What Happens when bio-terrorism becomes a tool for corporate profits? And what happens when said bio-terrorism forces humanity to the cusp of post-human evolution? In The Windup Girl, award-winning author Paolo Bacigalupi returns to the world of "The Calorie Man"( Theodore Sturgeon Memorial Award-winner, Hugo Award nominee, 2006) and "Yellow Card Man" (Hugo Award nominee, 2007) in order to address these questions.
At first the atmosphere gripped me, but the more I read, the more I had to suspend my disbelief. The world was beautiful and colorfully written, but why would people rear such huge animals to wind springs with the calories they could instead have used directly? Why the need to transport energy stored in springs? Why not just transport an animal (ox, donkey, elephant) and make it convert calories to energy on the spot where it's needed? That and some other things that seemed illogical to me was what made me stop reading. I do very much enjoy some of Bacigalupi's other works, though.
Modern genre fiction, that is science fiction and fantasy from the post Cold War era, is certainly entertaining, but not challenging — a meal replacement pill as compared to Haute cuisine. The authoritarian communist threat is done, and the public generally views space exploration as passé. As scifi authors, Huxley and Orwell were born at just the right time to write about “big” ideas.
I said as much to Jason Snell in a Twitter conversation who answered my question, “What value genre fiction?” with the question, “What value fiction at all?” Jason recommended of Paolo Bacigalupi. His first novel The Windup Girl had a difficult task: besides telling an engaging story, Bacigalupi had to restore my faith in genre fiction. He did splendidly.
I wanted to like this book, but my suspension of disbelief was hard to overcome. I had particular problems with the energy systems described. Any explanation I came up with for the things like mega-elephants winding springs, like fossil fuel bans or running out and electricity becoming expensive, make no sense in a world where the street lighting are gaslights burning "approved" methane.
That is a problem given how much of the early part of the book is mostly "world-building". It takes far too long for the actual story to really get moving. Once that happened, I was much more able to ignore the scenery/details that didn't make sense to me.
I suspect that if I hadn't been listening to the audiobook (at 2x speed) in the car and switching to another book safely would have required pulling off and downloading something else, I might not have powered through long …
I wanted to like this book, but my suspension of disbelief was hard to overcome. I had particular problems with the energy systems described. Any explanation I came up with for the things like mega-elephants winding springs, like fossil fuel bans or running out and electricity becoming expensive, make no sense in a world where the street lighting are gaslights burning "approved" methane.
That is a problem given how much of the early part of the book is mostly "world-building". It takes far too long for the actual story to really get moving. Once that happened, I was much more able to ignore the scenery/details that didn't make sense to me.
I suspect that if I hadn't been listening to the audiobook (at 2x speed) in the car and switching to another book safely would have required pulling off and downloading something else, I might not have powered through long enough to let the story kick in.
There definitely were some interesting ideas and, upon reflection from the end of the book, the various plot threads were pulled together nicely, but I almost didn't see that because the world didn't make 100% sense to me.
Great science fiction novel about a wasted future and the inevitable evolution of the human. Gorgeous language sets this novel apart from so many others.
I don't normally read dystopian fiction, but I was intrigued by the idea of a post-oil Thailand protecting itself from the genetically modified foods that have caused plagues and killed millions. I loved the the author's description of Thailand, and I thought he did a good job with the character development, but the story lacked...something. I don't know. While Jaidee and Hock Seng had interesting stories, I wish the author had left them out completely and had focused more on the wind-up girl. The book did pick up speed, but not until I was 250 pages into it and way beyond frustrated. If you enjoy dystopia fiction you might want to give it a try.
book review of bacigalupi's 'the wind-up girl' (2009)
the only regret i have with this book is that i haven't read it sooner. it has just been sitting on my desktop for months after i have gotten it. now that i am almost finished with it, i am going to write my assessment.
the windup girl belongs to the science fiction subgenre of 'biopunk.' it is kinda like 'cyberpunk.' whereas the scientific field that is fictionalized and explored in cyberpunk is that of computers and cyberspace, biopunk looks at genetics - biodiversity of crops, and genetic manipulation techniques for example. In both, there is the idea of 'the street finding its own uses for things.' The effects of technologies are often unintended and the black market and its illegal activities are depicted constantly.
what stands out with the windup girl also is the setting. the future is bleak, far bleaker …
book review of bacigalupi's 'the wind-up girl' (2009)
the only regret i have with this book is that i haven't read it sooner. it has just been sitting on my desktop for months after i have gotten it. now that i am almost finished with it, i am going to write my assessment.
the windup girl belongs to the science fiction subgenre of 'biopunk.' it is kinda like 'cyberpunk.' whereas the scientific field that is fictionalized and explored in cyberpunk is that of computers and cyberspace, biopunk looks at genetics - biodiversity of crops, and genetic manipulation techniques for example. In both, there is the idea of 'the street finding its own uses for things.' The effects of technologies are often unintended and the black market and its illegal activities are depicted constantly.
what stands out with the windup girl also is the setting. the future is bleak, far bleaker than in any of the gibson novels i have read. whereas with gibson it is the western and highly-developed megalopolis that is looked at, the humid tropical city is what bacigalupi describes. the characters move and interact with each other in this space. the miasma of odours and sights and sounds made me feel claustrophobic. there is a suffocating quality to it, though not as much as for example in dan simmons' depiction of calcutta in 'song of kali.'
the characters also make this book highly compelling. you feel their their motivations through their pasts which are often painful and dark. in some, it is their present that is their nightmare, having gone down in life from a more affluent and comfortable station. the wind-up girl, which is the titular character is a beautifully tragic creature in so many ways than one.
the story starts out slow, taking you into the gears and workings of its world. it has a good structure and the plot unfolds slowly, then picks up speed, faster and faster. besides being action-packed, the book tackles the big issues of loyalty, humanity, and survival amidst tragedy.
i won't make this longer anymore so you can go and start reading. overall this is the best book i have read this year so far.
Full disclosure: I think I pulled the trigger on this purchase a long time ago after someone suggested Murakami's Wind-Up Bird Chronicle. It might have been a dumb mistake, but I wasn't going to let it go to waste.
And then, it wasn't really a dumb mistake because it wasn't a bad book.
Bacigalupi (owner of an awesome last name) elegantly presents a full multidimensional dystopic vision. Rather than resorting to a horrible preface to set the scene, the setting of the novel is presented gradually over the first third of the story through the memories and conversations of characters. It's subtly accomplished and satisfying and realistic.
The author also sets a nice pace with plenty of action, plenty of scheming, logical motivations and structures for the plot. It moves quickly and never seems fantastic. My willingness to believe was never strained.
Where The Windup Girl misses, however, is a …
Full disclosure: I think I pulled the trigger on this purchase a long time ago after someone suggested Murakami's Wind-Up Bird Chronicle. It might have been a dumb mistake, but I wasn't going to let it go to waste.
And then, it wasn't really a dumb mistake because it wasn't a bad book.
Bacigalupi (owner of an awesome last name) elegantly presents a full multidimensional dystopic vision. Rather than resorting to a horrible preface to set the scene, the setting of the novel is presented gradually over the first third of the story through the memories and conversations of characters. It's subtly accomplished and satisfying and realistic.
The author also sets a nice pace with plenty of action, plenty of scheming, logical motivations and structures for the plot. It moves quickly and never seems fantastic. My willingness to believe was never strained.
Where The Windup Girl misses, however, is a pretty big deal. I didn't care for, nor connect with, any of these characters. I'm not sure who I was intended to grasp onto as my surrogate or guide in this story. Bacigalupi comes pretty close to making the novel work despite this deficiency, but leaves me just short of the connection I need.
This is a brilliant book...Thailand is one of the last civilizations in a world crumbling away with GMO wars.... my science scaffolding needed a little work to fully appreciate it at some points, as I wondered, what exactly is everyone trying to do? It is rich in themes, the characters are well-developed, so much so that it is not always clear who the good guys are, which I appreciated immensely... and the atmosphere of the book is compelling and original, full of sweltering heat, raging cruelty, bravado and hopelessness. And information that would excite anyone with a degree in agricultural genetic engineering... Ultimately, it is a bleak vision of a ravaged, exhaustively manipulated environment and a miserable future for us all as we war over calories, our last unit of energy. As stated it is brilliant, but I wouldn't read it with PMS or if your dog just died if …
This is a brilliant book...Thailand is one of the last civilizations in a world crumbling away with GMO wars.... my science scaffolding needed a little work to fully appreciate it at some points, as I wondered, what exactly is everyone trying to do? It is rich in themes, the characters are well-developed, so much so that it is not always clear who the good guys are, which I appreciated immensely... and the atmosphere of the book is compelling and original, full of sweltering heat, raging cruelty, bravado and hopelessness. And information that would excite anyone with a degree in agricultural genetic engineering... Ultimately, it is a bleak vision of a ravaged, exhaustively manipulated environment and a miserable future for us all as we war over calories, our last unit of energy. As stated it is brilliant, but I wouldn't read it with PMS or if your dog just died if I were you.
A hypothesis of a fascinating, terrifying future, The Windup Girl manages to surprise you continually while still making you feel for the characters, whose life situations and choices are so far removed from us on a superficial level, but in reality, not very different at all.
This is pretty wonderful -- hence all the awards. Bacigalupi creates a future world that's rich and complex without ever dropping big info-dumps into the narrative. It's a dystopia where the effects bioengineering and capitalism destroyed the society that we have today, dropping things back into a combination of pre-oil energy (clipper ships, windmills) and advanced biological manipulation. It's disturbingly believable, alas. It took me a bit to get engaged with the characters, but once I was it absorbed me.
The near future world of the Windup Girl is an unpleasant place. Granted this makes for an interesting setting, and the author manages that very well. Throughout the book I wanted to learn more and more about the world. We’re exposed only to Thailand, and only one city and its local area. Everything else is only hinted at or described mostly indirectly. I can't say how far into the near future it is. It could be along the lines of 50 years in the future, or maybe as many as 150, but I think that's pushing it.
The characters… were all very human. Eexcept for the title character, being a genetically modified “New Person”. Unfortunately the characters being so human in such an awful world made them rather unlikeable and untrustworthy. As a reader I want to have someone I can root for and no one in The Windup Girl …
The near future world of the Windup Girl is an unpleasant place. Granted this makes for an interesting setting, and the author manages that very well. Throughout the book I wanted to learn more and more about the world. We’re exposed only to Thailand, and only one city and its local area. Everything else is only hinted at or described mostly indirectly. I can't say how far into the near future it is. It could be along the lines of 50 years in the future, or maybe as many as 150, but I think that's pushing it.
The characters… were all very human. Eexcept for the title character, being a genetically modified “New Person”. Unfortunately the characters being so human in such an awful world made them rather unlikeable and untrustworthy. As a reader I want to have someone I can root for and no one in The Windup Girl made me want to root for them, not even the windup girl herself.
The story is very busy, and it takes a long while to really bring all the threads together. In fact it seemed for quite a long time that there were actually multiple stories that didn't tie together being told all at once. Eventually they all do come together, but it takes a bloody revolution and the destruction of the city to do it, not to mention killing off most every named character in the book!
On the other hand, since I like the author personally, and thought his world building was intriguing, I’m curious enough that I’m going to try reading his book of short stories (Pump Six and Other Stories).
**Edited 2/7/14
I've decided to bump this up to 3 stars. Given the number of times I've referenced it, thought about it, and tied it into other things, I have to say that it was better than my initial 2 star impression.
