Space Opera

The frenetic pace of this book began on page one and was so unrelenting it became almost wearisome, like an amphetamine-fueled joke that just goes on and on. Here’s a taste:

Give them the soggiest cast-off thigh-high stocking’s worth of a tune and the most obnoxiously Campari-drunk open-mic-night-reject half-sucked raspberry lolly of a lyric, and in one night, Dess and Mira and Oort would turn around a glamgrind anthem perfectly crystallizing the despair of the young enslaved by the London real estate market crossbred with the desperate futuro-cosmic hope of murdering a Martian catwalk in a satin slip while guzzling a rubbish bin full of cheap ruby port, as sung by the comet-pummeled ghost of Oscar Wilde snorting stars like meth.

But show more … BUT … it had such heart, and I became so enamored of the protagonist Decibel Jones, that I ended up loving it. It was full of pithy, quotable lines that really need context to be fully appreciated. It was full of glamrock and zaniness with the occasional pointed shard of tragedy tinged with Brexit and neofascism. If you can enjoy the dopey pun of the title and if you might enjoy a little SFnal Eurovision fanfic, this is the book for you. show less

Eurovision in space.

No, really.

This is humorous sf, strongly influenced by Douglas Adams and Terry Pratchett. Not everyone will love it. Some people will find it hopelessly over the top, especially if that's how they felt about Hitchhikers' Guide to the Galaxy.

I loved it.

Earth has discovered that we are not alone in the big, beautiful universe, or even in the galaxy. There's a galactic confederation that, since the Sentience Wars a hundred years ago, have worked at system to decide who gets to join the sentience club, and who gets eliminated permanently, with their planet getting a chance to try again when another species has evolved far enough to be contemplating space travel.

The system is a totally over-the-top musical competition. show more It's an interstellar, inter-species Eurovision, and performance on stage matters at least as much as the song itself. New species competing for the first time don't have to win; they do have to not lose. Established species who finish dead last are confined to their own planet for a long time to contemplate their mistakes. New species competing for the first time, if they finish dead last, are eliminated permanently, their species exterminated, with as little damage to their planet as reasonably possible so that the biosphere can try again to produce a sentient species.

The aliens have been monitoring Earth's transmissions since the beginning of radio, and they have a list of possible representatives to compete on Earth's behalf in the Galactivision competition. Unfortunately, most of them are dead.

The trio Decibel Jones and the Absolute Zeroes are chosen, not quite by default.

Unfortunately, only two of the three, Decibel himself and Oort (I listened to the audiobook and didn't, alas, get his last name well enough to reproduce it here), are left, Mira Wonder Star having died in a car crash. Neither of them thinks they can really do it without Mira, but since the alternative is that Earth finishes dead last by default and everyone dies, they are shortly on their way to the contest site, 7,000 lightyears away. They're accompanied by a couple of friendly aliens, one of whom is apparently a big, blue flamingo. Oh, and Oort's children's cat, Kaypro, is with them, and newly endowed with the ability to talk.

This is a completely madcap, insane rollercoaster ride, so far over the top you can't even see the top anymore, and it's a lot of fun. It's also sharp and insightful and warm and decent. The characters learn and grow and are well worth spending the time with, especially, but not exclusively, Decibel and Oort. Valente uses the language beautifully, and it was a lot of fun to listen to Heath Miller reading it.

Recommended.

I bought this audiobook. show less

This was nominated for the Hugo Award in 2019. Its genesis is simple, and explained by the author in an afterword. A US genre author discovered the Eurovision Song Contest and was much taken with it. A fellow author persuaded them to use it in a science fiction novel. There are many reasons why this is a bad idea. The US does not compete in Eurovision. People in the US have no idea what Eurovision means… and it means different things to different countries. In the UK, it is considered somewhat risible, with a side-order of resentment. In Sweden, there is a month-long televised Melodifest merely to pick the song to represent the country. Valente decided to appropriate Eurovision for a US audience and base it all on The Hitch-hiker’s show more Guide to the Galaxy. She failed. Not only are the references a weird mishmash of UK and US that make no sense, embedding UK cultural elements in US cultural movements, but the whole thing is a litany of megaviolence and genocide from start to finish… While Eurovision was indeed created to help rebuild links between the war-torn nations of Europe after WWII, it does not celebrate the death and destruction which occurred between 1939 and 1945. Nor does it boast of the weaponry, tactics or bodycounts of the various competing nations. Valente also chose to model her prose on The Hitch-hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. I am not, I admit, a great fan of Adams’s novels, although I’ve read them and, when I was young, enjoyed them. But Adam’s books at least contained ideas and riffed off them. Valente’s does not. Adams’s jokes were carefully set up, and then left quickly behind, to crop up again when least expected. Valente belabours her jokes, sometimes with almost Fanthorpe levels of repetition. You end up skipping pages, trying to find the narrative. To be fair, I tried reading a Valente novel once before, Palimpsest, and ended up throwing it against the wall because it was so overwritten. And I admire Lawrence Durrell’s prose! I managed to finish Space Opera, but it was a slog. I can only recommend people avoid it. Especially if they’re fans of Eurovision. show less

So... Combine David Bowie, with his glam rock style, Hitchhikers Guide to the Universe, Eurovision, and end of the world scenario, and you get this book. Its fun, its cheesy, and really, the more I think about it, I think this is a perfect way to prove sentience (but not with the world ending bit).

Decibel Jones and the Absolute Zeroes has it all (except a best selling second album and a dead drummer) but they have been chosen as the best band that Earth can send (mostly because all the other choices are dead). Theres also a cat who was given the gift of speech. Also, the cat has the best line in the whole book regarding the sub-continent of India.

I'm not sure how the author manages to capture the seriousness of the situation, with the show more absurdity that is glamrock and Eurovision. I highly recommend this one because it shouldn't work, but it does, and manages to do it on many levels. show less

The population of Earth is shocked when one day an alien shows up in the living room of each person on the planet and informs them that in order to prove their sentience and worthiness of continuing to exist in the galaxy, they must send a band to compete in an intergalactic version of Eurovision. The aliens have scanned recent music history and come up with a list of candidates the only one of whom is still living is Decibel Jones and the Absolute Zeroes, a decidedly has-been one-hit wonder band.

Combining the weirdness of Eurovision with a decidedly Douglas Adams-esque vibe, this science fiction tale is both deeply weird and pretty dang funny. It is decidedly not for everyone and Valente's intense prose in the first couple chapters show more will definitely weed out those for whom this book will not be enjoyable. But once you make it through those initial chapters the tale of Dess and Oort as they grapple with who they used to be and the insanely ridiculous task of singing to save the planet is a great time. show less

This book was a mind-expanding, chortle-making, thought-provoking, memory-stirring, joy-producing experience from beginning to end.


It's packed with wit, pyrotechnic sentences, infinite imagination, seasoned with potential genocide and diabolically devious competition and held together by compassion and empathy and a little hope. It's kept human and relevant by focuses on some broken-but-not-yet-destroyed musicians and all the magic that music works for us.


The title is ironic but you only know that after you've read the book - yeah, it's that kind of book - so confident of its own coolness it doesn't care if you only get it in retrospect because that's kinda cool too, you know? This isn't about space battles and complex hardware. Think show more Douglas Adams and Terry Pratchett falling in love the Eurovision Song Contest and going "what if that was pan-galactic and the stakes were WAY higher?"


I can't believe that I've never read Catherynne Volente before. Where have I been all her life? I'm hooked now and I'll definitely be reading more. Her kind of talent is rare. He voice lifts me up to who I'd like to be, lets me forgive myself for not being him (yet) and tells me that I (and you) am not alone.


"Space Opera" was my first Buddy Read, a process that was great fun and prompted me to record my experience of the book as I read it. I've given my unedited Buddy Read posts This book was a mind-expanding, chortle-making, thought-provoking, memory-stirring, joy-producing experience from beginning to end.


It's packed with wit, pyrotechnic sentences, infinite imagination, seasoned with potential genocide and diabolically devious competition and held together by compassion and empathy and a little hope. It's kept human and relevant by focuses on some broken-but-not-yet-destroyed musicians and all the magic that music works for us.


The title is ironic but you only know that after you've read the book - yeah, it's that kind of book - so confident of its own coolness it doesn't care if you only get it in retrospect because that's kinda cool too, you know? This isn't about space battles and complex hardware. Think Douglas Adams and Terry Pratchett falling in love the Eurovision Song Contest and going "what if that was pan-galactic and the stakes were WAY higher?"


I can't believe that I've never read Catherynne Volente before. Where have I been all her life? I'm hooked now and I'll definitely be reading more. Her kind of talent is rare. He voice lifts me up to who I'd like to be, lets me forgive myself for not being him (yet) and tells me that I (and you) am not alone.


"Space Opera" was my first Buddy Read, a process that was great fun and prompted me to record my experience of the book as I read it. I've given my unedited Buddy Read posts here:
https://mikefinnsfiction.wordpress.com/2018/04/29/space-opera-by-catherynne-m-va... show less

Absolutely hilarious. The writing style is very much like Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, but not quite as novel. The world-building is expansive and incredibly original and the plot is well paced and interesting. I expected this to just be a light novel, but it actually has a strong message and covers a number of serious themes all within a glittery-glam package.