The Anubis gates

Several friends recommended books by [a:Tim Powers|8835|Tim Powers|https://s.gr-assets.com/assets/nophoto/user/u_50x66-632230dc9882b4352d753eedf9396530.png], saying that his books were of a similar genre to those of [a:Charles Williams|36289|Charles Williams|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1217390107p2/36289.jpg]. This is the second one I've read, and I was rather disappointed. This

I found it a bit too messy. The plot is complex, and sometimes saying a book has a complex plot is a recommendation. [b:Foucault's Pendulum|17841|Foucault’s Pendulum|Umberto Eco|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1396645125l/17841.SY75.jpg|11221066] by [a:Umberto Eco|1730|Umberto Eco|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1588941738p2/1730.jpg] has a complex plot, and has many similar elements, but it is the kind of complexity that makes one want to read it again to unravel it. This one made me want to say to the author, "just get on with the story". In [b:The Annubis Gates|132137368|THE ANNUBIS GATES (PAPERBACK)|Tim Powers|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1697834916l/132137368.SX50.jpg|2193115] you start reading one story, and then you find you're in a different one, with no apparent connection with the first one.

It begins with Brendan Doyle an American student of literature, being asked to go on a time travel trip with a group of wealth dilettantes to hear a lecture given by Samuel Taylor Coleridge in 1810. Doyle is interested in a minor poet, William Ashbless, who was said to have been present at the lecture, and is persuaded to join the expedition in the hope of meeting Ashbless, but when the expedition returns to the 20th century (1984) Doyle is somehow left behind, and has little option but to become a beggar, and soon finds that begging is an industry controlled by a few, and you have to join one of the begging cartels to survive.

That on its own has the seeds of quite a complex plot, but numerous disparate elements are added, which are difficult to follow, because of Powers's habit, noted in another of his books that I have read, of suddenly switching from one scene to another without giving any clue to the reader that he has done so, until you are two or three paragraphs into the new scene, and then have to go back and reread the paragraph after making a mental adjustment to fit it to the new setting and characters. But in the second reading one tends to.... (text disappeared, can't be arsed to type it again now, will maybe edit it later)

When millionaire J. Cochran Darrow finds The Anubis Gates that will make time travel possible, he quickly assembles a team to go back to 1801. He hires Professor Brendan Doyle to give advice about the poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge. Soon a band of misfits are assembled and they are off on an early 19th century London adventure and throughout time.

If you think the plot sounds a little weird, then you are not the only one. I spent a lot of time wondering about the logic behind the locations and people within The Anubis Gates. This was the steampunk pick for the Literary Exploration book club and true to the group’s purpose; this book really challenged my reading choices. It was an interesting experience, I had no idea what to expect next and there was no way to predict anything.

The cast of characters was strange; I expected to like the book because Samuel Taylor Coleridge and Lord Byron were featured. Unfortunately they didn’t get enough development and that might be for the best but I was interested in finding out what Tim Powers would do with them. This book also featured an Egyptian wizard, werewolf, crazy clown and so much more.

What I found to be the biggest problem with this novel was the fact that Tim Powers took so many of his good ideas and tried to force it all into one novel. There was a lot going on and it was all over the place. There never was enough time to develop scenes or characters and it just felt like everything was condensed to make room for all his ideas. The concept was great, wacky and fun but the execution did not work for me.

Tim Powers is a well-respected fantasy author; his book On Stranger Tides (1987) was the inspiration behind the Monkey Island video games and also turned into the fourth Pirates of the Caribbean film. The Anubis Gates is often considered one of the pioneer sin the steampunk genre (though I am not sure I would class it as steampunk) and also won the Philip K. Dick Award in 1983. Powers seems like an author that you either love or hate. However from my experience, 1980’s science fiction and fantasy are all a bit odd and unusual.

This is such an unusual novel, which makes it extremely difficult to explain and review. I wanted to enjoy this book but for the most part I found myself skimming the pages. There are great concepts and ideas going on in this but the author didn’t want to explore them instead attempting for a fast moving adventure. For me that just made things difficult. I am fascinated by people who love this book, I’d love to know the reasoning. If you love science fiction or fantasy novels, this might work for you; unfortunately it didn’t for me.

This review originally appeared on my blog: literary-exploration.com/2014/10/30/the-anubis-gates/

Wow what a book! The plot twists and turns and spirals every which way and I never knew what was going to happen next.

An ancient conspiracy of sorcerers have been working for centuries to bring Egypt back into power. As the book starts, they break holes through the wall between our world and the place where the Egyptian gods exist, and in the process, create a series of gaps in the stream of time. These are the Anubis Gates.

More than a century later, Brendan Doyle, an expert in early 19th century poetry and about as unlikely a hero as you can imagine, joins a group of people who use one of these gates to travel back in time. The purpose of the trip is to attend a lecture by Coleridge. And that is where everything goes wildly off the rails. Body snatching werewolves, ancient Egyptian gods lurking in the Thames, evil clowns on stilts, a hypnotised Byron, a dreaming Coleridge - and it all works. As always with Tim Powers, there is a wonderful mix of science, history and sorcery and it all seems quite plausible.

Wild, violent, extremely grim at times, but very entertaining.