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#199169 in eBooks 2010-06-23 2010-06-29File Name: B0036S4F18 | File size: 66.Mb

China Miéville : Kraken before purchasing it in order to gage whether or not it would be worth my time, and all praised Kraken:

15 of 16 people found the following review helpful. A Magical Realm hiding in plain sightBy fzwzAll of China Mieville's books seem to have an overarching theme that is illustrated throughout the story, though it is not directly related to the story. In "" the theme seems to be the nature of duty and obligation. In "", the theme is hubris. I think the theme in "Kraken" is the nature of being. All sorts of creative modes of being are suggested and explored as if they are really possible. The book is also a combination homage to and satire of and "Americam Gods" and H.P. Lovecraft and the whole Cthulu thing. I think it's also intended as a satire of religion in general and the Anglican Church in particular.Oh, that's right, there's also a story. At heart this is a mystery novel about what may or may not be a plot to bring about the end of the world. It's fast paced with good characterization. It presents an almost plausible alternate reality that may invisibly exist all around us. It's especially interesting how ordinary people, we might call them "Muggles" are brought into an awareness of this magical realm.17 of 17 people found the following review helpful. An Enjoyable MessBy Jeff the ZombieChina Mieville is an author whose books don't often live up to the scope of his ideas, and Kraken is no exception in this regard. This is not to say that I don't like his work, or that I didn't enjoy Kraken, but going back to Perdido Street Station and the Bas Lag novels, he has the habit of jamming awesome ideas into his novels that unfortunately don't always work with the plot he's constructed. I get the feeling that he makes things up as he goes along, and molding his ideas to fit into a cohesive story is not one of his strong suits. I've always preferred Mieville's short fiction to his novels -- when constrained by a shorter format, his stories are much more satisfying and focused.Kraken centers around a scientist at the Museum of Natural History in London named Billy who is responsible for preserving a specimen of a giant squid, architeuthis. The squid is one of the most popular exhibits at the museum, but has also caught the attention of London's secret underworld of mages and cults, who believe it to be both a god of the deep and the harbinger of an apocalypse. The Kraken is stolen from the museum, although there is no practical way to remove it from the room. Billy finds himself flung into the depths of a London he never new existed, a reluctant prophet for a cult that worships the squid, as well a person of great interest to the various supernatural factions in the city. What follows is a fairly standard "chase the McGuffin" story in which Billy and his new allies attempt to locate the squid and stop the end of the world, while various antagonists hunt for him.I won't reveal any spoilers here, because there's lots of great surprises in the book -- an unusual labor movement, a Star Trek loving mage (as well as an insightful look into a particular Star Trek trope that is often taken for granted by fans), a pair of terrifying immortal hit men called Goss and Subby, a man with a bizarre tattoo on his back and much more. However, for all the unique ideas, I can't help but think of Kraken as a crazier version of Neil Gaiman's Neverwhere, or a saner version of Grant Morrison's comic book series, The Invisibles - either way, it covers ground that other writers have explored in better stories. In many ways, it is a conventional urban novel, except unlike others in the genre, the characters are ciphers who exist to carry Mieville's big ideas. Billy, though the central character, is mostly unknown to us through the end. We know he's very good at pickling squids, but other than that, we learn very little about him as a person. Others we get to know a little better, but given the strength of Mieville's past protagonists, I expected more.Overall, Kraken is an entertaining read, but not Mieville's best. If you're new to his work, I'd recommend starting out with Perdido Street Station and The Scar, both of which are worth your time.4 of 4 people found the following review helpful. NahBy Elliot Richard EastinDreadful book. Loose ends everywhere. Half baked characters. Half baked plot. Sentences not always grammatical. Generally hard to follow. Absurd. I'd like the time I spent reading this one back. There are many other more deserving books out there.

BONUS: This edition contains an excerpt from China Miéville’s .With this outrageous new novel, China Miéville has written one of the strangest, funniest, and flat-out scariest books you will read this—or any other—year. The London that comes to life in Kraken is a weird metropolis awash in secret currents of myth and magic, where criminals, police, cultists, and wizards are locked in a war to bring about—or prevent—the End of All Things.In the Darwin Centre at London’s Natural History Museum, Billy Harrow, a cephalopod specialist, is conducting a tour whose climax is meant to be the Centre’s prize specimen of a rare Architeuthis dux—better known as the Giant Squid. But Billy’s tour takes an unexpected turn when the squid suddenly and impossibly vanishes into thin air.As Billy soon discovers, this is the precipitating act in a struggle to the death between mysterious but powerful forces in a London whose existence he has been blissfully ignorant of until now, a city whose denizens—human and otherwise—are adept in magic and murder.There is the Congregation of God Kraken, a sect of squid worshippers whose roots go back to the dawn of humanity—and beyond. There is the criminal mastermind known as the Tattoo, a merciless maniac inked onto the flesh of a hapless victim. There is the FSRC—the Fundamentalist and Sect-Related Crime Unit—a branch of London’s finest that fights sorcery with sorcery. There is Wati, a spirit from ancient Egypt who leads a ragtag union of magical familiars. There are the Londonmancers, who read the future in the city’s entrails. There is Grisamentum, London’s greatest wizard, whose shadow lingers long after his death. And then there is Goss and Subby, an ageless old man and a cretinous boy who, together, constitute a terrifying—yet darkly charismatic—demonic duo.All of them—and others—are in pursuit of Billy, who inadvertently holds the key to the missing squid, an embryonic god whose powers, properly harnessed, can destroy all that is, was, and ever shall be.

.com "The Soft Intelligence": 5 Underrated Literary Cephalopods by China Miéville It was Jacques-Yves Cousteau and Philippe Diolé who named cephalopods 'the soft intelligence', in the subtitle to their 1973 book Octopus and Squid. At first, the adjective seems vaguely simpering, as if these ambassadors of alterity are in fact safe, unthreatening, cuddly. But immediately comes a strangeness. If they are a, no, the soft intelligence, what are we? Hard intelligence? Soft unintelligence? Why are they soft intelligence singular? Is each but an iteration of some tentacular totality? What strange sentience. An opaque collective. There are rules to this exercise. No invented species nor chimerical monsters--though this doesn't preclude gigantism nor a little taxonomic vagueness. Thus the 'huge, brown, glistening bulk' of William Hope Hodgson's 'mighty devil-fish' in The Boats of the 'Glen Carrig' would be permissible: haploteuthis ferox, that hitherto unknown squid that assailed the English coast in H.G. Wells's The Sea Raiders is not: still less would be Cthulhu, despite his admirably tentacular visage. And as the effort here is to overturn a few rocks less jostled to see what coils beneath, much celebrated ceph-lit has been left alone. Captain Nemo's nemesis is not here. Benchley's Beast is absent, as is Lautréamont's octopus spirit from Maldoror. The astounding ruminations on the octopus-as-bad-ontology in Victor Hugo's otherwise 'prodigiously boring book' (Sebald) Toilers of the Sea, remain indispensable--but elsewhere. See China Miéville's full list of underrated literary cephalopods at Omnivoracious, .com's books blog From Publishers WeeklyBritish fantasist Miéville mashes up cop drama, cults, popular culture, magic, and gods in a Lovecraftian New Weird caper sure to delight fans of Perdido Street Station and The City the City. When a nine-meter-long dead squid is stolen, tank and all, from a London museum, curator Billy Harrow finds himself swept up in a world he didn't know existed: one of worshippers of the giant squid, animated golems, talking tattoos, and animal familiars on strike. Forced on the lam with a renegade kraken cultist and stalked by cops and crazies, Billy finds his quest to recover the squid sidelined by questions as to what force may now be unleashed on an unsuspecting world. Even Miéville's eloquent prose can't conceal the meandering, bewildering plot, but his fans will happily swap linearity for this dizzying whirl of outrageous details and fantastic characters. Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.From Bookmarks MagazineHailed as "a truly delirious ride" by SF s.net, Miéville's latest novel resists all attempts at categorization. By turns an , a rousing whodunit, a study of religious mania, and an impish parody of all three, Kraken is cheeky fun and a testament to Miéville's spectacular storytelling skills. While this light, playful tone marks a departure for the normally somber writer, loyal readers will recognize the heady ideas, the deliciously weird characters, and the riotous plot lines to which they've become accustomed. Critics cited a few disappointments, including some stilted characters, heavy- handed pop culture references, and an unsatisfying conclusion. Nonetheless, "Kraken is full-strength, grade-A geekitude," declares the Onion A.V. Club, echoing most critics' reactions, "and as such, it's brilliant."

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