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Perdido Street Station by China Mieville
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Perdido Street Station (original 2000; edition 2001)

by China Mieville (Author)

Series: Bas-Lag (1)

MembersReviewsPopularityAverage ratingMentions
9,360315833 (4.04)684
WINNER OF THE AUGUST DERLETH AND ARTHUR C. CLARKE AWARDS • A masterpiece brimming with scientific splendor, magical intrigue, and fierce characters, from the author who “has reshaped modern fantasy” ( The Washington Post ) “[China Miéville’s] fantasy novels, including a trilogy set in and around the magical city-state of New Crobuzon, have the refreshing effect of making Middle-earth seem plodding and flat.”— The New York Times The metropolis of New Crobuzon sprawls at the center of the world. Humans and mutants and arcane races brood in the gloom beneath its chimneys, where the river is sluggish with unnatural effluent and foundries pound into the night. For a thousand years, the Parliament and its brutal militias have ruled over a vast economy of workers and artists, spies and soldiers, magicians, crooks, and junkies. Now a stranger has arrived, with a pocketful of gold and an impossible demand. And something unthinkable is released. The city is gripped by an alien terror. The fate of millions lies with a clutch of renegades. A reckoning is due at the city’s heart, in the vast edifice of brick and wood and steel under the vaults of Perdido Street Station. It is too late to escape.… (more)
Member:deathjoy
Title:Perdido Street Station
Authors:China Mieville (Author)
Info:Del Rey (2001), 710 pages
Collections:Your library
Rating:****
Tags:DECEMBER 2015

Work Information

Perdido Street Station by China Miéville (2000)

  1. 80
    Embassytown by China Miéville (mclewe)
    mclewe: For Miéville's ability to create a complete world, incomprehensible, fascinating, intelligent.
  2. 70
    City of Saints and Madmen by Jeff VanderMeer (bertilak)
  3. 96
    The Windup Girl by Paolo Bacigalupi (souloftherose)
    souloftherose: Although The Windup Girl is more science fiction than steampunk/fantasy, I felt there were similarities in the exoticness of the world-building and readers who enjoyed Perdido Street Station may also enjoy The Windup Girl.
  4. 30
    Iron Council by China Miéville (kaipakartik)
    kaipakartik: Same universe, a lot of the same creatures. Brilliantly done as well
  5. 53
    Geek Love by Katherine Dunn (fyrefly98)
  6. 10
    This Alien Shore by C. S. Friedman (MyriadBooks)
    MyriadBooks: For the world building, for the heft of the plot.
  7. 10
    Sea of Ghosts by Alan Campbell (iftyzaidi)
  8. 33
    Dhalgren by Samuel R. Delany (aaronius)
    aaronius: Another dystopian dream-city to get lost in with weird sex and fantastic writing.
  9. 11
    God's War by Kameron Hurley (electronicmemory)
    electronicmemory: Two excellent examples of twisted, dark and brutal stories with unexpected sci-fi/fantasy elements and engrossing worlds.
  10. 22
    The Etched City by K. J. Bishop (Jarandel)
    Jarandel: Similar dark, steampunk-ish urban environments that sometime veer into the horrific and fantastical.
  11. 00
    The Dervish House by Ian McDonald (majkia)
    majkia: no idea why exactly, but the two seem similar to me.
  12. 00
    The Last City by Nina D'Aleo (GuyMontag)
  13. 00
    City of Bohane by Kevin Barry (Macon)
  14. 00
    Viriconium: "The Pastel City", "A Storm of Wings", "In Viriconium", "Viriconium Nights" by M. John Harrison (g33kgrrl)
    g33kgrrl: "Weird cities" staples.
  15. 02
    Santa Olivia by Jacqueline Carey (Aerrin99)
    Aerrin99: An interesting world filled with unexpected people.
  16. 13
    Earth by David Brin (freddlerabbit)
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» See also 684 mentions

English (310)  Spanish (2)  Italian (2)  Finnish (1)  All languages (315)
Showing 1-5 of 310 (next | show all)
Had some high hopes, but in the end steampunk animalmonster fantasy isn't my thing. The story gets off to a slow start, and heats up more grippingly in the latter half. If cactus people, pig-men and giant monkey-moths are your thing, mixed with technomedievalisms ('chymical', 'elyctric', 'thaumaturgic') then you'll enjoy it. ( )
  breathslow | Jan 27, 2024 |
This is a book whose main romantic pairing is between a man and a woman who has a cockroach for a head. The relationship is portrayed more honestly, poignantly, and quite frankly erotically than most fantasy authors can manage between two human protagonists. Any book that pulls this off is getting no fewer then four stars.

This is a noisy, messy, cacophony of a book. Its central idea: what does a city full of truly alien people look like? How do they get along with each other? What are the politics of that city? What are the economics? What is its culture like? Its underground art scene? Its mafia? Its pornography? Miéville for the most part pulls this off believably. Perdido Street Station is not perfect, but a Frankenstein monster such as this one isn't going to be the prettiest or most streamlined book you've ever read. Frankenstien's monster wasn't remarkable because it was pretty, it was remarkable because despite being a hodgepodge creature hastily sewn together it somehow, bafflingly, worked. ( )
  ethorwitz | Jan 3, 2024 |
Marvelous book, unbelievably rich in language and a very, very good story line (but not recommended for happy-ending lovers!) ( )
  bert42 | Nov 2, 2023 |
Perhaps i would have given it twice as many stars if I'd made it to the end instead of half way. I got bored with the overbearing prose that insisted on using as many synonyms of "putrid" as the author could think of. I have no doubt there's a good story in there somewhere, but I've given up struggling through to watch it unfold. ( )
  emmby | Oct 4, 2023 |
I was incredibly disappointed in this book. Despite Mieville's astonishing imagination, this story could not rise above the pages and pages of relentless detail about so many literally disgusting things. It wasn't just the revulsion, I could have handled that, but it was the endless passages that were so unnecessary and boring, the truly hackneyed writing style, and the lack of any real insight. I would never have guessed that the same author wrote "The City and the City." ( )
  lschiff | Sep 24, 2023 |
Showing 1-5 of 310 (next | show all)
Perdido Street Station is a well written and absorbing story aimed at breaking the rules for a number of different fantasy concepts.
 

» Add other authors (14 possible)

Author nameRoleType of authorWork?Status
Miéville, Chinaprimary authorall editionsconfirmed
Bauche-Eppers, EvaTranslatorsecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed
Bauche-Eppers, EvaTranslatorsecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed
Lee, JohnNarratorsecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed
Miller, EdwardCover artistsecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed
Miller, EdwardIllustratorsecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed
Oliver, JonathanNarratorsecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed
Stevenson, DavidCover artistsecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed
Villa, ElisaTranslatorsecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed
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Epigraph
'I even gave up, for a while, stopping by the window of the room to look out at the lights and deep, illuminated streets. That's a form of dying, that losing contact with the city like that.'

Philip K. Dick, We Can Build You
Dedication
to Emma
First words
Veldt to scrub to fields to farms to these first tumbling houses that rise from the earth.
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(Click to show. Warning: May contain spoilers.)
Disambiguation notice
Do not combine with either Die Falter or Der Weber. Perdido Street Station was split into two volumes for publication in Germany.
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WINNER OF THE AUGUST DERLETH AND ARTHUR C. CLARKE AWARDS • A masterpiece brimming with scientific splendor, magical intrigue, and fierce characters, from the author who “has reshaped modern fantasy” ( The Washington Post ) “[China Miéville’s] fantasy novels, including a trilogy set in and around the magical city-state of New Crobuzon, have the refreshing effect of making Middle-earth seem plodding and flat.”— The New York Times The metropolis of New Crobuzon sprawls at the center of the world. Humans and mutants and arcane races brood in the gloom beneath its chimneys, where the river is sluggish with unnatural effluent and foundries pound into the night. For a thousand years, the Parliament and its brutal militias have ruled over a vast economy of workers and artists, spies and soldiers, magicians, crooks, and junkies. Now a stranger has arrived, with a pocketful of gold and an impossible demand. And something unthinkable is released. The city is gripped by an alien terror. The fate of millions lies with a clutch of renegades. A reckoning is due at the city’s heart, in the vast edifice of brick and wood and steel under the vaults of Perdido Street Station. It is too late to escape.

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