The books of 2004

1. Light - M. John Harrison

This is a dense one. Maybe it's not as complicated as I felt, but when I read it there was to books in my mind. Somehow I had a sf novel of some complexity and at the same time a realistic novel about a very disturbed man. A Man that hallucinated and happened upon things that felt more like symbolic encounters of his own sick psyche than sf troupes. At the same time is wasn't. Maybe it's just be but I felt Harrison couldn't decide if he was writing sf or a "serious" novel. In my mind they didn't gel.

2. Skugga över Mars (Shadow Over Mars) - Leigh Bracket

Adventure fiction of old. It felt less fabulous than I expected. Maybe they needed less gilden trappings of exoticity than I crave. A determined man makes a revolt on Mars. Nothing special.

3. Stories of your Life - Ted Chiang

Short stories are nice. Short, and self contained they often are the most difficult to write well. Chiang is one of those whom everyone heap praise and I must say he is good. But, there must always be a 'but', mustn't there? I felt that his stories are sometimes so polished and elegant that I didn't felt emotionally engaged at the deeper level. He is smart, slick and very good but there was a spirit lacking in some of the stories. Those that I did like, I did like a lot on the other hand! He is a name to watch, and I will definitely read more of his stories, given the chance.

4. Saga of Seven Suns: Hidden Empire - Kevin J. Anderson

I have had 'reader's block' this year. When Leigh Bracket couldn't help me I instead turned to more modern adventure fiction. Anderson is a former Star Wars author so I expected nothing much but good, roaring adventure without much litterary ambition. I can't say I was dissapointed. It's colourful and simple. The only thing that is a bit annoying is he writes as if it were a tv serial. In each and every scene we are reminded on who each and everyone is! I think the audience Mr. Anderson is writing for is if not dull at least not very used to reading books with more depth to the plot than telly soaps. Now, this is not bad if you just want entertainment were the protagonists blow up suns (yeah, they do that in the first chapter of "Hidden Empire"...) and such stunning special effects. It was just what I needed to get some "flow" and really page-turn again.

5. Last Call - Tim Powers

Shuffle up and deal! This is Vegas, Powers style. I have long wanted to read something by Tim Powers and at last I did. His mix of conspiracy, myth and urban fantasy was spectacular. I kind of understand why he has a dedicated following. A whacko story about the Fisher King in the Nevada desert and about how to manipulate reality by playing cards. Since poker seems to have become something everyone does these days I guess it was just right for me to read this book now, having started to play some myself. It was a novel with many new and fresh uses of urban myths and and other powerful symbols woven together. I kind of figures Powers like Jung... It also made me finally buy the RPG "Unknown Armies" som it was an expensive book. But I don't mind. I'll read more Powers, that's for sure.

6. Saga of Seven Suns: Forest of Stars - Kevin J. Anderson

More space adventure. More mysterious aliens from the depth of gas giants. More telepathic trees. More space battles. More intrigue at court and devious schemes. More fun without the brainhurt. I think I'm beginning to get out of my block.

7. Fornnordisk Mytologi enligt eddans lärdomsdikter (Old Norse Mythology according to the older edda [my translation]) - Lars Magnar Enoksen

I had a brush with norse mythology playing D&D, and I happened upon this book in a book store. Since I like the old poems of life wisdom and creation myths I felt I had to read this. Some things I had forgotten were here placed in their proper places again. I also learned something new about our forefathers faith and view of life. It's really basically a longer essay based upon a saga when Odin travels to meet the wisest of the giants and their talk of how things became. Since Enoksen talks about every line in the poem and a lot about Odin you get a very good view of older times in Scandinavia. Interesting.

8. Flicker - Theodore Roszak

Now, this is a scary book! It's not horror as such, but it is still very unsettling. Let's just say that is's the secret history of film. You get some really nice doses of film history in this novel, since it starts in 1950 something and ends something like 20-30 years later. I liked that and actually started to read about the history of film and cinema in the process. As far as the plot is concerned I can only say it is well crafted. Some scenes are really positioned for maximum emotional effect and there is some gruesome stuff in this book. I know one thing now, I understand why the word "heretic" was coined and I don't like them one tiny bit. Fanatics scare me, even more those in with power.

9. Absolution Gap - Alastair Reynolds

So it's finally time for the end. The far reaching effects of what started in "Redemption Space" hits the shore. Some demolishing occurs. This is space opera in the grand sense. The fate of humanity is on the line and the spaceships are not only more than a kilometer long, they also pack weapons that can make planets dissapear. Me like. Actually planets do dissapear in this novel. A gas giant dissapears for a short fraction of a second and a dying man with a ideological virus in his veins starts a church. Gigantic cathedrals march across the face of an icy moon and during that time a few good men and women evacuate a planet where the oceans are filled with an alien life form, while other machine-aliens in the space above try to eradicate them all for being alive and sentient. The weapons are terrible and the sacrifices the protaginists have to do while just trying to keep alive are moving. Reynolds write well, and his language evokes the poetry of stark, cold space and the tiny speck in the infinite universe that are human lives. I have friends who think he writes a contrived and stilted prose, but I really don't see it. He has imaginative ideas and some quite memorable characters that the story hinge on. To bad the series is ended. I do hope he writes more books. It will be interesting to see if he can write as well outside the setting that made him a novelist.

10. Elvis - Bobbie Ann Mason

Sometimes people ask me what's so fascinating about Elvis. They think his music and life is just outrageous suits with capes and Las Vegas shows with middle aged ladies watching. Sure that's part of the saga, but it's also so much more. His life and his career is a modern American myth, a legend larger than life and all that's grand and rotten about America rolled into one man's life. He is the American dream inpersonated. Now, he started his life dirt poor and all he ever wanted was to sing, be something bigger and better. This book is just one of the books about Elvis that I've read, and it showed very clear how Elvis all his life was a very shy person that never felt he fit in with the fancy and posh people. Much of his later life was a mess, but it's understandable if you see him as one poor Memphis boy who very attached to his mother had gotten lost in a life to glamorous for him. A good book, that showed some interesting human sides in a sad life.

11. The Crying of Lot 49 - Thomas Pynchon

This man Pynchon is a well known character, known for his style and his qualities as a writer. It sure was well done, but it wasn't very interesting. While at times it felt like a jolly fare on a merrygoround, it sometimes felt it was just so much style it drowned. I almost felt Pynchon to be too smart for the book to be any fun. It rambled and never fulfilled any of the promises shown in the beginning. It was as if he tried to write like Umberto Eco or Robert A Wilson, to be academic and stylish while at the same time trying to be whacko. It felt like a David Lynch film which didn't work. I wanted to like this one. Maybe some other time, I'm not an easy reader to please right now.

12. Hackers - Steven Levy

This is one book I have been meaning to read for a long time. I've been interested in the early hackers since I began fooling around with computers. The railroad club, and the homebrewed computer club is things which I've both heard about and read about. Some of the persons in the book are really colourful. Greenblatt, Williams and Wozniak are just a few. And curiously enough, this book somehow made it clear to me why RMS is considered so extreme and annoying by some. The early history of hackers is the history of some really odd characters! More than ever after reading this book do I want to have a computer system myself that's community built like the ITS once was. One can always dream. Interesting book, and it shows that many of the classics of hackerism are very much shaped by outside forces. Today when everyone have a computer it's not that important anymore to wit up at night to get a timeslice at the big computer that stays idle only during the night. An interesting perspective on my own ideas and ideology which in no small way are shaped by hacker history. Good book.

13. Flow my Tears, the Policeman Said - Philip K. Dick

What's this? A PKD book that's comprehensible all way through, and no odd side plots and peculiarities? If it wan't soo fun, imaginative and just plain entertaining I might be tempted to say that this almost was to easy for being a PKD novel. Great read!

14. All the Traps of Earth - Clifford D. Simak

Since I at the time have a case of reader's block, I'm trying to read stuff that I know I'll like. Thus I thought a few short stories of my old favourite Simak might be fun to slip in between longer works. It was some really good stories in this one. All the Traps of Earth is a story about the most Simak'ian things of all, robots. A robot goes beyond and learns more about his place in the universe. Good. Good Night, Mr. James was interesting. It was almost more "dickian" than the Dick novel I read recently. How do you know you are for real. Kind of spooky. Very good. The Sitters really was something! This was a grand reminder of why I used to love Simak's stories. A vision of greatness, and of cosmic vistas while at the same a very human story about an old man. Aliens visit us and they look so harmless we don't even understand what they are all about. Most excellent. Installment Plan on the other hand is a typical old school yarn, complete with a twister ending how to outwit the problem and solve the dilemma presented. A story about how space trading and colonisation might be harder than we think. Fun. Condition of Employment is once again a twister yarn. A bleaker story about the little man of the future and his working day. Not great, but with the elegant and dry intensity of emotion that Simak manages to show with his polished prose, this one is a winner. Good.

15. The Guns of Avalon - Roger Zelazny

I thought that reading something easy would help me trhough my reader's block. I really don't know why, but for some reason I always felt that the first Amber novel, while fun and a good read, was kind of sluggish book. I skipped it this time and read the sequels instead. They were just a fun as everyone say they are. Sometimes they feel a bit odd when the action slow down and the characters all sit down and summarize what they know and what has happened. It plays havoc with the pacing, and it sure isn't good litterary style, but it works. Perhaps it would have worked better if Zelazny had written fewer books, but a bit thicker. Now most of them only have one "problem" and its solution, plus the exposition on how Corwin knew who did what. Whatever. They were fun to read and now I'm ready to take on some meatier stuff.

16. Sign of the Unicorn - Roger Zelazny

This one has some major shadow walking and a good fantastic feek to it.

17. The Hand of Oberon - Roger Zelazny

This one ends with quite a nice surprise. Good work, I didn't see it coming.

18. The Courts of Chaos - Roger Zelazny

Now, why do I think of "Stormbringer" by Michael Moorcock here? This one is a bit slow sometimes and the end doesn't have the punch of "Stormbringer". Maybe it's unfair to even compare them, but it felt very natural. After this I feel I have read what Amber books I care for. Time for something new.

19. Pollen - Jeff Noon

Not as rip-roaring gorgeous a joyride as Vurt, but still good. In the end it felt more prosaic, and you read until the very end more to drink fully from the plot than to savour the telling. Maybe I'd satisfied and no longer hungry for the gonzo world of dogs, dreams and Manchester. I wonder how his other books are?

20. Fevre Dream - George R. R. Martin

How splendid it is, all white, blue and silver with towering stacks, billowing black clouds of smoke and the boilers burning red. The most beautiful steamer on the Missisippi - Fevre Dream. Amongst the shadows of the night a pale man walks down the boatyard to look at this dream come true. His companion grunting and waving his big hickory stick around. It's colourful, it's the deep south during the 1857 and it's all about a language of colour and steam. Long have it been since I read such a marvelous a story with passion and feeling. That man Martin can write! Nothing beats the combined glory of vampires, steamboats and vivid pictures from ages past. If more writers of vampire stories were this good at writing about bygone times and not so damned busy describing the poor old blooddrinkers, I think the genre would be much more readable. This is a gem.

21. Timescape - Gregory Benford

This might be a fairly interesting story all things considered, there are a plot in there somewhere that I sometimes cared about.Too bad Benford had to drown it in boring and annoying details of the miserable personal lives of the scientists he describe. Not all protaginists have to be larger than life, but they have to be more than grumpy old farts. Don't get me started on that swaggering suit that's such a parody of upper class public school rottenness! Bloody boring, I say.

22. Agent of the Terran Empire - Poul Anderson

This is adventure! James Bond in space, with devious schemes and galatic empires plotting against each other. Dominic Flandry is not a great tragic hero, he is the vehicle for a tale of adventure. It's enough. Often "old school" sf authors write terrible, but Anderson's prose is not all that bad. Sure, it's not the exquisite artful prose of George R.R. Martin, but that wouldn't fit this book. In a year when I had big troubles finishing books, this was a good way to end the year. I crave more of Dominic Flandry.