The Hunger Games : Mockingjay
WARNING : This review may contain spoilers of the previous two Hunger Games novels
Following her unexpected exit from the Allstars Hunger Games arena, Katniss Everdeen finds herself a resident of District 13, a district widely believed to have been destroyed many years before. She comes under intense pressure to become "the Mockingjay" the public face of the rapidly gathering rebellion, but after agreeing, discovers deceptions, ulterior motives and dangers from unexpected sources.
Mockingjay is very different from the previous novels and was less compelling for me in it's opening third. District 13 has to be established as a new society in addition to the continuing rebellion, its a bit slow, and then later, a lot of warfare segments which I'm not a great fan of anyway. What is clever about the depiction of the District 13 rebellion is its emphasis on propaganda, war is less about action and more about persuasion, hearts and minds. I thought this was a really interesting and important message to give young readers to think about. When watching media coverage think about agenda, think about manipulation, think that those purporting to be "right" may not always be what they seem. I liked it.
Where I am more critical however is with some slightly dodgy plotting on a number of occasions in order to get Katniss into the necessary position for the next event. Its weak, its like some of the highly unconvincing plotting that occurs in those awful Disney TV series, Katniss wants something, it looks impossible, she's told its impossible, but somehow it all turns out exactly as she wanted. Sigh.
The Gale/Peeta dilemma interests me as a writer because I actually think that Collins herself couldn't decide what to do with this decision, she doesn't choose the easy way of eliminating the choice, but it is done in a quite lame, anti-climax way. I decided that she really regretted the strength of the origins of one of them and didn't know what to do with him, and even the end resolution for the couple who do become the item, though the right choice, feels unromantic and halfhearted.
Although, the "fault on both sides" take on war was well done. President Snow still fails to be at all threatening or scary. The pinnacle of Katniss's desires is to be the one to assassinate Snow and yet, he's only really in two scenes. He just doesn't cut as a bad guy, even with Finnick's testimony to add weight to his crimes.
Still.....very readable, if rather flawed and the trilogy as a whole is massively enjoyable 7/10
Wednesday, 19 October 2011
Friday, 14 October 2011
Book #87 The Hunger Games : Catching Fire by Suzanne Collins
The Hunger Games : Catching Fire
This review contains spoilers of The Hunger Games :
This sequel to The Hunger Games picks up more or less exactly where it left off. Following the choices she made at the end of the last novel Katniss Everdeen has unwittingly become a symbol, not of loves young dream, but of rebellion. Even though it wasn't so much a deliberate rebellion as an awareness she could outsmart the system, she has inspired an uprising and led her family and friends into danger.
Attempting to punish Katniss, the President makes the uprising worse when he forces her to compete in a second Hunger Games tournament, a battle pitting previous victors against one another in a series which reminded me of an "All Star" Amazing Race or Survivor.
Like its predecessor Catching Fire is compulsive and I read it over a matter of hours, it reads like adrenalin feels and you really do want to turn the page. Though it is called The Hunger Games it is less about the new tournament and more about the consequences of the previous one, and that was difficult for two reasons. 1) The Hunger Games game show is the best bit but 2) There is/would have been a danger of simply recycling the same story elements over again like a bad Hollywood sequel. Catching Fire doesn't do this, which is to its credit, but, personally I enjoy The Hunger Games scenario and found the competition angle a bit truncated, though I liked the creativity of the setting of the new arena. It's a tough balance to get right, on the one hand creative credit to Collins for not repeating herself on the other I wanted more....
In this novel, President Snow is presented as the antagonist both for this novel and the final novel Mockingjay, but, he himself, isn't really asserted as a proper villain, an evil man to be feared like for example, Mayor Prentiss from the Chaos Walking Trilogy. He's comparatively weak despite his threats and his intimations that he knows things and is watching. I didn't feel scared by him and didn't feel Katniss was either. He doesn't make a convincing 'big bad'. Even the Peacekeepers don't feel all that threatening. Though the Capitol has been playing The Hunger Games for decades it is hard to believe in it as a genuine sinister enemy when its citizens are so frivolous and weak and hard to see how it has maintained its hitherto lengthy hold on these Districts. I feel like this could have done with further exposition in the previous book as well as this one.
In addition the difficulty Collins has given herself with her Bella/Jacob/Edward esque love triangle (Twilight) with Katniss/Peeta/Gale is that Gale is given less time than even before to develop into a more rounded 3D character. It is Peeta who the reader has come to know and love despite the angle that Gale is meant to be Katniss's true love and best friend. Like the way in which Bella/Jacob doesn't quite work after establishing a romance with Edward, Katniss's love for Gale though he came first, has been outshone by Peeta's devotion in the original novel and continued self sacrifice in Catching Fire.
All in all an enjoyable 8/10 despite its inability to truly establish the feeling of "an enemy".
This review contains spoilers of The Hunger Games :
This sequel to The Hunger Games picks up more or less exactly where it left off. Following the choices she made at the end of the last novel Katniss Everdeen has unwittingly become a symbol, not of loves young dream, but of rebellion. Even though it wasn't so much a deliberate rebellion as an awareness she could outsmart the system, she has inspired an uprising and led her family and friends into danger.
Attempting to punish Katniss, the President makes the uprising worse when he forces her to compete in a second Hunger Games tournament, a battle pitting previous victors against one another in a series which reminded me of an "All Star" Amazing Race or Survivor.
Like its predecessor Catching Fire is compulsive and I read it over a matter of hours, it reads like adrenalin feels and you really do want to turn the page. Though it is called The Hunger Games it is less about the new tournament and more about the consequences of the previous one, and that was difficult for two reasons. 1) The Hunger Games game show is the best bit but 2) There is/would have been a danger of simply recycling the same story elements over again like a bad Hollywood sequel. Catching Fire doesn't do this, which is to its credit, but, personally I enjoy The Hunger Games scenario and found the competition angle a bit truncated, though I liked the creativity of the setting of the new arena. It's a tough balance to get right, on the one hand creative credit to Collins for not repeating herself on the other I wanted more....
In this novel, President Snow is presented as the antagonist both for this novel and the final novel Mockingjay, but, he himself, isn't really asserted as a proper villain, an evil man to be feared like for example, Mayor Prentiss from the Chaos Walking Trilogy. He's comparatively weak despite his threats and his intimations that he knows things and is watching. I didn't feel scared by him and didn't feel Katniss was either. He doesn't make a convincing 'big bad'. Even the Peacekeepers don't feel all that threatening. Though the Capitol has been playing The Hunger Games for decades it is hard to believe in it as a genuine sinister enemy when its citizens are so frivolous and weak and hard to see how it has maintained its hitherto lengthy hold on these Districts. I feel like this could have done with further exposition in the previous book as well as this one.
In addition the difficulty Collins has given herself with her Bella/Jacob/Edward esque love triangle (Twilight) with Katniss/Peeta/Gale is that Gale is given less time than even before to develop into a more rounded 3D character. It is Peeta who the reader has come to know and love despite the angle that Gale is meant to be Katniss's true love and best friend. Like the way in which Bella/Jacob doesn't quite work after establishing a romance with Edward, Katniss's love for Gale though he came first, has been outshone by Peeta's devotion in the original novel and continued self sacrifice in Catching Fire.
All in all an enjoyable 8/10 despite its inability to truly establish the feeling of "an enemy".
Thursday, 29 September 2011
Book #86 Snowdrops by AD Miller
Snowdrops
Snowdrops is the final novel on the Booker shortlist that I had left to read, although I have I believe around four of the longlist contenders yet to go. The story is told as a flashback Nick Platt is telling his girlfriend, possibly fiancee about the time he spent abroad working in Russia. The narrative reveals that this is something he has refused to open up about hitherto in their relationship, something bad happened to Nick Platt, but what?
Snowdrops is a portrait of modern post Cold War Russia, and it paints a Moscow rife with crime, of both the organized and small time variety. The new face of corrupt Russia we have begun to see in the West, where anything you want can be got at a price.
It is a relatively short novel, Nick collides with two sisters Masha and Katya after someone attempts to mug them on the underground. They are two vulnerable girls from a poor background trying to make it in the city, and Nick enters their world despite warnings from colleagues that it won't end well. There are MANY reviews on Amazon, saying that this book is not a thriller and shouldn't be on the Booker shortlist. For my part I didn't know it was meant to be a thriller so that's a none issue because I took it for what it was; somebody relating a life experience they had once had, competently done, interesting, enjoyable and attention holding.
I have no issue with its place on the shortlist, it takes as its time and place a modern feeling setting which hasn't been mined by many writers yet, unlike say, the Second World War about which many novels are written and so there is a freshness to it. If it were meant to be a thriller however, it should have told some events from Katya and Masha's perspective to achieve this. Instead it's again, like A Sense Of An Ending and Half Blood Blues the story of a man who got caught up in a situation and made a mistake. How odd that there are so many of them on the Booker list this year. It's a good novel of this year and if you spot it in a bookshop, I see no reason not to pick it up. In terms of the Booker however, it has nothing on Jamrach's Menagerie or A Sense Of An Ending, and if neither of those aforementioned novels win the prize, I shan't be very impressed. 8/10
Snowdrops is the final novel on the Booker shortlist that I had left to read, although I have I believe around four of the longlist contenders yet to go. The story is told as a flashback Nick Platt is telling his girlfriend, possibly fiancee about the time he spent abroad working in Russia. The narrative reveals that this is something he has refused to open up about hitherto in their relationship, something bad happened to Nick Platt, but what?
Snowdrops is a portrait of modern post Cold War Russia, and it paints a Moscow rife with crime, of both the organized and small time variety. The new face of corrupt Russia we have begun to see in the West, where anything you want can be got at a price.
It is a relatively short novel, Nick collides with two sisters Masha and Katya after someone attempts to mug them on the underground. They are two vulnerable girls from a poor background trying to make it in the city, and Nick enters their world despite warnings from colleagues that it won't end well. There are MANY reviews on Amazon, saying that this book is not a thriller and shouldn't be on the Booker shortlist. For my part I didn't know it was meant to be a thriller so that's a none issue because I took it for what it was; somebody relating a life experience they had once had, competently done, interesting, enjoyable and attention holding.
I have no issue with its place on the shortlist, it takes as its time and place a modern feeling setting which hasn't been mined by many writers yet, unlike say, the Second World War about which many novels are written and so there is a freshness to it. If it were meant to be a thriller however, it should have told some events from Katya and Masha's perspective to achieve this. Instead it's again, like A Sense Of An Ending and Half Blood Blues the story of a man who got caught up in a situation and made a mistake. How odd that there are so many of them on the Booker list this year. It's a good novel of this year and if you spot it in a bookshop, I see no reason not to pick it up. In terms of the Booker however, it has nothing on Jamrach's Menagerie or A Sense Of An Ending, and if neither of those aforementioned novels win the prize, I shan't be very impressed. 8/10
Book #85 The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins
The Hunger Games
To give a brief synopsis The Hunger Games takes place in a dystopian future in what I understood to be the Appalachian regions of America. At some point in the past twelve Districts started a rebellion against the Capital, and as punishment they now participate in a yearly "reaping" in which two adolescents from each district are randomly selected to participate in The Hunger Games, a Big Brother type reality TV series which it is compulsory to watch. It's not a popularity contest though, the object of the games is to kill all other opponents and emerge the victor.When her little sister is selected against the odds, Katniss Everdeen volunteers to take her place.
I'll start with what's right about The Hunger Games, it is an utterly compelling, riveting novel. I started the thing at 6PM last night, I finished it at 22.41 exactly. I couldn't tear myself away from it, I'm pretty certain I didn't even go to the toilet. Katniss Everdeen makes a great hero and other characters like Rue, Peeta and even Foxface are intriguing in their own right. It is easy to see why Jennifer Lawrence was picked to play Katniss in the forthcoming film. In the early portion of the novel the life of Katniss echoes that of Ree Dolly in Winters Bone, a part which Lawrence played so successfully. One advantage of reading the novel with Lawrence in mind means that when the film is released this March, the character of Katniss won't look "wrong" as opposed to the picture in my minds eye. Once she leaves District 12 however, Lawrence as Katniss has an opportunity to play a new and interesting part.
The Reality TV aspect of things is really interesting. In the Capitol this show isn't about poverty stricken children murdering one another to win food for their area. It's entertainment. With some of the things that get put on television in 2011, I did wonder how many years we have to go before something like this happens. I really enjoyed this novel which was suspenseful and thrilling throughout, it will make an excellent film, if they do it "right". The teaser trailer for The Hunger Games is here
But, The Hunger Games has a problem, and that problem is the 1999 Japanese novel Battle Royale by Koushun Takami which was later made into an extremely successful film in 2000 by Kinji Fukasaku. Battle Royale takes place in a totalitarian dystopian Japan, in which high school children are sent into a forest with one objective, kill each other and be the last one standing. I've seen the film but I've not read the book. The essential difference between the two is that The Hunger Games is a reality TV show and Battle Royale is a military research program and is not televised but the purpose is the same it is "a means of terrorizing the population, of creating such paranoia as to make organized insurgency impossible".
Though the run up to the start of the Games, and the section at the end of the novel differ entirely from Battle Royale; the competition, which takes place in the forest, is extremely similar with only very minor differences. It is so similar as to make me wonder whether Takami should sue Collins. It is entirely possible of course that neither Collins nor her publisher had seen or heard of Battle Royale, and the entire thing is a massive coincidence. Which would be a damn shame for Collins because a) It would be terrible to find out that you thought you had this great original idea but someone beat you to it and b) You could never plausibly prove that you hadn't seen Battle Royale prior to your book being published.
On my Twitter feed last night I put something like Hunger Games. GENIUS. But I didn't really mean that it terms of originality, I meant it as a reading experience. It just sucks you in so completely, it is a page turner in the truest sense of the expression. I described it to someone as "like reading Battle Royale as a book" before I was even aware Battle Royale was based upon a book, so this is another reason why Takami should potentially sue. It makes me wonder whether he is aware of The Hunger Games, but if he isn't he very soon will be. Some people have said The Hunger Games is "Battle Royale for kids" but I'm 30 and found it actually equally violent in parts, this is an example of a "teen novel" that actually crosses over into "universal appeal" if you can forgive its one big problem that is. My guess is that most Battle Royale fans won't.
For originality 5/10
For actual reading enjoyment 9.5/10
To give a brief synopsis The Hunger Games takes place in a dystopian future in what I understood to be the Appalachian regions of America. At some point in the past twelve Districts started a rebellion against the Capital, and as punishment they now participate in a yearly "reaping" in which two adolescents from each district are randomly selected to participate in The Hunger Games, a Big Brother type reality TV series which it is compulsory to watch. It's not a popularity contest though, the object of the games is to kill all other opponents and emerge the victor.When her little sister is selected against the odds, Katniss Everdeen volunteers to take her place.
I'll start with what's right about The Hunger Games, it is an utterly compelling, riveting novel. I started the thing at 6PM last night, I finished it at 22.41 exactly. I couldn't tear myself away from it, I'm pretty certain I didn't even go to the toilet. Katniss Everdeen makes a great hero and other characters like Rue, Peeta and even Foxface are intriguing in their own right. It is easy to see why Jennifer Lawrence was picked to play Katniss in the forthcoming film. In the early portion of the novel the life of Katniss echoes that of Ree Dolly in Winters Bone, a part which Lawrence played so successfully. One advantage of reading the novel with Lawrence in mind means that when the film is released this March, the character of Katniss won't look "wrong" as opposed to the picture in my minds eye. Once she leaves District 12 however, Lawrence as Katniss has an opportunity to play a new and interesting part.
The Reality TV aspect of things is really interesting. In the Capitol this show isn't about poverty stricken children murdering one another to win food for their area. It's entertainment. With some of the things that get put on television in 2011, I did wonder how many years we have to go before something like this happens. I really enjoyed this novel which was suspenseful and thrilling throughout, it will make an excellent film, if they do it "right". The teaser trailer for The Hunger Games is here
But, The Hunger Games has a problem, and that problem is the 1999 Japanese novel Battle Royale by Koushun Takami which was later made into an extremely successful film in 2000 by Kinji Fukasaku. Battle Royale takes place in a totalitarian dystopian Japan, in which high school children are sent into a forest with one objective, kill each other and be the last one standing. I've seen the film but I've not read the book. The essential difference between the two is that The Hunger Games is a reality TV show and Battle Royale is a military research program and is not televised but the purpose is the same it is "a means of terrorizing the population, of creating such paranoia as to make organized insurgency impossible".
Though the run up to the start of the Games, and the section at the end of the novel differ entirely from Battle Royale; the competition, which takes place in the forest, is extremely similar with only very minor differences. It is so similar as to make me wonder whether Takami should sue Collins. It is entirely possible of course that neither Collins nor her publisher had seen or heard of Battle Royale, and the entire thing is a massive coincidence. Which would be a damn shame for Collins because a) It would be terrible to find out that you thought you had this great original idea but someone beat you to it and b) You could never plausibly prove that you hadn't seen Battle Royale prior to your book being published.
On my Twitter feed last night I put something like Hunger Games. GENIUS. But I didn't really mean that it terms of originality, I meant it as a reading experience. It just sucks you in so completely, it is a page turner in the truest sense of the expression. I described it to someone as "like reading Battle Royale as a book" before I was even aware Battle Royale was based upon a book, so this is another reason why Takami should potentially sue. It makes me wonder whether he is aware of The Hunger Games, but if he isn't he very soon will be. Some people have said The Hunger Games is "Battle Royale for kids" but I'm 30 and found it actually equally violent in parts, this is an example of a "teen novel" that actually crosses over into "universal appeal" if you can forgive its one big problem that is. My guess is that most Battle Royale fans won't.
For originality 5/10
For actual reading enjoyment 9.5/10
Monday, 26 September 2011
Book #84 Half Blood Blues by Esi Edugyan
Half Blood Blues
The second to last of the Booker shortlist I had yet to read; Esi Edugyan's Half Blood Blues is a story of of a group of jazz musicians and their associates in the 1990's and during their heyday in wartime Europe.
In Paris, 1941 Sidney Griffiths goes to buy cigarettes and have a glass of milk with fellow musician Hieronymus Falk, who is considered to be a musical genius. Problem is, Falk is black and when Sidney steps out to the toilet Falk is arrested by Nazi soldiers, he is deported and never seen again.
Flashforward some 50 years and Sidney Griffiths and childhood friend and fellow musician Chip Jones are old and enjoy something of a 'Buena Vista Social Club' style status. Jones persuades Sid, who lives quietly in Baltimore to attend a conference in Berlin celebrating Falk. Once there, he publicly accuses Sid of being to blame for what happened to Falk. But is he right?
I think my main problem with Half Blood Blues is that I struggled to engage with the characters, any of them, and whilst I saw merit in it, it wasn't really my cup of tea. The ending is also a bit quick, and a bit weak. The writing there could have used a strong flourish, an important closing statement, but it falls flat.
This is a short review because I can't think of many aspects I want to delve in and discuss. This book has strong reviews on Amazon but I'm afraid it just wasn't my scene. It may be to other peoples taste however
Oddly though, it is another story about making a selfish choice or mistake that then had massive repercussions for all those involved which has proved to be something of a theme for the Booker this year, alongside A Sense Of An Ending and A Cupboard Full Of Coats. This book has nothing on The Stranger's Child really, and I would have preferred to have seen that on the shortlist and not this. 6/10
The second to last of the Booker shortlist I had yet to read; Esi Edugyan's Half Blood Blues is a story of of a group of jazz musicians and their associates in the 1990's and during their heyday in wartime Europe.
In Paris, 1941 Sidney Griffiths goes to buy cigarettes and have a glass of milk with fellow musician Hieronymus Falk, who is considered to be a musical genius. Problem is, Falk is black and when Sidney steps out to the toilet Falk is arrested by Nazi soldiers, he is deported and never seen again.
Flashforward some 50 years and Sidney Griffiths and childhood friend and fellow musician Chip Jones are old and enjoy something of a 'Buena Vista Social Club' style status. Jones persuades Sid, who lives quietly in Baltimore to attend a conference in Berlin celebrating Falk. Once there, he publicly accuses Sid of being to blame for what happened to Falk. But is he right?
I think my main problem with Half Blood Blues is that I struggled to engage with the characters, any of them, and whilst I saw merit in it, it wasn't really my cup of tea. The ending is also a bit quick, and a bit weak. The writing there could have used a strong flourish, an important closing statement, but it falls flat.
This is a short review because I can't think of many aspects I want to delve in and discuss. This book has strong reviews on Amazon but I'm afraid it just wasn't my scene. It may be to other peoples taste however
Oddly though, it is another story about making a selfish choice or mistake that then had massive repercussions for all those involved which has proved to be something of a theme for the Booker this year, alongside A Sense Of An Ending and A Cupboard Full Of Coats. This book has nothing on The Stranger's Child really, and I would have preferred to have seen that on the shortlist and not this. 6/10
Sunday, 25 September 2011
Book #83 World War Z by Max Brooks
World War Z
What's that you say?? A Zombie Apocalypse novel you say?? A Zombie Apocalypse novel currently being turned into a movie starring Brad Pitt indeed?? Why, Waterstones, I really don't mind if I do.......
I think those people who know me well and who know the stuff I read in both this year and in other years are probably amused and possibly bemused by my guilty pleasure and attraction to this sort of "trashy novel" but one can't read Booker winners all the time. In any case World War Z isn't trashy, far from it. It takes its subject matter very seriously in fact it does not acknowledge its classification as a fiction. This is a historical document, a retrospective, an eyewitness account from those who survived!
I love the fact that the blurb of the novel backs this stance up with the following description of the author :
Max Brooks lives in New York City but is prepared to move to a more remote and defensible location at a moment's notice
It really adds something to the book, the seriousness, this book isn't tongue in cheek or playing for laughs. It takes as its premise that in the recent past humans actually fought for global survival against zombies, and that World War Z isn't quite over yet.
It is constructed entirely through interviews "conducted by Max Brooks" in various parts of the globe chronicling the build up to and commencement of the war. Naturally Brooks begins in China, because this is where the first breakout was recorded, with a doctor who has been called to a remote village and does not know what to make of what he finds there. A boy who was swimming in deep water has been infected with something, he has bitten several other villagers who now show signs of this infection. Though the government tries to hush it up, the contagion spreads. The problem becomes global when as refugees stream out of China trying to escape several take the infection with them, believing that the West will have a solution. As soon as the human becomes zombie they are then an immediate threat to all surrounding humans, and the only way to kill them is a bullet or an axe to the head, so as their population grows, the human population shrinks. As opposed to focusing on a small band of humans who we get to know by name and are all in the same location, Brooks jumps from location to location and interviewee to interviewee, one moment he's in China, the next India or Russia although the USA gets a lot of attention. By doing this he succeeds in creating the portrait of a global problem and of building haunting images of nightmarish scenarios from the families trapped in traffic jams as Zombies attack them, to the celebrities who find that celebrity is meaningless now, to the Indian man who swims for his life to a boat, and watches other boats become floating vessels of the undead. Terrifying, new underpants terrifying.
One of my favourite aspects of this novel was the way in which set in a post Zombie future the global political and sociological landscape has changed. Palestine is now a nation state. Cuba, which largely survived unscathed, a wealthy envied nation. Although a Zombie Apocalypse is unlikely, the Chinese outbreak in the novel is compared to the recent SARS and Avian flu, without involving zombies a pandemic of this kind COULD cause a global panic on this scale. Its not entirely implausible, and when at one moment I found myself reading it as if it were non fiction, part of me had to laugh at myself and part of me considered the possibilities.
Were I liked the book less was in the amount of military strategy and soldier stories when war has broken out, I much preferred the stories of ordinary people trying to survive. But I think the average player of Call Of Duty or Dead Island style video games would enjoy this aspect.
I feel, however that this novel based on its interview form, is virtually unfilmable in terms of "doing it justice". Though Brad Pitt and Mirelle Enos have been charging round Cornwall and Glasgow, this isn't a character novel, its a jigsaw novel with no focus on any person or country. My fear is that World War Z the movie will unlike this clever novel, become your average Hollywood shoot em up, without originality and with leads who are paint-by-numbers characters you find in any action film. Brad Pitt, for the most part shows more savvy than that when choosing scripts, so I hope not, but it could be that he was just looking for some straightforward Zombie slaying action. Well, who wouldn't given the chance? I know I'd be up for it. 8/10
What's that you say?? A Zombie Apocalypse novel you say?? A Zombie Apocalypse novel currently being turned into a movie starring Brad Pitt indeed?? Why, Waterstones, I really don't mind if I do.......
I think those people who know me well and who know the stuff I read in both this year and in other years are probably amused and possibly bemused by my guilty pleasure and attraction to this sort of "trashy novel" but one can't read Booker winners all the time. In any case World War Z isn't trashy, far from it. It takes its subject matter very seriously in fact it does not acknowledge its classification as a fiction. This is a historical document, a retrospective, an eyewitness account from those who survived!
I love the fact that the blurb of the novel backs this stance up with the following description of the author :
Max Brooks lives in New York City but is prepared to move to a more remote and defensible location at a moment's notice
It really adds something to the book, the seriousness, this book isn't tongue in cheek or playing for laughs. It takes as its premise that in the recent past humans actually fought for global survival against zombies, and that World War Z isn't quite over yet.
It is constructed entirely through interviews "conducted by Max Brooks" in various parts of the globe chronicling the build up to and commencement of the war. Naturally Brooks begins in China, because this is where the first breakout was recorded, with a doctor who has been called to a remote village and does not know what to make of what he finds there. A boy who was swimming in deep water has been infected with something, he has bitten several other villagers who now show signs of this infection. Though the government tries to hush it up, the contagion spreads. The problem becomes global when as refugees stream out of China trying to escape several take the infection with them, believing that the West will have a solution. As soon as the human becomes zombie they are then an immediate threat to all surrounding humans, and the only way to kill them is a bullet or an axe to the head, so as their population grows, the human population shrinks. As opposed to focusing on a small band of humans who we get to know by name and are all in the same location, Brooks jumps from location to location and interviewee to interviewee, one moment he's in China, the next India or Russia although the USA gets a lot of attention. By doing this he succeeds in creating the portrait of a global problem and of building haunting images of nightmarish scenarios from the families trapped in traffic jams as Zombies attack them, to the celebrities who find that celebrity is meaningless now, to the Indian man who swims for his life to a boat, and watches other boats become floating vessels of the undead. Terrifying, new underpants terrifying.
One of my favourite aspects of this novel was the way in which set in a post Zombie future the global political and sociological landscape has changed. Palestine is now a nation state. Cuba, which largely survived unscathed, a wealthy envied nation. Although a Zombie Apocalypse is unlikely, the Chinese outbreak in the novel is compared to the recent SARS and Avian flu, without involving zombies a pandemic of this kind COULD cause a global panic on this scale. Its not entirely implausible, and when at one moment I found myself reading it as if it were non fiction, part of me had to laugh at myself and part of me considered the possibilities.
Were I liked the book less was in the amount of military strategy and soldier stories when war has broken out, I much preferred the stories of ordinary people trying to survive. But I think the average player of Call Of Duty or Dead Island style video games would enjoy this aspect.
I feel, however that this novel based on its interview form, is virtually unfilmable in terms of "doing it justice". Though Brad Pitt and Mirelle Enos have been charging round Cornwall and Glasgow, this isn't a character novel, its a jigsaw novel with no focus on any person or country. My fear is that World War Z the movie will unlike this clever novel, become your average Hollywood shoot em up, without originality and with leads who are paint-by-numbers characters you find in any action film. Brad Pitt, for the most part shows more savvy than that when choosing scripts, so I hope not, but it could be that he was just looking for some straightforward Zombie slaying action. Well, who wouldn't given the chance? I know I'd be up for it. 8/10
Sunday, 18 September 2011
Poem #6 I started early, took my dog by Emily Dickinson
September's Poem of the month given its link to the Atkinson novel
I started Early—Took my Dog—
And visited the Sea—
The Mermaids in the Basement
Came out to look at me—
And Frigates—in the Upper Floor
Extended Hempen Hands—
Presuming Me to be a Mouse—
Aground—upon the Sands—
But no Man moved Me—till the Tide
Went past my simple Shoe—
And past my Apron—and my Belt
And past my Bodice—too—
And made as He would eat me up—
As wholly as a Dew
Upon a Dandelion’s Sleeve—
And then—I started—too—
And He—He followed—close behind—
I felt His Silver Heel
Upon my Ankle—Then my Shoes
Would overflow with Pearl—
Until We met the Solid Town—
No One He seemed to know—
And bowing—with a Mighty look—
At me—The Sea withdrew—
I started Early—Took my Dog—
And visited the Sea—
The Mermaids in the Basement
Came out to look at me—
And Frigates—in the Upper Floor
Extended Hempen Hands—
Presuming Me to be a Mouse—
Aground—upon the Sands—
But no Man moved Me—till the Tide
Went past my simple Shoe—
And past my Apron—and my Belt
And past my Bodice—too—
And made as He would eat me up—
As wholly as a Dew
Upon a Dandelion’s Sleeve—
And then—I started—too—
And He—He followed—close behind—
I felt His Silver Heel
Upon my Ankle—Then my Shoes
Would overflow with Pearl—
Until We met the Solid Town—
No One He seemed to know—
And bowing—with a Mighty look—
At me—The Sea withdrew—
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