I really wanted to like this book. It is the winner of both a Hugo and a Nebula award, so I had really high hopes. Then I started reading it. It took me about 100 pages to get absorbed into the world Bacigalupi created here, a post-apocalyptic, or rather a post-globalwarming, post-cloning world, run by the major agricultural companies, limiting the seeds and foods available, and producing infertile seeds, so that new seeds are always needed from the ag companies. There is limited available energy, having used all the easy energy, so things are powered by animal, cloned mammoths do all the heavy lifting. Everything we take for granted now is a rarity. It took a while to figure out this world, but after I did, it was fascinating. The world pulled me in. The characters, however, not so much. Not one of the major characters pulled me in, gained any sympathy from me, or any concern. I did not like any of these characters, even the titular Windup Girl, who was the most interesting of the bunch.
In the end, I found my interest really flagging, and found myself sludging through the last fifty pages to get it done. Overall, interesting, but not recommended.
This is one of the most impressive dystopian SF novels that I have ever read, but it does start as slowly as any great book that I have ever encountered. There is no question that the book builds the story slowly in order to build up the social and political and economic background to the book - describing, in fact, a world where the economic has swallowed up the political and determines the social. As a result there is an unusual degree of depth to the book.
ReplyDeleteBacigalupi also builds the title character slowly, not even introducing her until fairly far into the novel, and only building her potential as a character that could carry a franchise until well over two-thirds into the novel. The climax of the novel is enormously entertaining and the end is as exciting as the beginning is slow.