Semiosis by Sue Burke

Published by Tor Books on February 6, 2018

In its infancy (both in its Golden Age and for years thereafter), science fiction took human supremacy as a given. Humans were viewed as superior to aliens and were destined to prevail in conflicts. A few writers (Clifford D. Simak among them) took a contrary approach, writing stories in which aliens had a lot to teach stupidly aggressive humans, but even today, the notion of human supremacy is alive and well in science fiction.

The best science fiction asks us to question our assumptions. Semiosis questions the assumption of human supremacy without denigrating human nature. Two forms of alien life come into contact with a human colony. One faction of humans condemns both alien species because, well, they aren’t human. A competing faction argues in favor of mutualism. Neither perspective is presented in a simplistic way, giving rise to the kind of debate that invites the reader to decide how humans might best interact with intelligent nonhuman aliens, if and when we meet them.

The first alien life form is a sentient plant, or more broadly, the most intelligent plant in an ecosystem. Different kinds of self-aware plants with varying degrees of intelligence communicate with each other chemically. Other life forms on the planet (flippokats are fun, flippolions less so, and bats have rudimentary language) interact with humans, but only the plants manipulate them.

Fifty human colonists on a distant world called Pax want to create a place that exists in harmony with nature. Global warming is ravaging Earth, so the colonists are looking to do better than the humans they left behind. They have a fine constitution dedicated to peace, freedom, and equality. Of course, by the time the second generation matures, the first generation has become repressive, outlawing time-wasting notions like art and forcing women to breed. Such is the nature of humanity; fine ideas give way to our worst instincts when things aren’t going well.

The novel follows the human colonists through seven generations. Each generational chapter is narrated by a human from that generation. The question for each generation of colonists is whether the plants can be trusted. Plants can synthesize chemicals, but chemicals can be beneficial or toxic. Will humans control the plants, will plants control the humans, or will plants and people work together to attain their mutual goals? The reader is likely to revise tentative answers to those questions repeatedly as the story moves forward.

The second generation comes upon a city in which glass has clearly been shaped as art and for utilitarian uses. The colonists dub the city’s original inhabitants “the Glassmakers,” but humans do not encounter an actual Glassmaker until later in the story, after the first few generations have become part of colonial history. The Glassmakers are the second alien race to interact with the human colony, but they seem to be more primitive and confrontational than the beautiful city they left behind would suggest.

Whether the Glassmakers are good or evil is no more easy to answer than whether humans are good or evil. Forgiveness is, for some, a human virtue, but we sometimes find it easier to forgive ourselves and our friends than people who are not in our own circle. Can we learn to forgive aliens for their harmful behavior, even if their behavior was based on a misunderstanding of humans? Will they forgive us for misunderstanding them?

Understanding another human is difficult enough for humans; understanding an alien might be an impossible task. Semiosis suggests that it is a task that, at best, will require multiple generations of effort on the part of both humans and aliens. But in the end, understanding the universe and all of its inhabitants is worthwhile, and the need to pursue understanding rather than conflict is at the heart of the best science fiction. Semiosis easily falls into the category of “the best” science fiction. In the depth of its story and of its characters, Semiosis is award-worthy.

RECOMMENDED

The Disappeared by C.J. Box

Published by G.P. Putnam's Sons on March 27, 2018

Much like the current president, the new governor in Joe Pickett’s Wyoming is a wealthy Republican who doesn’t pay his bills and tries to sell himself as one of the common folk. Joe famously conducted investigations for the former governor, so the new governor decides to give him a try. A British CEO named Kate disappeared in Saratoga, Wyoming, and for reasons that have something to do with budget cuts and passive-aggressive bureaucrats, local law enforcement officers are dragging their spurs instead of finding her. The new governor wants Joe to track down the missing woman because the governor cares about getting bad press in British tabloids.

Kate was last seen at an expensive resort where (oh happy coincidence!) Joe’s youngest daughter Sheridan happens to be working. Nate Romanowski shows up to cause the kind of mayhem that soft-talking Joe doesn’t want to cause himself. As usual, Romanowski points his extra-large gun at everyone he meets and has to talk himself out of shooting them, unless he doesn’t. He commits a murder in just about every novel (this one included) while his law-and-order buddy Joe Pickett looks the other way. It is impossible to believe that someone as resolutely virtuous as Joe would befriend, much less enable, the psychopathic Romanowski. The hypocrisy of ticketing the governor for not having a fishing license (we hear about that in every novel) while letting Romanowski get away with all sorts of violent crimes is hard to swallow.

A subplot involves an industrial burner in which unauthorized and mysterious burning is taking place. Another subplot involves Joe’s reaction to Sheridan’s new boyfriend. I’ve learned to shake my head and ignore Joe’s antiquated notions about appropriate human behavior. There’s only one kind of “real man,” the shy but resolute cowboy who says “shucks,” rarely says more than “yup” or “nope,” and shows no hint of being a metrosexual. In other words, real men don’t have a personality. However, real men wear Carhartt coats, a brand name that appears so many times in The Disappeared I’m wondering whether C.J. Box got paid a product placement fee every time he mentioned it. Box even includes a discussion of how to dress like a real cowboy (hint: wear Carhartt). In any event, I’ve always admired Joe Pickett novels for Box’s storytelling skills more than for Joe, who is a stalwart but lackluster character, despite his choice of clothing.

As he did in Cold Wind, Box has his characters sermonize about the evils of wind energy, falsely claiming that it is more expensive than traditional fossil fuel energy while ignoring the benefits of a clean, renewable energy source. His characters are also upset that the wind-generated electricity is transmitted to California, which automatically makes it bad because California is full of metrosexuals. Box acknowledges that wind energy brings jobs to Wyoming, but one of his characters laments that wind energy cost him his job as a coal miner (clearly not true). Box ignores the fact that Wyoming coal is mined to provide power in other states. If it isn’t bad to transport Wyoming’s coal out of Wyoming, what’s wrong with transporting energy from Wyoming’s wind to other states? As anyone who has been to Wyoming knows, the state has wind to spare.

It is a legitimate concern that wind turbines kill birds (which angers Romanowski and his falconer friends), but coal mines kill people and fossil fuels cause global warming that is killing the planet. Life is full of tradeoffs. Wind energy isn’t perfect, but no energy source is. Still, don’t expect to find a balanced discussion of energy or environmental policy in Box’s books.

In addition to his disdain for clean energy, Box reprises another disappointing element of Cold Wind in The Disappeared, one that will apparently play an even stronger role in the next novel. For fear of spoiling what might be a surprise, I won’t mention it, but I will say that Cold Wind is Box’s worst novel, and he does his readers no favors by rehashing its worst plot elements in The Disappeared.

Fortunately, The Disappeared is a slightly better novel, in part because Box avoids the howlingly silly events that makes Cold Wind so utterly unbelievable. The part of the story that involves the missing Kate is interesting and credible, although it lacks suspense. Romanowski isn’t in enough scenes to ruin the book, and I can’t hold it against Box for ascribing ill-informed opinions about wind energy to his characters, given how many people have a distorted view of clean energy (presumably because they are spoon-fed their opinions by Fox News). However, the part of the story that involves mysterious activities at the burner is intended solely to advance Box’s political views by demonizing the people he disagrees with, and I regarded that as a cheap shot.

The novel’s ending is a cliffhanger setup for the next novel. I’m not sure I’ll bother to read it, as the Joe Pickett series seems to have passed its shelf life.

RECOMMENDED WITH RESERVATIONS

Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn

Published by Crown on June 5, 2012

One thing I’ve learned from reading Amazon book reviews is that many readers say they dislike books unless they like (or can identify with) a main character. Why, then, was Gone Girl such a huge success? The two principal characters, Nick and Amy, are despicable. They are selfish, self-absorbed, dishonest, and (at least with regard to one of those characters) totally evil. Yet readers love this book, and with good reason. Maybe Gone Girl will help readers understand that good fiction does not depend upon likable, virtuous characters.

I came late to Gone Girl. It’s likely that the basics of the plot are well-known but it shouldn’t be spoiled for those readers who haven’t opened the book (or seen the movie), so I will say little about it. Nick and Amy are married. Amy’s parents made good money writing a series of children’s books called Amazing Amy. Sales have dwindled in recent years and Amy’s parents have borrowed from her trust fund. Meanwhile, Nick and Amy both lost their New York publishing jobs. They move to Nick’s hometown in the Midwest, where Nick uses the last of their savings to open a bar with his sister Go. Financial burdens place a strain on their marriage.

And then Amy disappears. Disorder in the home suggests that she might have been kidnapped, but the police think the scene has been staged. A police investigation uncovers a series of clues that suggest Nick has done away with Amy. That’s all I’ll say about the plot.

The story is creative and original. It alternates point of view between Nick and Amy and, in so doing, causes the reader to reevaluate the two characters. Neither are people you’d want to have as neighbors, much less friends. But they are realistic characters, imbued with the kind of detail that brings them to life in a reader’s mind. At first, I disliked the two characters because one was too perfect and the other was too self-indulgent. Later I disliked them for entirely different reasons. The way Gillian Flynn transforms the reader’s perception of both characters as the story moves forward is the novel’s most impressive feature.

Flynn offers some strong insights into the nature of marital relationships, and more generally into the nature of men and women as they are and as they pretend to be. I also like the way she skewers self-righteous media stars (one is clearly a stand-in for Nancy Grace) who vilify men despite the absence of proof or a fair trial, happily destroying lives for the sake of ratings.

Flynn's prose is filled with wickedly clever sentences. This is an absorbing novel from start to twisted finish. If there are two characters in recent fiction readers might love to hate more than Amy and Nick, I don’t know who they are. Gone Girl is proof that readers don’t need to love the characters to love a work of fiction.

RECOMMENDED

The Girl in the Ice by Robert Bryndza

First published in Great Britain in 2016; published in paperback by Grand Central Publishing on April 24, 2018

The Girl in the Ice gives the reader a standard crime novel plot: intrepid investigator continues to pursue leads after being suspended for an insubordinate disagreement with the investigative choices made by her bureaucratic bosses, who avoid upsetting powerful people by focusing suspicion on an easy but innocent target. The plot also includes a human trafficking element, which is the current trendy crime novel crime. Standard plots and trendy crimes are fine if they are made fresh, and The Girl in the Ice manages to stand slightly above the pack of standard but trendy crime novels with interesting characters and a solid story.

When a fellow finds a dead woman in the ice, DCI Erika Foster is assigned to the case. Foster has recently transferred from Manchester to London, carrying with her some heavy emotional baggage. The dead woman is the daughter of a prominent politician (and a baron, no less). The politician happens to be the wealthy owner of a private defense contractor, so PR is important, as is a quick and favorable resolution of the crime. Foster’s Slovak background is considered good for PR given the similar heritage of the victim’s mother, until Slovak discovers that the victim’s mother considers herself superior to Foster based on the respective cities in which they were born.

The investigation leads to a pub where the dead woman met a man — a pub that people are afraid to discuss. One of the fearful witnesses ends up dead, but Foster’s superiors view that as a coincidence, not as evidence that a serial killer is on the loose.

Naturally, Foster disagrees with her superiors and concludes that a serial killer is, in fact, killing attractive young prostitutes. And naturally, the politician doesn’t want his dead daughter lumped together with prostitutes, which accounts for the reluctance of Foster’s superiors to pursue her theory. But even if the politician’s daughter wasn’t a prostitute, she might have had something in common with the other murder victims, so Foster ignores her superiors and her suspension and investigates the crime in her own way.

Despite my weariness with human trafficking plots, The Girl in the Ice held my interest. The focus is not so much on trafficking but on a murder investigation that branches in several directions, and the killer’s identity is nicely concealed until the big reveal. Robert Bryndza takes time to build his characters and establish atmosphere, but the pace picks up considerably as the novel enters thriller territory in its stretch run. Erica is a bit of a stereotype, but she’s likable, or at least sympathetic. The novel has obviously benefited from effective marketing by its original publisher, but I enjoyed it, even if some of the accolades it has earned are a bit suspect. The Girl in the Ice is the first in a series, and while I might not go out of my way to read the next one, I certainly won’t avoid it.

RECOMMENDED

Macbeth by Jo Nesbø

Published by Crown/Hogarth on April 10, 2018

The new police commissioner, Duncan, has vowed to sweep corruption out of the police department. Duff, the head of the Narco Unit, is on Duncan’s side. A tip encourages him to believe he can bring down the Norse Riders motorcycle gang and Sweno, its leader. He turns down help from Macbeth, who is sitting on the sideline with Banquo, Angus, and other members of the SWAT team in case Duff needs help. Also watching from the sideline is Hecate, the richest drug dealer in town and the man who tipped off the police about Sweno’s receipt of a new drug supply that the Norse Riders are about to offload from a Soviet ship.

One thing leads to another and Macbeth commits a foul deed in support of Duff, whose own deed is even more foul. Not long after that, three sisters sent by Hecate prophesy that Macbeth will be promoted to head the new Organized Crime unit. His wife, Lady, is pleased, but sees that the only path to the top for Macbeth is to kill Duncan. Lady is a cunning manipulator who owns a casino and wants Macbeth to advance so he can shut down a competing casino, but is she as cunning and manipulative as Hecate?

Duncan’s death alone will not bring Macbeth to the top; Malcolm must also go. That creates a conflict between Macbeth and loyal Banquo. Eventually Duff and Angus are also in Macbeth’s sights. No one who opposes the mad police commissioner is safe.

Shakespeare’s Macbeth is a relatively straightforward play about Macbeth’s descent into madness that accompanies (causes? is caused by?) his lust for power. Shakespeare purists might not like the liberties Jo Nesbø has taken, but given that the point of the Hogarth Shakespeare series is to draw upon the themes of Shakespeare’s plays to tell a modern story, I think most Shakespeare fans will be pleased with the way Nesbø has reimagined Macbeth as a modern crime story. Parallels to the play are evident. A drug called “brew” substitutes for witch’s brew. Three sisters brew the drug for Hecate while denying rumors that they add toads’ glands to the tank. Macbeth is haunted by the ghosts of his victims and sees dead men in traffic lights. Lady soaps her hands until they turn red. The city is at war, but it is a war between the police and two criminal gangs that also war with each other. Macbeth is sure that no man born of woman can kill him but . . . well, you know how that works out.

And of course, the parallels to the play are evident in the novel’s themes: ambition, manhood, corruption, guilt, betrayal, weakness, and in the end, justice. Nesbø uses Lennox to suggest that weakness is a natural reaction to threats made by those with power; cowardly submission to immoral commands may be shameful, but self-preservation is a powerful instinct, and it is difficult to judge people who submit to manipulation by more powerful forces rather than forfeiting their own (or their childrens') lives. Weakness is also a facet of Macbeth’s love of Lady, as described by Hecate: “The desire to be loved and the ability to love, which gives humans such strength, is also their Achilles’ heel. Give them the prospect of love and they move mountains; take it from them and a puff of wind will blow them over.”

The story mixes in modern themes, as well, including the excessive use of force as a law enforcement tool and manipulation of public opinion to support authoritarian action even when those in authority act lawlessly. Small moments of decency set ordinary people apart from powerful Macbeth and his corrupt followers, suggesting that decent but seemingly unimportant people have the power to change world. When a radio reporter urges listeners to “take to the streets and depose Macbeth,” the reader imagines that people might actually be able to empower themselves with collective action against despots and autocrats.

Nesbø illuminates the complexity of Macbeth’s character: villainous at times but troubled by a conscience; merciful at times, but not when mercy would stand in the way of ambition; a murderer, but as Duff points out (perhaps too charitably), reluctant to kill the innocent. He is driven more by his need to please Lady than by power for its own sake.

The Hogarth Shakespeare novels supposedly “retell” Shakespeare’s plays. The entries I’ve read have been good, but this is the only one I’ve seen that is penned by a crime novelist. Nesbø was a fitting choice to write about the murderous Macbeth. His choices are sound and his use of imagery is stunning. More importantly, Nesbø does justice to a play about justice.

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