FACT SF Reading Group

September 2006

September 5: Thrice Upon a Time by James P. Hogan

This discussion at Charles and Willie's home drew seven attendees. One person submitted comments by email. Our topic was Thrice Upon a Time, a science fiction novel written by recent ArmadilloCon Special Guest James P. Hogan. The story concerns a team of scientists in Scotland who discover a means of limited time travel. Six of us finished the book, and three had read it when it was published originally in 1980. All of us had read Hogan before.

The first third of the book is devoted to the scientific investigation of time travel. Experiments are described in detail from planning to execution to compilation of results. There are pages devoted to descriptions of scientific apparatus. The scientists' discussions of how to fit the logic of time travel into theoretical physics were well presented. To make this potentially dry material flow more smoothly, Hogan injects humor into the scientists' personal interactions and depicts some culture clashes involving the visiting American scientists. This helped to some extent, but several of us were waiting for the experiments to end and the real conflict of the story to begin.

The story got moving when serious situations developed that caused the scientists to consider using time travel in a substantial way. Several new characters were introduced, and we cared about what happened to them. There was serious discussion of the moral consequences of using time travel.

Since this book was published in 1980 but set in 2010, it was amusing to see how well the author's projected future matches our time. The book's computers are monolithic and use punch cards, air travel from New York to Scotland only takes 90 minutes, and people communicate with videophones. Digital Equipment Corporation, Hogan's employer at the time he wrote the book, was still a major computer manufacturer. Obviously things turned out a bit differently.

We appreciated that the book included a couple of smart female scientists. One of the female members of the group really liked that a girl was writing machine code in the book. There was a sweet romantic subplot between two characters. We noted that if the book was published newly now, it would probably be marketed to appeal to romance readers.

Several of us commented that the story and writing seem simple by current standards. We discussed it in the context of other time travel books. Gregory Benford's Timescape and Ken Grimwood's Reflex were mentioned prominently. One person commented that this book's basic time travel concept is used by more recent fiction including Eric Flint's 1632 series and Leo Frankowski's Cross Time Engineer books.

Overall we enjoyed reading a traditional hard science fiction book. The time travel element was well developed, and we liked the characters and story. After the meeting, several of us had dinner at Fuddrucker's.

September 19: Snake Agent by Liz Williams

Eleven people attended this meeting at A. T.'s home. This was the first occasion most of the group had been to the house, so there was a brief home tour before the meeting started. Our topic, Snake Agent by Liz Williams, is about a police detective in near-future Asia who investigates a case involving ghosts and demons, which eventually leads him to visit the Chinese underworld. Nine of us had finished the book, and three had read Liz Williams before.

Several in the group commented that they would normally not have read this book because they do not like procedural mysteries and genre mixing. They read it because it was on our reading list and it had a great cover. We found a lot to discuss.

We liked Detective Inspector Chen and his well-realized world of Singapore Three. Chen's status as an ostracized detective of supernatural cases was a clever twist on the standard loner detective. He had a strange but interesting relationship with his patron goddess. We enjoyed his uneasy temporary alliance with Zhu Irzh, a law enforcement officer from Hell. The back story of Chen and his wife was so rich that many people mistakenly assumed there was an earlier novel in the series. There were several other memorable characters that we’d like to see again.

We thought this book’s concept of gods and magic was intriguing. We enjoyed the descriptions of the underworld and journeys to and from Earth. We wondered how many of the metaphysical concepts actually came from Chinese culture. The concept of bribing one's way to a smoother trip to the afterlife seemed appropriately Chinese. The idea of Hell filled with bureaucracy and power struggles worked. We were amused to learn that hellish laboratories were the source of much technology used on Earth, including television.

We generally appreciated the writing style used in Snake Agent. Scenes of martial arts battles and explosions practically leaped off the page, and many of us found this book hard to put down. Some of the imagery of scenes in Hell was striking, although one person commented that such scenes should not be read while one was trying to eat. The non-visual senses (smells, sounds, etc.) were handled strongly. We noted several clever and well-turned phrases. Someone remarked that the author did a good job of writing the story deeply in Detective Chen’s viewpoint. One person in the group who reads extremely fast was less happy with the writing style, commenting that “the film broke down occasionally.”

Since this book has such a variety of story elements, we had a hard time determining its genre. Ultimately we decided on supernatural crime. We briefly compared this book’s genre mixing to that of another recent Reading Group book, The Atrocity Archives.

We were pleased to hear that a sequel had just been released, and we fought over the one copy that Willie had brought to sell at the meeting. Afterward, we had a nice dinner at Curra’s Grill.

-- A. T. Campbell, III