Good on ye, McDonald! Richly imagined, tautly woven. ( )

Welcome to the Indian subcontinent, circa 2047. In the midst of a disastrous drought (no monsoon in over three years), the 1.5 billion inhabitants of what was formerly India have split into several combative states. Much of the story revolves around issues surrounding Indian religion, culture and political subdivision. Artificial intelligence, genetic engineering and computer generated avatars also play prominent roles.

This is not an especially easy science fiction novel. In addition to what are somewhat complicated and confusing story lines, there is a significant volume of unfamiliar cultural and linguistic material which requires reference to a glossary in the back of the book. There is enough of this to detract from the overall reading experience. The technological innovation and complex physics in some threads can also be somewhat intimidating.

All in all, however, the disparate threads and story lines come together nicely in an excellent climax which satisfactorily answer many of the questions raised in the novel. Again, not recommended for those looking for a quick, easy sci-fi reading experience. In that respect, it is more akin to much of Philip Dick’s and Frank Herbert’s later work. It definitely requires some effort to stay abreast of the story. ( )

(Reprinted from the Chicago Center for Literature and Photography [cclapcenter.com]. I am the original author of this essay, as well as the owner of CCLaP; it is not being reprinted here illegally.)

As I've mentioned here several times before, there are many of us science-fiction fans who believe that the industry has entered a whole new "age" in the last ten years, one major enough to be compared to the four eras that came before it (to be specific, the historic "Golden Age" of the 1930s and '40s; the Modernist-influenced "Silver Age" of the '50s and '60s; the countercultural "New Age" of the '60s and '70s; and the angsty, postmodern "Dark Age" of the '80s and '90s); I myself have mostly been calling this new post-9/11 period the "Accelerated Age" (after the Charles Stross novel) and also sometimes the "Diamond Age" (after the Neal Stephenson one), although of course the fan community as a whole hasn't yet collectively agreed on a term, and probably won't until the age itself is over. And in the best historical tradition, this age is mostly defined in opposition to the period that came right before it; unlike the Dark Age, for example, Accelerated-Age tales tend to be overly optimistic about the future, many times bypassing our current political messes altogether to instead picture how our society might work hundreds or even thousands of years from now, with a whole series of scientific conceits that tend to pop up in book after book, thus defining it as a unified "age" to begin with -- sentient computers; the effortless mixing of the biological and mechanical (otherwise known as the Singularity); a "post-scarcity" society where food is artificially created and money no longer exists; practical immortality through a combination of inexpensive cloning and "brain backups" to infinitely powerful hard drives; and a lot more.

And also like the eras that came before it, the Accelerated Age is mostly being defined through a loose handful of authors who all seem to sorta know each other, or at the very least always seem to be mentioned together in conversations on the topic -- people like the aforementioned Stross and Stephenson, Cory Doctorow, Justina Robson, John Scalzi, Robert J Sawyer, Jeff Vandermeer and more (although to be fair, Mr. Vandermeer has criticized me publicly in the past for lumping all these people together, which I suppose marks the main difference between him as an actual practitioner and me as simply a fan); but out of all these post-9/11 SF authors, it seems sometimes that the one who gets the most consistent amount of praise of them all is Ian McDonald, an Englishman by birth who's lived most of his life in Northern Ireland, part of the much ballyhooed "British Invasion" of the early 2000s which is yet another big calling-card of the Accelerated Age.

And this is ironic, because the majority of McDonald's work does not fit the typical Accelerated-Age mold whatsoever; in fact, what McDonald is mostly known for among fans is being the so-called "heir to cyberpunk," the subgenre from the '80s that mostly defined the Dark Age before him. And that's because McDonald is a master of taking day-after-tomorrow concepts and marrying them to the dirty, sweaty here-and-now, which is exactly what such classic cyberpunk authors as William Gibson and Bruce Sterling did in the '80s to become famous in the first place, itself a rebellious response to the shiny, clean visions of such Silver-Age authors as Arthur C. Clarke and Isaac Asimov; but unlike this first wave of cyberpunk authors, McDonald does this uniting not among the smoky back alleys of America and western Europe, but rather in the trash-filled slums of such emerging regions as Africa and South America (see for example my review last year of his latest novel, Brasyl), delivering an entire series of third-world fever-dreams that could've never even been imagined by the trenchcoated fans of '80s science-fiction.

And it's all this that finally leads us to what's arguably McDonald's most famous book, River of Gods, originally published in the UK in 2004 and then a few years later in the US by our friends over at Pyr, considered by a whole lot of people to be the single best SF novel on the planet in the last ten years; and I'm happy to report that I just finished the book myself, after recently receiving the brand-new related book of short stories Cyberabad Days, and essentially begging the good folks at Pyr* for a copy of the original so that I could catch up, an incredibly slow yet pleasurable reading experience that took me six weeks altogether, hampered in my case by first having a bad bicycle accident right after starting, then being on a whole series of powerful narcotics the rest of the time, which one could argue made the reading experience even better than normal, but unfortunately also dropped my concentration level to nearly zero, which is why it took me so freaking long to get through these two books in the first place. Whew!

And after finishing it myself, I have to confess that the hype is mostly warranted; if this isn't maybe the single best SF novel of the entire Accelerated Age so far, it's at least in the top five, an infinitely rewarding experience that made me almost immediately want to start all over again on page one after initially finishing. And a big part of this, frankly, is just in its setting alone; because for those who don't know, this is one of the first English-language books in SF history to be set in India, a part of the world that in just the last few years has suddenly become a red-hot topic among an ever-growing amount of Americans and Europeans. And that's because we're in the middle of watching one of the most fascinating moments in that region's entire history, the moment when the population of India is pulling itself kicking and screaming out of third-world status and into the first world; and yes, I know, this is an inherently insulting term to even begin with, a classification dreamt up by rich white males in the middle of the Industrial Age mostly as a way to differentiate themselves from non-whites, which of course is part of what makes it so fascinating, to see whether terms like these are even applicable anymore in this multicultural age of ours.

You see, for Westerners who don't know, India in the 21st century is a giant mass of contradictions, a big reason why it's suddenly becoming of such interest to so many in the West in the first place: it's the world's largest secular democracy, for example, yet with a sizable minority (and growing every day) who believes the country should instead be run under a Hindu-based theocracy, much like how the Muslim nations around them are fundamentally based on Islamic law; it's been a politically unified whole since 1947 now, yet for thousands of years before that was actually a series of constantly warring mini-kingdoms, part of what allowed the British to so easily take over the entire region in the 1700s; and speaking of which, it's a country with infinitely complicated thoughts about its past as a British colony, proud of its Victorian heritage and widespread knowledge of English, even while rightly ashamed of the various indignities it suffered under the so-called "Raj" of the 19th and early 20th centuries. It's a nation which desperately wishes to be the next great international hub for education and technology, yet a nation where tens of millions still go without electricity, without indoor plumbing; a nation virtually ruled by its explosively growing middle class, yet experiencing all the same bourgeois-based problems as the British did two centuries ago when its own middle class first exploded, a nation where Jane Austen storylines are literally played out in real life every day.

McDonald perfectly understands the drama inherent in such a situation, and puts all these issues to great use in River of Gods, although be warned from the start that you Westerners will need to do a bit of homework to fully appreciate it; as mentioned, for example, you will need to know a little about the longstanding conflict there between Hindus and Muslims (and a little about the Hindu religion in the first place), a little about India's ancient caste system, a little about its former history as a series of warring mini-states, a little about the growing gap between traditional Indian life (think housewives in saris and cows roaming the streets) and modern Indian life (think two-earner families in business suits and clutching iPhones). And that's because this is a major theme of River of Gods as well, the growing divide between old third-world India and the gleaming first-world vision it wants to become, with the entire novel set in the year 2047, the 100th anniversary of the area becoming a unified independent nation in the first place.

Ah, but see, there's trouble in paradise in McDonald's world, which is why it's so important to have a basic understanding of all these cultural issues; just to mention one important example, in River of Gods India isn't even a unified country anymore by 2047, after global warming led to a period of severe drought there in the early 21st century, leading to a breakdown into regional states again and a series of bloody civil-war skirmishes over the dwindling water supply. We then mostly follow the fate of one of these states -- "Bharat," comprising the northeast corner of the former nation, with the religious mecca of Varanasi its new capital...or "Varanasi 2.0" if you will, a head-spinning mix of the ancient and the cutting-edge, with thousand-year-old ghats along the Ganges River now sitting in the shadows of mountainside skyscrapers and maglev trains.

The actual storyline of River of Gods is best left as secret as possible, which is why I'm going to largely skip over it today; but I will say that in the best cyberpunk tradition, it's actually made up of a half-dozen smaller storylines that each stand on their own, almost impossible at first to determine how they fit together until getting closer and closer to the end, and as the lives of the hundred or so major and minor characters on display start interweaving more and more. And I can also mention that the story here is a dense-enough one and laden with enough local issues and terms to make one think that McDonald must be an expat who has spent a substantial amount of time in India himself (and don't forget, by the way, that there's a glossary of terms at the end of the book); and this is in fact one of the other things McDonald is known for, because the fact of the matter (as he has confirmed many times in past interviews) is that the vast majority of his books' details come merely from page-based academic research, along with just a minimum amount of actual traveling through the region in question, almost all of it simply tourist-based traveling instead of pseudo-native backpacker-style. How he manages to turn in novel after novel of such depth using only traditional book-based research is a mystery that sometimes borders on the magical; and it's precisely this that makes McDonald so intensely loved by certain types of literary fans out there, and is precisely one of the reasons so many consider River of Gods the best SF novel written in the last decade.

And then as far as this book's companion piece, Cyberabad Days, the main reason I was sent the pair of volumes in the first place, it's pretty much what you expect -- a collection of standalone short stories all set in the same world as River of Gods, that McDonald has written for various magazines over the last five years, published together here as a whole for the very first time, with all the traditional good and bad things that come with such minor story collections. Surprisingly, though, instead of needing to first read River of Gods for this companion volume to make sense (as is usually the case in these situations), Cyberabad Days actually exists as a great primer to get yourself ready for the bigger main novel; because also in good cyberpunk tradition, in River of Gods McDonald simply drops you right in the middle of things at first, not bothering to explain any of the details of the situation itself but instead letting the reader slowly pick them up here and there over the first 200 pages of that 600-page tome, something that diehard SF fans love but that can drive others a little batty. That of course is one of the biggest benefits of the short-story format in general, is that authors are simply forced to explain things in a much shorter period of time; for those of you who like getting your backstory out of the way quickly, you may actually benefit from tackling the companion book first before even trying the main novel in question.

I have to admit, out of all the books I could've gotten stuck with during a long convalescence from a major accident, I could've done a lot worse than these two; and now after taking my sweet time with them both, I can very easily see why people continue to go so nuts over McDonald's vision of a future India, even half a decade after he first started laying this vision out. It's one of the great pleasures of being a science-fiction book critic in the early 2000s, in my opinion -- a chance to be reading and reviewing this literature right when it's first being written and published, that is -- and after taking in now a pretty fair amount of ultra-contemporary SF, I have to confess that I too have become a pretty slavish fanboy of McDonald. If you're looking for stories that elevate themselves above the usual tropes of the genre, you can't really go wrong by picking up this groundbreaking saga; here's hoping that McDonald has lots more of them in store for us down the road.

*And by the way, all kidding aside, I do want to thank the hardworking PR staff at Pyr once again for all their help; over the last year I've probably requested at least a dozen old backtitles from their catalog, and in every case they've sent them along with a smile and nary a complaint, not to mention of course all the new titles they're actively seeking publicity for, a huge difference in attitude from some other SF publishers who shall remain nameless. It's a common trait among a lot of publishing companies these days, to treat litbloggers like sh-t, so I always appreciate it when coming across companies like Pyr who take bloggers as seriously as any other book reviewers out there. ( )

Random Comments review ( )

Nominated for the 2005 Hugo Award for best novel (losing to Susanna Clarke's Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell), River of Gods is an ambitious look at 2047 India by Ian McDonald.

As India approaches its 100th birthday, it has balkanized into a number of semi independent nations. Technology runs high here, higher than in some parts of the world. Artificial Intelligences reach for above-human sentience even as "Krishna cops" try and prevent them from doing so. The lack of a monsoon for years has caused two of the nations to go to the brink of armed conflict. And in space, the Americans have discovered an asteroid is actually an alien artifact, seven billion years old, which inexplicably has a tie to several of the characters...

As I said, its an ambitious novel, with a large cast and a large canvas upon which McDonald draws. In an almost Bollywood like fashion, all of the plotlines and characters, disparate at first, eventually have their stories draw together.

McDonald pulls no punches and immerses the reader immediately in unfamiliar culture, terms, customs and societies. It takes a lot of work to keep up in this novel, but once the basics are down, the novel starts to sing. (This is definitely not a novel to give to a first time reader of science fiction). In point of fact, with its numerous characters at all sorts of social strata, its social commentary, and its vision of the future, the novel feels to me like McDonald's attempt to re-write Brunner's Stand on Zanzibar (but without the New Wave experimental narrative and textual techniques).

I don't think the novel quite lives up to its ambitions, and a few of the characters did not much appeal to me as much as the main plot did. However, the vision of India's future is wall-to-wall, engrossing and interesting. Throw in some snazzy technology, and even a bit of humor (I dare you not to laugh when you discover the fate of Bill Gates in this timeline)

Mcdonald has a collection of stories set in this world (Cyberdad Days) which, on the strength of this, and my enjoyment of it, I fully intend to buy and read.

Recommended. ( )

This book is huge, the cast of characters is extensive, and there are several plot lines on the go. Even so, Ian McDonald's brisk pacing and remarkable ability to immerse the reader in his rich and textured future India make "River of Gods" read like a much shorter novel. I was unable to put it down, and felt immensely satisfied and rewarded at the end. Highly recommended. ( )

This book is certainly as imaginative as the back cover reviews say, but if felt disconnected to me. There were so many characters that it took me a few pages into each chapter to remember who I was reading about now. Even at the end of the book, I still didn't understand how some of the characters fit in -- they just seemed superfluous.

River of Gods is an exciting and imaginative read, but I think it lacks the big picture needed to make it a _great_ book. ( )

'What is going on here?'Mr Nandha demands as he walks through the scrum of police, Ministry warrant card held high.
'Sir, one of the factory workers panicked and ran out into the alley, straight under,' says a police sergeant. 'He was shouting about a djinn; how the djinn was in the factory and was going to get all of them.'
You call it djinn, Mr Nandha thinks, scanning the site. I call it meme. Non-material replicators; jokes, rumours, customs, nursery rhymes. Mind-viruses. Gods demons, djinns, superstitions. The thing inside the factory is no supernatural creature, no spirit of flame, but it is certainly a non-material replicator.

Set in 2047 in an India that has fragmented to separate states just 100 years after gaining independence, this story is told from the point of view of about a dozen very different people. But who or what is manipulating them all? Could it be N.K. Jivanjee, leader of a Hindu fundamentalist group that threatens to destabilise the state of Bharat? Or perhaps a mysterious company called Odeco, which has fingers in a lot of very interesting pies?

The way that Mr Nandhu's security programs are displayed as avatars of the Hindu Gods really reminded me of David Brin's novel "Earth", as did the multiple viewpoints and the environmental theme, with water-shortages in some of the Indian states caused by the damming of the River Ganges upstream, and Bengal's plan to change the climate by towing an iceberg all the way from the Arctic.

I wonder why they didn't bring the iceberg from the Antarctic. Surely it would have been a shorter and more direct journey than towing it from Arctic Canada, all the way down the Atlantic, round Africa and across the Indian Ocean (or round South America and across the Pacific if they went the other way). I can only think that they would have been hampered by unfavourable winds and currents. ( )

Absolutely loved this book. It's set in India 100 years after independence, and follows a number of intertwining characters and stories through a very atmospheric India. ( )

as for the book, i definitely loved it and would be reading more mcdonalds soon. i loved the hindu gods there (i have a soft spot for them) and i loved mcdonalds way of looking at gods/god, loved his future and what might/can be, loved the way the story flowed and the characters were shown bit by bit and how they grew. that said i must admit that it was not 5 stars for me and that's i think was because of the ending. compared to the rest of the story and it's lovely flow i thought that it just ended too abruptly, the charactes grew dim in the last part, the last part was mostly all action and also there was an answer there (admiting that i didn't really understand it) and yet i didn't like the idea of an answer to a question like "the meaning of life" or maybe i really, really like an answer or actually like to "know" BUT i don't want some else's answer, i wouldn't mind to know what they think, but only what they think (though what mcdonald proposed was very interesting) and then they can leave me and let me decide. what i thought was that the story was too lovely and too perfect to end with everything answered and solved! so it's not 5 stars but definitely a big 4, cause in all the other ways i thought it was absolutely perfect and i loved every minute of reading it. ( )

Despite its size (600 pages), it's quite readable. Interested story about what could happen in the future, though no all the characters resonated with me. ( )

Big book. If you liked Brasyl, step back and read this tale of India. McDonald gives you plenty to chew on. ( )

How good is this book? I am loath to go too far in awarding accolades to something so recent, something i've just read, but the scale of this, the skill with which he handled the multitude of characters, painting like a Balzac or a Tolstoy a portrait of a society in all its strata -- these are most impressive.

A very great book. ( )

Aeai lifecycle.

I have a Merlinesque Once and Future McDonald thing going on it seems, going backward through his work.

I just recently read Brasyl, which I think is superior to this book.

River of Gods is still a good book, however, and possibly as India is a bit more familiar that the setting wasn't as interesting.

Whereas the former had three story strands going, although in different periods of history, River of Gods has around triple that, and all at the same time, which can leave you feeling that there isn't necessarily much point to some of them.

Basically, AI above a certain level of capability have been banned, and hounded out of most countries, and have taken refuge in India.

Via military, economic and political manipulation they are trying to keep themselves alive. However, the major focus is on the people that are the main players in this, a corporation, some researchers and the Indian prime minister, and a few more minor characters that perhaps got a little much 'stage time' and made this longer than it needed to be.

Americans have discovered an object in space older than the solar system, and an indian corporation appears to have developed early zero point energy.

This all eventually ties together rather abruplty.

Still, definitely worth reading, and McDonald is top class.

http://notfreesf.blogspot.com/2007/09/river-of-gods-ian-mcdonald.html ( )

Aeai lifecycle.

I have a Merlinesque Once and Future McDonald thing going on it seems, going backward through his work.

I just recently read Brasyl, which I think is superior to this book.

River of Gods is still a good book, however, and possibly as India is a bit more familiar that the setting wasn't as interesting.

Whereas the former had three story strands going, although in different periods of history, River of Gods has around triple that, and all at the same time, which can leave you feeling that there isn't necessarily much point to some of them.

Basically, AI above a certain level of capability have been banned, and hounded out of most countries, and have taken refuge in India.

Via military, economic and political manipulation they are trying to keep themselves alive. However, the major focus is on the people that are the main players in this, a corporation, some researchers and the Indian prime minister, and a few more minor characters that perhaps got a little much 'stage time' and made this longer than it needed to be.

Americans have discovered an object in space older than the solar system, and an indian corporation appears to have developed early zero point energy.

This all eventually ties together rather abruplty.

Still, definitely worth reading, and McDonald is top class.

http://notfreesf.blogspot.com/2007/09/river-of-gods-ian-mcdonald.html ( )

An outstanding book. Captures the feel of many facets of India and within the context of an exciting and innovative science fiction storyline. McDonald's writing is topnotch, and while the ending is not entirely satisfying, the enjoyment of getting to the ending makes up for it. ( )

http://nhw.livejournal.com/146900.htm...

In 2047, a hundred years after independence, India is embedded in ecological troubles and accelerated technology. The cast of characters includes a comedian who inherits a business empire, a journalist, a policeman hunting rogue AI's, an American scientist, a politician, a neuter, a small-time crook, a Big Dumb Object, and India itself. McDonald keeps all these balls hurtling through the air, to dazzling effect. A great book. ( )

Aeai lifecycle.

I have a Merlinesque Once and Future McDonald thing going on it seems, going backward through his work.

I just recently read Brasyl, which I think is superior to this book.

River of Gods is still a good book, however, and possibly as India is a bit more familiar that the setting wasn't as interesting.

Whereas the former had three story strands going, although in different periods of history, River of Gods has around triple that, and all at the same time, which can leave you feeling that there isn't necessarily much point to some of them.

Basically, AI above a certain level of capability have been banned, and hounded out of most countries, and have taken refuge in India.

Via military, economic and political manipulation they are trying to keep themselves alive. However, the major focus is on the people that are the main players in this, a corporation, some researchers and the Indian prime minister, and a few more minor characters that perhaps got a little much 'stage time' and made this longer than it needed to be.

Americans have discovered an object in space older than the solar system, and an indian corporation appears to have developed early zero point energy.

This all eventually ties together rather abruplty.

Still, definitely worth reading, and McDonald is top class.

http://notfreesf.blogspot.com/2007/09... ( )

Deep political intrigue, alternate sexualities, artificial intelligence, urban landscapes, cultural extrapolations, and dishoom-dishoom action in the heart of future India. Brilliant and sprawling, and the best South Asia-based SF I've read to date. ( )

I've been waiting for over a year to read this book. When I first found it in a bar in Hanoi, I was working as a consultant and too distracted to work past page 5. But such five pages - I could tell that McDonald captured the majesty and clutter of India.

This past week, I carved chunks of time to read the book, to concentrate on the kalidoscope of subplots and textures of scene. It's a wonderful book in which McDonald weaves India, settled in tradition, with the science fiction. ( )

http://www.schlaikjer.net/reviews/115... ( )

Another fantastic book by Ian McDonald, who’s been on my ``must buy’’ list since his first book, Out on Blue Six appeared as part of the revamped Bantam Spectra Specials series. India. Artificial intelligence. Amazing. ( )

Ian McDonald earned a Hugo nomination last year for this novel set in near future India. The year is 2047 and the Hamilton Acts have restricted the development of all AI beyond Gen 2. India has shattered into smaller warring nations. A drought has nearly dried up the Holy Ganges. This is the backdrop for a complex and beautiful story.

McDonald uses a Point of View chapter style to weave his plot. Nine separate characters start the story and they are eventually intertwined and woven into a rich tapestry. Mr. Nanhda, the Krishna cop, His wife Parvati. Professor Lull and his protege Lisa. Shiv, the gangster. Vishram, the family blacksheep, Tal the Nute, Najia the reporter, and Khan the political advisor.

The vision of the future presented is exciting and scary. Its relatable enough to seem well within reach.

Overall I really liked this book, It was a complex tale and not one to be lightly read. I found myself getting lost a few times, but in the end it was well worth the investment put into the read.

8.5 out of 10 ( )

The gimmick is India, but it's not enough to carry the novel. Complicated plot-line with lots of wasted energy and missed opportunities, huge cast but very few truly affecting characters, 'revelation' on the third-to-last page that you see coming from miles off, and in my edition a terrible crop of typos ranging from miss-spellings to entire sentences of word salad. Many of the bits that didn't immediately need the attention of a copy-editor would have benefited from a competent editor.

I wasn't very impressed.

Much better is his "The Little Goddess", set in the same universe, but mercifully shorter and simpler. You'll find the same rich detail of Indian life and imaginative future history, but without the juggling of mutiple perspectives and storylines that makes River of Gods just too chaotic. Plus, it's online at http://www.asimovs.com/_issue_0604_5/... ( )

I want to review this book because I really enjoyed reading it, but I'm not sure how to describe it. It's an intriguing work of imagination set in India in the mid-21st century, told through the experiences of several widely differing characters, with lots of surprises. Fascinating. And I think it's so good to see a work of this genre which is not set in North America or Europe. ( )