The Mirage: A Novel (original 2012; edition 2012)

Matt Ruff's novels have always surprised me, and this one did, too. At first, I was strongly reminded of Michael Chabon's "The Yiddish Policeman's Union" because of the Muslim detectives and the alternate history of the world of the novel. Ruff leads in ways a little deeper and stranger than a thriller or mystery, although this novel can be described as both. Really, what he has written is a kind of alternate apocalyptic story. And, it's a great read! ( )

Honestly, I'm still not sure what to say about this one. There is some unbelievably awkward plotting here, and a whole bunch of Ruff having fun with his reverse world alt-9/11 premise at the expense of the audience's eye-rolling abilities, but it's still a weirdly compelling little thriller at the bottom. Could have been treated a whole lot deftly, I think, but it's still an interesting bit of world-building. I liked it more than I thought I would, less than I wish I could have. ( )

This is THE BOOK to read this year.

Matt Ruff's newest triumph of speculative fiction is the kind of story to keep you up late and make you sleep through meetings (trust me on this). In Ruff's inverted world, it was American Christian fundamentalists who perpetrated a terror attack on the United Arab States superpower on 11/9/2001, and now Homeland Security Agent Mustafa al Baghdadi is working to bring down a Christian terror ring. His targets begin to shift when a captured terrorist claims that the world they live in is just a mirage, an inversion of the real world in which America is the superpower and Muslim extremists the terrorists. A stunning piece of work, Mirage is sure to be the book to break Ruff from cult-status genius to national treasure. ( )

originally appeared on: Bookshelf Confessions

I’m not so sure what to think of the book ---The book make me feel like I was about to read something unforgivable - It also almost turned me away because of its premise, but because Matt Ruff is really famous for BAD MONKEYS , I took the risk. It also makes me laugh in a way, that it’s really a twist.. there are: the UAS (United Arab States) instead of US, ABI (Arab Bureau of Investigation) instead of FBI, 11/9 instead of 9/11.. there are a lot more. And I wasn’t disappointed; I was in awe of how good that twist is, that I was actually beginning to think the world he created might be possible!

Matt Ruff has created his own story out of history. I wouldn’t go more into the plot, but I assure you, it will keep you on edge--- thinking what would happen next. I was up all night reading and contemplating the events unfolding in front of me. At first it’s hard to get into the story, because the book is an alternate reality..it would really take some time for a reader, to fully grasp the concept and be familiar with it. But once I’m in terms with the characters, the place, I finally realized how complicated and how much time and thinking this book requires the author to complete it. And the result- is a very interesting plot that might be condemned by some but admired by many.

The topic/theme of this book, is not easy, but if we just read the book as a work of fiction, let the author take us away from reality… then THE MIRAGE is really a brilliant one. The writing is very good, the Library at Alexandria (Wikipedia) is a good move to keep the reader up to date with the history, and the author’s right-in-time-humor is sufficient to make you stop and smile at the very concentrated moment,. He gives us enough details, enough to satisfy and make us curious altogether.

The characters are all significant on the story. We could even see in the picture the infamous Saddam Hussein and Osama bin Laden. I enjoyed the journey to the truth with Mustafa, the hero, how he finds out about the Mirage, and discover things he thought far from possible.

The venue- Baghdad is totally different than we used to – it’s modern, with skyscrapers, modern culture, just think of anything that’s opposite. (Anyways, that’s what this book is.>:D). The author’s really good in describing the new face of the city, Mecca, every place in the story is a whole lot new than what we know, and yet, I could totally picture it. It’s vivid and complete.

One drawback I guess, is the end. I was expecting it anyways, but I’m thinking that there might be something more ( I’m confusing you, I know--- but I have really confused feelings about the book… )

Last words: It’s amazing… I didn’t even think one could rewrite 9/11 in such a flawless way that’s really believable.. I could already imagine a movie for this.>:D Good book, good plot, lots of characters more than needed maybe, good writing style, and maybe with little changes on the details of the story in between and at the end, this would make it to the top-rated political thriller of 2012. (I’ve written quite long—but trust me, YOU DON’T WANT TO MISS THIS BOOK!!!)

Very highly recommended to everyone who enjoys action/mystery/sci-fi stories.
I wouldn’t recommend this to children and culture-sensitive people, though. ( )

It’s hard to write a 9/11 novel. This one takes place in an AU in which Baghdad, the premier city (though not the capital) of the United Arab States, was the city whose twin towers were destroyed by Christian fundamentalists, and Israel is a state carved out of Germany whose closest ally is the UAS and whose existence many Christians don’t accept. After 9/11, the UAS invades America and attempts to put a better government in place. There’s a popular TV show tracking 24 hours in the life of an antiterrorist agent whose use of torture seems contrary to Islamic principles to its critics. And so on:

Mustafa found himself in an open aisle between two entertainment mediums and two warring sociopolitical viewpoints. To his left, in the DVD section, a bank of flat-screens showed the governor of Lebanon, in his previous career as an action-movie superstar, maneuvering a jump jet between the skyscrapers of Beirut and using the plane’s nose-cannon to annihilate an army of terrorists, all of whom looked like relatives of the man Mustafa was chasing. To his right, in pop music, a wall of speakers and subwoofers blasted out the punk band Green Desert’s anti-war, anti-Saud anthem, “Arabian Idiot.”

Saddam Hussein is a mob boss; Osama bin Laden is a war hero turned Senator; Gaddafi claimed credit for inventing the internet. A big early mistake in the occupation of America was disbanding “the Minutemen—the American National Guard—thereby throwing half a million heavily armed Christians out of work.” You get a lot of information via infodumps from the Library of Alexandria (that is, AU Wikipedia). Then Homeland Security starts encountering Americans who believe that it’s all a mirage, that something has reversed the true order of things in which America is the world’s superpower and it’s the Muslim world that is fractured and invaded. What’s more, these Americans have artifacts that, though obviously fakes, support their story—for what reason, Homeland Security doesn’t know.

I like Ruff and I thought he made interesting choices in dealing with Sunni/Shi’a conflicts that do not obviously translate one-to-one in America while positing Protestant/Catholic conflicts in Europe due to the population displacement caused by the creation of a Jewish state. (America’s racial divisions, however, and the UAS’s ignorance thereof, play important roles in the disastrous invasion.) He pretty much punted on science, though: America was a creationist wasteland, but it wasn’t clear whether the UAS held different views, except that homosexuality was outlawed, with 50s-US-level variations in the amount of intolerance from person to person. Ruff undoubtedly can write “the interrogation scene,” “the chase scene,” etc. with both verve and tongue in cheek. The question is whether you can deal with his basically playful treatment—look ma, no hands!—of highly fraught topics. ( )