Alastair Reynolds Lives! Kurt Vonnegut, Alas, Does Not.

Came across a random article on the physicist turned sci-fi novelist, Alastair Reynolds. I've read 4 of his books and can see why he's been one of the key components of the British "space opera renaissance" of the last few years (other contributors include Neal Asher, Charles Stross, Peter Hamilton and of course the grand masters Iain Banks and Ken MacLeod).

I'm looking forward to reading his new book 'The Prefect', though I don't imagine it will be any time soon, what with work and a huge backlog of stuff to read.

On another note, the brilliant satirist and novelist Kurt Vonnegut has passed away. To learn more about him you can follow the link to his obituary on bbc.com. I thought I'd just put down a comment of two about some of his stuff that I've read.

The first book of his that I read was 'Breakfast of Champions' back when I was doing my A Levels in Karachi. I remember picking it up at a friend's house, just meaning to browse and then getting caught up. Its very elegantly written, like all of his best stuff. At the same time I was amazed. I didn't know it was possible to write like this! Breaking all the conventions of plot and characterisation and narrative, and yet, still write something so interesting. I remember when I finished the book I was crying. At the time I found the book unremittingly bleak, though a recent rereading of it found it less so.

My favourite Vonnegut book has to be 'Slaughter House 5'. It is based on Vonnegut's own experience in the Second World War. In the introduction, Vonnegut describes how he was a prisoner of war in 1945, and was held at Dresden where he and other prisoners were housed in a Meat processing plant which had been converted to hold prisoners because there was no meat to be found at this late stage of the war in Germany. He describes how Dresden was fire-bombed (many now hold the fire-bombing of Dresden as a war crime because it was not a military target and led to the deaths of between 20,000 - 60,000 civilians, with some estimates going as high as 160,000) which he survived because the slaughter-house in which he and his fellow prisoners were in was untouched while the next building over which housed nuns who were war refugees was completely destroyed. After the bombing he and the other prisoners were put to work pulling out bodies from the wreckage. There is one horrific detail (out of the many) which sticks in my mind, which is his description of another POW - a Maori from New Zealand retching till he choked to death at the sight of the carnage. Vonnegut builds on these and other experiences to write about fate, free will and human nature. The climax of the novel comes not with the fire-bombing, but in the aftermath with the hanging of a man for looting in the ruins of the city, a rather senseless tragedy in the face of everything that has come before and that is to follow.

As Vonnegut says 'So it goes'.

IZ