Angelmaker

I opened Angelmaker with high expectations. I enjoyed The Gone-Away World a great deal, and admired the blend of characterization, humor, and social commentary with a solid underlying concept. While those elements are in place for Angelmaker, it was a struggle to read until it gained momentum halfway through.

It has been a challenge to figure out why, but I think at heart, the beginning reads a little like a collection of short stories or vignettes, which makes the thriller plotting drag. There is an ominous situation; Joe, the clockmaker/restorer of mechanical odds and ends is visited by some very suspicious people. He is unnerved, and resolves to find out more. After phoning a friend, it's quick trip through underground London show more (literally and figuratively), which segues from the the current situation to three days ago and then deeper into Joe's past. The narrative jumps to Edie, an elderly lady of suspicious skill sets, who earlier had Joe repairing various mechanical oddities. As she leaves the apartment, we are treated to a long walk down Edie's memory lane. It does gestalt together at the end, but quite honestly, it's a bit more patchwork quilt than pointallist painting. The time shifts remind me a little of [b:The Rook|10836728|The Rook (The Checquy Files, #1)|Daniel O'Malley|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1327619585s/10836728.jpg|15750881], only in that case, O'Malley's time jumps were strictly between the same character, maintained a linear tracking and were therefore significantly more cohesive: two parallel plotlines that dovetailed together. Angelmaker is more like a complicated weaving, but instead of being enraptured, I find myself wandering away.

****

There's some great bits:
"Perhaps unsurprisingly, Ari is reticent on the poison issue. Ari regards cats as lessons in the journey through life. Cats, he explains are divine messengers of patience. Joe, one shoulder still sore from a near miss two weeks ago, says they are Satanic messengers of discord and pruritus. Ari says this is possible, but by the working of the ineffable divinity, even if they are Satanic messengers of discord and pruritus, they are also tutors sent by the Cosmic All.
'They are of themselves,' Ari says, clutching this morning's consignment of organic milk, some of which is leaking through the plastic, 'an opportunity for self-education.'
'In first aid and disease,' mutters Joe Spork.
'And in more spiritual things. The universe teaches us about God, Joseph.'
"Not cats. Or, not that cat.'
'All things are lessons.'
And this is so close to something Grandpa Spork once said that Joe Spork, even after a sleepless night and a bad cat morning, finds himself nodding.
'Thanks, Ari.'
'You are welcome.'
'I still want cat poison.'
'Good! Then we have much to teach one another!'"

******

Does that cat have anything to do with the story? No. Does Ari? Not really. This elaborate conversation exactly demonstrates the fun, the challenge and the problem in Harkaway's writing. Necessary? No. Fun, yes. Convoluted and elaborate? Yes.

Harkaway is very good at the small scale work of combining incongruities to create an absurd whole, which is perhaps why people acclaim Angelmaker as absurdly humorist story. But absurd and thriller are a tricky mix; like a black bean and corn salad (one of my recent attempts), it can be a delightful taste mix. It can also be a mushy mess.

"He has a head shaped almost exactly like a pear. His brain must be squeezed into the narrow place at the top. His cheeks are wide and fatty, so that, if Mr. Cummerbund were a deer or a halibut, they would excite pleasurable anticipation in those fond of rich foods and delicacies."

He does capture elderly dogs well:
"They have long ago settled between them that he is to be disturbed between three and nine only in the direst of emergencies or if there is steak. The steak should be meltingly soft and warmed over in the pan. The emergencies are more exigent: fire, earthquake, rains of frogs, the arrival of a cat in the building."

I notice some readers squirmed at the violence, but I found it usually understated:
"The revolver makes an absolutely huge noise. To her relief, the back of Mr. Biglandry's head stays on, although it's clearly a close-run thing."

He often starts with standard dialog and then sparks it up with absurdist social commentary:
"Mr. Pritchard! What are you doing?... My grandfather is weeping in Heaven, or he would be if there were such a place, which there is not because religion is a mystification contrived by monarchists! Again! Again, and this time do it properly!"

His convoluted writing often conceals clever references:
"From the back of Polly Cradle's car and disguised like Mr. Toad escaping from the clink, Joe Spork stares at his home."

He has an Adams-esque way with thoughts:
"'Well,' Mercer says after a moment, 'that was insane. But apparently it was also a good idea. I find the combination unsettling. Please try not to have any more good ideas until I get to measure them against the possibility that you have gone entirely off your rocker.'"

And pieced in, oh-so-delicately, is some heartfelt philosophy:
"Love causes people to do stupid things. That does not, she realizes now, make them the wrong things."

*****

I like Harkaway's writing, I really do, and yet I'm struck by just how often I was willing to set it down to go to sleep, about the exact opposite my reaction to thrillers and mysteries (which normally falls in the "one more chapter" category). It's a little more like reading bon mots by a philosopher or humorist, and a little less like reading a single yarn from a fine storyteller. Great ideas, challenging philosophy, nice characterization--all good reasons to read it. Gripping, cohesive action? Not so much.

I will note, especially in contrast to a number of other recently read books that pour on the cultural-referencing humor, that Harkaway manages to stay true to the emotion of the book and the family drama at its heart. He also does some interesting things with sexuality, which rather bothered me at first, until I realized he seemed to be turning Edie into a caricature of James Bond.

After finishing, I realized that Harkaway has rewritten The Gone-Away World for a different milieu. Read it if you like more literary, humorist works, likely [b:Breakfast of Champions|4980|Breakfast of Champions|Kurt Vonnegut|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1327934446s/4980.jpg|2859378], [b:Catch-22|168668|Catch-22|Joseph Heller|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1359882576s/168668.jpg|814330] or [b:A Confederacy of Dunces|310612|A Confederacy of Dunces|John Kennedy Toole|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1406092525s/310612.jpg|968084], and not so much if you are looking for a mystery/thriller/steampunk focus. show less

This book has a lot in common with other modern British urban fantasy novels (particularly Neverwhere and Kraken), but with quite a bit of James Bond thrown into the mix. The story features strange ineffable magic and a wondrous and terrible underworld, but also troublesome bureaucrats and a cross-dressing secret agent with extensive martial arts training. It is bombastic!

The protagonist isn't an everyman by birth. His father was a storied burglar, but he denies that legacy to follow the career of his grandfather, the honest clockmaker. Of course chaos and trouble comes into his life anyway, in the form of a sweet old lady with a dark past and a crazy plan.

If you're comfortable with flashbacks and intertwining stories then you'll enjoy show more this narrative. The story leaves the protagonist's perspective just when the number of questions introduced by his story became overwhelming, and switches to characters who immediately answer some of those questions.

Also, this book features the most sympathetic depiction of an attorney that I've ever read.

Did I mention that it is often funny, touching, or rivetingly exciting? show less

Joshua Joseph Spork is a name that will be with me for a long time, if not the rest of my life (I say, hoping that the rest of my life will be longer than a long time). He is an antique dealer, expert repairer of things clockwork, son of a submachine toting crook, and the main character in Nick Harkaway’s excellent spy adventure novel, “Angelmaker”.

When I reviewed Nick’s previous novel, “The Gone-Away World”, I described it as “a fast paced tale that covers a lot of ground and doesn’t let you rest for a minute”. Well, he’s done it again. The same pace, subtle, and not so subtle, humour, intricate plot, and breadth of scope are all present. “The Gone-Away World” convinced me I should read anything Nick writes. show more “Angelmaker” reinforced this decision.

Without being specific I can tell you that Joe Spork, like any central character in a spy novel, finds himself in a troublesome situation with different elements of his life falling asunder. For someone who just wants a quiet life this is rather troubling. In addition, he is surrounded by characters who he is not sure are on his side or the other; for that matter, he doesn’t know what or who the other side is.

Don’t be fooled by Edie Banister’s outward appearance. She may be a little old lady in her eighties, but in her heart she is something very different.

Nick’s characters are impeccably drawn, his language artful, and his plot intriguing. This was one of those books that I was sorry to finish and that, I have to admit, had me with an emotional lump in my throat at the end.

“Angelmaker” is much more than a spy novel. It is a tale of struggle and loyalty; a story of family and righteousness; and a narrative of how a legacy of former years can visit havoc on the present day world. It also poses the questions, “Who is really in control?” and “What are they really trying to do?”

For those of you interested in that sort of thing, there are several modes of transport in the book, including a boat, a submarine, a train, a taxi, a Lancaster bomber, and of course, an elephant. There is always and elephant.

#Angelmaker #Harkaway #NickHarkway show less

Joshua Joseph Spork, Joe to his friends, is a clockmaker and repairer of automata and is happy to keep a low profile. When your notorious gangster father was known by the nickname of Tommy Gun then being out of the limelight is something he's more than happy to be. Unfortunately for Joe, this state of affairs isn't going to last. It starts with a favour for a friend. Billy Friend wants Joe to take a look at an item for one of his clients. It's a book that is more than a book as it also has machine parts which the client wants cleaned up, repaired and made ready for use. Nobody but Billy should know that he's come in contact with it but some strange people have appeared at Joe's shop asking questions about and trying to acquire the show more object in question. Firstly there was the strange pair of Mr. Titwhistle and Mr. Cummerbund purporting to represent the Loganfield Museum of Mechanical History and this pair of oddball characters was quickly followed by a strangely dressed man who refers to himself as a Ruskinite. Joe advises them all that he is not in possession of the item they seek and then goes to try and find out more about it and his mysterious visitors. Joe's life is about to be turned upside down and inside out.

The second part of the story revolves around Edie Banister. A former superspy now nearing ninety whose story is told in flashback. She's probably the most sprightly octogenarian that I've ever encountered in any media. From her recruitment and training into the service and her long-running encounters with a diabolical South Asian dictator who goes by the name of Shem Shem Tsien who wants to look God in the eye and poke it with a finger. He's commissioned a doomsday device in best James Bond supervillain style and it's up to Edie to see he doesn't get to switch it on. When Joe and Edie's worlds collide it could be the end of everything.

Oh what a fun romp this is! A multi-genre mash-up that works brilliantly. Mixing in the aforementioned Bond with a touch of Allan Quatermain adding more than a dash of the British gangster flick and throwing in some steampunk elements and philosophical musings for good measure. Excellent characters that inhabit a beautifully written world. Dialogue that is imbued with a dark humour and a plot that brings all the strings together and ties them up in an end-of-the-world scenario that will have you furiously turning the pages. show less

I can't speak highly enough about this book. I bought a copy for my dad before I even finished reading it.

The characters were fascinating, the villain was breath-takingly evil, and the plot was razor sharp. Even the philosophical underpinnings of the story were thought-provoking and a completely new spin on that age-old cliche--"The End of the World." Because even nuclear war wouldn't really finish off humankind, right? Well, Nick Harkaway thought of an even worse way, and in his story it makes sense that his dooomsday device really would be THE END for us all.

But what I might have loved most of all was the LANGUAGE. Harkaway's words alternate between passages of warm, buttery smoothness to breathless, heart-pumping exuberance. Maybe show more even for the language alone, I think this may be my new favorite book.

Five stars aren't really enough. Until I come down off of this "book high," in my mind Angelmaker gets six. show less

At his best, Harkaway is hard to beat, and this is him at the top of his game.
He can certainly be exhausting, with ornate meandering descriptions, observations, and musings that too often lead nowhere in particular and at best add an additional splash of colour to an already oversaturated scene. The humour and references are witty and obscure to the point of self-indulgent arrogance. The plot and dialogue are quite over the top, more a spoof of a cheesy 1970's James Bond movie than a serious attempt to craft a realistic thriller.

But somehow he manages to just barely keep enough of his ebullient creativity within the lines to carve out a coherent story, set in a world populated by gangsters, spies, clockwork monks, mad scientists, show more shadowy government agents, a Bond supervillian, and a blind pugnacious pug. All vying for control of a doomsday device.

It's brilliant and frustrating, exciting and pensive, absurd and moving. And most importantly, tremendous fun. show less

Harkaway's second novel Angelmaker is a far better book than his first, despite showing a similar range of preoccupations. There are still martial arts training, a big showdown with a fearsome villain, strange conspiracies, and incomprehensible technology with basically metaphysical effects.

This story has for its hero Joshua Joseph Spork, a "clockworker" with a gangster heritage, and it concerns the immanentization of the eschaton by means of mechanical apiary. Although set in the early 21st century, the novel includes recollected episodes from throughout the 20th--largely thanks to a key alternate protagonist, superspy Edie Banister. The whole thing is told in a hectic Pynchonesque style that I greatly enjoyed.

A lot of the show more sensibility of this book has been taken up again in the later Jack Price novels by "Aidan Truhen," and while the tale of Crazy Joe Spork is sometimes as funny as Jack Price, it also includes a little more serious reflection and attempts to deal with "deep" concerns. show less