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The Road to Science Fiction, Volume 5: The British Way
The history of science fiction, the way the British created it
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The Road to Science Fiction, Volume 5: The British Way
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Edited by James Gunn
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Borealis
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$14.99/$19.99 Canada
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Trade Paperback, Feb. 1998
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ISBN 1-56504-157-7
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Review by Clinton Lawrence
 he Road to Science Fiction, Volume 5: The British Way is the fifth installment in James Gunn's historical Road to SF anthology series. In this volume, Gunn turns his attention to the evolution of British science fiction, examining 31 short stories and four novel excerpts written between 1871 and 1986.
Gunn, in his lengthy introduction, writes that the previous volumes in his series focused mostly on an American view of science fiction. But while the genre has become closely identified as an American literature, the British contribution has been not only significant, but also distinctly different in flavor. While a number of British authors were included in previous Road anthologies, a full volume devoted to their contributions allows Gunn to fully examine the evolution of British SF.
Once again he begins with a historical overview of the period he's covering, focusing in particular on the cultural, historical, and literary reasons British science fiction developed an aesthetic and philosophical perspective distinctly different from its American counterpart. In general, he argues that British science fiction is perceived as more pessimistic and more literary than traditional American SF. The pessimism, according to Gunn, comes primarily from Britain's hardships of the 20th century, many of which the United States has not experienced.
Also, science fiction was never as thoroughly divorced from mainstream literature in Britain as it was in the United States, and therefore the SF genre in Britain never carried the stigma it did in the United States. On the other hand, the British never had the proliferation of science fiction magazines that existed in the U.S., so outside of the mainstream magazines or U.S. science fiction magazines, there were few places to publish short fiction.
Great stories from across the pond
Once again, Gunn has produced a volume that brilliantly illustrates the evolution of science fiction. In this anthology, the selections give a very strong impression that early British science fiction is distinctly more sophisticated than early American science fiction. H.G. Wells' "The Country of the Blind" and Rudyard Kipling's "As Easy as A.B.C.", for example, are hardly dated at all, though they were written very early in the century.
Many of these turn-of-the-century writers were mainstream authors who wrote science fiction only occasionally and therefore brought mainstream techniques to their fiction. This literary cross-fertilization has remained a British tradition. It's no coincidence that the British, led by J.G. Ballard, Brian W. Aldiss, Michael Moorcock and John Brunner, were particularly well positioned to lead SF's New Wave movement.
Beyond the historical perspective, Gunn has once again produced an anthology filled with great stories. The early years include fine pieces by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle ("The Horror of the Heights") and Olaf Stapledon (an excerpt from Star Maker). The stories from the Golden Age and the 1950s seem less distinct from American science fiction, but Arthur C. Clarke's "The Star" and John Wyndham's "The Emptiness of the Space" are the highlights.
The New Wave years include excellent stories from Ballard ("The Voices of Time" and "The Drowned Giant"), Anthony Burgess ("The Muse"), Brunner ("The Totally Rich"), and Aldiss ("Working in the Spaceship Yards" and "Appearance of Life"). The best of the more recent stories are Tanith Lee's "Written in Water" and Brian M. Stableford's "And He Not Busy Being Born".
Altogether, The Road to Science Fiction, Volume 5 is an outstanding addition to an already essential anthology series. The good news is that it doesn't end here--Gunn promises sixth and seventh volumes in his introduction.
I'm only able to scratch the surface of this anthology by mentioning a few of the best stories. There are also some real gems by less well known writers, as well as a couple of very early stories that uncannily predict the political events leading to World War II and the London killer fog.
-- Clint
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Child of the River
Yama is a man of destiny. But will he save the world, or destroy it?
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Child of the River
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By Paul J. McAuley
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Avon Eos
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$14.00/$19.00 Canada
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Hardcover, June 1998
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ISBN 0-380-97515-7
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Review by Curt Wohleber
 aul J. McAuley's Child of the River is the first book in a new series about a distant world in the far future. After rearranging the galaxy like so much furniture, humanity's godlike descendants have disappeared into a black hole called the Eye of the Preservers. On the artificial world of Confluence, many believe the Preservers still look and listen from the Eye. But it has been years since the Preservers or their avatars have spoken.
Confluence is a world of many races, most of them descendants of species genetically engineered to have human-level intelligence. Whatever their race, everyone on Confluence carries common genes marking them as creations of the Preservers. Everyone, that is, except a young man named Yama.
While an infant, Yama was rescued from the arms of a dead woman and adopted by the administrator of a minor port city on Confluence's Great River. The administrator, simply known as "the Aedile," grooms Yama for a comfortable but dull career in civil service. Yama, however, wants to fight in the war raging downriver at the world's "midpoint." (Confluence isn't exactly a planet: on maps it is many times longer than it is wide.) But the Aedile's drug-addled physician, Dr. Dismas, has his own plans for Yama and has him kidnapped.
Yama has a mysterious power over the ancient machines that flit about Confluence and impose order on the world. This helps him escape both his father's fellow bureaucrats and Dr. Dismas. He then heads up the Great River to the vast city of Ys, where he hopes to learn who he is and whether there are any others like him. He has many adventures and gains a lover, a loyal sidekick, and a few tantalizing clues about his true nature.
Ride the Great River
Like Confluence's Great River, Paul J. McAuley's fifth novel flows wide and strong and never meanders. First installments can be like packing luggage: put some exposition here, some background there; put some characters here, there and a couple way over there; now readers are ready to go. But McAuley starts Child of the River with bags already packed. Readers need only climb aboard and enjoy the ride, confident that the tour guide will hand out supplies as needed.
With his gift for lush yet economical writing, McAuley shows readers a strange and colorful world. Confluence is like a hallucinatory vision of India in the time of Buddha, with posthuman technology instead of sorcery. The characters are equally colorful, from Dr. Dismas, who confounds the Preservers' machines by basing crucial decisions on random numbers, to the eerie star-sailors, who don't have bodies, just brains and nerve fibers. Readers also meet assassins, ghouls, mercenaries, computer simulations of people long dead, and a bunch of giant robots.
Yama is the calm center of all this beguiling madness: earnest, a bit bland, and gamely filling the role of archetypal hero on a mythic journey. Child of the River doesn't quite end on a cliffhanger, but Yama and friends are still catching their breath when McAuley brings down the curtain.
Yama, no doubt, will venture into even stranger realms, learn great truths, discover his true nature, and return to transform the world. It's a formula as old as Gilgamesh, but durable and flexible enough that it may outlast even humanity.
The series gets off to a strong start. I hope that in addition to power and
knowledge, Yama gets a sense of humor.
-- Curt
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