Justina Robson

I had read Justina Robson's first novel, Silver Screen, and been unimpressed by it. But this, her second novel, turned out to be a beast of a different stripe. From the outset, we had a selection of well-rounded characters, and a situation that was quite novel - a research project into using nanoware and brain scanning techniques to build a therapeutic tool for psychiatric disorders. But of course, having mapped the interface between the human mind and the actual neurological structures show more within the brain, the work comes to the attention of various players who see the opportunity to use the tool for nefarious purposes - nothing less than being able to exercise mass mind control over a population.

We are introduced to one of the scientists leading the research; her flat-mate; an FBI agent investigating the whole project because it touches on other areas that he is investigating, either officially (who is the mysterious Russian defector who does not appear to have a past - or has too many of them?) or unofficially (why was the agent's sister attacked on the reservation where she lives by neighbours who she grew up with?); and a fellow agent who has multiple layers and seems to be playing at least two games for different bosses simultaneously; plus a lot of walk-on characters who are more than just bit players.

The setting is also unusual - a lot of the action takes place in the UK city of York, which is quite well drawn, and the setting of a research institution has a ring of authenticity about it. The race to control and understand the wetware is well-described and the outcome always in doubt.

The book was slightly spoiled for me because of some sloppy editing, which in turn allowed some sloppy writing through. These were all details, rather than anything that would derail the plot, but I stumbled over them nonetheless. For example, York is some distance from any major airport (an hour to Doncaster Robin Hood, and hour and a half to Manchester) from where one of the protagonists is due to get a suborbital flight direct to Washington; yet everyone talks as though "the airport" is just down the road, and when another character follows, they give themselves 30 minutes to get to the airport and make their flight. The thing is that Justina Robson is a northern Brit and ought to be expected to understand these things. And there is a character (the FBI agent's sister) called "White Horse", which I persisted in reading as "White House" nearly all the way through, which seeing as the book involves plottings in the US military was quite possible. (In fact, the last instance in the book really was "White House", which took me completely by surprise.) And for a thriller about conspiracies in the US and British governments, Robson shows little sign of understanding exactly how these bodies work and are organised.

But these are minor issues. What really struck me was this: in 2001, when the book was written, an author could only imagine achieving mass thought control through complex and potentially dangerous nanoware infestation. Twenty years later, we seem to have achieved that through the far simpler vehicle of social media. The arguments are all there: a boon to humankind vs. a threat to freedom and democracy; how people identify with groups/tribes and how they react to new ideas or cleave to old ways. And bad actors from all sides are active in the novel as in real life. I found the whole thing rather chilling and quite compulsive reading. show less

What a long, strange trip it has been... with flashes of humor, convulsing and convoluted mythology, treachery and loyalty twisting back on each other like snakes, and at long last, some measure of peace for a world that has lost none of its strangeness but just a bit of its peril. Robson does a good job bringing readers up to speed at the start of DOWN TO THE BONE (with prophetic, faery beer, of all things), but even with the bare bones of the conflict laid out, I can't say if new readers show more would be able to catch up to the complex emotional lives of these characters. Even having read the whole series, I often felt ill-equipped to understand the manic passion and complexity of these creatures more than human.

So much of what brings Lila, Teazle and Zal and their support crew to this end of days is as slippery and inevitable as a maelstrom, sucking everyone down and together into a cataclysmic confrontation. As deeply as Lila mourns and rages, so quickly can she come back to forgiveness. Robson manages to interweave the trickery of faerie into her story without tipping over into "arbitrary". Still, with so much drama and magic flying by, I feel like I absorbed a tenth of what Robson wrote over the course of this series. DOWN TO THE BONE brings all of the surface stories together, creating a satisfying resolution to the adventure portion of the story, even as I know I will still be piecing together the history and mythology of these worlds in the future.

KEEPING IT REAL and DOWN TO THE BONE have the benefit of bracketing this almost overwhelming series, but I think they would remain my favorites regardless for the clear introduction and resolution each has to offer. Upon finishing this series, I feel a little dazed and completely wrung out, but definitely glad I followed this roller coaster from start to finish.

Full review at All Things Urban Fantasy.

Sexual Content: Several sex scenes, references to threesomes. show less

This is a very imaginative science fiction story -- the kind of risk that might work magnificently or fail catastrophically. It fell somewhere in the middle for me.

Robson conjures a future in which genetic engineering has allowed the human race to intentionally evolve special purpose types -- creatures who can do the work barred by human limitations but who remain human at their core. The "forged" have been specially engineered to travel through space or mine asteroids or terraform planets. show more As time goes along, the interests of the forged diverge from those of the "unevolved", and, of course, there are the downsides of lives devoted entirely to special purposes. The forged do remain human at their core, and they have the needs, ambitions, and desires of humans. But their fate, which of course they didn't choose -- they were engineered from conception or birth -- precludes much of that.

The book's plot takes that situation and inserts a discovery by the forged of an alien technology -- something that would allow them to separate from the unevolved and build a civilization of their own, one tuned to their own needs rather than to the service of the unevolved.

The aliens themselves seem absent, but in fact, they are presenting the forged (and one unevolved) with a choice. The use of their technology requires a choice to give up something maybe more fundamental to human life than any of the things that the forged miss in their current world and seek in a new one.

I think the story is a good one, a really ambitious one, and it's great to see science fiction that takes the risks that this story does. And it raises great questions.

It may be unavoidable that, in reading, finding my way through the world that Robson imagines detracts a bit from the focus on the question that she raises about what makes us human and what we would or would not give up. A less risky story would keep as much of the world familiar as possible in order to focus the reader's attention on the question it raises. Robson pays special attention to what is different -- the appearances and abilities of the forged -- though because it is part of the question. How much can we change and still remain ourselves? How much would we really be willing to change? show less

A bit of a slog for me, again I think it's a mismatch between reader and book. This is firmly a new weird book, suitable for fans of China Mieville.

In a city where women are in charge, in a world without a name where in general women have the upper hand, there is a family. Tralane Huntingore is the mother, renowned as a scientist she is the heiress of an ancient but defunct and broke line of mages, she has two daughters, both different from each other and both with paths of their own.

There's show more a war and the strange and alien Karoo are involved and things are going badly. The three women of this family are going to be pivots in the future of the world.

I still don't know what to think about this, strange and beautiful but not me. The characters didn't quite gel with me and I didn't really care who lived and who died, there is scope for another book in this series and I might look it up but overall it was just a slog sometimes to get to the end. This one is a flight of fancy and you may or may not hit turbulence along the way. show less