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(em português → sol2070.in/2024/11/livro-absolution-jeff-vandermeer-comando-sul-4/ )

"Absolution" (2024) is the fourth installment in Jeff Vandermeer's "Southern Reach" series, a book whose release date I had even marked on my calendar.

It's a prequel to the other three books, which mix surreal horror with science and ecological fiction. The first of them, "Annihilation" (2014), is the most famous, since it became a cult movie by Alex Garland.

The story revolves around a phenomenon in a vast swampy area of the USA, Area X, which causes nature to behave in a bizarre and potentially annihilating way for humans. Southern Reach is the government task force that has been covering up what is happening for decades, investigating and ultimately influencing the whole process.

The things I like most about the series are:

• Ecology. The predominant symbol is environmental catastrophe and our relationship with the natural world, revealing an inconceivable dimension of nature.
• Ambiguity. At first glance, the disaster seems horrific. But... is it really?
• Psychedelic cosmic horror. Jeff writes in the “new weird” subgenre, a revitalization of the “weird” enshrined by H.P. Lovecraft, who mixed horror, science fiction and fantasy to contrast human smallness in the face of unimaginable cosmic forces. New weird is also a pun on “new wave”, the lysergic science fiction of the 60s.
• Exquisitely well-constructed and fascinating characters. The extremely human perspective is never lost or eclipsed by the fantastic, on the contrary, it is a magnifying glass.
• Exemplary writing. For me, Vandermeer is the best writer of speculative fiction today.

"Absolution" takes up some characters from the story who seemed secondary, showing their key role. There are three parts that mimic the three previous books. In the first, a group of scientists come into contact with the first transformations, 20 years earlier, which were already quite disturbing. The second focuses on the beginning of the investigation into the secret agency and its behind-the-scenes work with double agents, manipulation, betrayals, brainwashing, etc. The third part is the first entry into Area X, already completely deflagrated, from the point of view of a practically demented agent.

In this fourth book, there are huge doses of cosmic horror, something that in the others is more measured. It takes a while to get going, as the connections aren't obvious at first. But all the smallest details fall into place.

As much of the story is open to interpretation, this series is one that invites the most diverse theories. "Absolution" brings more raw material for us to speculate about.

It was a good hook for me to re-read the other books, for the third time.

(em português → sol2070.in/2024/10/livro-semiosis-sue-burke/ )

It's been harder to read science fiction, for some reason. Or rather, it's not been easy to find books I like in the genre. In the last few weeks, I've abandoned three well-recommended ones. So “Semiosis” (2018, 336 pgs.), by Sue Burke, was a find.

The story covers the first century of a small human settlement on the planet Pax, roughly the year 2200, after the complete collapse of civilization and the environment on Earth. The plan is a reboot of humanity, with values that don't point towards compromising the environment and self-destruction. Pax has a biosphere similar to Earth's — already with vegetation and animals — but as it is a billion years older, its members have evolved in an unexpected way. The species with the most sophisticated intelligence and communication is a plant, and humans have to learn to deal with it, among other factors, such as loss of technology, population decline and environmental hostility.

It's a gripping, conflict-ridden story that also reflects fundamental questions about ethics, society and non-human sentience. It has small flaws, which can even be seen as qualities. The depth of the scientific dive into world creation is ideal — any more than that and it would be too hard sci-fi for me. However, people with a more rigorous scientific bent may be disappointed by some of the details, since the focus is on human and non-human relationships.

It's the first volume of a duology that will be completed with “Interference” (2019), already in my reading queue.

(em português → sol2070.in/2024/10/conto-spill-cory-doctorow/ )

‘Spill’ (2024, 111 pgs.) is a contemporary cyberpunk novella set in the universe of Cory Doctorow's Little Brother series.

As a fan of the trilogy(1), I was delighted to have hacker-activist Marcus back, as well as protest organiser Tanisha, a character from ‘Attack Surface’ (2020), the third volume.

Over the course of the series, Marcus grows up - the first two volumes are aimed at young people, and in the third, he's already an adult. In ‘Spill’, in his spare time between freelancing as a digital security consultant, Marcus sets up a mighty personal server in a hacker friend's datacenter, which ironically ends up hacked and hijacked as a vector for ransomware attacks.

In a parallel story that intertwines, a civil disobedience movement protesting the fossil fuel corporations wreaking havoc in California is being accused of terrorism and cyber-attacks, suffering brutal violence and repression.

It's a page-turning thriller about activism, climate emergency and hacking, intelligently, engagingly and inspiringly reflecting the dystopia we're entering.

Read online: reactormag.com/spill-cory-doctorow/ Buy: torpublishinggroup.com/spill/

(1) In addition to the Little Brother Trilogy, there are three other smaller stories that I haven't read yet: Lawful Interpetion (2013), Force Multiplier (2020) and Vigilant (2024).

(em português, com links → sol2070.in/2024/10/utopia-ursula-le-guin-always-coming-home/ )

"Always Coming Home" (1985, 640 pgs.) is Ursula K. Le Guin's most ambitious novel, which took her five years to complete. The format is a collection of documents, illustrations and anthropological studies on the Kesh people, inhabitants of valleys in northern America thousands of years in the future. The complete edition was even accompanied by a cassette tape, as if they were recordings of Kesh songs and ceremonies.

In this future, the current civilisation was lost so long ago that it has been almost completely forgotten -- all that remains are sparse myths and legends about environmental catastrophes (the effects of which are still being felt) and self-annihilation.

The Kesh people are presented both through the reproduction of their own literature (biographies, novels, poetry...), art and religion (a kind of natural pantheism), and in the description of the elements of their culture by a visiting anthropologist. It is implied that the Kesh culture is exotic and isolated, compared to the people of this anthropologist narrator and the supposed readers of the study, who seem to have a sensibility not very different from ours.

As in the more harmonious societies of Le Guin's other stories, these people are free in the anarchist sense: there is no authority or hierarchy, but rather the self-organisation seen in nature itself. There is some high-tech here and there -- including AI -- but overall it's a fairly low-tech and natural society.

For those who appreciate the work of the visionary writer, it's a feast, as it describes in detail the most complete utopia she imagined.

The plot part is in the autobiography of a woman, whose name changes throughout her life, divided into three parts, in the chapters referred to as ‘Stone Telling’. The character is linked to an aggressive invading people, and her dramas revolve around her conflicting alliances. It's a gripping and grand story, spanning a lifetime, that can be read independently of the rest -- it takes up half the book.

The other parts of the book, on the other hand, greatly expand the understanding and appreciation by detailing the entire cultural context of this other world. There are things as minute -- but significant -- as, for example, the explanation of why the Kesh don't know the meaning of the word ‘pets’, using ‘commensal’ instead; or how the concept of ‘person’ is not restricted to humans.

I confess that I haven't read 100% of this extra material -- Ursula herself writes in the introduction that the appendices are optional. I followed Samuel R. Delany's (another acclaimed speculative fiction writer) tips on the essential parts of the book, which he commented on at the time of its release in 1985. An extract from his effusive review:

“Always Coming Home is a slow, rich read, full of what one loves most in her work: a liberal utopian vision, rendered far more complex than the term ‘utopian’ usually allows for by a sense of human suffering. This is her most satisfying text among a set of texts that have provided much imaginative pleasure in her 23 years as an author..”

For me, although it wasn't her most engaging book, it was the most fascinating and profound, requiring re-reading in order to be better absorbed.