Oh blogging, how I love thee! Without the I would never have "discovered" China Miéville.

Seriously, I've found that blogging requires me to keep up with literary award annually and not just when I'm looking for something to read. It leads me to books I probably wouldn't have picked out at a bookstore otherwise.

Recently, China Miéville won his third Arthur C. Clarke Award for The City and the City, a book that has also made this year's Nebula and Hugo Award short lists. All of this recognition is deserved, I believe, because The City and the City is unique, genre-bending, and genre-defying. It can be read as modern "Literary" fiction and as a crime/thriller.

The City and the City opens when Inspector Tyador Borlú of the Besźel Extreme Crime Squad begins to investigate the murder of an unidentified young woman, a Fulana. The case becomes more complicated when Borlú discovers the woman is from Ul Qoma.

Ul Qoma and Besźel are the city and the city. They take up the same topographic space but are divided into two distinct cities with two distinct languages, cultures, and governments. Citizens of the two cities are trained from birth to unsee and unhear things and people belonging to the other city.

No one knows how the split (or maybe the merge) happened, but illegal crossing over between jurisdictions is policed by and entity know as "Breach" which exists between the cities. Something else may exist between the cities, but that's part of the mystery.

The City and the City is crime noir with stock characters, but having stock characters serve a purpose. First, they place the brilliant world-building in the forefront of the reader's mind. They also underscore the central idea of the novel—that people can become invisible to one another, that people "unsee" what they don't want to see.

Some controversy exists over whether The City and the City is really science fiction, because it contains no "hard" science. There are no aliens, no spaceships, no speculation on the macroscopic effects of quantum theory. Instead, Miéville takes a sociological phenomenon and takes it to the extreme; he does what the best  science fiction writers do.

We are all familiar with the way we unsee the homeless. We're appalled by the way so many German and Polish citizens were willfully blind to the horrors of the Holocaust. We drive by traffic accidents all the time while pushing them to the back of our minds so they won't impact our thoughts.

Imagine that rubber-necking at an accident could actually be punishable by the death. Imagine living in a city with two populations trained to not see each other. Imagine the house next to yours exists in another city and you can't permit yourself to see it. Imagine the bureaucracy of that city, the lives of its people, the folklore that could be spawned. That's what China Miéville has done.

Was reading this book worth my time?
Absolutely. It's giving Cherie Priest's Boneshaker a run for my theoretical Hugo vote. I can't wait to read Miéville's other books, especially Perdido Street Station. I also think that most people will be able to appreciate The City and the City.

I've been a fan of Guy Gavriel Kay (hereafter referred to as GGK) since I read his first book in college. I like some of his books better than others, but I've read them all and am definitely a fan. Sometimes being a fan pays off. I don't know whether it was through Aarti at BOOKLUST or the lovely Mad Hatter, but somehow I got the email address of GGK's publicist and an ARC of Under Heaven, GGK's latest historically-inspired fantasy novel.

I think people have been especially excited about Under Heaven because it's inspired by Chinese history, specifically the 8th-century Tang Dynasty, as opposed to the history with which most people in Western countries are more familiar. A large proportion of fantasy readers are also interested in Anime, Manga, ninjas, samurai, and Asian cultures in general. I know I've done my share of reading on Chinese and Japanese art and poetry, politics and philosophy, and, of course, military. I've even read a couple books on Genghis Khan.

I don't think, however, that GGK was "reading the market" when he was researching and writing Under Heaven. I think he was just looking for new inspiration and ancient China had all the things he loves—poetry, political intrigue, chaos and cultural upheaval, men and women fighting against what the world has given them. Ripe stuff, that.

In Under Heaven, GGK goes back to his Fionavar Tapestry roots in a more obvious way that he did in even Ysabel. He gives a definite sense of warp and weft, focusing on the nodes where people's lives intersect, where small decisions are made that end up having far-flung consequences. GGK then summarizes entire battles, troop movements, the end of the war (of course there's a war). This type of focus along with the poetry and the lyrical writing make the book evocative of a watercolor painting or, perhaps more aptly, a faded Chinese silk tapestry.

He also shift view points, writing in present tense when writing from a woman's point-of-view (perhaps to highlight their increased perception of the transitory nature of life), and writing in past tense when writing from a man's or a historian's point-of-view. Yes, GGK drops himself in as a historian in multiple places in the novel and in the epilogue providing direct commentary in a way he he never has in any of his previous novels.

So now that I've written this review bass ackwards, let me fill you in on the setting and the characters. The book begins with Shen Tai, a man with an unusual personal history, burying the bones of the dead by Kuala Nor while mourning his father, General Shen Gao, once Left Side Commander of the Pacified West. "The West" is actually the Empire of Tagur. It's not actually pacified; it's just that too many men on both sides have died. Tai is there because toward the end of his father's life he expressed sorrow and grief over the battles fought by Kuala Nor.

Because of Tai's highly unconventional mourning period, he's earned the respect of people in Tagur and his native Kitai (not-China). The White Jade Princess, a princess of Kitai married to the emperor of Tagur as part of the peace treaty, has given Tai 250 Sardian horses. (Sardia corresponds to somewhere in Eastern Europe.)  Given that the heads of the horses of the steppes are only about five feet tall to the shoulder and that the much larger Sardian horses don't survive the trip across the desert to Kitai, 250 Sardian horses is a fortune, a fortune someone would kill for.

Except someone ordered Tai killed even before Tai found out about the horses. It's a good thing that Tai's unusual life has made him some unusual friends, because he has to return to the capitol of Kitai to find out why someone would want him dead before he had the horses. He also has to keep himself alive until he can get rid of the horses. Actually, Tai's friends and family are more interesting than he is. His sister gets her own adventure. His older brother is just the kind of Mandarin you love to hate. Some ghosts and a spirit man from the steppes get involved. So do a bunch of Kanlin warriors, female Kanlin warriors.

Women are almost more important in this story than men are. They are the ones who are really in the most peril, whose choices matter most, yet who have the fewest choices. The female characters in Under Heaven are fabulous. The love triangle are interesting and the ending is surprising while still being organic.

FYI: The title "Under Heaven" comes from the fact that the rulers of the Kitai Empire rule under the Mandate of Heaven.

GGK books, even the lesser ones, always prove to be worth my time. While Under Heaven won't replace The Lions of Al-Rassan, Tigana, or The Sarantine Mosaic in my heart, Under Heaven definitely beats Ysabel and The Last Light of the Sun. Thanks to some kind of error, I now have a pre-release hardcover in addition to my ARC, so I'll be giving away my ARC on Wednesday, April 28th in conjunction with FreeVerse. Should you not be able to wait, Under Heaven is being released in the US this week—Tuesday, April 27th to be more specific.

I never formally reviewed Soulless, the first in Gail Carriger's Parasol Protectorate Series. I did, however, post the first two scenes and call them absolutely fabulous. Soulless is a genre mash-up of comedy, paranormal romance, mystery, and steam-punk. It's a blast with fabulous and colorful characters. If you haven't read it, stop reading this post (it necessarily contains spoilers of Soulless) and go read Soulless now.

First, the cover. The cover model on Changeless is a bit better-endowed than the one on Soulless making the Alexia on the cover better match the Alexia in the book. She's still not the brick house she should be, but she does look somewhat Italian. The paleness of her complexion can be forgiven since Alexia has been keeping nighttime hours for the last three months.

Changeless opens with Alexia feigning sleep while her werewolf husband, Lord Maccon, is already bellowing before sundown. The opening is even funner than the one in Soulless and that opening is awfully hard to top. Reading Alexia's running commentary as her husband bellows is great. Alexia and Lord Maccon's relationship is fabulously written—not in an "oh so romantic" way but in an "oh so real" way.  Carriger writes what happens after the couple in the romance novel gets together.

The title "Changeless" comes from the mystery Alexia has to solve. Something has caused all the vampires and werewolves to become human for a time and all the ghosts to disappear permanently. Alexia initially thinks "weapon." The rest of the Shadow Counsel initially thinks "Alexia." The plot and the action are written much more tightly than those in Soulless.

When I read Blameless, I initially thought that it wasn't as funny as Soulless, but I wasn't in a very good mood. Now that I'm re-reading passages for this review, I'm thinking that reaction was my mood and not the writing. Ivy Hisselpenny and Alexia's obnoxious sister, Felicity, manage to insinuate themselves into the investigation while remaining completely oblivious and providing comic relief. Lord Akeldama and Biffy have become two of my favorite characters—a fact that isn't surprising considering that Lord Akeldama is one of Gail Carriger's.

We are also introduced to some fabulous new characters. There's a new Alpha female and a female inventor who wears men's clothing with considerable aplomb. Alexia meets her husband's gamma wolf. I just don't know what to say about him except "not my type" and "Oh, Professor Lyall."

A few mysteries are cleared up. We learn why Lord Maccon left his Scottish pack and what that octopus is all about. A new mystery develops with heart-wrenching consequences that make me glad Orbit has Carriger on a six-month schedule. (Blameless is due out in September 2010.) The main mystery is well-paced and we figure it out only just before Alexia does. A twist is foreshadowed. The twist after that twist is the heart-wrenching mystery. I did not see it coming at all, but it explains the title of the next book.

It was completely and absolutely worth my time. I plan on buying and reading every novel Gail Carriger writes. I probably won't be reviewing them anymore, though. I'm afraid I might be becoming too much of a fan girl. We'll just have to see.

I had a Twitter conversation with Gail Monday to ask, "Why octopi?"

She responded, "Why not octopi, in the end?"

She had a good point, but I had to ask, "Seriously, is that just the first thing that popped into your head? Was there brainstorming involved?"

"Oh no, I've always been a big fan. Octopodes are so very smart, cute, well-armed and tasty. Everything you want in a creature," she responded.

Good point, Gail. Yet another good point.