Like many, arguably most, nerds, I'm a voracious reader.
Serendipitously, my present daily commute allows for at least 40-60
uninterrupted minutes of potential reading time five days a week. The reason
why being packed into the subway sardine-style doesn't faze me? My imagination
is usually running on all cylinders before the automatic doors ease shut (when
I'm not buried under assignments for school that is). As such, my hope is that
this will be the first of many book reviews, since most of us are continually
on the lookout for a solid read.
This year boasts a particularly
dense and diverse roster of new titles that would appeal to those of the geeky
persuasion. My most recent encounter with one of these came in the form of Arctic Rising by Tobias Buckell. Released
back in February, this tight-knit thriller has been making waves amongst fans
of several genres and the title appeared has on several 'must read' lists. The
book claimed to combine my love of spy-action, political intrigue, near-future
hypothesizing, and science. A quick perusal of the plot synopsis was enough to
convince me to give it a go.
Set approximately 60-75 years
beyond present day, Arctic Rising
presents a rendition of planet Earth that scientists have been warning us about
for over 30 years now. The atmosphere, rife with anthropomorphic carbon, has retained
more than enough heat in the biosphere to eliminate the Arctic icecaps and open
the entirety of the Northwest Passage (somewhere in Samsara, the spirit of Sir John Franklin faints). The climatic shifts associated with global warming have
resulted in corresponding shifts in sovereign wealth and, concordantly, in
geopolitical power. State, corporate,
and supranational actors alike are jostling for control in this still-changing
environment while simultaneously dealing with an volatile post-Peak Oil
economy.
Amidst this stifled furor, we
meet our protagonist: Nigerian airship pilot Anika Duncan. Having forsworn her
days as a mercenary, Anika enjoys the comparative quiet and routine of flying reconnaissance
missions for the United Nations Polar Guard (the UN having climbed to increased
prominence as many territories exposed by the receding Arctic ice are either
hotly contested or stated to be autonomous and separate from any given
country). After her airship is shot down by what appeared to be the RPG of a
smuggler trafficking in nuclear arms, Anika finds herself to be the
unanticipated wrinkle amidst reams of seamless political scheming. The book focuses primarily on Anika's
attempts to discern the identity and motive of the parties who blew her out of
the sky and, as the facets and scope of what turns out to be a conspiracy of a
titanic scale, her efforts to simply keep breathing.
It's a taut, quick read set at a
pace that you'd expect of a thriller. The quality of the writing starts out
somewhat weak, and there are points where you question the judgment of certain
characters, but it strengthens markedly by the time you're about a third of the
way into the story. Buckell earns points for creating a strong, intelligent
heroine, but the majority of the cast of secondary characters fall into the realm of one
dimensional. The author takes care to create an extremely realistic setting for
his tale, but the twists and turns he subjects his readers to are
well-worn and the climax of the action
feels so cliché that you may wonder if he'd originally envisioned the text as a
comic book.
Mercifully, the science was
clearly a priority to Buckell and his presentation of the environmental factors
at work and the consequences they wreak is arguably the strongest facet of the
narrative. As someone who studies sustainability and environmental management,
I was especially discriminating of Buckell's depiction and was pleasantly
surprised by the end product. His characterization of the 'Arctic Tiger'
nations (the countries that would experience a substantial inflow of wealth as
climate patterns shift and fossil fuels are displaced out of necessity) is
highly feasible and the conflicts that arise amongst claimants of newly freed Arctic
territories seems probable. You find yourself agreeing with Buckell's
description of human reactions to the altered Earth simply because they feel legitimate. This stuff seems like
it could happen tomorrow. Furthermore, the author doesn't shy away from thorny
social, political, and scientific issues during the course of the novel. He
makes a point to touch on race, gender roles, sexuality (Anika's lesbianism
factors heavily into the tale), and the quest for personal happiness as well as
macro quandaries like how denizens of low-lying island nations must be properly
compensated after their homes are swallowed up by the melted remnants of the Arctic icecaps (something that Grenedan-born Buckell plays close to the chest).
There are several occasions where Buckell takes his eco-enthusiasm to a
near-bombastic level of sermonizing which do actively detract from the rest of his
narrative, but this is typical of the vast majority of literature concerning
global warming (this will be the subject of a future post). Additionally, there
are a handful of scenes that ostensibly seek to dissect a larger social matter,
but end up contributing to the issue on the very side that Buckell sets out to turn
on its proverbial head (oh yeah, we get 'empowered' hookers with hearts of
gold).
Overall Grade: B-
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