|
Jan 2017
7:54pm, 6 Jan 2017
27,466 posts
|
McGoohan
I haven't scored it yet!
|
|
Jan 2017
7:55pm, 6 Jan 2017
27,467 posts
|
McGoohan
The 7 is from Serens-Dippers 
|
|
Jan 2017
7:55pm, 6 Jan 2017
27,468 posts
|
McGoohan
But first... I have to do the washing up.
|
|
Jan 2017
8:56pm, 6 Jan 2017
27,469 posts
|
McGoohan
So, I have given it an 8.
I really enjoyed Nod. If I start at 10 out of 10 and deduct a point for things that mildly annoyed me, I end up at 8, approximately.
First off, I don't mind *at all* that the reason for the sudden inability to sleep is never explained. In apocalyptic/dystopian fiction like this, it often isn't. In fact it was slightly convenient that Paul meets the guy on the battleship that nuked Seattle. I was happy with random nukes going off - I didn't need it explained. Not that irked though. So from 10 to 9.5.
Secondly, for someone who has read a lot of this sort of stuff, the references are clearly there, but worn lightly enough for it to feel original.
I thought I was going to be annoyed that he was a writer but that ultimately worked as his manuscript becomes important plot-wise. I was irked earlier on by the style of his writing. He - Barnes - clearly likes wordplay, but there's often a lot of set-up to get to something clever. The whole setting-up of the concept of Blemmye for instance felt very contrived. These things are mostly in the earlier chapters and I got into the style after a bit. That knocked it back from 9.5 to 8.5.
I do have a slight issue with the concept: not that I want it explained, but I felt it lacked a little internal consistency. This is happening All Over The World. He refers to 'night' as if it's happening at the same time everywhere: he barely considers that Vancouver will be experiencing what Sydney or Hong Kong did 15 hours ago. I realise that is part of his theme: in the apocalypse, ones interests get narrower and narrower. 8.5 down to 8.25.
The character of Charles, later on is fine, but I had a sense of a sketched intro to him so that we had an antagonist and he didn't at first feel very real. 8.25 to 8.
That all seems very negative for a book I really liked - they were minor quibbles really.
|
|
Jan 2017
9:04pm, 6 Jan 2017
27,470 posts
|
McGoohan
And now some more positives. I talked about the references above. This is because to me, there's one very clear forerunner: J G Ballard (and behind him, Michael Moorcock).
When Moorcock was editor of New Worlds in the 60s, he was pushing it into a more avant garde direction. That wasn't such a big draw so he would regularly commission disaster/dystopian fiction from Jim Ballard. The Drowned World, The Crystal World that sort of thing. Moorcock even did a few himself (e.g. The Ice Schooner).
But Ballard was the king of it. Generally, they would involve:
- some sort of disaster, natural or man-made
- a less than perfect hero
- a person of relative weakness in the 'normal' world, raised the prophet in the new
- a really miserable conclusion
While doing that, Ballard would satirise society, behind a story whose more obvious point was: civilisation is only two meals thick.
Nod is like the novel Ballard forgot to write. In some ways, Ballard's style could be a bit dry and unemotional, whereas Barnes has put more humour and feeling into it. He's a natural for slipping into Ballard's vacated shoes.
|
|
Jan 2017
6:57pm, 7 Jan 2017
88,985 posts
|
GregP
I am just over half way through. My liking for it has diminished enormously over the past sixth
|
|
Jan 2017
9:21am, 8 Jan 2017
88,987 posts
|
GregP
Okay. Finished. Still marshalling my thoughts but it's a hard seven or a soft eight. Liked the writing, but there are plot holes you could drive an aircraft carrier (or destroyer - it's described as both which annoyed me a great deal) through. And there are blind alleys that stick out like yellow poo.
|
|
Jan 2017
9:22am, 8 Jan 2017
88,988 posts
|
GregP
I'd add John Wyndham to your list McG, fwiw.
|
|
Jan 2017
10:57am, 8 Jan 2017
7,925 posts
|
Badger
Also marshalling my thoughts. I took a particular dislike to the narrator with the line "He could have been a hobo, could have been a poseur; for years it had been getting harder and harder to tell the difference." I think that's sharp characterization, rather than snotty authorial insertion, and completely consistent with the kind of person he is; my irritation stems from the author doing his job well.
Good point about Wyndham, Grep (though Ballard is much more heavyweight). There's one Wyndham protagonist in particular who goes through the whole book sincerely believing he's the hero; if he was slightly smarter, he'd realise his wife is actually the hero, and he'd be dead at least twice over without her.
|
|
Jan 2017
11:43am, 8 Jan 2017
88,989 posts
|
GregP
Here's what I posted on Goodreads:
-----
I have mixed feelings about this. I enjoyed the writing very much, and the broad scenario was intriguing. However, the plot had flaws and inconsistencies that I found impossible to ignore, and as the days and grimness increased so the suspension of disbelief became, for this reader, almost impossible to maintain. If you only read one Canadian dystopian novel, pass this one by and read the magnificent Station Eleven instead. 7/10, a solid three stars.
|
