Omnivoracious (Jeff Vandermeer) Interviews China Miéville

From the interview:

China Miéville’s latest novel, Embassytown, is a fascinating mix of the cerebral and the visceral, a “weird” science fiction novel that features paired ambassadors communicating with aliens on a distant planet. When a new, strange ambassador pair arrives from a more central world, communication between the groups begins to break down, with disastrous and transformative results for humans and aliens alike. It’s an ambitious, heady mix for readers, rewarded with praise in The Guardian from Ursula K. LeGuin and, this past weekend, in the New York Times Book Review. The novel builds on the success of previous books written in a variety of related genres, and, to this reader at least, reflects a continuing quest to break down the barricades between so-called “literary” and “genre” fiction. As ever, his fiction is a potent delivery system for sometimes difficult ideas.

I interviewed Miéville via email at the end of his U.S. book tour for Embassytown, focusing not just on the novel but on his recent tour.

The rest of the interview can be found here....

New Artwork Revealed for China Miéville

Pan Macmillan unveiled the full re-jacketed backlist of China’s books, to be published alongside his new novel, Embassytown, on 6th May 2011.

Crush Creative designed the covers and they look truly amazing! I can already see the fans wanting to own the entire catalogue.

They all look sublime but if I have to pick the best one, in my opinion, it would be the cover of Iron Council. What do you think?

Hardcover: 432 pages
Publisher: Macmillan (6 May 2011)
ISBN-10: 0230750761
ISBN-13: 978-0230750760

Embassytown: a city of contradictions on the outskirts of the universe.

Avice is an immerser, a traveller on the immer, the sea of space and time below the everyday, now returned to her birth planet. Here on Arieka, humans are not the only intelligent life, and Avice has a rare bond with the natives, the enigmatic Hosts - who cannot lie.

Only a tiny cadre of unique human Ambassadors can speak Language, and connect the two communities. But an unimaginable new arrival has come to Embassytown. And when this Ambassador speaks, everything changes.

Catastrophe looms. Avice knows the only hope is for her to speak directly to the alien Hosts.

And that is impossible.

Something for the weekend...

Two very interesting and innovative sites have launched recently in the UK.

Dark Fiction Magazine is now on Issue 2 with the theme Dystopian Desires. This site presents audio short fiction, often read by the author themselves. The current issue contains the following:

• Story: The Crack Angel by Jon Courtenay Grimwood (read by David Moore)
• Story: The Killing Fields by Kim Lakin-Smith (read by Kim Lakin-Smith)
• Story: What Would Nicolas Cage Have Done? by Gareth L Powell (read by Gareth L Powell)
• Story: On the Last Wave by Jennifer Williams (read by Jennifer Williams)

This is a very professional site, with very cool graphics and clear navigation and instructions. You can download the stories either as audio files or an ebook, or do as I do and listen online through the built-in player. The first issue, The Darkness Descends, was launched at Halloween with a fanfare of well deserved praise.

There are also regular episodes of single short stories released in between issues. Follow their blog to keep updated on releases and general news. Personally I am looking forward to the Twelve Days Anthology due for release on the winter solstice (21st December 2010): all 12 stories were submitted for a competition, and the winners are listed here: Twelve Days Anthology: winners
Twitter: @DarkFicMagazine
Facebook: DarkFictionMagazine

Un:Bound Video Editions was launched on 6th December 2010 and it is a 4-part video magazine. the intro trailer below gives a very good overview of what to expect.



This first issue includes:

• inteviews with authors Tony Ballantyne (Twisted Metal, Blood and Iron, Recursion); Mark Charan Newton (Nights of Villjamur, City of Ruin), Adrian Tchaikovsky (Shadows of the Apt series) and Peter F Hamilton (Pandora's Star, The Reality Dysfunction, The Dreaming Void) when they appeared at the Other Worlds con in Sepetember 2010
• an in depth tour of Tor UK publishing house, including Julia Crisp (the woman with the best job in the UK!)
• advice from Angry Robot editor Lee Harris
• news from Alasdair Stuart
• Great Cthulhu, inhuman correspondent

Un:Bound Video Editions has got off to a very promising start. The author discussions were interesting and insightful but I particularly enjoyed the visit to Tor UK where a variety of aspects of publishing were explored, including artwork and marketing plus there were lots of shiny new books on view, including a tantalising glimpse of a China Miéville novel due out next year...

For lovers of Speculative Fiction, Un:Bound Video Editions should be high on your favourites list so visit regularly to see what interesting snippets they post in between their monthly full editions.

REVIEW: The City & The City by China Miéville

The City & The City by China Miéville
Hardcover: 312 pages
Publisher: Macmillan (UK) (15 May 2009)
ISBN-10: 1405000171
ISBN-13: 978-1405000178
Copy: Bought On-Line
Reviewer: Yagiz

When the body of a murdered woman is found in the extraordinary, decaying city of Besźel, somewhere at the edge of Europe, it looks like a routine case for Inspector Tyador Borlú of the Extreme Crime Squad. But as he probes, the evidence begins to point to conspiracies far stranger, and more deadly, than anything he could have imagined. Soon his work puts him and those he cares for in danger. Borlú must travel to the only metropolis on Earth as strange as his own, across a border like no other. With shades of Kafka and Philip K. Dick, Raymond Chandler and 1984 , "The City & The City" is a murder mystery taken to dazzling metaphysical and artistic heights.

On the surface, The City & The City is a detective novel. It is told in the first-person and its narrator is Tyador Borlú of the Besźel Extreme Crime Squad. Borlú investigates the murder of a young foreign woman. Her body is found in Besźel but the investigation slowly reveals that the case spans both cities. As the case progresses, the focus of the story shifts to the setting. For a while, the reader doesn't really comprehend how exactly these two cities are connected. In the beginning it is easy to suspect various possibilities, especially for the readers who already know how unpredictable Miéville's imagination can be.

At its core, Miéville's 2010 Clarke Award-winner book is the tale of two cities: Besźel and Ul Qoma. The author doesn't reveal the exact location of these cities but given the references to some eastern European countries like Turkey and Bulgaria, the reader's mind places them on the eastern edge of Europe. The truly unique setting is executed brilliantly and Miéville masterfully reveals how intertwined his twin cities are.

The readers who have read the author's previous books may be surprised or even disappointed in the lack of strongly weird and fantastical traits. As Miéville seems to like to experiment with different concepts in his books, one may expect to encounter highly surreal aspects. However the setting and its execution are what make this book unique. Furthermore the characters are very satisfactory. As usual, the prose and the author's style don't disappoint.

I also think that The City & The City is a thought-provoking book. Before moving to a relatively small Irish city, I had only lived in very large cities, including Istanbul, the fourth largest city in the world with its 13 million inhabitants. Miéville made me think about the cities contained in these metropolises. I'm not only talking about China Town or Little Italy, but he made me think about the inner-cities with financial, cultural, religious or educational frontiers set by their inhabitants. It was about the beggar or the drunkard that we unsee in the corner of a street or about the districts we avoid at all costs.

With his amazing imagination and talent, Miéville continues to be unconventional. His astonishing ability to confuse and surprise his readers persists in his award-winning The City & The City. I would highly recommend this truly unique book.

Plot: 9
Characters: 9
Style: 9

Overall 9/10

Reviewer: Tyson

The City & the City is my first experience with Miéville and I came into this book not knowing what to expect. What I had after I had finished the book was a top-notch detective story with elements of the fantastical.

While it takes a while to figure out just what the heck is going on between the two cities, you do see a lot of parallels to life in a large city, I live in one of the largest cities in the world, Seoul. Seoul has one of the largest population by density and in order to survive the rigours of daily life you have to blank or zone out some of the seedier elements of the city. In The City & The City you are required to forget or un-see the other city or face the possibility of punishment, imprisonment, or far worse.

The City and the City was an exceptional detective novel with a great twist. It was a great introduction to Miéville and does an excellent job of showing us why it is the award winner that it is.



Plot: 8
Characters: 8
Style: 9

Overall 8.5/10