The Separation
May. 6th, 2003 10:53 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
coalescentThe Separation is the latest novel by Christopher Priest. It's been sitting on my to-be-read pile for a while; inspired by its BSFA award win, yesterday I finally got around to reading it.
The Separation is an alternate history, but an atypical one. Most counterfactuals posit a point of change in world history, then show us the world that results from that change and explore how it differs to our own. Priest's novel, like many before it, explores an alternate outcome from World War II - but focuses almost exclusively on the moment of change, asking how it could arise and what effect it might have on the people involved.
In this case, the people are twin brothers: Jack and Joe Sawyer (this is a book strongly about dualism and reflection, mirrors and doubles). They row together in the 1936 Berlin Olympics, then are separated by the war. Jack becomes a pilot in the RAF, Joe a member of the Red Cross.
Priest's prose is clean and uncomplicated. which is just as well; there's enough complexity in the structure and thematics of the book as it is. This is a dense novel. It is perfectly balanced throughout, however; the level of detail is astonishing, yet you somehow never lose sight of the big picture. And whilst Jack and Joe both have a significant impact on the course of history, you are always reminded that on another level they are small men, caught up in large events. Only Kim Stanley Robinson has previously portrayed this contradiction in the nature of history with such subtlety.
It becomes hard to write much more about The Separation without spoiling it. The joy of the novel is in putting the clues together, and solving the mystery surrounding the Sawyer brothers. Suffice it to say that this is one of the best novels of the year, and it fully deserves its award-winning status.
(The other notable thing about The Separation is that it's on this year's Arthur C Clarke award shortlist. I don't think it will win, despite the BSFA result - and I don't think it should win, either, despite what I said above. It's an unfair comparison - were it not for the fact that they share a shortlist, the two novels would have nothing in common - but when it comes down to it, I find that whilst The Separation impresses, Light dazzles.)
The Separation is an alternate history, but an atypical one. Most counterfactuals posit a point of change in world history, then show us the world that results from that change and explore how it differs to our own. Priest's novel, like many before it, explores an alternate outcome from World War II - but focuses almost exclusively on the moment of change, asking how it could arise and what effect it might have on the people involved.
In this case, the people are twin brothers: Jack and Joe Sawyer (this is a book strongly about dualism and reflection, mirrors and doubles). They row together in the 1936 Berlin Olympics, then are separated by the war. Jack becomes a pilot in the RAF, Joe a member of the Red Cross.
Priest's prose is clean and uncomplicated. which is just as well; there's enough complexity in the structure and thematics of the book as it is. This is a dense novel. It is perfectly balanced throughout, however; the level of detail is astonishing, yet you somehow never lose sight of the big picture. And whilst Jack and Joe both have a significant impact on the course of history, you are always reminded that on another level they are small men, caught up in large events. Only Kim Stanley Robinson has previously portrayed this contradiction in the nature of history with such subtlety.
It becomes hard to write much more about The Separation without spoiling it. The joy of the novel is in putting the clues together, and solving the mystery surrounding the Sawyer brothers. Suffice it to say that this is one of the best novels of the year, and it fully deserves its award-winning status.
(The other notable thing about The Separation is that it's on this year's Arthur C Clarke award shortlist. I don't think it will win, despite the BSFA result - and I don't think it should win, either, despite what I said above. It's an unfair comparison - were it not for the fact that they share a shortlist, the two novels would have nothing in common - but when it comes down to it, I find that whilst The Separation impresses, Light dazzles.)
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no subject
Date: 2003-05-06 04:19 pm (UTC)(sigh)
Oh well, back to reading The Tain at a pathetic pace.
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Date: 2003-05-07 07:51 am (UTC)But I'm still a bit hesitant, given that I'm not keen on alternate histories, or books that require the reader to put clues together to solve a mystery. We'll see soon enough, I guess.
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Date: 2003-05-08 03:52 am (UTC)They are very different. Very, very different.
I'm not keen on alternate histories,
Man In The High Castle? :)
I wouldn't worry too much about that. It's not much like any other AH I've ever read.
or books that require the reader to put clues together to solve a mystery.
Well, everything is explained in the end. More or less. It's just that if you don't pay close attention, you might think Priest has messed up his continuity, when he's actually just being annoyingly clever.