Martin, George R.R.: Hunter's Run
Hunter's Run (2008)
Written by: George R. R. Martin, Gardner Dozois, Daniel Abraham
Genre: Science Fiction
Pages: 288
When this book came out in 2008, I can't say I was interested. At first glance, I thought it was some kind of anthology, but then when I saw it was a novel penned by all three men, a novel that supposedly celebrated the flavor of good ole fashioned SF, I really wanted to pass. But then a funny thing happened: it came out in paperback and I saw it in the store. Yes, that's a funny thing. Funny because when I'm suspicious of books, I really don't want to pay hardcover prices. But funny too because since it was now in paperback, I could see it in the store and actually check it out. And the first page seemed promising, and I had to remind myself that of the three authors penning this novel, I've read and liked two of the three. Surely, it'd be worth the gamble, so I picked it up. Also, you may notice (and if you haven't yet, you will in the reviews to come), I'm getting back in the SF groove. :)
The premise: after a really, REALLY bad night at the bar, Ramón Espejo has to flee into the wilderness of the planet São Paulo. He hopes he can spend a few months in peace while prospecting the landscape for a lucky strike, but everything turns into a nightmare when his blast reveals a group of aliens in hiding, aliens that will stop at nothing to keep their presence on this planet a secret.
Review style: once again, I'll divide the review into what I liked and what I didn't. PLEASE NOTE: the "what I like" section will contain NO spoilers, whereas the "what I didn't like" section WILL contain spoilers.
What I Liked
One of the best things about this novel, something I didn't even KNOW until I read the Afterword and the Author Q & A section in the back, is that this book exists in an existing universe. The brainchild of Gardner Dozois, this book utilizes the same settings and aliens and situation as some of Dozois's previous work, and the fact that I didn't even REALIZE this while reading makes this book super-awesome. There's nothing that annoys me more than to read a book or a short story and realizing that I'm missing something because it's part of a series or an existing universe and the writer is writing as though you're already familiar with it, when you shouldn't have to be. I see this more in short stories, but no matter where it happens, it's annoying as hell. The fact that I read this entire book and never got the impression it was directed at a certain knowing audience and never felt like the background information was an info-dump to catch me up to speed, well, that's quite a feat and I applaud the authors for pulling it off. Maybe it was Martin's and Abraham's influence that prevented the book from feeling like another adventure in the land of WHATEVER, but whatever the case, I'm glad for it.
The aliens were truly alien, almost frustratingly so as I, along with Ramón, struggled to figure out what they were really talking about when the spoke. Sure, Maneck's people may have picked up Spanish quickly, but that didn't mean we could understand the thought process that inspired the words. The Enye, too, are depicted well. We don't see a whole lot about them, but what we do get works well in the imagination.
Another fantastic thing about this novel is the fact the hero (or rather, anti-hero) is not white-bread American, and the entire planet of São Paulo has been colonized by Mexican/South American peoples, so the language and culture and names reflect as much. Ironically, this story was first imagined in the seventies, when this sort of thing really wasn't common at all, but even now, it's not common, so it was a joy to see something fresh and new on the page.
Something else I enjoyed, something that's more food for thought, was learning via the Afterword and Author Q&A, some of the influences that defined this book, like Mark Twain's The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn and Ursula K. Le Guin's The Left Hand of Darkness. I love considering those books in context of the story we get, especially in terms of the river journey in addition to two beings of different species journeying together is just really cool. It elevates the book a little in my eyes.
Ramón's definitely an anti-hero, and not a character you necessarily want to really root for, except you can't help but feel sorry for him as he realizes just what kind of mess he's in. I, personally, enjoy the anti-hero, and really liked part one where we see what kind of man he is. But I also love that Ramón, due to his circumstances, changes. The Ramón we end the book with is not the same Ramón we start out with by any means, and it's refreshing to see how he grows as a character and how his relationships change as a reflection of that. And speaking of reflections, there's a section of the book where Ramón really has to confront who he really is deep down, and those sections are remarkably well done. That's all I'll say about that.
I also like how the plot comes together. For the most part, the story is unpredictable, and it also comes full circle in a really, really satisfying way. I was impressed the authors even bothered doing so, considering the focus of the story was Ramón's manhunt and his desire to escape the clutches of Maneck, but I'm glad they did.
What I Didn't Like (SPOILERS)
Ramón has his moments where I wanted to smack him. His proclamations how he's Ramón Espejo and how no one's going to fuck with him get a little tiring, and there's sections in the narrative where even the prose gets inflated with Ramón's self-importance (especially with the use of exclamation marks). Said moments in the prose, which I'm too lazy to look up to quote an example, seems more like an old-fashioned style of prose, which makes me think that perhaps I'm looking at one of Dozois's contributions to the manuscript. But I have no way of knowing, so let's just say that those sections bugged me.
Part two of the book dragged for me, and for a while, it got predictable with how Ramón was going to distract the alien so the man he's hunting can have a solid start, and also, it didn't take long for me to wonder if whether or not the man Ramón was hunting was himself, which turned out to be true. Sometimes I had difficulty seeing how the sahael worked (just what section of the neck was it attached to?), and I actually despised the use of alien words that the reader had to ascertain the meaning based on the context of the sentences. However, there were still some words that honestly, I didn't get a solid grasp on, and those I did, I wondered if it was really necessary to have an alien word instead of the English word that it ended up translating to.
I also hated how Ramón constantly referred to Maneck as "monster" because the more Ramón changed and grew to understand the alien and its purpose, you would've thought he'd become more sympathetic. He is, in a way, but even at the end, he still refers to Maneck as "monster." Maybe by now it's an affectionate nickname, as he refers to himself as a monster too, but still.
Also, while I liked how the plot came around full circle, I was a little disappointed that we never had to see this Ramón admit to what he really was, and how he killed the original. I guess I didn't expect him to admit it so much as I expected it would come out somehow, that the people who knew him best, basically Elena, would recognize a certain difference that couldn't be explained by his disappearance in the wilderness.
My Rating
Worth the Cash: for a book written by three people, it's pretty seamless, and the Afterword and Author Q&A sections at the end are a must, because they really shed light on the process it took to get this book written, as well as the motivations of the authors and what each author brought to the table. The story itself is solid and stand-alone, and if you're a fan of anti-heroes, you're gonna like Ramón Espejo in spite of everything he does to convince you otherwise. I love how this book is populated by colonists from Mexican and South America, and how the aliens are truly alien, almost to the point you wish they were a little more human so you could understand them better. But in the end, this story is a journey story: a outer one, in which Ramón is on a manhunt and fighting for his very survival, and an inner one, in which Ramón is forced to examine who and what he is and come to grips with himself in ways that most characters in most books don't have to do. It's a satisfying read, and I'm glad I took a chance on it.
Cover Commentary: it's not my favorite art by Stephen Martiniere, but it's nice nonetheless. Martiniere covers always catch my attention.
Next up: Genesis by Bernard Beckett