Wednesday, 21 November 2018

The Science Fictions of Liz Williams.

               Part the First.

At a lecture in 1970, Theodore Sturgeon compared the history of Science Fiction to the handle

of a suitcase. Science Fiction it would seem had emerged from the body of literature, the body

of the suitcase, and like the handle, would eventually emerge back into it. There is no

doubting that the output of one of England's most prolific Science Fiction writers would need

a suitcase to carry her oeuvre. The first book I bought on Kindle was the first in her Detective

Chen series: Snake Agent. I read it one sitting, and was immediately hooked. The novel is set

in Singapore Three. The city is the supreme embodiment of technological construction, and

for this reason Science Fiction has been a heavily urban literary mode. Different renderings

of the city means that Science Fiction authors can use it as a laboratory for technological

change. What Williams so cleverly does with Singapore Three that is refreshingly different

is to use it as the locus point between the here and now of Earth, Heaven and Hell.

When a soul goes missing, Chen, the occult detective is called upon to go to Hell to retrieve it.

..' To Chen's experienced eyes, everything seemed to be in order: the immigration visa

   with the celestial authorities, the docking fees of the ghost-boat, the license of passage

   across the Sea of Night..'

The case has also attracted the interest of Seneschal Zhu Irzh of Hell's Vice Division. Even

in Hell taxes must be paid, and the ghost trade that the missing soul of Pearl Tang leads

this unlikeliest of pairings to uncover cost the perpetrators much more than tax. One of the

skills of an accomplished writer is not to paint their characters in monochrome shades of

black and white. To this end Zhu Irzh is the most delightful demon in literature, being

afflicted as he is with a conscience, of which he hopes a remedy maker will help him remove.

."You've got two souls...one is called the hun, and the other is called the p'o. The hun tries

  to find its way to heaven-usually it just wanders about until it gets reincarnated. The p'o

  used to remain with the corpse for about three years, before the other worlds speeded up

  their bureaucracies more in line with modern times.. "

Both Chen and Zhu Irzh use spells to aid them in their quest for the truth. Chen is under

the protection of the goddess Kuan Yin, although his relationship with Inari a demon on

the run from hell makes this problematic. One of the more delightful touches is the

character of Badger who is Inari's familiar spirit and who transforms into a kettle on a

regular basis. The title of the book comes from the sobriquet given by the Vice Squad

to an undercover agent-Snake Agent. The resultant case of soul-trafficking results in

both Chen and Zhu standing on the backward facing feet of some of the most powerful

denizens of Hell. Feng shui, séances and spell casting all abound, as does the most

subtle nod to new technologies..'small phial containing the flatscreen' which is poured

over Chen's desk panel. In the spirit of inter-realm co-operation Zhu is sent to Earth

on a three month posting at the end of the novel. This series addresses the existential

angst many of us have, moves the reader to turn the page to find out who did it and

why in the tradition of the nest private eye stories, and confounds the simplistic

utopic/ dystopic tradition in much Science Fiction writing with its depiction of Hell

and Earth. The series continues with ' The Demon and the City '  ( Zhu works his

first homicide case and meets Jhai Tserai, the deva who will become the love of

his afterlife), ' Precious Dragon' ( Chen and Zhu accompany the Heavenly Mi Li Qi

to Hell on a diplomatic mission, but soon after they check into their hellish hotel

Miss Qi vanishes. The bowels of demonic bureaucracy have to entered to avoid

a political incident with Apocalyptic implications), ' The Shadow Pavilion' (Chen

is called to Heaven to find out who is trying to kill its new Emperor, Mhara) and

' The Iron Khan' ( The Book is missing-It has wandered off from Heaven taking

the secrets of the Universe with it). In these novels, the nature of difference and

the limits of identity are interrogated. Science Fiction is famous for doing so, but

the literary technique of explaining the supernatural slots into the Gothic genre

more readily. The hybrid mixing of forms works well in the Chen series. Much

of the power of Liz Williams' writings lie in the ways in which they destabilize

the polarities of life/death, human/ alien and time and space. The many and

varied controlling intelligences at work in the universes at play in Singapore

Three show the reader that there is something in the fictive world that is

dissonant with the materialist world. And a what if begins to coalesce as

part of that reader's lived experience, a what if that expands the inner world.

Strong characterisation is not a feature of all Science Fiction writers.Williams

is almost stand-alone in her depiction of strong female characters that will stay

with you long into the future.

'The Ghost Sister' ( Bantam Spectra) memorably brought some of these to light.

Mevennen is out of tune with her people's bloodmind on Monde D'Isle. She is

the narrator Eleres' ghost sister.

 ..." Her right hand was bare, apart from one little sign of her name around her

thumb: the road to the star. The other members of the family had their personal

signs given by the world. Mevennen wore rings to cover the lack,,"

The Mondhaith seek out the weakest of their prey at the time of the hunt, and

Mevennen worries that even Eleres will succumb to his when the time comes.

The landblindness Mevennen suffers from has precedent in the myths of their

land.

.." The only person I had heard of who had been cured of such a sickness was

said to be the lover of  Yr En Lai, that ancient Ettic lord who plays such a part

in the legends of the north, but maybe that was just a myth.."

Her brother, his lover Morrac and his sister Sereth set off for Outreven to find

the elusive cure, watched over by the two moons Elowen and Embar, and the

sun Damoth. Shu Gho is an anthropologist who has arrived on the ancient

colony of Monde d' Isle as part of an expeditionary force from Irie St Syre.

Her journal entries allow us the reader to learn that the colonists who came

to Monde d' Isle had terraforming equipment with them and that ReForning

should have occurred -

"...no evidence that the colonists kept to our Gaian Path of placing their new

environment in harmony with themselves.."

She is accompanied by Dia, her young acolyte Bel Zhur, the daughter of one

of Irie's most formidable priestesses, and the exobiologist Jennet Sylvian.

Three delazheni accompany this quartet, biomachines. Worldbuilding is an

essential part of good science fiction writing, and at this Williams excels. Ghosts

abound in the telling of this tale. Shu Gho is thought to be a ghost by Mevennen.

She promises to cure Mevennen, which is a promise that carries with it a terrible

price. Monde d' Isle is engineered to preserve the delicate balance between human

and animal. The question that was asked in much postwar Science Fiction on

computers was whether they facilitated or entrapped, The Ghost Sister answers

this in a rather chillingly satisfactory way.


Alien encounters on Earth are given an unusual twist in this novel. Millions of years ago alien

beings seeded Earth with their genetic strands to create a new outpost of intelligent life. Their

descendants are drawn back to Earth's skies by a human with the ability to tap into their

communications. That human is Jaya Nihalani. At the opening of the novel she is in hospital

ageing rapidly. A conjurer's daughter she has been a prophet, a crusader and terrorist for the

rights of her own despised untouchable caste. Alien encounters are frequently used as a

strategy of encounter, whereby readers are encouraged to examine their self-conceptions

as a result of confrontation with the Other. This novel continues that tradition with a central

female character who is neither cipher nor symbol..

                              To be continued..................




















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