The Sacred Book of the Werewolf
Or, this modern fantasy novel is Empty of Inherent Existence. A quick book review.
I remember my Clarion experience including at least one discussion on what Buddhist SF/F would look like... well, now I know what a Buddhist modern fantasy novel looks like. And, it is glorious.
(UK cover shown on left. The American book cover looks like crap. I remember seeing it before now and filing it under "WTF". Thank god the local bookstore had the UK version.)
I actually rarely read fiction anymore, but a surfing session brought this book to my attention when I was looking at (how the hell did that happen) my usual blogs on the environment/globalization effects. What got my attention was that the protagonist of the book was a fox spirit. And not just a fox spirit, but one of Chinese origin. (I'm so used to Japanese ones appearing in fantasy, I've felt like Japanese culture now owns the creatures, while seductive supernatural females of Chinese fantasy will have to be confined to ghosts and snakes. Anyway.) This ancient fox spirit was now working as a prostitute in modern Russia.
I was sold. (Again, thank goodness it was the UK version we found here. You all now know my shallowness with book covers. Janet does not like ugly books.)
Checking online, there are two great reviews of the book out there already:
Demonic Muse (NYT review)
Pinning the tail on the fox (Ursula Le Guin's review in the Guardian)
I'm really glad now for the NYT reviewer providing more info on the writer's background and previous books. Victor Pelevin's book is originally Russian, and I kept wondering during my reading how much might have been lost in the translation to English. But the English version reads beautifully. The whole entire book is smooth and consistent in its odd, flippant, yet endearing tone. Really darkly hilarious and clever in a lot of places (I lost count how many times I exclaimed aloud while reading) and in others, I would stop reading because I was afraid the magic would pass away too quickly. (In fact, at one point, I stopped 10 pages from the end. But the ending did not disappoint.) It was perfect. In all its layers. In how the weird, almost clinically-written romance was still touchingly sweet. And I also understand now why I'd found it on the environment/globalization blogs. And as for the Buddhism bit, it still astounds me that this book combines the concept of Emptiness and shapeshifting exquisitely, and it is about Enlightenment/Liberation.
(There was the one part of the book that didn't work for me, and it was where the protagonist was explaining her name. I've ranted before on how most Westerners screw up Chinese names and name conventions--and there are one billion of these names on the planet!--and I feel that there's a FAIL here over the way A Hu-Li and her fox sisters are named. "A" being the impossible name. I still wonder if the naming mistake was Pelevin's or the translator's, or the problem with trying to make the Chinese name sound like a Russian expletive.)
Anyway, for what it's worth, I recommend this book. I don't know that it'd be everyone's cup of tea, but it rocked my world because it hit everything I wanted from a fantasy book but didn't know I did, or that it was possible. I really can't give it more praise than that.
Alas the American cover is still atrocious.
I remember my Clarion experience including at least one discussion on what Buddhist SF/F would look like... well, now I know what a Buddhist modern fantasy novel looks like. And, it is glorious.
(UK cover shown on left. The American book cover looks like crap. I remember seeing it before now and filing it under "WTF". Thank god the local bookstore had the UK version.)
I actually rarely read fiction anymore, but a surfing session brought this book to my attention when I was looking at (how the hell did that happen) my usual blogs on the environment/globalization effects. What got my attention was that the protagonist of the book was a fox spirit. And not just a fox spirit, but one of Chinese origin. (I'm so used to Japanese ones appearing in fantasy, I've felt like Japanese culture now owns the creatures, while seductive supernatural females of Chinese fantasy will have to be confined to ghosts and snakes. Anyway.) This ancient fox spirit was now working as a prostitute in modern Russia.
I was sold. (Again, thank goodness it was the UK version we found here. You all now know my shallowness with book covers. Janet does not like ugly books.)
Checking online, there are two great reviews of the book out there already:
Demonic Muse (NYT review)
Pinning the tail on the fox (Ursula Le Guin's review in the Guardian)
I'm really glad now for the NYT reviewer providing more info on the writer's background and previous books. Victor Pelevin's book is originally Russian, and I kept wondering during my reading how much might have been lost in the translation to English. But the English version reads beautifully. The whole entire book is smooth and consistent in its odd, flippant, yet endearing tone. Really darkly hilarious and clever in a lot of places (I lost count how many times I exclaimed aloud while reading) and in others, I would stop reading because I was afraid the magic would pass away too quickly. (In fact, at one point, I stopped 10 pages from the end. But the ending did not disappoint.) It was perfect. In all its layers. In how the weird, almost clinically-written romance was still touchingly sweet. And I also understand now why I'd found it on the environment/globalization blogs. And as for the Buddhism bit, it still astounds me that this book combines the concept of Emptiness and shapeshifting exquisitely, and it is about Enlightenment/Liberation.
(There was the one part of the book that didn't work for me, and it was where the protagonist was explaining her name. I've ranted before on how most Westerners screw up Chinese names and name conventions--and there are one billion of these names on the planet!--and I feel that there's a FAIL here over the way A Hu-Li and her fox sisters are named. "A" being the impossible name. I still wonder if the naming mistake was Pelevin's or the translator's, or the problem with trying to make the Chinese name sound like a Russian expletive.)
Anyway, for what it's worth, I recommend this book. I don't know that it'd be everyone's cup of tea, but it rocked my world because it hit everything I wanted from a fantasy book but didn't know I did, or that it was possible. I really can't give it more praise than that.
Alas the American cover is still atrocious.