Book Author :: China Miéville

Several times now I’ve sat down with my wife and have attempted to explain a China Miéville book. I’ve tried to tell her how cool it is and how amazing the ideas are.

I tried to tell her about THE CITY AND THE CITY (EBR Review) and how it was about two cities that occupy the same space, and how you weren’t allowed to look at the other city. How you could be identified by the way you walked and talked as being from one city or the other. I once tried to tell her about a special kind of magic in KRAKEN (EBR Review), where you were able to fold large, three dimensional objects as if they were a piece of paper down into small pieces of origami. I even tried to tell her about a cool race of cactus like people that lived in the Bas-Lag novels: PERDIDO STREET STATION (Amazon), THE SCAR (Amazon), and IRON COUNCIL (Amazon).
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My dad and I have an ongoing argument. My dad seems to think that China Miéville (Amazon) is a superior work to THE SCAR (Amazon), which is also by Miéville and set in the same world as PERDIDO. While I know better. THE SCAR is better, better plotted, cooler stuff. In one thing we are agreed, however. In my opinion THE SCAR is a 10 (on a scale of one to ten, ten being perfect) whereas PERDIDO is a 9.9. For my dad it’s PERDIDO that gets the 10 and THE SCAR the measly 9.9. They are both good books. Fantastic books, genre-altering books.

Why am I telling you all of this? Because EMBASSYTOWN (Amazon), the latest novel by China Miéville, is probably a strong 9.8 in my opinion. Easily my favorite of Miéville’s books since THE SCAR.
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China Miéville is like Dan Simmons in a way. No matter how odd or bizarre the idea or synopsis, the novel turns out well. Imagine Miéville’s editor when China said, “So I’m gonna write this novel. It’s a comedy. Kinda. In London. Kinda. Where a giant squid is stolen. And there are people running around with a giant hand in place of their head–Knuckle-heads, get it? And there is a Star Trek phaser that works. And there are cults of every kind whose gods are all legit. And they all have real and scheduled Apocalypses.” With his track-record, what can Miéville’s editor say but, “Awesome! I’ll sell it tomorrow for a ton of money. Yay us!” (Note: This is similar to a post our friend, Larry Correia, did on the previously mentioned Dan Simmons. It was awesome, and it reminded us completely of how we feel about Miéville).
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First, we want to thank Kaylynn ZoBell for letting us borrow her copy of this novel. She is full of awesome, and hopefully, will be published soon so we can do advance reviews of her work (no pressure there, Kaylynn).

Secondly, it’s been a long time since we have been this conflicted over a novel.

UN LUN DUN by the excellent China Miéville (Amazon) is a Alice in Wonderland-style tale about two girls living in London who are mysteriously transported to Un Lun Dun (UnLondon… get it?). One of the girls, Zanna, is the Prophesied One who is supposed to save Un Lun Dun from a disaster. The other girl, Deeba, is the Prophesied Sidekick (seriously, it’s mentioned in the glossary of a talking book they encounter).
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Read on for our completely incredible opinions on THE CITY AND THE CITY by China Miéville (Amazon).

China Miéville is an author who doesn’t settle for one genre. He has sampled many, many different genres, and somehow manages to give them each a unique creative style all their own. While many might argue what genre to lock Mr. Miéville in, we at Elitist Book Reviews think he is nearly as awesome as we are and doesn’t need to be bound to a single style.

While THE CITY AND THE CITY is a fairly large departure from his previous works, Mieville blends the familiar and the unknown together to create a believable mystery. The protagonist, Tyador Borlú, loves his city and country of Beszel, and works there as a police inspector.
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