Osama

Tidhar, an Israeli writer, has written a beautiful and haunting book--but to try to describe it without revealing too much of its mysterious heart is quite a task. So let me start by saying it is extremely well-written and brilliantly evokes each of the places it takes place: Vientiane, Laos; Paris; London, New York; and finally, Kabul. Ostensibly, it is the story of a detective (in the Raymond Chandler mode) hired by a mysterious woman to track down a writer named Mike Longshott, who has written a series of books about Osama Bin Laden, Vigilante. It soon becomes clear, however, that in the detective's world, Osama Bin Laden, the events of 9/11, and a few significant chunks of history don't exist. But to pigeonhole this book as just an show more alternate history or science fiction would be missing the point. Osama isn't as neat and tidy as such fictions tend to be. Tidhar blends the real and the unreal together in such a way that truth and fiction blur into a marvelous new synthesis that tells us something about both. It succeeds, where other attempts such as China Mieville's THE CITY AND THE CITY largely fail, because of the depth of feeling at the book's center and because the detective is so well-drawn and interesting, even when stumbling blindly in search of his next clue. OSAMA achieves the near-impossible--serious escapist fiction, or maybe vice-versa? Just read it. show less

A private investigator straight out of Central Casting Noir is given the job of tracking down the author of a series of pulp thrillers. But the world this gumshoe inhabits is not ours, and the thrillers are part of a series entitled 'Osama bin Ladin: Vigilante'...

The world-building is intriguing. It's hard to tell if the world of Joe, the PI, is a "real" world or some construct of the human imagination. It is certainly a timeless setting, any time from the 1940s to the 1990s. Yet at times, "our" reality breaks through into the novel. There are opium dens, and London private members' clubs, and a disused Tube station, and villains, and a Sydney Greenstreet character, and Bogart, and a fan convention, and people who become transparent and show more disappear. Is this an afterlife? Which is the fantasy world? Who is the author of the bin Ladin novels, and whose story is he really telling? Is our world fantastic, or just unbelievable?

Tidhar's perspective is interesting. An expatriate Israeli with a cosmopolitan background, his sympathies are not where you might think they'd be.

The style is economical, the chapters short, but I had the urge to continue reading. This is a book I shall want to come back to.

The UK hardback from PS Publishing is an exquisite production, too. show less

Osama is one of those novels that keep on surprising me long into the reading. It FEELS like a noir with some really cool easter eggs. What sets this one apart from most noirs is the fact that this is in an alternate dimension.

Coolness already. But when we're dealing with an easter egg like an enigmatic novel named Osama, based on a revolutionary vigilante hero Osama Bin Laden, things get... weird.

Never too weird or too quick, this mystery only gets deeper and stranger when we dive into the worldbuilding. Fascinating, in-depth worldbuilding. Rather obscure turning points in history, deeper explorations of culture, and here's a really good tidbit: Vigilante justice conventions. You know. Like comic-cons, with panels, guest stars, show more discussions, but all about real-life vigilantes. Like Osama, who is a hero here.

One man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter.

But most of this novel takes place in England! It's freaky! Disturbing. Very reminiscent of Man in the High Castle. But in some ways, it's BETTER than PKD's novel. It has more to say, better pacing, and a super-addictive noir style for all you mystery fans.

Of course, when we start bleeding into another universe... all bets are off. Things get very interesting indeed.

Hello, world. :)


I'm quite impressed with this novel. Lots of food for thought. show less

Osama is a strange and haunting science fiction/detective story about a world in which 9/11- and a lot of other things too- have become fiction fodder rather than real-life tragedy. It's the kind of book you need to take in all at once, like a dream. A detective named Joe living in Laos is hired to find a pulp writer who may be living in Paris, but his journey takes him around the world. Lavie Tidhar evokes his settings beautifully, especially London, which has a surreal feel to it. I was totally drawn into this unusual novel.

The premise is an intriguing one
“In a world without global terrorism Joe, a private detective, is hired by a mysterious woman to find a man: the obscure author of pulp fiction novels featuring one Osama Bin Laden: Vigilante..."

It's an odd book and the blurb tends to mislead; it's all smoke and mirrors not a concrete alternative history book, it draws on the terrorism subtext but mixes the topic with a deft touch, it is sci fi and noir but uses none of those writing styles. It is however a beautifully written tale, which plays with Noir tropes to tell a science fiction story and, yes, holds a mirror up to the effects of terrorism. It muses on trauma and death, the stark harshness of violence and fear, of love and the act of show more remembering. It is not titillating or harsh it is funny, odd, stark, dreamy and touching and I liked it very much.

The settings of this international thriller are fantastic (especially London which literally seeps off the page( but we also go to Paris, Kabul, Laos and to small extent the US. Tidhar deftly weaves the pressure and fullness of history, the locations are rich and deep and carry weight and secure the worlds dreamy unexplained place in a reality. I loved the small asides of historical facts which some obviously are wrong i.e. De Gaulle did not die in Algiers. I loved the nods to our stories, ones easily spotted and ones I probably missed. It’s not an annoying gimmick it feels right their world should reflect ours, the PI should buy a purple rose in little Cairo to mourn a lost friend.

The pace of story is well done, action in all the right places, short chapters and sections to keep the rhythm. The characters, fit their purpose. Fully realised, glimpsed and memorable, a stereotype subverted and made more real. The styles used are unexpected, the pulp fiction of Osama is written in factual, reportage style and it works much better than a jokey pulp would (I would love to know if the author tried it other way 1st). It also, as many things are, has a reason why which becomes clear much later. Indeed there are many unclear things, this is not a book for those who love explanations. Nor will it satisfy anyone looking for a thorough exploration of terrorism through fiction nor any hard science fiction fans. It is a twisted blend of genres and topics.

Still its hard to fault, it's just whether it fits your taste. All I can say is it’s not about the mystery, it’s about the journey, it’s about the PI doing right thing in harsh world and having to working out what the right thing is: down these mean streets a man must go.. and well there is delicious subversion to the that. A tale a old noir fan will adore. Everyone else will just merely enjoy it.

Recommended. Actually after writing that review highly recommended. show less

3.5/5

The thing about terrorism is that it implicates us all. Your fear is the terrorist's weapon. It is an intrinsically memetic act; the terrorism of the 2010s doesn't require the organised bank robberies of the 1970s or even the underground networks of the 1990s and early 2000s - I read this as Omar Mateen murdered 49 people and ascribed it to an ISIS he'd never been a member of, like a young punk learning three chords, starting a band in his basement and somehow feeling a part of a movement, like Breivik before him, like Thomas Mair after him. You don't need organisation any more; you just need to throw the idea out there and let the right people make it theirs.

I digress right away. Osama isn't a great novel, Tidhar's overcooked show more prose bothers me more than it should and once he telegraphs the reveal you've still got a lot of ground to cover before you get there, but the idea at its core is both creepy, well done, and shot through with grief and anger. In a world where things went differently after WWII (exactly how different we don't know), a mysterious author starts publishing stories of the "vigilante" Osama bin Laden, a literary supervillain or superhero sold by a porn publisher and drawing legions of fans speculating on how things work in the Osamaverse, writing fanfiction called "Love in the desert", etc. A private investigator who's just a little too perfectly noir gets a visit from a mysterious woman asking him to track this writer down, while a mysterious government agency hunts him, terrified of what he might know. And another (maybe) mysterious woman shows up, disappears, mumbles about Nangilima (gold star for that reference, and for not explaining it).

Not sure what to make of the ending. It's either a copout or a gutpunch. Are there some things we don't want to know, some ideas we would rather simply forget? If so, who would blame us? show less

Very very odd. Hard to describe. Sort of alternative universe, where Osama Bin Laden is fiction and none of the terrorists atrocities we've known in the last few decades have come to pass.

Which changes a lot of things, no internet, no iphones, no computers at all really - which is daft because they were around a long time before - no space race. What's even weirder is that you don't really notice the absence at first either. Joe is a private detective in Vietnam, drinking coffee or whisky and smoking, there's not a lot of trade, and he doesn't mind. He's sitting in a cafe when he see's the girl, almost not quite there. She asks him to find Mike Longshott, expense no object, and hands him a black credit card. Joe knows the name, he's a show more prolific author of trashy novels in an alternative world where Osama is leading a terror campaign against the West - our world. Joe tracks the author to the publishing company based in Paris, and runs inot many dead ends. There's opposition out there too who don't want Mike found.

It's very slow in the style of noir, and works very well. The mystery remains unexplained and even at the end isn't totally clear. Joe is introspective but not maudlin, determined but not obsessive, gruff but not uncaring. From Paris the stoey moves to London and a lot of detail is given over the streets and pubs that Joe searches in trace of the elusive and obviously pseudonym Mike. He seems to dwell in murky world of opium and 2nd hand books, but there's never a moment of breakthrough, merely the long elimination of alternatives.

I enjoyed this far more than I initially thought I would, the writing and the setting draw you in, and the puzzle becomes intriguing. There are plenty of faults and hardly any action, but clearly and author to investigate further. show less