Bull, Emma - Bone Dance

I ended up getting a good two-thirds of the way through this book before realizing that I had absolutely no idea what was going on and who all these characters were. It made a lot more sense the second time round. I figure reading things on five hours of sleep generally doesn't lead to greater comprehension.

The book takes place in post-nuclear-holocaust America -- sometime in the distant past, the US government developed mind control weapons. The Horsemen are humans who can somehow hijack another person's mind and knowledge (they call this "riding" a person, though I think that sounds very sketchy ^_~), and one of them or a group of them pushed the button that set off the nukes down in South America. Sparrow, the protagonist, is a trader dealing in pre-war videos and CDs and other assorted media, and one of the things I like about the world is this sense of something lost.

No one reads the old books anymore in this world, because no one has access to them. The man controlling the city Sparrow lives in controls not only the source of electricity and power, but also knowledge.

The book felt very noirish to me -- something in Sparrow's cynicism and the harsh lives of the other characters, along with the feeling that so much was happening underground, outside of the eyes of the law. But like much noir, I didn't feel very connected to the characters, and because of that, I don't think the ending quite worked for me. Bull doesn't take the usual noir ending (if I am reading this correctly as noir, which is questionable) of darkness and despair and increasingly grey morality; instead, Sparrow doesn't stay disconnected from the world, and much of the plot hinges on this point. Anti-noir? Not sure. But not enough of an anti-noir to make me care about the characters, some of whom felt a little cardboard at times. I also couldn't really understand why so many people ended up allying themselves with Sparrow, given that Sparrow is really not the nicest of people in the beginning.

Plus, I liked Frances a great deal and was sad that she wasn't in more of the book.

I'm still glad I got it, because it's a very different sort of book than I usually read, but I'm not quite sure if I liked it or not.

Norwescon: Day 2

In which I attend my first panel and drop much money on loot

I woke up late. This turns out to be the case for most of the con.

I sort of stumbled into the first panel, half worried I'd be late.

( How Do You Name Your Characters? )

After this panel, I basically followed McKillip to her reading, which was next, and felt like a complete stalker because I was a few meters behind her. I was also trying not to walk to fast so I'd bump into her and not too slowly so that I'd lose her, because I had absolutely no idea where the reading would be. But yeah, I felt very stalkery. We all sort of milled around the door of the room since it didn't seem like the people ahead were finished, and I actually said something to McKillip. It was weird and my brain did not implode.

( Patricia McKillip Reading )

The reading ended early, so I headed off to see the end of Yoon's first panel, "Too Many Ideas," but to be honest, I couldn't really tell what was going on in the last ten minutes from the back of the room. Then we hied ourselves to lunch, and I finally got a chance to dose myself with caffeine and really wake up. Then while Yoon went off to go critiquing or some such, I wandered down to the dealer's room. Truly, it is evil!

( Dealer's room loot )

( Pitfalls of Language Creation )

( The Art of Renaissance Swordplay )

After this was more food gettage at the hotel, and then I showed off my loot and collapsed for a bit. Then I went off to a panel on Plagues and Pestilences, which I don't remember at all, except that it was rather scary. After that was a much appreciated break from panels and watching Fullmetal Alchemist eps. 1-4 in the hotel room and then a collapse into bed.