent cultural force just yet. If you are one of those people who put aside The Luminaries after a few hundred pages then prove Will Self wrong by picking it up again; you will be rewarded for your efforts.

Ghostopolis - Doug Tennapel (2010)

One of the advantages of working in a library is being able access a whole range of media I’d not normally encounter on an every day basis. When I saw Ghostopolis handed back at the returns counter I was immediately attracted to the cover artwork and the concept. I grew up in the 1970‘s reading comics; buying them for 0.10c each at the local second-hand book store across the road from Boans department store in Bunbury (now those were the days). It was time, I thought, to channel the past and read something different.

The premise of Ghostopolis is simple: ghosts are real and Frank Gallows, as a suitably disheveled anti-hero, is employed by the Supernatural Immigration Task Force to track down wayward ghosts and send them back to the afterworld. Due to unfortunate circumstances involving a wayward nightmare horse skeleton Gallows sends teenager Garth Hales into the afterlife, namely Ghostopolis. Ghostopolis is ruled by a suitably evil character named Vaugner, and is populated by mummies, skeletons (ruled by the noble Bone king), will o wisps, specters, zombies, boogymen and goblins. Ghostopolis is a brilliantly rendered freaky supernatural world. The artwork is superb, the colours and shadings are beautiful; a fine example is the eerie gloaming of a werewolf’s tea house. That’s right, a werewolf’s tea house; owned by a creaky old werewolf obsessed with tea who freaks out when Gallows dares to say that he’s “More of a coffee guy.” 

Aside from the brilliant artwork, it is the characters that help make Ghostopolis an above average graphic novel. The tea obsessed werewolf is only part of the fun. Vaugner’s bug-eyed insect army are simply fantastic, in particular his top hat wearing enforcer who is bent on eating Garth and his nightmare horse. Gallows makes for a convincing hapless hero who has to imagine that he has an imagination in order to unleash his earthly powers in Ghostopolis. Just to complicate matters he’s also in love with a ghost, the beautiful Claire, who is a strong character in her own right. However it is Garth Hales who really makes Ghostopolis something special. He’s not just a typical teenager, but a complex character who has to cope with some serious issues; not just how to deal with freaky insect enforcers flying around in bee-copters.

Ghostopolis has such a strong narrative flow that by the time you get to the climax, in which the eerily slender Vaugner engages in an apocalyptic battle with Garth, you are totally hooked. Ghostopolis is a great blend of action, snappy dialogue and emotional pathos. Despite the blockbuster climax and the cast of freaky supernatural characters the ending of Ghostopolis is very human, which is a real strength. I’d love to see a sequel be published, but in the meantime apparently Hugh Jackman owns the rights for a movie version and if Tennapel has anything to do with its production then it will be brilliant.

I’m Still the Greatest Says Johnny Angelo - Nik Cohn (1967)

Nik Cohn is a British music journalist and author of Awopbopaloobop Alopbamboom: The Golden Age of Rock (1970), which is considered to be one is the first serious works of rock journalism and is also included in David Bowie’s list of his hundred favourite books. I’m Still the Greatest Says Johnny Angelo is Cohn’s first published work and is the fantastic story of street urchin Johnny Angelo’s seduction by early rock ‘n’ roll. The novella is a wild fast paced allegory about the cultural impact of rock ‘n’ roll and in many ways perfectly captures the primal energy of rock music.

In the beginning Johnny Angelo is a typical unloved youth and from the age of four indulges in escapist behavior, initially by dressing up in a red suit and parading back and forth, like a showman, on top of a wall. The adults are outraged, of course, and so begins his flight from the grimy reality of post-war Britain. By the age of six Johnny is a petty thief, stealing watches from the markets, and before the age of ten he meets a mysterious William Burroughs type character called the Doctor (no, not that Doctor). The Doctor becomes a mentor, spinning fantastic stories whilst grinning through yellow teeth. The Doctor also possesses a honeypot of crystals that ‘makes flowers blossom’ in his brain. Like much of the symbolism throughout the novella, the Doctor and his honeypot of crystals is partly self evident and partly nebulous.

Their unlikely friendship comes across as a changing of the generational guard and it is significant that the Doctor remarks to Johnny ‘Doesn’t truth get tiresome? When lies are so much fun.’ Such advice gives credence to the notion that this novella did indeed influence David Bowie, who only five years later would invent himself as a rock star in the form of alter-ego Ziggy Stardust. The novella is a rock ‘n’ roll fantasia, complete with bikes revving endlessly in the streets, the flowering of youthful rebellion, hero worship and street-wise fashion. Significantly by the age of fifteen Johnny both leaves home and hears and sees through a scopitone Little Richard singing Tutti Frutti. His mind is suitably blown. 

I’m Still the Greatest Says Johnny Angelo manages to both capture the impact of early rock ‘n’ roll and to also predict its future. Johnny’s fuck you attitude, his gang of bikers and his posing finds Johnny rooted in the early rock ‘n’ roll moment, but his violently riotous live shows complete with wild animals (a metaphor for the energy of rock ‘n’ roll?) and freaky circus performers point toward the future of glam rock theatre and the nihilism of punk only nine years later. There’s an interview with Johnny that comes across like the infamous interviews Lou Reed gave in the 1970’s, full of casual deadpan distain. Johnny lives for the moment, the moment of danger and release that is the rock ’n’ roll concert. This is both his making, and true to rock ‘n’ roll mythos, his undoing as well.

I’m Still the Greatest Says Johnny Angelo also tells the story of the establishment’s knee jerk reaction to rock ‘n’ roll and how that contributed to the fatalistic hubris of rock stardom. Hounded by the establishment and holed up with his followers, Johnny’s endgame is one of futility and egotism. With amazing prescience Johnny’s story ends at the age of 27; that mythic and tragic age that would later claim Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin, Brian Jones and then Kurt Cobain decades later. My copy of the novella was published in 1970, tempting me to think that perhaps Cohn tinkered with Johnny’s age for the reissue, because by the end of that year Hendrix, Joplin and Jones were all dead. Either way I’m Still the Greatest Says Johnny Angelo is a recommended read for anyone interested in the rock ‘n’roll mythos and the evolution of rock writing in general. 

The Circle - Dave Eggers (2013)

I have to admit that I find it hard to keep up with contemporary fiction. There are just too many quality older books out there waiting to be read. Dave Eggers, despite enjoying both critical and some commercial success, has until now completely passed me by. It has made me wonder whether this is a failing; is it important to read contemporary books, or is it fine to see if they endure and become an older book that you must read because its worth has been proven? Sometimes a novel’s importance and power can only be judged in hindsight from a future vantage point. Could The Circle become one of those books that future generations will venerate? Or will it succumb to its flaws and just become another novel tied to its historical context and fade away?

The Circle is the name of a technology corporation that is modeled on Facebook, Google and Silicon Valley. In fact in the novel The Circle has subsumed these companies and has become the biggest corporation of its type in the world. Eggers uses The Circle as a means to explore the possible dangers of when technology, power and prevailing cultural attitudes intersect in a way that can lead to the subversion of basic human rights, such as freedom of speech and privacy. In some ways The Circle is a descendent of cyber-punk, with a corporation flexing more power than the government, set within a technologically dystopian context.

The Circle’s protagonist, Mae Holland, is a ‘typical’ twenty something who is extremely happy that she has left behind her humdrum job at a dead-end company when she is headhunted by her college friend Annie, who is both one of the ‘gang of 40’ in The Circle and close to the ‘three wise men’ who run the corporation with the kind of self-righteous glee displayed by those who think they know best. Mae readily goes along with all of the company’s demands and dubious plans for the future. On her first day at work she is gifted Circle technology and is asked to hand over her laptop. Mae hesitates, but not because she is worried about other people accessing her private information, but because she merely wants time to say goodbye. It is an obvious device, as it is only the first of many things that Mae will say goodbye to, not least her perspective and humanity.

Although she has a few bad experiences along the way Mae remains both idealistic and gullible, readily agreeing with everything The Circle suggests; which pushes the envelope of credibility when it comes to realistic character development. It is possible that Eggers has sacrificed credibility for the sake of thematic power. Unfortunately in this regard The Circle is excessively heavy-handed. As the novel progresses The Circle’s blatant disregard for basic human rights becomes increasingly outrageous as they progress from TruYou, a one stop cyber-portal, to SeeChange micro cameras that allow widespread surveillance, to the concept of total transparency and slogans such as “privacy is theft.” The descent into dystopia is unfettered and rapid, perhaps self-consciously attempting to outdo the likes of Orwell’s 1984 (1949) and Huxley’s Brave New World (1932).

Thematic heavy-handedness is not the only way The Circle is flawed. The prose borders on the banal and character development is limited by the demands of the plot. Mae’s psychological state, as she reacts to The Circle’s demands, is often revealed in detail, however she is an unsympathetic character and has a superficial personality. The same can be said for Annie, whose personality seems subsumed by technology and the demands of the job. In contrast Mae’s parents are the novel’s most grounded characters, trying to cope with illness, unfair health insurance and then finally their daughter’s skewed perception. Such a contrast is no doubt a deliberate device used to highlight The Circle’s dehumanizing technology and its effect on younger generations. Mae’s ex-boyfriend, the artistic Mercer, is an obvious personification of those who inherently distrust the internet and big data. Eggers gives Mercer some hipster credibility, but ultimately he just comes across as a hollow mouthpiece for all that’s believed to be wrong about big data. If his character had been given a more rounded presence, then his endgame in the novel would have packed a bigger punch. Even so Eggers does manage to create some nervy chills from Mercer’s fate, but it is too little too late to improve on the lack of narrative tension that hampers most of the novel. 

There is an alternate way to view The Circle; one in which Eggers has deliberately written a novel that appeals to teenagers and twenty somethings. In particular those from that demographic who wouldn’t normally read a novel. Perhaps Eggers has commercially tailored The Circle to reach the widest possible audience because ultimately the themes he explores are real and important. In 1985 George Orwell’s 1984 was part of my year eleven curriculum and it impacted on me greatly. Less than three years later I walked through the city centre of Perth and saw the first CCTV cameras that were supposedly installed for the sake of public safety, and I couldn’t understand why people were not outraged by their presence. So perhaps The Circle is destined for better things? In the future it may be regarded as a key text and its flaws will be overlooked because the themes are so important. Perhaps now or in the future people will be inspired enough by The Circle’s dystopian themes to make a stand against big data’s erosion of privacy.

Note: The Circle gets an admirable rating, although it's not quite there, but nor is it mediocre - it's somewhere in-between, in my opinion anyway.

Couples - John Updike (1968)

The great John Updike died only five years ago. Such was his prolific nature that had he lived during that time he would have no doubt produced many short stories, essays, criticism, some poetry and a few novels just to round things off. He is greatly missed, but he will always be remembered for his brilliant quartet of Rabbit Angstrom novels (plus a novella), The Witches of Eastwick (1984), the Henry Bech trilogy of novels and perhaps also Couples, which was hugely successful when first published. Couples is set during the early 1960’s and explores the relationships between a cluster of couples who party, work and play adulterous games in a fictional town called Tarbox. Updike ended up on the cover of Time due to its success, an honor that is rare for authors.

Couples is a thematic cousin to the Rabbit books, with Updike exploring how a range of characters deal with culturally changing times, most notably the waining of religious influence and the after-affects of the introduction of the pill. There’s a sizable ensemble of characters, with Dutch expat Piet Hanema acting as a focal point. Piet turned to religion after his parents were killed in a tragic car accident. Unlike some of the couples he regularly attends church on Sundays, but this does not stop him from pursuing carnal delights with at least three married women within the circle of couples. Updike applies his richly descriptive and dextrous prose to the sexual act, something that both outraged and enticed the readers of America at the time, although now Updike’s approach does seem almost quaint in comparison to the modern novel’s tendency to go right to the heart of the matter.

The first chapter, ‘Welcome to Tarbox,’ begins with Piet and his wife Angela discussing Ken and Foxy Whitman, the new couple in town. With this first long chapter Updike cleverly places the reader in the shoes of the Whitman’s by introducing many of the cast of characters with little in the way of backstory. Apart from Piet, whose backstory is established early on, you have to cope with Freddy Thorne’s Rabelaisian buffoonery, Janet Appleby’s neurotic personality and Roger Guerin’s ”hostile touch” as if, like the Whitman’s, you were awkwardly meeting them for the first time. Updike’s characters are a self conscious bunch; often neurotic, vain and desperate for distraction from their established lives. They are hermetic, trying desperately to find escape amongst themselves; a tendency that sends some of them to the therapist’s couch and others toward a great deal of trouble. Updike’s characters are well rounded, but their hollow ennui is palpable, making them a rather soulless bunch. By the novel’s end it’s hard to shrug off a feeling of ambivalence when it comes to caring what happens to them all.

Couples is a dense read, not because it is particularly complex, but due to Updike’s erudite and allusive style. The syntactic spell he weaves around the couples libidinous lifestyles is really something to admire. Updike is also brilliant at handling social scenes in which most characters have equal footing. The dialogue sparkles with wit and humour, particularly when rivals Piet and Freddy are sparring. Unfortunately the novel is at least one hundred pages too long and as a result reading Updike’s prose becomes like eating too much rich food, then regretting it later. By the time the novel resolves the central plot and ties up some loose ends, the joy of gorging has become diminished. Despite this problem Couples is an excellent read, although if you are new to Updike I’d begin with the Rabbit novels.

After I completed Couples I had a look around on the web to see what other people thought and my interest was piqued by a reviewer who wondered whether Couples was realistic. It is perhaps hard to say whether Updike’s tight knit group of couples living in a small town who indulge in sometimes witty repartee and adultery is particularly realistic, but ultimately such a question misses the point. All narratives are versions of reality, coloured by both the author’s rendering and the subjective filter of the reader’s own perceptions. To critique Updike for not being realistic is to critique every writer of fiction who has ever lived. In any case I rather admire Updike’s version of reality and will read many more of his novels to find out just what he made of it all.

The Menace from Earth - Robert A. Heinlein (1959)

It has been an age since I have read Heinlein, in fact I think that the last one was Starman Jones (1953) and I borrowed it from my high school library way back in the 1980’s. Considering I read so many Arthur C Clarke and Asimov novels in my early years I have no idea why Heinlein was mostly ignored; after all he was considered to be in the same league, a triad known as the “big three” of science fiction writers. Heinlein gets another chance at this point because I thought he would be a great antidote to the grimness of The Watch Tower. The Menace from Earth is a collection of short stories from the 1940’s and 1950’s. Considering many current science fiction writers feel that technology has taken humanity well into the realm of science fiction (and they are right), reading old science fiction is an interesting exercise in terms of how ideas, attitudes and themes are either prescient or dated. 

The first story, The Year of the Jackpot, is all about mathematics, probability curves and the very fate of humanity. A character with the memorable name of Potiphar Breen notices that a number of strange occurrences are clustering and could mean bad news for humanity. It’s an interesting premise that is well executed, but what is of most significance is that it includes the first use of the word geek, which is used to describe a dead Russian scientist. Also it opens with a beautiful woman undressing on a city street who is, of course, rescued by the unusually named protagonist. 

By his Bootstraps is recognized as one of the greatest science fiction stories of all time and that is a fair assumption considering it is a perfect distillation of the chicken or the egg time paradox. It’s brilliantly written and also features nubile scantily clad slave women thirty thousand years in the future who are totally willing to be subservient. Columbus is a four page joke at the expense of humankind’s shortsightedness. There are no scantily clad women in this one, even though it is typical science fiction magazine fodder. The Menace from Earth has a perfect science fiction title, but it turns out to be tale about a teenager’s romantic problems with her love interest who is attracted to a gorgeous woman from Earth. The fact that they all go flying with wings on their backs in a giant underground cavern on the Moon isn’t really enough to hide the fact that it is basically a stock standard teenage love story.

Things get better with Sky Lift, which tells the story of pilots on a mercy dash to the Proserpina space station out near Pluto in their extremely fast torch ships. This is quality hard science fiction told in a compelling way and you’ll never think about G-force in the same way again, or at least I won’t. There are no scantily clad women in this one either, although the main protagonist thinks about them for a while. Goldfish Bowl features two scientist who are investigating two giant pillars of water in the Pacific that seem to be connected to abductions of humans by mysterious balls of energy. This story is well executed, intelligent and though provoking, all without featuring beautiful women, although there are some naked men.

Project Nightmare is, like The Year of the Jackpot, set in the context of cold war tensions that could escalate given the right conditions. Heinlein places a number of characters with psychic powers in just such a situation with chilling results. Stories like this would have been quite frightening in the 1950’s, despite their fantastic elements. The final story, Water is for Washing, would have appealed in a macabre way to people living on America’s west coast, but ultimately it’s hard to define it as a science fiction story. Is a tale of survival during a natural disaster science fiction? Not by todays definitions perhaps.

The Menace from Earth is an interesting collection of short stories, some dated, but with others that still impress. They are all well written and Heinlein certainly knows how write a satisfying ending. He also knows how to take a story forward at the right moment and stimulate the reader’s urge to know what comes next and how it will end. One of the criticisms leveled at Heinlein is his apparent sexism, in particular during his later period. If you view these early stories from that position then yes, you can argue that the manner in which women are portrayed in these stories is problematic. Did the female character in The Year of the Jackpot really need to undress on a crowded street? Of all the things Bob Wilson could have encountered thirty thousand years into the future in By his Bootstraps, did it have to be scantily clad slave women? Perhaps not, but Heinlein would have certainly known his market in the late 1940’s and 1950’s - teenage boys.

The Watch Tower - Elizabeth Harrower (1966)

Just who is Elizabeth Harrower? Only one of Australia’s great lost writers. The publication of The Watch Tower would be her last and she eventually gave up writing altogether, despite the likes of Patrick White and Sidney and Cynthia Nolan urging her to keep writing. White believed that Harrower should have won the Miles Franklin Award and in hindsight he was undoubtedly right. Whilst it is fortunate that Text Publishing has included her novels in their quest to make available long out of print Australian literature, I do wonder how the average reader would handle The Watch Tower, which is one of the most psychologically intense novels’ I have ever read.

It is the character of Felix Shaw that makes The Watch Tower an almost unbearable psychological horror story. Felix Shaw is one of the most complete sociopaths in literature.  Laura and Claire Vaisey are teenage sisters who are abandoned by their narcissistic mother and left to the devices of Shaw, who marries Laura and takes control of their lives. Shaw’s sociopathic nature brings an almost unbearable tension to the novel that never goes away. There is a core of misogyny within Shaw and also hints of repressed homosexuality in his dealings with younger men.

With Laura Vaisey Harrower has drawn a disturbing and realistic portrait of a victim. Laura seems, from the beginning, ripe for exploitation. Her mother takes advantage of her pliable nature, squashes most attempts at independence and is more concerned about playing bridge than the welfare of her daughters. The psychological implications of victimhood are brilliantly realised as Laura starts to become more like Felix, which is one of the most disturbing aspects of the novel.

Harrower’s prose style is eloquent and poised, although often her turn of phrase is such that you need to reread passages, which is a small hindrance considering the quality of her prose. Harrower doesn’t experiment with form as such, but she uses shifting points of view expertly to give the reader contrasting perspectives of the psychological horror that is unfolding. On occasions we are privy to the neighbours point of view, then sometimes Felix himself, but mostly Claire who is the one stuck in the middle and is emotionally manipulated by both Felix and Laura.

One of the great aspects of The Watch Tower is that the ending is not predictable. The novel appears to be heading toward one of several highly possible outcomes, but Harrower sidesteps cliche and the reader is left with very mixed emotions, not to mention being totally drained. Almost everything is perfect about The Watch Tower. The characters are fully realised, in particular Felix Shaw and Claire Vaisey. The prose is superb, as is the depiction of the Sydney suburbs and the harbour beyond, of which we only get glimpses. Finally there is the all too accurate portrayal of women’s compromised lives in the mid twentieth century. It’s time to give Harrower the attention she deserves and although I couldn’t truthfully say that I’d recommend The Watch Tower, in terms of art holding up a mirror to the darkness in life it is essential reading. Ultimately the question of whether to read the novel or not is a matter of can you deal with the sociopathic nightmare that is Felix Shaw?