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Jack-din-Sticlă
Într-un viitor, în care deplasările prin sistemul solar sunt controlate de o oligarhie nemiloasă, Jack-din-Sticlă este căutat pentru activităţi teroriste. Jack crede că supravieţuirea lui este vitală pentru supravieţuirea speciei şi de aceea trebuie să comită mai multe crime… Cele trei părţi ale cărţii sunt tot atâtea intrigi SF poliţiste, străbătute de un fir comun. Prima se petrece într-o închisoare spaţială sumbră şi abundă în accente de disperare şi horror. Este practic o introducere pentru partea a doua, care utilizează tema cyberpunk clasică a războiului dintre corporaţii supranaţionale. Partea a treia este plasată în perioada postbelică, în care se declanşează revoluţia împotriva „clanurilor" post-postcapitaliste.
504 pages, Paperback
First published July 26, 2012
71 people are currently reading
4223 people want to read
About the author
Adam Roberts
258 books559 followersLibrarian Note: There is more than one author in the GoodReads database with this name. See this thread for more information.
Adam Roberts (born 1965) is an academic, critic and novelist. He also writes parodies under the pseudonyms of A.R.R.R. Roberts, A3R Roberts and Don Brine. He also blogs at The Valve, a group blog devoted to literature and cultural studies.
He has a degree in English from the University of Aberdeen and a PhD from Cambridge University on Robert Browning and the Classics. He teaches English literature and creative writing at Royal Holloway, University of London. Adam Roberts has been nominated twice for the Arthur C. Clarke Award: in 2001, for his debut novel, Salt, and in 2007, for Gradisil.
Adam Roberts (born 1965) is an academic, critic and novelist. He also writes parodies under the pseudonyms of A.R.R.R. Roberts, A3R Roberts and Don Brine. He also blogs at The Valve, a group blog devoted to literature and cultural studies.
He has a degree in English from the University of Aberdeen and a PhD from Cambridge University on Robert Browning and the Classics. He teaches English literature and creative writing at Royal Holloway, University of London. Adam Roberts has been nominated twice for the Arthur C. Clarke Award: in 2001, for his debut novel, Salt, and in 2007, for Gradisil.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 361 reviews
March 23, 2024
Space dystopia where greedy corporations rule the Solar system and one mysterious (anti)hero rebels against them.
Poignant, violent and graphic. Repulsive characters but the plot is engaging. Interesting technological predictions and worldbuilding but the story barely scratches the surface of it all so it seems more like a beginning of a series rather than standalone novel.
Poignant, violent and graphic. Repulsive characters but the plot is engaging. Interesting technological predictions and worldbuilding but the story barely scratches the surface of it all so it seems more like a beginning of a series rather than standalone novel.
December 28, 2015
Beautiful cover, but not at all reflective of the tone or content of the book. What you're getting is a dark, rather nasty series of interlocked stories set in a future of corporate dictatorships, widespread poverty, and minimal concern for human rights. So, um, kind of like now, actually, only with more advanced technology and drugs.
Because I read the blurb and some reviews, I wasn't expected a fun, optimistic tale a la the early days of science fiction, but I was hoping for at least some nods in that direction. You know, maybe a rocket ship made of glass rather than a space vessel made of . There is no stained glass in this book, unless you count the occasional glass fragment stained with human blood. In fact, glass played so small a part that I couldn't help but suspect that Roberts hit on the title first and worked the glass into the book later.
The writing is not bad, but there are a lot, I mean a LOT, of long expositional and philosophical passages, often presented as thought stream or dialog in a manner that I found pretty implausible. I'm willing to allow the teen girls, because they are supposed to be super Special (although they didn't seem too special most of the time, frankly) but having the men struggling to survive the harsh conditions of the prison asteroid prose on about political philosophy seemed ridiculous.
This book had some smart and interesting elements, but they were buried in mounds of stuff I didn't care for and was trying to skim. The ending also felt like a huge let-down, not just of my time investment but of the story itself. I didn't believe it. My recommendation: try Roberts' Yellow Blue Tibia instead. or if you want something more futuristic, another author.
Because I read the blurb and some reviews, I wasn't expected a fun, optimistic tale a la the early days of science fiction, but I was hoping for at least some nods in that direction. You know, maybe a rocket ship made of glass rather than a space vessel made of . There is no stained glass in this book, unless you count the occasional glass fragment stained with human blood. In fact, glass played so small a part that I couldn't help but suspect that Roberts hit on the title first and worked the glass into the book later.
The writing is not bad, but there are a lot, I mean a LOT, of long expositional and philosophical passages, often presented as thought stream or dialog in a manner that I found pretty implausible. I'm willing to allow the teen girls, because they are supposed to be super Special (although they didn't seem too special most of the time, frankly) but having the men struggling to survive the harsh conditions of the prison asteroid prose on about political philosophy seemed ridiculous.
This book had some smart and interesting elements, but they were buried in mounds of stuff I didn't care for and was trying to skim. The ending also felt like a huge let-down, not just of my time investment but of the story itself. I didn't believe it. My recommendation: try Roberts' Yellow Blue Tibia instead. or if you want something more futuristic, another author.
July 7, 2014
“A quantity of blood is spilled in this story, I’m sorry to say; and a good many people die; and there is some politics too. There is danger and fear. Accordingly I have told his tale in the form of a murder mystery; or to be more precise (and at all costs we must be precise) three, connected murder mysteries.
But I intend to play fair with you, reader, right from the start, or I’m no true Watson. So let me tell everything now, at the beginning, before the story gets going.“
Such a promising beginning; a sly narration, word play, and enticing hints. A troublesome book; very well written, cold and only intellectually interesting characters, dysconjugate plotting, and rather engaging world-building. The result is a book that is clearly well-done but doesn’t ever reach that point of emotional resonance or engagement.
After the prologue by the aforementioned sly narrator, the first section/story, “In the Box,” is about seven men placed on an asteroid as part of their prison sentence. It will be eleven years before the ship returns, so until then, survival is up to them. A fascinating, brutal and uncomfortable character study as the seven men engage in the adult version of Lord of the Flies. The reader knowing that a murder will take place lends an interesting tension to the already violent group dynamics; I was poised on the edge of a reading seat wondering how and when it would happen. Oh, and the ending! A clever, disgusting, squeamish solution.
**********************
All this and more quotes at:
http://clsiewert.wordpress.com/2014/0...
February 14, 2022
Beware.
Don't go to Adam Roberts looking for utopian visions of the future. If you want harmonious co-operation, post-scarcity paradises or futures where humanity has forged its nobler instincts into the foundations of Brave New Worlds, look elsewhere - most of Robert's books will give you screaming nightmares.
In On Earth's gravity has literally flipped ninety degrees, and it's a hardscrabble, borderline medieval dump. In new Model Army the world is ravaged and broken by conflict wrought by cheap, democratic armies. And now, in Jack Glass, the solar system is a grim dictatorial dystopia for most, ruled by a family known as the Ulanovs who keep the great mass of people living in decrepit dome-habitats hanging in space, living off barely palatable algae and collecting cancers from the radiation they are exposed to.
I don't want to live in these places, but damn Roberts makes me want to read about them. Roberts tells an intense tale in most of his novels and does so again here, although 'intense' is a pretty mild description of the beginning of Jack Glass.
The first of two starting narratives begins with six men, all prisoners, dumped into the freezing cold of a sealed over crevasse on an asteroid with nothing more than a small air generator, a tiny heater, some digging machines, some edible algae spores and a packet of biscuits.
Desperately cold, crazed with thirst and packed into a tiny space only a meter or so across, these men have to survive an eleven year sentence together and to do so they must hollow out their asteroid and find ice to drink and make more air. At the end of their stay, the asteroid they have hollowed will be scrubbed and sold as accommodation for the rich, its new owners caring not about the suffering of it's creators.
There is no way out of this prison floating abandoned in space. The men go through despair, anger, and then - far more dangerous than either - boredom. They establish brutal hierarchies of dominance, the top men using and abusing the weaker men as they please, violence breaking out and threatening to end them all.
One of the weaker men - Jac - is different from the others. He has no legs, and he spends time polishing a tiny round of glass he finds in the asteroid. He means to escape this prison, even though such an escape is impossible.
The second narrative concerns the two scions of a powerful family, second only in stature to the rulers of the solar system, who are holidaying on a summery European island when one of their servants is brutally murdered. Diana, the younger of the two sisters, is an aficionado of murder mysteries and throws herself into investigating what has happened. The case seems open and shut. There were nineteen other servants in the building, no-one else entered or left, and there is a clear motive for one of the nineteen. There is of course, more to this killing than there first seems, and as Diana solves it she will be introduced to a civilisation ending threat.
From these two narratives Roberts spins a story spanning the solar system, and dealing with concepts that span a great deal more at the same time. It's heady, compelling stuff and I loved every minute of it.
Jack Glass is Adam Roberts at his best, and his best is very, very good. Roberts is a master of concept driven SF, each of his books different from the last. This novel is different from his other work and in some ways reads as a science fiction detective story, although it soon grows to encompass far, far more than that.
The only thing holding me back from a five-star, wide-eyed evangelical review is that Jack Glass's ending is both abrupt and unsatisfying. I loved this story, and I didn't want it to end, so the way it did was particularly galling. There are some codas in the form of poems that add some supplementary insight into the Ulanovian solar system and some of the players in the background of the narrative but I still felt a little short changed.
In saying that I still rate Jack Glass as one of my favourite reads this year, and a novel worthy of inclusion in any serious SF collection. Roberts has written several works I would consider to be twenty-first century classics, and when considered along with Bete, Stone and New Model Army , Jack Glass only further cements Roberts as one of the brightest supernovae in Science Fiction.
4.5 mysteriously exploding stars.
Don't go to Adam Roberts looking for utopian visions of the future. If you want harmonious co-operation, post-scarcity paradises or futures where humanity has forged its nobler instincts into the foundations of Brave New Worlds, look elsewhere - most of Robert's books will give you screaming nightmares.
In On Earth's gravity has literally flipped ninety degrees, and it's a hardscrabble, borderline medieval dump. In new Model Army the world is ravaged and broken by conflict wrought by cheap, democratic armies. And now, in Jack Glass, the solar system is a grim dictatorial dystopia for most, ruled by a family known as the Ulanovs who keep the great mass of people living in decrepit dome-habitats hanging in space, living off barely palatable algae and collecting cancers from the radiation they are exposed to.
I don't want to live in these places, but damn Roberts makes me want to read about them. Roberts tells an intense tale in most of his novels and does so again here, although 'intense' is a pretty mild description of the beginning of Jack Glass.
The first of two starting narratives begins with six men, all prisoners, dumped into the freezing cold of a sealed over crevasse on an asteroid with nothing more than a small air generator, a tiny heater, some digging machines, some edible algae spores and a packet of biscuits.
Desperately cold, crazed with thirst and packed into a tiny space only a meter or so across, these men have to survive an eleven year sentence together and to do so they must hollow out their asteroid and find ice to drink and make more air. At the end of their stay, the asteroid they have hollowed will be scrubbed and sold as accommodation for the rich, its new owners caring not about the suffering of it's creators.
There is no way out of this prison floating abandoned in space. The men go through despair, anger, and then - far more dangerous than either - boredom. They establish brutal hierarchies of dominance, the top men using and abusing the weaker men as they please, violence breaking out and threatening to end them all.
One of the weaker men - Jac - is different from the others. He has no legs, and he spends time polishing a tiny round of glass he finds in the asteroid. He means to escape this prison, even though such an escape is impossible.
The second narrative concerns the two scions of a powerful family, second only in stature to the rulers of the solar system, who are holidaying on a summery European island when one of their servants is brutally murdered. Diana, the younger of the two sisters, is an aficionado of murder mysteries and throws herself into investigating what has happened. The case seems open and shut. There were nineteen other servants in the building, no-one else entered or left, and there is a clear motive for one of the nineteen. There is of course, more to this killing than there first seems, and as Diana solves it she will be introduced to a civilisation ending threat.
From these two narratives Roberts spins a story spanning the solar system, and dealing with concepts that span a great deal more at the same time. It's heady, compelling stuff and I loved every minute of it.
Jack Glass is Adam Roberts at his best, and his best is very, very good. Roberts is a master of concept driven SF, each of his books different from the last. This novel is different from his other work and in some ways reads as a science fiction detective story, although it soon grows to encompass far, far more than that.
The only thing holding me back from a five-star, wide-eyed evangelical review is that Jack Glass's ending is both abrupt and unsatisfying. I loved this story, and I didn't want it to end, so the way it did was particularly galling. There are some codas in the form of poems that add some supplementary insight into the Ulanovian solar system and some of the players in the background of the narrative but I still felt a little short changed.
In saying that I still rate Jack Glass as one of my favourite reads this year, and a novel worthy of inclusion in any serious SF collection. Roberts has written several works I would consider to be twenty-first century classics, and when considered along with Bete, Stone and New Model Army , Jack Glass only further cements Roberts as one of the brightest supernovae in Science Fiction.
4.5 mysteriously exploding stars.
April 16, 2014
This is still the best book I've read this year. I know it's only April, and I read this in February, and there's still a lot of time. But I bloody loved it. And I haven't even got to lend my copy out yet, which is a travesty.
I found it in a way that usually turns up a lot of dross but has actually done me quite proud in the last few months, which is to say in the comments section of a Guardian Online article, this time on locked room mysteries. Every so often, I discover that someone has written a book specifically for me, and they didn't even TELL me - three choice golden age detective stories, set in the golden age of sci-fi? It took me about forty-five seconds to order it on Amazon, and when it arrived, about the same amount of time to get extremely excited about the prologue. Tell me you don't love good, genre-savvy fiction. Tell me you don't love it when someone looks you in the eye, tells you they're about to trick you, and does it anyway.
The thing about golden age crime fiction, and golden age sci-fi, is that the former relies on very strict rules and Getting Shit Past The Radar of readers like me who are busy being eagle-eyed and trying to spot the trick in a very narrow set of variables - whereas the sci-fi is based on going to places and doing things that the reader isn't so familiar with. In a way they ought to be at odds; at any rate they should be pretty difficult to combine without betraying somebody's favourite.
Don't worry, Adam Roberts hasn't betrayed your favourite. What Jack Glass does that makes me so happy is to tread the very fine line between them - in an effort to surprise readers, golden age crime often ends up resorting to pulling solutions out of its own ass, so in a way both genres prime you (or at least me) to say "Of COURSE! Of course the answer is faster than light travel/evil twins/the Illuminati/evil butler! It's the only solution!" Both genres train you to view the impossible as if there's a loophole in it, and I really adored the deft, enthusiastic, respectful way that Roberts exploits the hell out of any loophole he can find.
He tells you who the murderer is in the prologue. Then he promises you'll be surprised. Well, I was surprised.
And besides - and if anything this is the important bit - it was really good fun to read. I enjoyed being in this book. Why has it not got more recognition? Why have I never heard of it, or its author, before? Why am I not right this minute seeking out other things he's written (which by the way I'm absolutely going to do)? MORE OF THIS SORT OF THING, PLEASE.
Please, someone else read this, because I want to talk about it and I've not got anyone to do that with. Also Adam Roberts please write some more things so I can buy them in hardback, preferably with covers this pretty so I can prop them up on my mantelpiece when I'm done.
I found it in a way that usually turns up a lot of dross but has actually done me quite proud in the last few months, which is to say in the comments section of a Guardian Online article, this time on locked room mysteries. Every so often, I discover that someone has written a book specifically for me, and they didn't even TELL me - three choice golden age detective stories, set in the golden age of sci-fi? It took me about forty-five seconds to order it on Amazon, and when it arrived, about the same amount of time to get extremely excited about the prologue. Tell me you don't love good, genre-savvy fiction. Tell me you don't love it when someone looks you in the eye, tells you they're about to trick you, and does it anyway.
The thing about golden age crime fiction, and golden age sci-fi, is that the former relies on very strict rules and Getting Shit Past The Radar of readers like me who are busy being eagle-eyed and trying to spot the trick in a very narrow set of variables - whereas the sci-fi is based on going to places and doing things that the reader isn't so familiar with. In a way they ought to be at odds; at any rate they should be pretty difficult to combine without betraying somebody's favourite.
Don't worry, Adam Roberts hasn't betrayed your favourite. What Jack Glass does that makes me so happy is to tread the very fine line between them - in an effort to surprise readers, golden age crime often ends up resorting to pulling solutions out of its own ass, so in a way both genres prime you (or at least me) to say "Of COURSE! Of course the answer is faster than light travel/evil twins/the Illuminati/evil butler! It's the only solution!" Both genres train you to view the impossible as if there's a loophole in it, and I really adored the deft, enthusiastic, respectful way that Roberts exploits the hell out of any loophole he can find.
He tells you who the murderer is in the prologue. Then he promises you'll be surprised. Well, I was surprised.
And besides - and if anything this is the important bit - it was really good fun to read. I enjoyed being in this book. Why has it not got more recognition? Why have I never heard of it, or its author, before? Why am I not right this minute seeking out other things he's written (which by the way I'm absolutely going to do)? MORE OF THIS SORT OF THING, PLEASE.
Please, someone else read this, because I want to talk about it and I've not got anyone to do that with. Also Adam Roberts please write some more things so I can buy them in hardback, preferably with covers this pretty so I can prop them up on my mantelpiece when I'm done.
November 1, 2018
3 crimes scenes, 1 man
Mass murderer Jack Glass is on loose and the Solar System is not safe. Enveloping theoretical physics and power dynamics, Roberts offers this suspense. It questions values from loyalty to the ever present, does the ends justify the means.
Broken down into three separate vignettes, it's not immediately obvious that these are sequential events, but the impetus for Jack's actions unfolds. The first vignette, "In the Box", I loved; it was gritty science fiction and a big surprise--Big! My favorite easily. The second part, "The FTL Murders" was very slow in comparison and it spent a great deal of time developing two characters, where the conflict of human versus science are anthropomorphized, too much time is you ask me. Dawdled. The third vignette, "The Impossible Gun", brings the stories full circle connecting them in the third crime scene. I liked this better than the FTL, but not as much as Box, but that was probably because I'd figured out the resolution or rather one version of possible resolutions--and I liked mine better than the real ending. I got the science part 100%, the human part, not as much; therefore, I was disappointed in how it drifted and settled. I guess the surprise in that one was one that I didn't see the basis for it existing, but then again I don't think it was suppose to be rational. Ended with me going, really Jack?
So, the fluffy ending and saggy middle kinda deflated the joy from this one. Eh.
Mass murderer Jack Glass is on loose and the Solar System is not safe. Enveloping theoretical physics and power dynamics, Roberts offers this suspense. It questions values from loyalty to the ever present, does the ends justify the means.
Broken down into three separate vignettes, it's not immediately obvious that these are sequential events, but the impetus for Jack's actions unfolds. The first vignette, "In the Box", I loved; it was gritty science fiction and a big surprise--Big! My favorite easily. The second part, "The FTL Murders" was very slow in comparison and it spent a great deal of time developing two characters, where the conflict of human versus science are anthropomorphized, too much time is you ask me. Dawdled. The third vignette, "The Impossible Gun", brings the stories full circle connecting them in the third crime scene. I liked this better than the FTL, but not as much as Box, but that was probably because I'd figured out the resolution or rather one version of possible resolutions--and I liked mine better than the real ending. I got the science part 100%, the human part, not as much; therefore, I was disappointed in how it drifted and settled. I guess the surprise in that one was one that I didn't see the basis for it existing, but then again I don't think it was suppose to be rational. Ended with me going, really Jack?
So, the fluffy ending and saggy middle kinda deflated the joy from this one. Eh.
June 20, 2013
What a wonderful thing this book is! Roberts himself describes it as arising from "a desire to collide together some of the conventions of 'Golden Age' science fiction and 'Golden Age' detective fiction." He does that beautifully, but he does so much more.
Does the book satisfy as a mystery? One hundred per cent, I'd say. Of course there are three mysteries, and each of them articulates in a different way. And each of them pays off beautifully. But it's not even scratching the surface of the novel to say that when the narrator promises both to give us the answer in advance and to surprise us with the final revelation, it's no idle boast.
In Jack, Roberts has created a truly unique protagonist - a monster whose pathology we not only understand but applaud, and whose bloody crimes we celebrate. He also gives us a fascinating and fully realised future, whose internal logic opens to us organically, with a bare minimum of exposition; and then, once we've got the big picture, continues to develop and to be enriched with more and more detail, more and more reveals.
I also loved the book for its prose style, which was elegant and hugely evocative. One example: when Diana Argent goes to the police station on Korkura to question the suspects in the provocatively named FTL Murders, we get this description of the place:
"They were at a squat, white-flanked building without windows. Jong-Il went first; then Diana climbed awkwardly out and stood for a moment. The grassy odour of olive oil. The sound of the cypresses hushing her. Beside the building was a swimming pool, ten metres across, filled, it appeared, with green tea. The shadow from the building printed a trapezoid over the dry grass, and dipped its apex into the water."
Diana is another of the book's major selling points for me. She sees everything with this hallucinatory clarity because it's all new to her. She's not only unfamiliar with the Greek islands, she's unfamiliar with Earth as a whole. She's just come down from the orbital habitats known as the uplands, and she's investigating a murder while trying to adjust to the appalling, debilitating local gravity. Oh, and she's sixteen. Almost. After Jack, she's the most vivid and most fully realised character, and Roberts draws their relationship - the duel of wits between a child savant and a ruthless killer - with great subtlety and ultimately with great warmth and tenderness. That's my opinion, anyway. For most of the book, you're kept at a certain emotional distance from what's going on - the intellectual puzzles and the amazing ideas being more important than the characters' inner lives. But by the end, you feel both for the monster and for the innocent, which is an astonishing feat.
I agree with the earlier reviewer that this is the sort of book that gets in the way of you doing anything else. I finished it in two days, when I really needed to be doing other things - sucked in, tantalised, played with, false-footed, blindsided, and finally moved.
Does the book satisfy as a mystery? One hundred per cent, I'd say. Of course there are three mysteries, and each of them articulates in a different way. And each of them pays off beautifully. But it's not even scratching the surface of the novel to say that when the narrator promises both to give us the answer in advance and to surprise us with the final revelation, it's no idle boast.
In Jack, Roberts has created a truly unique protagonist - a monster whose pathology we not only understand but applaud, and whose bloody crimes we celebrate. He also gives us a fascinating and fully realised future, whose internal logic opens to us organically, with a bare minimum of exposition; and then, once we've got the big picture, continues to develop and to be enriched with more and more detail, more and more reveals.
I also loved the book for its prose style, which was elegant and hugely evocative. One example: when Diana Argent goes to the police station on Korkura to question the suspects in the provocatively named FTL Murders, we get this description of the place:
"They were at a squat, white-flanked building without windows. Jong-Il went first; then Diana climbed awkwardly out and stood for a moment. The grassy odour of olive oil. The sound of the cypresses hushing her. Beside the building was a swimming pool, ten metres across, filled, it appeared, with green tea. The shadow from the building printed a trapezoid over the dry grass, and dipped its apex into the water."
Diana is another of the book's major selling points for me. She sees everything with this hallucinatory clarity because it's all new to her. She's not only unfamiliar with the Greek islands, she's unfamiliar with Earth as a whole. She's just come down from the orbital habitats known as the uplands, and she's investigating a murder while trying to adjust to the appalling, debilitating local gravity. Oh, and she's sixteen. Almost. After Jack, she's the most vivid and most fully realised character, and Roberts draws their relationship - the duel of wits between a child savant and a ruthless killer - with great subtlety and ultimately with great warmth and tenderness. That's my opinion, anyway. For most of the book, you're kept at a certain emotional distance from what's going on - the intellectual puzzles and the amazing ideas being more important than the characters' inner lives. But by the end, you feel both for the monster and for the innocent, which is an astonishing feat.
I agree with the earlier reviewer that this is the sort of book that gets in the way of you doing anything else. I finished it in two days, when I really needed to be doing other things - sucked in, tantalised, played with, false-footed, blindsided, and finally moved.
September 5, 2012
Roberts' books are truly difficult to rate, because there isn't anything else like them in the modern SF genre. He writes beautifully, really beautifully; the kind of image-dense, well-crafted sentences that you have to read three times just to savour the feel of them sliding through your neurons. His ideas are magical, and he's no imaginative slouch - each novel he writes sports a new and freshly minted world of wondrous veracity.
Set in a future where humans thickly clot the space between the worlds of the Solar System and are ruled most oppressively, Jack Glass is a story about a kind of cosmic terrorist, but presented as a series of three murder mysteries; the literary conceit here being Roberts' take on the old country house, Agatha Christie style whodunnit.
To a point this is what we have, but the detective angle proves more a surface gloss to SF world buildery. The murders take back seat and we're soon hip-deep in Roberts' usual concern of the unworthy swain courting the unobtainable damsel. Who are we to complain? All authors have their literary drums to beat, but with the gruesome first installment of Jack Glass it appears at first that we have escaped this particular obsession, and it's something of a surprise and disappointment to be presented with it again.
Glass himself is a confident, capable man, much more sure of himself than many of Roberts' earlier protagonists. Part of the book's draw is the slow revelation of the various layers to his character, and the discovery of the romantic flaw in Glass is well-judged, if slightly disappointing, by which I mean it fits this story perfectly, but anyway, see above. The dividing up of the story into three undoes the pacing, and the contrast between the first taut, superbly claustrophic tale and the more languid tone of the latter two unseats the reader. There's a little too much time spent detailing the inner thoughts of teenage girls (something Roberts already tackled brilliantly in By Light Alone). He does it well, admittedly, but too much here.
Although this is not his strongest work overall, Jack Glass contains some of Roberts' most artful writing, and the first part of the book is among the best SF stories from one of today's finest British SF writers.
Set in a future where humans thickly clot the space between the worlds of the Solar System and are ruled most oppressively, Jack Glass is a story about a kind of cosmic terrorist, but presented as a series of three murder mysteries; the literary conceit here being Roberts' take on the old country house, Agatha Christie style whodunnit.
To a point this is what we have, but the detective angle proves more a surface gloss to SF world buildery. The murders take back seat and we're soon hip-deep in Roberts' usual concern of the unworthy swain courting the unobtainable damsel. Who are we to complain? All authors have their literary drums to beat, but with the gruesome first installment of Jack Glass it appears at first that we have escaped this particular obsession, and it's something of a surprise and disappointment to be presented with it again.
Glass himself is a confident, capable man, much more sure of himself than many of Roberts' earlier protagonists. Part of the book's draw is the slow revelation of the various layers to his character, and the discovery of the romantic flaw in Glass is well-judged, if slightly disappointing, by which I mean it fits this story perfectly, but anyway, see above. The dividing up of the story into three undoes the pacing, and the contrast between the first taut, superbly claustrophic tale and the more languid tone of the latter two unseats the reader. There's a little too much time spent detailing the inner thoughts of teenage girls (something Roberts already tackled brilliantly in By Light Alone). He does it well, admittedly, but too much here.
Although this is not his strongest work overall, Jack Glass contains some of Roberts' most artful writing, and the first part of the book is among the best SF stories from one of today's finest British SF writers.
November 12, 2013
2,5 / 5
Jack Glass, by Adam Roberts is a book that tries too much to be many things but ultimately fails in most, if not all of them. Here’s my personal view and opinion why this is so and why I was disappointed. As usual, I will avoid going into too much detail describing what this book is about, you can read the synopsis up there ^. Instead, I will go straight into my review. Be wary, this review will probably contain light spoilers but nothing too revealing. Quick summary?: A book with a very ambitious plot and ideas that suffers from frustrating characters, occasionally bad writing, really sketchy science and uneven pace.
Format:
In my e-book version, the book had 373 pages. It is comprised of 3 parts which in effect are 3 different but eventually interconnected stories. The 2nd and 3rd part contain many shorter subchapters. One of my early gripes has to do with the lack of chapter waypoints in my ebook version (I don’t know if this problem is present in all ebook versions). It made navigating back and forth a lot of trouble. At the end, a glossary is included (very useful!) along with a very extensive extra part with poems and songs of the book’s universe which was a nice and original feature for a SF book! The narration is in 3rd person perspective and entirely in the past tense.
Characters:
The main character as one would expect is Jack though he shares the spotlight for the most part with Diana. Jack’s character is always presented with an air of mystery and surrounded with a lot of question marks. We are never really sure of what he is like, nor even who he is in each story though that’s quite easy to get after a point. Even though this character is never fully developed and detailed, this in a way is a bit acceptable because he is supposed to be mysterious and unknown, a stranger throughout the whole novel. Unfortunately, Roberts fumbles big time with Jack’s character at the final subchapters with a reveal and justification that I personally found totally weak and disappointing. More on that later as this is also part of the plot and quite spoilerish.
Diana is the other main character and in a way the protagonist for most part of the novel. I don’t want to give away too much so I will be a bit vague but suffice to say that her characters is very weak and unbelievable (in a negative way). Now, you see, Diana has supposedly been raised and trained to be a problem solver, one of the cleverest and wisest young persons in the whole system. Well, guess what, Diana is very stupid for a "clever problem-solver" and can't really solve anything. As a matter of fact, she's very ignorant of many important things like system politics and physics and sociology on the most basic level. That level of lack of education is inexcusable for a high-society person trained since kindergarten to be smart and know-it-all. In a novel where she is supposed to be the main brain force, the puzzle’s unscrambler and the riddle’s solver she is constantly out of ideas and clues, relying solely on intuition and external help and guidance.
So sadly, as both main characters are rather distant, unrealistic, unlikable and extremely hard for the reader to connect to, the novel comes out short on any real attachment to the protagonists and suffers from indifference and incredulity.
World building:
Luckily, world building is good enough to stand apart from the novel’s other deficiencies. Roberts has imagined a future where humanity is spread but still restricted to the limits of our solar system. Strict hierarchical levels exist and control all life everywhere. Humans have evolved sufficiently to posses many technological and biotechnological capacities and abilities though as it can be imagined those can be found in different levels and abundance throughout the social castes and classes. Also, as humanity has taken off Earth and most of its population lives in space in low or no g gravity, the human physiology has also changed and degenerated to a more suited state which presents problems to those going to 1g gravity environments. All those and many more are very well presented and documented by Roberts, making world building the most glowing part of this novel.
Plot & story:
And we arrive at the plot… Here is the thing, Jack Glass is essentially a SF howdunit. As such, it is supposed to be made mostly of two major ingredients: a base of typical crime/mystery/murder howdunit that is the main engine and pushes the plot forward with suspense, guessing and gradual revelations, and a big dose of science fiction to give the novel an original and fresh taste, something to amaze and awe the reader. I’m sorry to say that both are found lacking thought for different reasons each.
The plot, the whole mystery and the way it’s presented feels like a huge mess. Roberts tried for something much more ambitious that he could handle. In a recent interview/post, Mark Charan Newton mentioned some tips/rules for writing good and proper whodunits. Among those were the following:
Roberts disregards both. He continuously tries to deceive and distract the reader from guessing with erroneous information and needless tactics. At the end, the questions are answered in unceremonious and bland ways, often revealing either uninteresting or incredulous solutions.
I also felt that occasionally there are some big holes in the plot. Why some things happen and why then? Not all questions are answered or can be answered by the provided information by the end of the novel. [SPOILER follows][END OF SPOILER] In general, the whole ending sequence was a huge let-down, Coda included! (Especially the Coda! Please don’t get me started about that one too. Most useless pages I’ve ever read in a book ending)
Pacing & Writing:
I decided to review the pacing along with the writing instead of in the previous section. The pacing left a lot to be desired. It was uneven throughout the whole novel, sometimes incomprehensibly slow, sometimes surprisingly jumpy and fast. What I disliked about the pace is that sometimes scenes take forever to unfold which is in part caused by the writing.
Robert’s writing is not bad but it’s nothing exceptional either. What stuck out at me from the beginning was Robert’s tendency to repeat and repeat himself. Was this done intentionally or is it a case of bad editing? I’m not sure, but the editing in general appears to be rather rough. A lot of needlessly made-up words (some of which make no sense at all), several mistakes, repetitions, just to name a few. Also, as I’m very particular with dialogue and this book was full of it, I have to admit that dialogue was not that much satisfying, (like as enhancing the narration and providing information and insights) but rather stiff and often felt as a delay.
Lastly, the science and physics were a mixed bag. Sometimes, they came out impressive and interesting but some other times they were sketchy and dubious and the explanations given were very weak.
Conclusion:
In conclusion, this is a book that was very ambitious in many levels and fronts but I personally think that it failed in most of them. It is a pity, as the chance for something truly memorable was there. I was surprised to find that Roberts is an experienced author as this work felt more like an unpolished debut than the work of a veteran. Considering all the frustrations and disappointments that I described above, I can’t really recommend this book to anyone. I’m sorry Mr. Roberts but I will have to think twice and hard before reading another of your novels in the future.
2,5 / 5
Jack Glass, by Adam Roberts is a book that tries too much to be many things but ultimately fails in most, if not all of them. Here’s my personal view and opinion why this is so and why I was disappointed. As usual, I will avoid going into too much detail describing what this book is about, you can read the synopsis up there ^. Instead, I will go straight into my review. Be wary, this review will probably contain light spoilers but nothing too revealing. Quick summary?: A book with a very ambitious plot and ideas that suffers from frustrating characters, occasionally bad writing, really sketchy science and uneven pace.
Format:
In my e-book version, the book had 373 pages. It is comprised of 3 parts which in effect are 3 different but eventually interconnected stories. The 2nd and 3rd part contain many shorter subchapters. One of my early gripes has to do with the lack of chapter waypoints in my ebook version (I don’t know if this problem is present in all ebook versions). It made navigating back and forth a lot of trouble. At the end, a glossary is included (very useful!) along with a very extensive extra part with poems and songs of the book’s universe which was a nice and original feature for a SF book! The narration is in 3rd person perspective and entirely in the past tense.
Characters:
The main character as one would expect is Jack though he shares the spotlight for the most part with Diana. Jack’s character is always presented with an air of mystery and surrounded with a lot of question marks. We are never really sure of what he is like, nor even who he is in each story though that’s quite easy to get after a point. Even though this character is never fully developed and detailed, this in a way is a bit acceptable because he is supposed to be mysterious and unknown, a stranger throughout the whole novel. Unfortunately, Roberts fumbles big time with Jack’s character at the final subchapters with a reveal and justification that I personally found totally weak and disappointing. More on that later as this is also part of the plot and quite spoilerish.
Diana is the other main character and in a way the protagonist for most part of the novel. I don’t want to give away too much so I will be a bit vague but suffice to say that her characters is very weak and unbelievable (in a negative way). Now, you see, Diana has supposedly been raised and trained to be a problem solver, one of the cleverest and wisest young persons in the whole system. Well, guess what, Diana is very stupid for a "clever problem-solver" and can't really solve anything. As a matter of fact, she's very ignorant of many important things like system politics and physics and sociology on the most basic level. That level of lack of education is inexcusable for a high-society person trained since kindergarten to be smart and know-it-all. In a novel where she is supposed to be the main brain force, the puzzle’s unscrambler and the riddle’s solver she is constantly out of ideas and clues, relying solely on intuition and external help and guidance.
So sadly, as both main characters are rather distant, unrealistic, unlikable and extremely hard for the reader to connect to, the novel comes out short on any real attachment to the protagonists and suffers from indifference and incredulity.
World building:
Luckily, world building is good enough to stand apart from the novel’s other deficiencies. Roberts has imagined a future where humanity is spread but still restricted to the limits of our solar system. Strict hierarchical levels exist and control all life everywhere. Humans have evolved sufficiently to posses many technological and biotechnological capacities and abilities though as it can be imagined those can be found in different levels and abundance throughout the social castes and classes. Also, as humanity has taken off Earth and most of its population lives in space in low or no g gravity, the human physiology has also changed and degenerated to a more suited state which presents problems to those going to 1g gravity environments. All those and many more are very well presented and documented by Roberts, making world building the most glowing part of this novel.
Plot & story:
And we arrive at the plot… Here is the thing, Jack Glass is essentially a SF howdunit. As such, it is supposed to be made mostly of two major ingredients: a base of typical crime/mystery/murder howdunit that is the main engine and pushes the plot forward with suspense, guessing and gradual revelations, and a big dose of science fiction to give the novel an original and fresh taste, something to amaze and awe the reader. I’m sorry to say that both are found lacking thought for different reasons each.
The plot, the whole mystery and the way it’s presented feels like a huge mess. Roberts tried for something much more ambitious that he could handle. In a recent interview/post, Mark Charan Newton mentioned some tips/rules for writing good and proper whodunits. Among those were the following:
6) Don’t short-change the reader.
7) Don’t make your method utterly ridiculous
Roberts disregards both. He continuously tries to deceive and distract the reader from guessing with erroneous information and needless tactics. At the end, the questions are answered in unceremonious and bland ways, often revealing either uninteresting or incredulous solutions.
I also felt that occasionally there are some big holes in the plot. Why some things happen and why then? Not all questions are answered or can be answered by the provided information by the end of the novel. [SPOILER follows][END OF SPOILER] In general, the whole ending sequence was a huge let-down, Coda included! (Especially the Coda! Please don’t get me started about that one too. Most useless pages I’ve ever read in a book ending)
Pacing & Writing:
I decided to review the pacing along with the writing instead of in the previous section. The pacing left a lot to be desired. It was uneven throughout the whole novel, sometimes incomprehensibly slow, sometimes surprisingly jumpy and fast. What I disliked about the pace is that sometimes scenes take forever to unfold which is in part caused by the writing.
Robert’s writing is not bad but it’s nothing exceptional either. What stuck out at me from the beginning was Robert’s tendency to repeat and repeat himself. Was this done intentionally or is it a case of bad editing? I’m not sure, but the editing in general appears to be rather rough. A lot of needlessly made-up words (some of which make no sense at all), several mistakes, repetitions, just to name a few. Also, as I’m very particular with dialogue and this book was full of it, I have to admit that dialogue was not that much satisfying, (like as enhancing the narration and providing information and insights) but rather stiff and often felt as a delay.
Lastly, the science and physics were a mixed bag. Sometimes, they came out impressive and interesting but some other times they were sketchy and dubious and the explanations given were very weak.
Conclusion:
In conclusion, this is a book that was very ambitious in many levels and fronts but I personally think that it failed in most of them. It is a pity, as the chance for something truly memorable was there. I was surprised to find that Roberts is an experienced author as this work felt more like an unpolished debut than the work of a veteran. Considering all the frustrations and disappointments that I described above, I can’t really recommend this book to anyone. I’m sorry Mr. Roberts but I will have to think twice and hard before reading another of your novels in the future.
2,5 / 5
November 12, 2013
Prologue:
Dear readers, I fear I have to convey a terrible, terrible tragedy to you! The fifth rating star was murdered and now lies dead in front of you.
But the strangest thing is that we already know who did the killing. It was a collarboration of the remaining four stars, who have fled into this review.
It's like in the novel "Jack Glass", where we are told who is the murderer in all three cases within the book right upfront in the prologue.
So, follow me into this murder mystery review and help me catch all four stars. One of them is hiding within each part of the review. Can you spot and point out all the four stars? If you want to play, please point out the stars in spoilers, so everybody can speculate on their own.
Eventually I'm going to reveal the location of the four stars in a spoiler comment later on. :)
Part 1: Structure
Jack Glass has a unique build up. It consists of three interlocking murder mysteries. Part one acts more as a general introduction of Jack Glass as a character, the main story is told in parts 2 and 3. It's very interesting to see that the narrative changes a lot, especially between part 1 and 2 and Roberts is able to introduce very distinguishable voices for his main protagonists.
Part 2: Characters
The characters are very well drawn. The all male cast in part 1 is a bit confusing in the beginning, but it works out in the end. The man called Jac and Gordius, a fattie who was worshipped as a sun god by his followers, have the most character.
Diana, the main protagonist of part 2 is completely different. Her part is more light-hearted and she has likeable traits, but also some aspects that make it hard to be completely on her side.
Part 3: Worldbuilding
Roberts shows us a very interesting vision of the future. He doesn't spoonfeed his information to you and many of his made-up words are never explained within the text, so you have to refer to the appendix.
So, as you're putting together the pieces of the murder mysteries, you're also putting together the pieces of the society.
Many people live in artifical bubbles orbiting Earth or the neighboring planets and having difficulties to adjust to gravity, when on Earth.
The society seems to be matriarchal and sexual encounters are often of bisexual nature. Yes, sex is mentioned in the book, but not in a Miley Cirus kind of way.
Part 4: Overall
Part one is most arguably the weakest part of the novel and on its own I would rate it 3/5. Parts 2 and 3 are stronger, but in the last part I wasn't really that fond of one aspect of the ending. So, all in all, this was a very enjoyable 4/5 read for me.
Epilogue:
So, did you catch our four culprits? And to be clear, no star hides in the spoiler. That would be mean. :)
Dear readers, I fear I have to convey a terrible, terrible tragedy to you! The fifth rating star was murdered and now lies dead in front of you.
But the strangest thing is that we already know who did the killing. It was a collarboration of the remaining four stars, who have fled into this review.
It's like in the novel "Jack Glass", where we are told who is the murderer in all three cases within the book right upfront in the prologue.
So, follow me into this murder mystery review and help me catch all four stars. One of them is hiding within each part of the review. Can you spot and point out all the four stars? If you want to play, please point out the stars in spoilers, so everybody can speculate on their own.
Eventually I'm going to reveal the location of the four stars in a spoiler comment later on. :)
Part 1: Structure
Jack Glass has a unique build up. It consists of three interlocking murder mysteries. Part one acts more as a general introduction of Jack Glass as a character, the main story is told in parts 2 and 3. It's very interesting to see that the narrative changes a lot, especially between part 1 and 2 and Roberts is able to introduce very distinguishable voices for his main protagonists.
Part 2: Characters
The characters are very well drawn. The all male cast in part 1 is a bit confusing in the beginning, but it works out in the end. The man called Jac and Gordius, a fattie who was worshipped as a sun god by his followers, have the most character.
Diana, the main protagonist of part 2 is completely different. Her part is more light-hearted and she has likeable traits, but also some aspects that make it hard to be completely on her side.
Part 3: Worldbuilding
Roberts shows us a very interesting vision of the future. He doesn't spoonfeed his information to you and many of his made-up words are never explained within the text, so you have to refer to the appendix.
So, as you're putting together the pieces of the murder mysteries, you're also putting together the pieces of the society.
Many people live in artifical bubbles orbiting Earth or the neighboring planets and having difficulties to adjust to gravity, when on Earth.
The society seems to be matriarchal and sexual encounters are often of bisexual nature. Yes, sex is mentioned in the book, but not in a Miley Cirus kind of way.
Part 4: Overall
Part one is most arguably the weakest part of the novel and on its own I would rate it 3/5. Parts 2 and 3 are stronger, but in the last part I wasn't really that fond of one aspect of the ending. So, all in all, this was a very enjoyable 4/5 read for me.
Epilogue:
So, did you catch our four culprits? And to be clear, no star hides in the spoiler. That would be mean. :)
September 6, 2022
Original, space-nerdy murder mystery.
I treated myself to a sci-fi mystery, and it was splendid. The prologue begins with an address from the author, telling readers who the killer is, and challenging them to figure out the how’s and why’s. Roberts intertwined three mysteries in one. All locked-room murders.
Part one is set on an asteriod. Prisoners serve their sentence in a small cave there in sub-standard conditions. The objective is to drive them to renovate the asteriod so that it can be sold as accomodation once their time is served. There were seven prisoners. The prison storyline was there. It was very descriptive in how they sorted out sharing their cramped space, the pecking order, and dabbling in the sexual needs of the prisoners, to the horror of others. It was a grim place. But you know there is a high death toll and you have to try and figure it all out. I did not solve the first mystery (or any for that matter). I admit, I was a touched peeved with the solution, as it bordered on unbelievable, however having said that, the journey more than made up for it.
The second mystery was down on Earth. The uplanders (space people) had a hard time adjusting to gravity. Another murder, another mystery. I am probably slack for saying this, but I was thinking that the amateur detective, Diana, would have made a more satisfying victim than a detective. She was pretty annoying. But the mystery was good and she was the right choice as a detective despite this.
The third part brings it all together and was also cool, but less drawn out.
The whole mystery was more than a who-dunnit. It covered the nerdy space realm as well. It included some unsolved astrophysic phenomenons and actually had me repositioning my views on the existence of intelligent life beyond our universe. It was impressive.
Five stars for the story, theme, build up, and characters (except the detective). One star deducted for some of the solutions as I still had questions like yeh but how. If you are thinking of reading this, but are not sure because of the solutions, give it a go anyway. The story is like nothing I’ve read before, and was addictive.
I treated myself to a sci-fi mystery, and it was splendid. The prologue begins with an address from the author, telling readers who the killer is, and challenging them to figure out the how’s and why’s. Roberts intertwined three mysteries in one. All locked-room murders.
Part one is set on an asteriod. Prisoners serve their sentence in a small cave there in sub-standard conditions. The objective is to drive them to renovate the asteriod so that it can be sold as accomodation once their time is served. There were seven prisoners. The prison storyline was there. It was very descriptive in how they sorted out sharing their cramped space, the pecking order, and dabbling in the sexual needs of the prisoners, to the horror of others. It was a grim place. But you know there is a high death toll and you have to try and figure it all out. I did not solve the first mystery (or any for that matter). I admit, I was a touched peeved with the solution, as it bordered on unbelievable, however having said that, the journey more than made up for it.
The second mystery was down on Earth. The uplanders (space people) had a hard time adjusting to gravity. Another murder, another mystery. I am probably slack for saying this, but I was thinking that the amateur detective, Diana, would have made a more satisfying victim than a detective. She was pretty annoying. But the mystery was good and she was the right choice as a detective despite this.
The third part brings it all together and was also cool, but less drawn out.
The whole mystery was more than a who-dunnit. It covered the nerdy space realm as well. It included some unsolved astrophysic phenomenons and actually had me repositioning my views on the existence of intelligent life beyond our universe. It was impressive.
Five stars for the story, theme, build up, and characters (except the detective). One star deducted for some of the solutions as I still had questions like yeh but how. If you are thinking of reading this, but are not sure because of the solutions, give it a go anyway. The story is like nothing I’ve read before, and was addictive.
April 2, 2018
Space-opera noir combinat cu anchete polițiste, asezonat cu un personaj malefic care face deliciul oricărui cititor serios. Mai multe, pe FanSF: https://fansf.wordpress.com/2015/01/0....
July 31, 2012
Jack Glass is one of those "cannot read anything else until finished books" and despite the occasional gruesomeness inside, I thought it had the same combination of inventiveness and exuberance that made Land of the Headless one of my most favorite sff books. Stone, Splinter and By Light Alone are also comparable in quality (all being among the top tier books I've read)though darker and arguably denser and "less accessible" to casual readers - however much i tend to dislike this expression, sometimes it just seems to be appropriate - and YBT is arguably funnier though also lighter, but Jack Glass hits the "sweet spot" in being inventive, literate, full of sense of wonder and "easily accessible" so it may work as a great introduction to the author's work also.
The first paragraph which opens the book is so funny in so many ways
"This narrative, which I hereby doctorwatson for your benefit, o reader, concerns the greatest mystery of our time. Of course I’m talking about McAuley’s alleged ‘discovery’ of a method of traveling faster than light, and about the murders and betrayals and violence this discovery has occasioned. Because, after all – FTL! We all know it is impossible, we know every one of us that the laws of physics disallow it. But still! And again, this narrative has to do with the greatest mind I have known – the celebrated, or infamous, Jack Glass. The one, the only Jack Glass: detective, teacher, protector and murderer, an individual gifted with extraordinary interpretive powers when it comes to murder because he was so well acquainted with murder. A quantity of blood is spilled in this story, I’m sorry to say; and a good many people die; and there is some politics too. There is danger and fear. Accordingly I have told his tale in the form of a murder mystery; or to be more precise (and at all costs we must be precise) three, connected murder mysteries."
From here the book gets going with its first part, In the Box, where 7 men are dumped on an asteroid where they have to serve an 11 year prison sentence by making it habitable - they are given some tools and a start with a little air in a sealed cavern, but they have to keep digging, find water, grow food, make personal chambers...
In-between the work and reminiscences of the world outside, the pecking order is established and at the bottom there is a legless man Jac who has an obsession with shards of glass and a very fat man, Gordius, former "son/sun god" of a cult. Things happen.
The next two parts called the FTL Murders and the Impossible Gun are the heart of the story and deal with the structure of power and revolution in a Solar System of trillions with world building for the ages and just great characters and style, though the events of In the Box are important for the up-close-and-personal look we get at Jack.
A full review for July 31, but to summarize, the last sentence of the blurb above "It is an extraordinary novel" is an understatement if anything.
I would also note that in addition to the text of the novel per se the book contains an interesting collection of "poems and ballads" that are indirectly related with its action, but add depth to the world building - even here and Adam Roberts found a way to be different than the usual info-dumping (direct or indirect) as he does it through verse....
I will include the FBC review below:
INTRODUCTION: "Jack Glass is the murderer. We know this from the start. Yet as this extraordinary novel tells the story of three murders committed by Glass the reader will be surprised to find out that it was Glass who was the killer and how he did it. And by the end of the book our sympathies for the killer are fully engaged.
Riffing on the tropes of crime fiction (the country house murder, the locked room mystery) and imbued with the feel of golden age SF, JACK GLASS is another bravura performance from Roberts. Whatever games he plays with the genre, whatever questions he asks of the reader, Roberts never loses sight of the need to entertain. JACK GLASS has some wonderfully gruesome moments, is built around three gripping HowDunnits and comes with liberal doses of sly humor.
Roberts invites us to have fun and tricks us into thinking about both crime and SF via a beautifully structured novel set in a society whose depiction challenges notions of crime, punishment, power and freedom. It is an extraordinary novel"
Ever since "Jack Glass" has been announced as above, the book has been a "super high expectations" one due to the combination of an irresistible blurb and its authorship by Adam Roberts who keeps producing the highest quality sf in story after story and novel after novel.
OVERVIEW/ANALYSIS: "Jack Glass" was one of the "cannot put down until finished books" and despite the occasional gruesomeness inside, I thought it had the same combination of inventiveness and exuberance that made Land of the Headless one of my most favorite sff books.
Stone, Splinter and By Light Alone are also comparable in quality with all being among the top tier books I've ever read, though they are darker and arguably denser and "less accessible" to casual readers - however much I tend to dislike this expression, sometimes it just seems to be appropriate - and Yellow Blue Tibia is arguably funnier though also lighter, but Jack Glass hits the "sweet spot" in being inventive, literate, full of sense of wonder and "easily accessible" so I would recommend it as a great introduction to Adam Roberts' whole body of work.
The first paragraph of the book is funny in so many ways:
"This narrative, which I hereby doctorwatson for your benefit, o reader, concerns the greatest mystery of our time. Of course I’m talking about McAuley’s alleged ‘discovery’ of a method of traveling faster than light, and about the murders and betrayals and violence this discovery has occasioned. Because, after all – FTL! We all know it is impossible, we know every one of us that the laws of physics disallow it. But still! And again, this narrative has to do with the greatest mind I have known – the celebrated, or infamous, Jack Glass. The one, the only Jack Glass: detective, teacher, protector and murderer, an individual gifted with extraordinary interpretive powers when it comes to murder because he was so well acquainted with murder. A quantity of blood is spilled in this story, I’m sorry to say; and a good many people die; and there is some politics too. There is danger and fear. Accordingly I have told his tale in the form of a murder mystery; or to be more precise (and at all costs we must be precise) three, connected murder mysteries."
From here Jack Glass gets going with its first part, In the Box, where seven men are dumped on an asteroid where they have to serve an 11 year prison sentence by making it habitable - they are given some tools and a start with a little air in a sealed cavern, but they have to keep digging, find water, grow food, make personal chambers...
In-between the work and reminiscences of the world outside, the pecking order is established and at the bottom there is Jac, a legless man, who has an obsession with shards of glass and Gordius, a very fat man who is a former "son/sun god" of a cult. Things happen.
The next two parts called The FTL Murders and The Impossible Gun are the heart of the story as they deal with the structure of power and revolution in a Solar System of trillions, with world building for the ages and great characters and style, though the events of In the Box are important for the up-close-and-personal look we get of Jack.
The author continues to pursue the themes from By Light Alone though in a more expansive setting; the Solar System is colonized to the hilt by orbiting asteroids where the teeming masses live in squalor, but where also the movers and shakers of the day live in unimaginable luxury, pampered by servants chemically doped for blind obedience. It is a harsh world for the poor and a fabulous one for the rich, though in the pyramidal structure under the Ulanov (!) clan, nobody is really safe.
Second in power are five genetically engineered clans - MOH, term explained in the glossary at the end of the book - of which the Argents are the information "ministry", led by the two "MOHmommies" of our main heroine Diana, who close to her majority at 16 is sent to a clan estate in the gravity well of Earth together with her older sister Eva.
Bred for super-smartness and the future leadership of the clan, Diane is an expert in "practical" thinking, well at least as that is possible in her simulation upbringing where she is the ultimate master at virtual crime solving, while Eva is already on her seventh science PhD at about 21. And of course a locked room murder just happens on their estate.
Here is another paragraph that is funny but also tells us a lot about the book, Adam Roberts' take on things and more; this is super funny if you are aware of the author's reviews of certain hard sf novels...
"Put silly romance to one side, and take those three questions in order. First: who committed the crime? Narrowing the group of suspects down to only nineteen people already placed the solution in the 99.9+++th-increment. Even if you limited yourself to the population of the island (though, since the whole Argent group had only just landed, and had not yet interacted with any island natives, the murderer was massively unlikely to be found outside the group – but for the sake of argument) we were talking about 19 out of 102,530, which was the 99.998+th percentile. Eva had never reached such levels of near-certainty in any of her PhDs! It was ridiculous to ask for more. Trillions of people in the solar system, and Diana wanted to waste her time sifting through a group of nineteen? Let her. If Eva had been in charge, she would have treated all nineteen as guilty – and then either execute them all, or perhaps treat the group conviction as a technical mitigation and sentence them all to long prison terms."
However larger happenings are afoot as there is a persistent rumor about FTL being invented despite its provable impossibility and that is the wild card which could shatter the stability of the System; of course Jack Glass - who is regarded by many as a nonexistent mythical hero or villain - and other Ulanov opponents have been working for the revolution for decades, but FTL can change everything overnight despite that it is impossible. And as the information clan, the Argents are in the bull's eye...
So grand themes - the fate of humanity in both the "internal", what is a good society, what is the cost of overthrowing oppression, etc, and external, in the "are the stars for us or are we stuck here in our corner forever?", a hinted resolution of the Fermi paradox, etc - larger than life characters, even an impossible love story, lots of action, mystery and indeed a strong dose of Golden Age sf done with modern sensibilities and superb style and Jack Glass succeeds on all fronts. Maybe for the ending I would have wished a few more pages but I really did not want the book to end anyway...
I would also note that in addition to the text of the novel per se and the aforementioned Glossary, Jack Glass contains an interesting collection of "poems and ballads" that are indirectly related to its action, but add quite a lot of depth to the world building - so even here and Adam Roberts found a way to be different from the usual info-dumping in sff novels as he does it through verse! A short quote too:
"The Interplanetary Rebel’s Hymn
You who govern Venus, where the disk is smooth and grey:
The Ulanovs rule your System—but you’re greater, far, than they!
Now as the laws are questioned and the police sloops blast and glide,
Mithras, lord of the planets, give strength to those who died."
.....
To summarize, the last sentence of Jack Glass' blurb above "It is an extraordinary novel" is quite the understatement. A top 10 novel of 2012 for me.
The first paragraph which opens the book is so funny in so many ways
"This narrative, which I hereby doctorwatson for your benefit, o reader, concerns the greatest mystery of our time. Of course I’m talking about McAuley’s alleged ‘discovery’ of a method of traveling faster than light, and about the murders and betrayals and violence this discovery has occasioned. Because, after all – FTL! We all know it is impossible, we know every one of us that the laws of physics disallow it. But still! And again, this narrative has to do with the greatest mind I have known – the celebrated, or infamous, Jack Glass. The one, the only Jack Glass: detective, teacher, protector and murderer, an individual gifted with extraordinary interpretive powers when it comes to murder because he was so well acquainted with murder. A quantity of blood is spilled in this story, I’m sorry to say; and a good many people die; and there is some politics too. There is danger and fear. Accordingly I have told his tale in the form of a murder mystery; or to be more precise (and at all costs we must be precise) three, connected murder mysteries."
From here the book gets going with its first part, In the Box, where 7 men are dumped on an asteroid where they have to serve an 11 year prison sentence by making it habitable - they are given some tools and a start with a little air in a sealed cavern, but they have to keep digging, find water, grow food, make personal chambers...
In-between the work and reminiscences of the world outside, the pecking order is established and at the bottom there is a legless man Jac who has an obsession with shards of glass and a very fat man, Gordius, former "son/sun god" of a cult. Things happen.
The next two parts called the FTL Murders and the Impossible Gun are the heart of the story and deal with the structure of power and revolution in a Solar System of trillions with world building for the ages and just great characters and style, though the events of In the Box are important for the up-close-and-personal look we get at Jack.
A full review for July 31, but to summarize, the last sentence of the blurb above "It is an extraordinary novel" is an understatement if anything.
I would also note that in addition to the text of the novel per se the book contains an interesting collection of "poems and ballads" that are indirectly related with its action, but add depth to the world building - even here and Adam Roberts found a way to be different than the usual info-dumping (direct or indirect) as he does it through verse....
I will include the FBC review below:
INTRODUCTION: "Jack Glass is the murderer. We know this from the start. Yet as this extraordinary novel tells the story of three murders committed by Glass the reader will be surprised to find out that it was Glass who was the killer and how he did it. And by the end of the book our sympathies for the killer are fully engaged.
Riffing on the tropes of crime fiction (the country house murder, the locked room mystery) and imbued with the feel of golden age SF, JACK GLASS is another bravura performance from Roberts. Whatever games he plays with the genre, whatever questions he asks of the reader, Roberts never loses sight of the need to entertain. JACK GLASS has some wonderfully gruesome moments, is built around three gripping HowDunnits and comes with liberal doses of sly humor.
Roberts invites us to have fun and tricks us into thinking about both crime and SF via a beautifully structured novel set in a society whose depiction challenges notions of crime, punishment, power and freedom. It is an extraordinary novel"
Ever since "Jack Glass" has been announced as above, the book has been a "super high expectations" one due to the combination of an irresistible blurb and its authorship by Adam Roberts who keeps producing the highest quality sf in story after story and novel after novel.
OVERVIEW/ANALYSIS: "Jack Glass" was one of the "cannot put down until finished books" and despite the occasional gruesomeness inside, I thought it had the same combination of inventiveness and exuberance that made Land of the Headless one of my most favorite sff books.
Stone, Splinter and By Light Alone are also comparable in quality with all being among the top tier books I've ever read, though they are darker and arguably denser and "less accessible" to casual readers - however much I tend to dislike this expression, sometimes it just seems to be appropriate - and Yellow Blue Tibia is arguably funnier though also lighter, but Jack Glass hits the "sweet spot" in being inventive, literate, full of sense of wonder and "easily accessible" so I would recommend it as a great introduction to Adam Roberts' whole body of work.
The first paragraph of the book is funny in so many ways:
"This narrative, which I hereby doctorwatson for your benefit, o reader, concerns the greatest mystery of our time. Of course I’m talking about McAuley’s alleged ‘discovery’ of a method of traveling faster than light, and about the murders and betrayals and violence this discovery has occasioned. Because, after all – FTL! We all know it is impossible, we know every one of us that the laws of physics disallow it. But still! And again, this narrative has to do with the greatest mind I have known – the celebrated, or infamous, Jack Glass. The one, the only Jack Glass: detective, teacher, protector and murderer, an individual gifted with extraordinary interpretive powers when it comes to murder because he was so well acquainted with murder. A quantity of blood is spilled in this story, I’m sorry to say; and a good many people die; and there is some politics too. There is danger and fear. Accordingly I have told his tale in the form of a murder mystery; or to be more precise (and at all costs we must be precise) three, connected murder mysteries."
From here Jack Glass gets going with its first part, In the Box, where seven men are dumped on an asteroid where they have to serve an 11 year prison sentence by making it habitable - they are given some tools and a start with a little air in a sealed cavern, but they have to keep digging, find water, grow food, make personal chambers...
In-between the work and reminiscences of the world outside, the pecking order is established and at the bottom there is Jac, a legless man, who has an obsession with shards of glass and Gordius, a very fat man who is a former "son/sun god" of a cult. Things happen.
The next two parts called The FTL Murders and The Impossible Gun are the heart of the story as they deal with the structure of power and revolution in a Solar System of trillions, with world building for the ages and great characters and style, though the events of In the Box are important for the up-close-and-personal look we get of Jack.
The author continues to pursue the themes from By Light Alone though in a more expansive setting; the Solar System is colonized to the hilt by orbiting asteroids where the teeming masses live in squalor, but where also the movers and shakers of the day live in unimaginable luxury, pampered by servants chemically doped for blind obedience. It is a harsh world for the poor and a fabulous one for the rich, though in the pyramidal structure under the Ulanov (!) clan, nobody is really safe.
Second in power are five genetically engineered clans - MOH, term explained in the glossary at the end of the book - of which the Argents are the information "ministry", led by the two "MOHmommies" of our main heroine Diana, who close to her majority at 16 is sent to a clan estate in the gravity well of Earth together with her older sister Eva.
Bred for super-smartness and the future leadership of the clan, Diane is an expert in "practical" thinking, well at least as that is possible in her simulation upbringing where she is the ultimate master at virtual crime solving, while Eva is already on her seventh science PhD at about 21. And of course a locked room murder just happens on their estate.
Here is another paragraph that is funny but also tells us a lot about the book, Adam Roberts' take on things and more; this is super funny if you are aware of the author's reviews of certain hard sf novels...
"Put silly romance to one side, and take those three questions in order. First: who committed the crime? Narrowing the group of suspects down to only nineteen people already placed the solution in the 99.9+++th-increment. Even if you limited yourself to the population of the island (though, since the whole Argent group had only just landed, and had not yet interacted with any island natives, the murderer was massively unlikely to be found outside the group – but for the sake of argument) we were talking about 19 out of 102,530, which was the 99.998+th percentile. Eva had never reached such levels of near-certainty in any of her PhDs! It was ridiculous to ask for more. Trillions of people in the solar system, and Diana wanted to waste her time sifting through a group of nineteen? Let her. If Eva had been in charge, she would have treated all nineteen as guilty – and then either execute them all, or perhaps treat the group conviction as a technical mitigation and sentence them all to long prison terms."
However larger happenings are afoot as there is a persistent rumor about FTL being invented despite its provable impossibility and that is the wild card which could shatter the stability of the System; of course Jack Glass - who is regarded by many as a nonexistent mythical hero or villain - and other Ulanov opponents have been working for the revolution for decades, but FTL can change everything overnight despite that it is impossible. And as the information clan, the Argents are in the bull's eye...
So grand themes - the fate of humanity in both the "internal", what is a good society, what is the cost of overthrowing oppression, etc, and external, in the "are the stars for us or are we stuck here in our corner forever?", a hinted resolution of the Fermi paradox, etc - larger than life characters, even an impossible love story, lots of action, mystery and indeed a strong dose of Golden Age sf done with modern sensibilities and superb style and Jack Glass succeeds on all fronts. Maybe for the ending I would have wished a few more pages but I really did not want the book to end anyway...
I would also note that in addition to the text of the novel per se and the aforementioned Glossary, Jack Glass contains an interesting collection of "poems and ballads" that are indirectly related to its action, but add quite a lot of depth to the world building - so even here and Adam Roberts found a way to be different from the usual info-dumping in sff novels as he does it through verse! A short quote too:
"The Interplanetary Rebel’s Hymn
You who govern Venus, where the disk is smooth and grey:
The Ulanovs rule your System—but you’re greater, far, than they!
Now as the laws are questioned and the police sloops blast and glide,
Mithras, lord of the planets, give strength to those who died."
.....
To summarize, the last sentence of Jack Glass' blurb above "It is an extraordinary novel" is quite the understatement. A top 10 novel of 2012 for me.
November 26, 2021
Interesanta hard sci-fi stilizācija Agatas Kristi noskaņās.
July 18, 2014
Holy wow, I loved this book!
The book is in three sections, and the first just sucked me in. I was obsessed with the world Roberts created within nine pages. Roberts's writing is marvelous; tender yet precise, dancing in rhythms then breaking out of step, like a flaneur's pause. The world he created is compelling and vast and utterly believable.
The second and third sections had a different focalizing character, and so I couldn't relate to them as easily. And then there is a plot development in section three, which other reviewers have commented on, which seemed . . . unlikely. And unnecessary. And lowered my opinion of the eponymous hero. But I don't care. The writing and the worldbuilding alone scores this five stars from me. And that moment, that goddamn moment on page 94 when I realized the MC had been planning this the whole time.
The book is in three sections, and the first just sucked me in. I was obsessed with the world Roberts created within nine pages. Roberts's writing is marvelous; tender yet precise, dancing in rhythms then breaking out of step, like a flaneur's pause. The world he created is compelling and vast and utterly believable.
The second and third sections had a different focalizing character, and so I couldn't relate to them as easily. And then there is a plot development in section three, which other reviewers have commented on, which seemed . . . unlikely. And unnecessary. And lowered my opinion of the eponymous hero. But I don't care. The writing and the worldbuilding alone scores this five stars from me. And that moment, that goddamn moment on page 94 when I realized the MC had been planning this the whole time.
April 30, 2013
This is the third Roberts novel I've read, after Swiftly and By Light Alone. It shares a number of qualities with those two books: division into several interlinked but tonally dissimilar sections, cold and not conventionally likable characters who nonetheless grow on the reader, flashy science fiction concepts that don't dominate the story the way one might expect them to, incessant reminders of extreme economic inequality, strange pacing with lurches and changes of focus, etc. I would rank it above Swiftly but below By Light Alone, for the simple reason that it lacks By Light Alone's artistry of characterization, prose and satire.
After finishing BLA, I felt like I had just read the perfect science fiction novel to recommend to people who were wary of the genre -- a novel that did all the ordinary things right and did them in a skillfully utilized science fictional context. Jack Glass is not in the same category. It eschews many of the "ordinary things" we expect of non-genre novels and replaces them with plot -- lots and lots of intricate, clever plot.
Jack Glass is made up of three linked murder mysteries, each of which simultaneously qualifies as each of three distinct classic types of murder mystery ("prison story," "locked-room mystery," and "whodunit"), and the overarching plot deftly wends its way through all of this genre structure. Oh, and in every case we already know who the murderer is, and yet Roberts sets thing up so that we're surprised when we learn how he did it, and why. And the afore-known murderer -- the titular Jack Glass -- is also one of the main characters of the overarching plot. It's all very clever and put together with evident delight, and it's fun to watch the whole machine work. And since this is Roberts the writing is good -- or it's better, anyway, than you'd tend to expect from such a plot-heavy book. But that's as far as it goes: better than you'd expect. Not just-plain-good in the way BLA was just-plain-good.
Not Roberts' best, but a lot of fun.
After finishing BLA, I felt like I had just read the perfect science fiction novel to recommend to people who were wary of the genre -- a novel that did all the ordinary things right and did them in a skillfully utilized science fictional context. Jack Glass is not in the same category. It eschews many of the "ordinary things" we expect of non-genre novels and replaces them with plot -- lots and lots of intricate, clever plot.
Jack Glass is made up of three linked murder mysteries, each of which simultaneously qualifies as each of three distinct classic types of murder mystery ("prison story," "locked-room mystery," and "whodunit"), and the overarching plot deftly wends its way through all of this genre structure. Oh, and in every case we already know who the murderer is, and yet Roberts sets thing up so that we're surprised when we learn how he did it, and why. And the afore-known murderer -- the titular Jack Glass -- is also one of the main characters of the overarching plot. It's all very clever and put together with evident delight, and it's fun to watch the whole machine work. And since this is Roberts the writing is good -- or it's better, anyway, than you'd tend to expect from such a plot-heavy book. But that's as far as it goes: better than you'd expect. Not just-plain-good in the way BLA was just-plain-good.
Not Roberts' best, but a lot of fun.
August 23, 2013
Jack Glass is an impossible book.
+++
I’ve had this on my radar ever since it came out but it wasn’t until it won the British Science Fiction Award for Best Novel this year that I decided to read it.
Jack Glass is ostensibly a blend of Golden Age Science Fiction and Golden Age Crime – to which point this is a homage or subversion is up for discussion. I feel it’s both.
+++
The opening like is one of the best opening lines I have ever read:
This narrative, which I hereby doctorwatson for your benefit, o reader, concerns the greatest mystery of our time.
+++
It’s a Science Fiction novel. Set in the far future – humanity has travelled extensively in the Solar System and spread out as far as it can go. There are trillions of us now, a minority of the super wealthy who run things and a vast majority of super poor – it’s not even simply polloi anymore, it’s sumpolloi – who inhabit shanty bubbles across the System with noting but the bare minimum for subsistence. Those who are really lucky end up working for the Clans and Corporations who run everything.
It’s a Crime novel. The story is divided in three interlinked parts: a prison story, a whodunit and a locked-room mystery.
Jack Glass is the murderer: we know this from the get go. There is a short – FANTASTIC – introduction that estate very clearly that whatever the crime is, he’s done it. So this is clearly a HOWdunit and a WHYdunit.
In the meantime: FTL! Faster Than Light travel – an impossibility according to the Law of Physics. Something that is both the epitome of Hope (imagine being able to travel even further afield, away from this horrendous reality and start anew!) and the possible end of all mankind (because new technology = undisputed potential for violence, exploitation and escalation).
+++
The prison story opens the novel:
7 violent criminals are about to start their 11 year prison sentence on a far away asteroid. Their survival depends on them working together to make the asteroid habitable which is both about their survival and the point of their sentence: they are given the necessary tools to extend the one room they dumped in (an advanced substance locks them in and allows them some air), create new chambers, grow food after they dig and find ice. At the end of these 11 years, they go free, the corporation that dropped them there resells the now inhabitable asteroid, everybody wins.
If they can make those 11 years, that is. Because humans being humans, as soon as they are left there, a power hierarchy is established between the 7 individuals. 5 Alphas run things – the 2 at the bottom must take it. One of them is a fat whinny man who used to be a God but now is the butt of everybody’s jokes. The other is a legless man (in a universe where most inhabitable places are gravity-free, why would anyone even need legs?) called Jac who has an obsession with the glass pieces he finds embedded in the asteroid.
These two become the group’s the punching bag and also their sex playthings (they are regularly raped).
Needless to say: the prison story is also a locked-room mystery and to some extent a whodunit. We know something really bad is going to happen and we know that Jack Glass will do it because we have been told so. It is a case of sitting down and abiding time to see how exactly things will play out. This first part is perfectly horrible and suffocating in its unstopping violence. The violence and tension in this part could have been a huge deterrent for me to carry on reading hadn’t it been for the fact that the writing! Was so good! The obvious claustrophobic environment expertly replicated in the writing itself.
It’s impossible to escape this asteroid, we are told several times. But Jac needs to get away before the people who put him there realise who he really is.
In the end Jack does what Jack does best (the greatest criminal of all time, the biggest murderer the world has ever seen) and manages the impossible.
+++
Then we move to the second part: The FTL Murders! This is a typical whodunit set in a “manor house” on Earth where the extremely wealthy and privileged sisters Diana and Eva are sent by their parents to celebrate Dia’s sixteenth birthday. They are the future of Clan Argent, genetically engineered to be master problem-solvers. Eva’s mastery of Science and Physics is equal to Dia’s mastery of virtual murder-solving. Both approach their subject in different ways – Eva is removed from any humanity whereas Diana’s approach is more sympathetic and humanised. Not that she has had any chance to actually be sympathetic so far as her privilege is so deeply ingrained.
The sisters are surrounded by their bodyguards, their servants and their tutor Iago all of whom receive hormone injections that hinder their sense of individuality and amplify their love for their employers. They would never EVER be able to hurt or be disloyal to Dia and Eva.
Which is why when one the servants is mauled to death (in a locked-room no less) no suspicion is raised about the safety of the two sisters. Instead, this becomes the perfect opportunity for Dia to apply her knowledge to a Real Murder.
It is painfully obvious to surmise who Jack Glass is in this scenario. But then again the WHO has never been the point. Things are not as simple as they look and the WHYdunit of this case is quite possibly the most important thing about Jack Glass.
Whodunit, Locked-Room, Prison Escape (yes, this too). The second part is all three at once as well.
+++
It’s better not to say anything about Part III – a locked-room mystery that is most definitely a whodunit (even though we know it was Jack Glass!) and a prison escape – because it completely spoils everything else. But here is where things reach their climax, overall character arcs are revealed and motivations shift one more time.
+++
How many times within the story we are told that things are impossible? And how many times have they been proved not to be? This is where homage meets subversion, I believe.
+++
It would be so easy to take this book at face value and to simply say: Jack Glass is a lot of fun. The author is clearly knowledgeable about the genres he is writing. The elements of Science Fiction are just super cool even if they require a LOT of suspension of disbelief (the impossibility of certain things, the outlandish conclusion to part one).
That said, to take this book at face value is doing it a huge disservice, I think. But this is also where things become not only less fun but also potentially problematic once you really think things through.
+++
The point is: the fundamental premise of the story and the very foundation of this cosmos are based on ideas that are so depressingly uninventive, old and downright boring to me: that humans are fundamentally bad and that things will always be shit apart from a few pointed individuals who will try to bring the Revolution to the rest of the humanity. Jack Glass and to some extent the narrative would like you to believe he is one of those (HE is not, of course. Dia is).
Basically, the universe is a prison of our own making and we are all trying to escape: the biggest locked-room/prison escape of ALL TIME .
+++
In part one, we are constantly faced with the worst of humanity. We ourselves are locked in the story with a bunch of characters that are so violently and abhorrent bad they are almost caricatures. If there is one thing this book is almost TERRIBLE at is in writing some of its characters – most of them are only skin-deep.
Each part uses their “mystery” as fodder to explore the make-up of this future. We come to clearly understand its economic, social and political systems which place no value on human life because there’s so many of us. At the same time, Jack Glass continuously brings up the idea that there is an elemental importance and uniqueness of each human life – interestingly though he makes that point by exactly reinforcing the idea of valueless he is trying to dismantle. But that’s ok: I don’t really think we are to sympathise with Jack Glass at all. I know I didn’t because the degree of his sociopathy is incredible as is his extremely narcissist personality (seriously, it is all about him)(which might well be The Point).
+++
I have to say this: some things make no sense to me.
For example:
The prison sentence on the asteroids is presented as an “elegant business model”. Really? In a universe where people obviously need new places to live urgently, it is a good business model to wait ELEVEN YEARS for each new habitable asteroid? Given the evident advanced technology, I am pretty sure it would be more logical to use that than prisoners to excavate asteroids little by little.
The question of what to do with the prisoners then would only be a question to follow the very premise ( people= valueless) to its logical conclusion. That this is not done sounds like a contradiction to me.
Similarly, certain ideas are info-dumped and hammered through and things are explained point-blank to Dia, a character who is supposed to be the cleverest person ever. Granted that this could be an attempt to question genetically engineered cleverness. But to be honest, I don’t think this makes sense given the portrayal of said character – it became clear that things were regurgitated for the reader’s benefit.
Why are people so far out in the future still doing the same shitty things , still being shitty to each other and also still talking about Shakespeare and quoting Sherlock Holmes? Are we not going to progress any more than that?
The tone of each different part changes and it is amazing how they suit the point-view narrator. I loved Dia’s point of view. BUT does this even make sense from a writing perspective given it is ONE character who is narrating it to us? Shouldn’t all parts sound the same?
+++
Diana Argent made this book. She is an awesome character and to me, the book is all about her. She is geeky and lover her own importance as an individualistic, privileged member of an important Clan to start with. But as her arc progresses this viewpoint changes into growth and understanding of her importance as an individual who is also a part of a larger universe, literally.
My own interpretation is thus:
Jack Glass is not the main character of this story although he is the main character of this novel (only because the person doctorwatsonning it is clearly biased).
This is the biggest gotcha of Jack Glass.
I am inclined to doctorwatson this novel myself and deface the cover by replacing JACK GLASS with DIANA ARGENT.
+++
I really just wish that Jack Glass and Diana Argent were not so SPECIAL in a universe composed of trillions of people.
+++
Although I had severe misgivings about the rest of the novel, the ending made it all better. It is as perfect as an ending can be because it perfectly suits the different strands of the novel and is extremely cynical as well as hopeful (which is kind of weird, I admit) .
+++
Like I said in the beginning: Jack Glass is an impossible book. It is super fun and inventive but has a supremely boring foundation because it is so pessimistic. But the ending is so hopeful!
It is both a huge triumph and a big failure! At the same time!
In other words: I liked it but I also didn’t. I highly recommend it: let’s talk about it.
+++
I’ve had this on my radar ever since it came out but it wasn’t until it won the British Science Fiction Award for Best Novel this year that I decided to read it.
Jack Glass is ostensibly a blend of Golden Age Science Fiction and Golden Age Crime – to which point this is a homage or subversion is up for discussion. I feel it’s both.
+++
The opening like is one of the best opening lines I have ever read:
This narrative, which I hereby doctorwatson for your benefit, o reader, concerns the greatest mystery of our time.
+++
It’s a Science Fiction novel. Set in the far future – humanity has travelled extensively in the Solar System and spread out as far as it can go. There are trillions of us now, a minority of the super wealthy who run things and a vast majority of super poor – it’s not even simply polloi anymore, it’s sumpolloi – who inhabit shanty bubbles across the System with noting but the bare minimum for subsistence. Those who are really lucky end up working for the Clans and Corporations who run everything.
It’s a Crime novel. The story is divided in three interlinked parts: a prison story, a whodunit and a locked-room mystery.
Jack Glass is the murderer: we know this from the get go. There is a short – FANTASTIC – introduction that estate very clearly that whatever the crime is, he’s done it. So this is clearly a HOWdunit and a WHYdunit.
In the meantime: FTL! Faster Than Light travel – an impossibility according to the Law of Physics. Something that is both the epitome of Hope (imagine being able to travel even further afield, away from this horrendous reality and start anew!) and the possible end of all mankind (because new technology = undisputed potential for violence, exploitation and escalation).
+++
The prison story opens the novel:
7 violent criminals are about to start their 11 year prison sentence on a far away asteroid. Their survival depends on them working together to make the asteroid habitable which is both about their survival and the point of their sentence: they are given the necessary tools to extend the one room they dumped in (an advanced substance locks them in and allows them some air), create new chambers, grow food after they dig and find ice. At the end of these 11 years, they go free, the corporation that dropped them there resells the now inhabitable asteroid, everybody wins.
If they can make those 11 years, that is. Because humans being humans, as soon as they are left there, a power hierarchy is established between the 7 individuals. 5 Alphas run things – the 2 at the bottom must take it. One of them is a fat whinny man who used to be a God but now is the butt of everybody’s jokes. The other is a legless man (in a universe where most inhabitable places are gravity-free, why would anyone even need legs?) called Jac who has an obsession with the glass pieces he finds embedded in the asteroid.
These two become the group’s the punching bag and also their sex playthings (they are regularly raped).
Needless to say: the prison story is also a locked-room mystery and to some extent a whodunit. We know something really bad is going to happen and we know that Jack Glass will do it because we have been told so. It is a case of sitting down and abiding time to see how exactly things will play out. This first part is perfectly horrible and suffocating in its unstopping violence. The violence and tension in this part could have been a huge deterrent for me to carry on reading hadn’t it been for the fact that the writing! Was so good! The obvious claustrophobic environment expertly replicated in the writing itself.
It’s impossible to escape this asteroid, we are told several times. But Jac needs to get away before the people who put him there realise who he really is.
In the end Jack does what Jack does best (the greatest criminal of all time, the biggest murderer the world has ever seen) and manages the impossible.
+++
Then we move to the second part: The FTL Murders! This is a typical whodunit set in a “manor house” on Earth where the extremely wealthy and privileged sisters Diana and Eva are sent by their parents to celebrate Dia’s sixteenth birthday. They are the future of Clan Argent, genetically engineered to be master problem-solvers. Eva’s mastery of Science and Physics is equal to Dia’s mastery of virtual murder-solving. Both approach their subject in different ways – Eva is removed from any humanity whereas Diana’s approach is more sympathetic and humanised. Not that she has had any chance to actually be sympathetic so far as her privilege is so deeply ingrained.
The sisters are surrounded by their bodyguards, their servants and their tutor Iago all of whom receive hormone injections that hinder their sense of individuality and amplify their love for their employers. They would never EVER be able to hurt or be disloyal to Dia and Eva.
Which is why when one the servants is mauled to death (in a locked-room no less) no suspicion is raised about the safety of the two sisters. Instead, this becomes the perfect opportunity for Dia to apply her knowledge to a Real Murder.
It is painfully obvious to surmise who Jack Glass is in this scenario. But then again the WHO has never been the point. Things are not as simple as they look and the WHYdunit of this case is quite possibly the most important thing about Jack Glass.
Whodunit, Locked-Room, Prison Escape (yes, this too). The second part is all three at once as well.
+++
It’s better not to say anything about Part III – a locked-room mystery that is most definitely a whodunit (even though we know it was Jack Glass!) and a prison escape – because it completely spoils everything else. But here is where things reach their climax, overall character arcs are revealed and motivations shift one more time.
+++
How many times within the story we are told that things are impossible? And how many times have they been proved not to be? This is where homage meets subversion, I believe.
+++
It would be so easy to take this book at face value and to simply say: Jack Glass is a lot of fun. The author is clearly knowledgeable about the genres he is writing. The elements of Science Fiction are just super cool even if they require a LOT of suspension of disbelief (the impossibility of certain things, the outlandish conclusion to part one).
That said, to take this book at face value is doing it a huge disservice, I think. But this is also where things become not only less fun but also potentially problematic once you really think things through.
+++
The point is: the fundamental premise of the story and the very foundation of this cosmos are based on ideas that are so depressingly uninventive, old and downright boring to me: that humans are fundamentally bad and that things will always be shit apart from a few pointed individuals who will try to bring the Revolution to the rest of the humanity. Jack Glass and to some extent the narrative would like you to believe he is one of those (HE is not, of course. Dia is).
Basically, the universe is a prison of our own making and we are all trying to escape: the biggest locked-room/prison escape of ALL TIME .
+++
In part one, we are constantly faced with the worst of humanity. We ourselves are locked in the story with a bunch of characters that are so violently and abhorrent bad they are almost caricatures. If there is one thing this book is almost TERRIBLE at is in writing some of its characters – most of them are only skin-deep.
Each part uses their “mystery” as fodder to explore the make-up of this future. We come to clearly understand its economic, social and political systems which place no value on human life because there’s so many of us. At the same time, Jack Glass continuously brings up the idea that there is an elemental importance and uniqueness of each human life – interestingly though he makes that point by exactly reinforcing the idea of valueless he is trying to dismantle. But that’s ok: I don’t really think we are to sympathise with Jack Glass at all. I know I didn’t because the degree of his sociopathy is incredible as is his extremely narcissist personality (seriously, it is all about him)(which might well be The Point).
+++
I have to say this: some things make no sense to me.
For example:
The prison sentence on the asteroids is presented as an “elegant business model”. Really? In a universe where people obviously need new places to live urgently, it is a good business model to wait ELEVEN YEARS for each new habitable asteroid? Given the evident advanced technology, I am pretty sure it would be more logical to use that than prisoners to excavate asteroids little by little.
The question of what to do with the prisoners then would only be a question to follow the very premise ( people= valueless) to its logical conclusion. That this is not done sounds like a contradiction to me.
Similarly, certain ideas are info-dumped and hammered through and things are explained point-blank to Dia, a character who is supposed to be the cleverest person ever. Granted that this could be an attempt to question genetically engineered cleverness. But to be honest, I don’t think this makes sense given the portrayal of said character – it became clear that things were regurgitated for the reader’s benefit.
Why are people so far out in the future still doing the same shitty things , still being shitty to each other and also still talking about Shakespeare and quoting Sherlock Holmes? Are we not going to progress any more than that?
The tone of each different part changes and it is amazing how they suit the point-view narrator. I loved Dia’s point of view. BUT does this even make sense from a writing perspective given it is ONE character who is narrating it to us? Shouldn’t all parts sound the same?
+++
Diana Argent made this book. She is an awesome character and to me, the book is all about her. She is geeky and lover her own importance as an individualistic, privileged member of an important Clan to start with. But as her arc progresses this viewpoint changes into growth and understanding of her importance as an individual who is also a part of a larger universe, literally.
My own interpretation is thus:
Jack Glass is not the main character of this story although he is the main character of this novel (only because the person doctorwatsonning it is clearly biased).
This is the biggest gotcha of Jack Glass.
I am inclined to doctorwatson this novel myself and deface the cover by replacing JACK GLASS with DIANA ARGENT.
+++
I really just wish that Jack Glass and Diana Argent were not so SPECIAL in a universe composed of trillions of people.
+++
Although I had severe misgivings about the rest of the novel, the ending made it all better. It is as perfect as an ending can be because it perfectly suits the different strands of the novel and is extremely cynical as well as hopeful (which is kind of weird, I admit) .
+++
Like I said in the beginning: Jack Glass is an impossible book. It is super fun and inventive but has a supremely boring foundation because it is so pessimistic. But the ending is so hopeful!
It is both a huge triumph and a big failure! At the same time!
In other words: I liked it but I also didn’t. I highly recommend it: let’s talk about it.
Read
December 7, 2017Didn't like this much, I think because I didn't connect to/engage with any of the characters. It felt very like the Golden Age mysteries Roberts is riffing off, in that it was three cleverly constructed puzzles and the people were basically puzzle pieces moved to fit. Basically rather cold and hard with pages of dialogue about equations and physics and some really deathly dream sequences (I don't want to hear lengthy accounts of people's dreams in real life; still less do I need five pages at a time off a fictional character), and the opening story has a really grim theme of prison rape which put me off the entire exercise. So yeah, not for me.
September 1, 2012
Another great novel by Adam Roberts, Jack Glass is a very exciting-to-read blend between "Golden Age science fiction and Golden Age detective fiction". Roberts doesn't try to make these genres something they are not, but he shows us what extraordinary things were done with this kind of fiction in the past, that Golden Age SF can still kick a punch or two and reminds us why we fell in love with SF.
March 22, 2021
Pirmā trešdaļa par cietumu bija lieliska, lai gan bija grūti iesākt lasīt, nebija no tām grāmatām, kuras aizrauj no pirmajām lappusēm. Pēc tam sākās young adult daļa, tur gāja smagi, izņemot tās vietas, kur bija diezgan dinamiska darbība. Nu, un siekalainās beigas... Ciets 3.5, jo nebija galīga viduvējība, bet nekas diži atšķirīgs un izcils arī nav.
April 20, 2016
What a splendid thing this book is. Inside and outside. Full disclosure: I bought this book ONLY because I loved its cover. I didn't read anything about the content or the author, I carefully avoided reading the cover blurb, and jumped into it in complete ignorance.
I have a very visual imagination and I've loved many book covers before, but I've never bought a book just because of its cover, this was the very first time for me. A complete gamble. And I'm glad it paid off so well.
So, just for a second, take a look at this cover. Not only its intricately crafted stained glass drawing is very beautiful in itself, it also:
1). succeeds in evoking a certain complexity in the plot / content, therefore attracting readers who like some intriguing thinking;
2). it works wonders on a tablet or mobile screen: the back-lit surface of your device's screen will give this cover an even more credible "transparent glass" effect. This cover, in summary, is just a marvel to look at. It deservedly won the BSFA award for "best SF book cover".
Jack Glass is Science Fiction. In its author’s own words, the novel is a collision of "the conventions of ‘Golden Age’ Science Fiction and ‘Golden Age’ detective fiction, with the emphasis more on the latter."
The book is divided in three stories, all connected and all taking place in the same world.
From the start, we know from the narrator that the murderer in each story is Jack Glass, but that's all we know. The mistery is to discover who Jack is, and why and how he committed these murders.
The first story blew my mind. It was actually reminiscing of some Golden Age SF. Big Ideas SF. It's dark, intense, full of ideas and horrific, heavy moments.
With the second story the writing's tone shifts completely (maybe a bit too much?), introducing new important characters and, finally, providing an overview of the universe where these stories are taking place. Here is where Adam Roberts is much heavier on the detective fiction. Yes we are still in a distant future, but it really feels like reading an Agatha Christie or Arthur C. Doyle story. And that is a good, fun, exciting thing! You can certainly feel the playfulness and the joy that Roberts was feeling while writing this book.
One could say that the main difference with a Sherlock Holmes story is that this is the future, and therefore it will be much easier for the author to come up with a clever resolution and make it seem oh-so-obvious, because he knows things about this world that the reader does not know. But I would counter that argument by noting how many of the Christie or Doyle stories, although based firmly in the present reality of their author, used very similar deus-ex-machina devices to resolve everything at the end, and to make the reader feel like he had the obvious solution in front his eyes the whole time.
The third story sums everything up and brings us to a slightly deeper appreciation of Jack Glass as a complex character, and of his background.
Look, this is just a load of intelligent fun. It's very well written. Does it lose a little bit of momentum at some points? Maybe it does. Is it a bit too cold in its intricated plotting matrix? Again, maybe, but deep and involving character development is not the point of this book at all.
It's not a "perfect" book, but it deserves 4 stars and a half from me for the fun that I had reading it.
SF author Paolo Bacigalupi wrote a raving review of this book wondering why Adam Roberts has not won any of the big SF awards yet (he did the BASF award for Jack Glass though). And Bacigalupi finds his own answer in the fact that Roberts is a unique, very unconventional writer, who focuses on the Big Idea for each one of his books, and then moves on to something completely different, while it's much easier - and profitable - in these days to strike gold with a more or less original concept, and then cash in on the series, and keep writing about the same characters. That might very well be true.
I have a very visual imagination and I've loved many book covers before, but I've never bought a book just because of its cover, this was the very first time for me. A complete gamble. And I'm glad it paid off so well.
So, just for a second, take a look at this cover. Not only its intricately crafted stained glass drawing is very beautiful in itself, it also:
1). succeeds in evoking a certain complexity in the plot / content, therefore attracting readers who like some intriguing thinking;
2). it works wonders on a tablet or mobile screen: the back-lit surface of your device's screen will give this cover an even more credible "transparent glass" effect. This cover, in summary, is just a marvel to look at. It deservedly won the BSFA award for "best SF book cover".
Jack Glass is Science Fiction. In its author’s own words, the novel is a collision of "the conventions of ‘Golden Age’ Science Fiction and ‘Golden Age’ detective fiction, with the emphasis more on the latter."
The book is divided in three stories, all connected and all taking place in the same world.
From the start, we know from the narrator that the murderer in each story is Jack Glass, but that's all we know. The mistery is to discover who Jack is, and why and how he committed these murders.
The first story blew my mind. It was actually reminiscing of some Golden Age SF. Big Ideas SF. It's dark, intense, full of ideas and horrific, heavy moments.
With the second story the writing's tone shifts completely (maybe a bit too much?), introducing new important characters and, finally, providing an overview of the universe where these stories are taking place. Here is where Adam Roberts is much heavier on the detective fiction. Yes we are still in a distant future, but it really feels like reading an Agatha Christie or Arthur C. Doyle story. And that is a good, fun, exciting thing! You can certainly feel the playfulness and the joy that Roberts was feeling while writing this book.
One could say that the main difference with a Sherlock Holmes story is that this is the future, and therefore it will be much easier for the author to come up with a clever resolution and make it seem oh-so-obvious, because he knows things about this world that the reader does not know. But I would counter that argument by noting how many of the Christie or Doyle stories, although based firmly in the present reality of their author, used very similar deus-ex-machina devices to resolve everything at the end, and to make the reader feel like he had the obvious solution in front his eyes the whole time.
The third story sums everything up and brings us to a slightly deeper appreciation of Jack Glass as a complex character, and of his background.
Look, this is just a load of intelligent fun. It's very well written. Does it lose a little bit of momentum at some points? Maybe it does. Is it a bit too cold in its intricated plotting matrix? Again, maybe, but deep and involving character development is not the point of this book at all.
It's not a "perfect" book, but it deserves 4 stars and a half from me for the fun that I had reading it.
SF author Paolo Bacigalupi wrote a raving review of this book wondering why Adam Roberts has not won any of the big SF awards yet (he did the BASF award for Jack Glass though). And Bacigalupi finds his own answer in the fact that Roberts is a unique, very unconventional writer, who focuses on the Big Idea for each one of his books, and then moves on to something completely different, while it's much easier - and profitable - in these days to strike gold with a more or less original concept, and then cash in on the series, and keep writing about the same characters. That might very well be true.
January 7, 2013
On the science fiction front I have to confess that pretty well every author I like I already liked in the 1970s. I really haven't picked up anyone new. But I was blown away by Jack Glass by Adam Roberts. I suspect what made this for me is that Roberts consciously was setting out to write a book that took on some of the conventions of the golden ages of science fiction and crime writing - both favourites for me. It is a new book. It is a modern book. However it encompasses the best of the old. And the result is absolutely wonderful.
The antihero of the book Jack Glass tells us up front that he is the murderer in each of three sections of the book - but this doesn't prevent the stories (which fit together almost seamlessly) from working in terms of suspense and anticipation.
The first section is probably the weakest and the middle the strongest, so if you make a start and struggle a little with the starkness of the first, do keep going. Roberts happens to be a professor of literature and if I say it doesn't show, I mean that in the best possible way. Although the book is very well written with some elegant turns of phrase, it doesn't get in the way of the storytelling as is the case with much 'literary' writing.
If I'm going to quibble, he gets the faster than light science wrong in the third section - but I always say that SF is fiction first and science second - this really isn't too much of a worry. If you like old school science fiction and haven't found anything you can really enjoy for years you should rush out and buy Jack Glass.
Review first published on http://brianclegg.blogspot.com and reproduced with permission
The antihero of the book Jack Glass tells us up front that he is the murderer in each of three sections of the book - but this doesn't prevent the stories (which fit together almost seamlessly) from working in terms of suspense and anticipation.
The first section is probably the weakest and the middle the strongest, so if you make a start and struggle a little with the starkness of the first, do keep going. Roberts happens to be a professor of literature and if I say it doesn't show, I mean that in the best possible way. Although the book is very well written with some elegant turns of phrase, it doesn't get in the way of the storytelling as is the case with much 'literary' writing.
If I'm going to quibble, he gets the faster than light science wrong in the third section - but I always say that SF is fiction first and science second - this really isn't too much of a worry. If you like old school science fiction and haven't found anything you can really enjoy for years you should rush out and buy Jack Glass.
Review first published on http://brianclegg.blogspot.com and reproduced with permission
February 15, 2022
I first read Adam Roberts in 2018 - I believe it was The Thing - and I remember being struck by how deeply I was pulled into the story. Roberts is a great storyteller - he weaves micro and macro narratives almost flawlessly, every detail accounted for - and I find myself immersed into the world he subtly built around the story, without much effort on my end. His characters, as odd and quirky they are, defies tropes and are still surprisingly relatable.
I was a bit hesitant about Jack Glass reading the blurb (and hence put it off for 4 years) but I was reminded again how I should really read all of Roberts' works. This story is told in 3 short stories from the same universe. The author's note says that Roberts wanted to meld the flavours of the Golden Ages of science fiction and mystery together - and he actually did that. Each short story is a different mystery - the first more of a short murder story rather than a mystery, the second a holiday mystery, and the third a locked room mystery - and interestingly, in all of them, the murderer is Jack Glass (not a spoiler), and we are invited to find out not who, but how. And you'd think you've heard of all ways someone could kill someone, but apparently Roberts can think of more, including
The worldbuilding was great. Roberts touched on the stirrings of an uprising in the midst of a feudal capitalist galaxy ruled by powerful families and corporations (the term Gongsi for a corporation is the Mandarin term for corporation/business - I loved that). He alludes to politics, social structures across the galaxy, religions. I loved the subtle satirical take on these things - as though he meant to reflect the ridiculousness of our own world. For example, employees and servants of powerful employers are drugged such that they love their employer deeply, to ensure loyalty and prevent any behaviour that will harm the employer. We are not quite there, here in real life, but it sometimes feel like if we could, we would do it.
What bumped my rating up from a 4 to a 5 was the collection of poems and prose from a number of 'writers' from the world he built. There are poems from all types of I was so immersed in the voices from these poems that I can easily believe that the 'writers' actually wrote them, and how impassioned they were about their experiences and lives. The poem that struck me was a poem from a man living in a shanty bubble in space, flimsy and prone to breaking with disastrous consequences, and his realisation that justice is only for those with money. How real is that!
I'm going to work through Roberts' catalogue now and reread The Thing. Exciting!
I was a bit hesitant about Jack Glass reading the blurb (and hence put it off for 4 years) but I was reminded again how I should really read all of Roberts' works. This story is told in 3 short stories from the same universe. The author's note says that Roberts wanted to meld the flavours of the Golden Ages of science fiction and mystery together - and he actually did that. Each short story is a different mystery - the first more of a short murder story rather than a mystery, the second a holiday mystery, and the third a locked room mystery - and interestingly, in all of them, the murderer is Jack Glass (not a spoiler), and we are invited to find out not who, but how. And you'd think you've heard of all ways someone could kill someone, but apparently Roberts can think of more, including
The worldbuilding was great. Roberts touched on the stirrings of an uprising in the midst of a feudal capitalist galaxy ruled by powerful families and corporations (the term Gongsi for a corporation is the Mandarin term for corporation/business - I loved that). He alludes to politics, social structures across the galaxy, religions. I loved the subtle satirical take on these things - as though he meant to reflect the ridiculousness of our own world. For example, employees and servants of powerful employers are drugged such that they love their employer deeply, to ensure loyalty and prevent any behaviour that will harm the employer. We are not quite there, here in real life, but it sometimes feel like if we could, we would do it.
What bumped my rating up from a 4 to a 5 was the collection of poems and prose from a number of 'writers' from the world he built. There are poems from all types of I was so immersed in the voices from these poems that I can easily believe that the 'writers' actually wrote them, and how impassioned they were about their experiences and lives. The poem that struck me was a poem from a man living in a shanty bubble in space, flimsy and prone to breaking with disastrous consequences, and his realisation that justice is only for those with money. How real is that!
I'm going to work through Roberts' catalogue now and reread The Thing. Exciting!
January 6, 2013
OK, I'll stick a caveat on this review - Adam Roberts has been very nice about my books, which I suppose leaves me very well disposed to his. However, if I didn't like the book I would just probably lie and tell him I liked it and not bother to review it. There are mild spoilers in this review, though I've done my best to be vague.
This book is a take on the classic locked room mystery. However, it is a Russian doll of a novel, locked rooms inside locked rooms inside locked rooms varying in size from someone's personal consciousness to the solar system.
The plot is intriguing - a series of intersecting puzzles. The beginning is basically a short story where you wonder how our hero is going to extricate himself from a situation of extreme peril. It works well and the solution is ingenious but as Jack Glass is a hero of competence, someone from that long line of protagonists who can always be relied on to 'sort it out', what keeps you reading is the question of how he will succeed rather than if he will or not. The hero isn't identified clearly in the opening but I was not in doubt of who it was past the first 20 or so pages.
It's a great opening but things become more intriguing when the POV shifts to that of a rich young woman whom Jack is following. You have no idea what his purpose is but as the cover does identify him as a murderer, you have a fair guess that some people may be for the chop - perhaps the POV character included. I found this tension very effective.
From the personal concern for his survival it opens up to the question of the survival of humanity.
I liked Roberts's use of language. Too many genre writers - if that's what Roberts is - relegate the bare bricks of sentence construction, word choice and description to second or third place in favour of plot and authenticity of the imagined world. Roberts clearly loves language and wordplay and can write.
The main characters are well imagined and I particularly liked the hyper-intelligent Diana who speaks like a valley girl but has a brain the size of a planet. The combination of great intelligence and shallowness was one I hadn't seen before.
What was wrong with the novel? Not much. Diana's language falls out of Valley speak for a while but there's perhaps a plausible reason for that - it's part of her character development. Jack Glass himself doesn't really emerge as a massively full character but then he is a man of mystery and so does what it says on the tin.
The novel is a take on the locked room and you don't come to such books for a hugely affecting emotional experience. Jack Glass is unlikely to leave you exultant or in tears. The locked room provides an intellectual challenge. On that Roberts delivers in spades.
I've heard Roberts called a 'clever' writer in the positive and negative connotations of the word. I've actually thought that myself at times when reading his books. However, I think that does him a disservice. The writing here evokes a real sense of place, the characters are well drawn, the ideas are intriguing and he tosses away interesting and thought provoking observations like Dan Brown throws in adverbs. OK, he is 'playing with form' which sounds a little wearying, but it doesn't obscure the story and it's possible to read Jack Glass as a straight SF adventure, complete with intriguing technologies, daring escapes, plot twists and the fate of the universe in the balance. My father, who is a golden age of SF pulp fan, very much enjoyed it.
The final reason I'd recommend this book is that you won't have read much like it, though paradoxically it is riffing on a tradition.
This book is a take on the classic locked room mystery. However, it is a Russian doll of a novel, locked rooms inside locked rooms inside locked rooms varying in size from someone's personal consciousness to the solar system.
The plot is intriguing - a series of intersecting puzzles. The beginning is basically a short story where you wonder how our hero is going to extricate himself from a situation of extreme peril. It works well and the solution is ingenious but as Jack Glass is a hero of competence, someone from that long line of protagonists who can always be relied on to 'sort it out', what keeps you reading is the question of how he will succeed rather than if he will or not. The hero isn't identified clearly in the opening but I was not in doubt of who it was past the first 20 or so pages.
It's a great opening but things become more intriguing when the POV shifts to that of a rich young woman whom Jack is following. You have no idea what his purpose is but as the cover does identify him as a murderer, you have a fair guess that some people may be for the chop - perhaps the POV character included. I found this tension very effective.
From the personal concern for his survival it opens up to the question of the survival of humanity.
I liked Roberts's use of language. Too many genre writers - if that's what Roberts is - relegate the bare bricks of sentence construction, word choice and description to second or third place in favour of plot and authenticity of the imagined world. Roberts clearly loves language and wordplay and can write.
The main characters are well imagined and I particularly liked the hyper-intelligent Diana who speaks like a valley girl but has a brain the size of a planet. The combination of great intelligence and shallowness was one I hadn't seen before.
What was wrong with the novel? Not much. Diana's language falls out of Valley speak for a while but there's perhaps a plausible reason for that - it's part of her character development. Jack Glass himself doesn't really emerge as a massively full character but then he is a man of mystery and so does what it says on the tin.
The novel is a take on the locked room and you don't come to such books for a hugely affecting emotional experience. Jack Glass is unlikely to leave you exultant or in tears. The locked room provides an intellectual challenge. On that Roberts delivers in spades.
I've heard Roberts called a 'clever' writer in the positive and negative connotations of the word. I've actually thought that myself at times when reading his books. However, I think that does him a disservice. The writing here evokes a real sense of place, the characters are well drawn, the ideas are intriguing and he tosses away interesting and thought provoking observations like Dan Brown throws in adverbs. OK, he is 'playing with form' which sounds a little wearying, but it doesn't obscure the story and it's possible to read Jack Glass as a straight SF adventure, complete with intriguing technologies, daring escapes, plot twists and the fate of the universe in the balance. My father, who is a golden age of SF pulp fan, very much enjoyed it.
The final reason I'd recommend this book is that you won't have read much like it, though paradoxically it is riffing on a tradition.
December 1, 2013
2.5 stars
Hard to pinpoint the genre on this one. Definitely sci fi, but that's not really important. There were murders, but we were told in advance that the murderer will always be Jack Glass; the mystery is only how he managed to pull it off. So the science isn't important, and it's not really a whodunnit...so, what is it?
That might be part of the reason why this book didn't get more press. No one was sure who to market it to.
For myself, the first 100 pages really turned me off. It was bloody and icky and altogether not what I wanted to read. I know, I picked up a book about murders, I should have expected it right? I guess I was hoping the sci fi would be more important, and it just wasn't.
Then the narrator changed for the rest of the book, which only served to make the whole thing feel disjointed and I wasn't sure who I should be caring about. No characters were fleshed out enough, most of all Jack Glass himself.
The cover is still awesome, though.
Hard to pinpoint the genre on this one. Definitely sci fi, but that's not really important. There were murders, but we were told in advance that the murderer will always be Jack Glass; the mystery is only how he managed to pull it off. So the science isn't important, and it's not really a whodunnit...so, what is it?
That might be part of the reason why this book didn't get more press. No one was sure who to market it to.
For myself, the first 100 pages really turned me off. It was bloody and icky and altogether not what I wanted to read. I know, I picked up a book about murders, I should have expected it right? I guess I was hoping the sci fi would be more important, and it just wasn't.
Then the narrator changed for the rest of the book, which only served to make the whole thing feel disjointed and I wasn't sure who I should be caring about. No characters were fleshed out enough, most of all Jack Glass himself.
The cover is still awesome, though.
September 12, 2012
Excellent blend of classic whodunnits and classic sci-fi. Three scenarios - prison escape, country house murder mystery and locked-room murder - form the framework for perfectly paced revelations about a fascinating 'hero', most unusual 'heroine', and consistent, believable Solar System with corrupt political system.
There have been comments in other reviews that the book ended abruptly, but in my view the author has revealed answers to all the mysteries and we appropriately leave the protagonists to continue their lives.
All is explained, the story is done.
There have been comments in other reviews that the book ended abruptly, but in my view the author has revealed answers to all the mysteries and we appropriately leave the protagonists to continue their lives.
All is explained, the story is done.
May 30, 2016
Par šo grāmatu es uzzināju tikai tad, kad tā iznāca krievu valodā. Man nudien vajadzētu izstrādāt kādu labu zinātniskās fantastikas grāmatu atpazīšanas sistēmu. Citādi sanāk visnotaļ skumji, tik laba grāmata, bet es viņu izlasu tikai četrus gadus pēc iznākšanas. Traki! Iespējams vajadzēs daudz vairāk laika veltīt dažādu nominēto un apbalvoto grāmatu sarakstiem.
Džeks Glass ir slepkava. Tas ir fakts, par kuru lasītājs tiek informēts jau no paša sākuma. Grāmata sastāv no trīs stāstiem, no kuriem pirmais ir bēgšana no cietuma un ne jau šāda tāda cietuma. Tālajā nākotnē par cietumu kalpo asteroīdi, un no turienes prom tiec tikai pēc soda izciešanas. Taču Džekam Glasam ir savas metodes, viņš sēž savā cietumā un slīpē stiklu. Otrais stāsts ir īsts krimiķis, slepkavība lauku mājā, vainīgo skaits ierobežots un atliek tikai noskaidrot motīvus, lai atrastu vainīgo. Trešais stāsts ir noziegums slēgtā istabā, un arī te lasītājam ir par ko palauzīt galvu. Autors no lasītāja nekā neslēpj, daudz kas tiek pateikts jau pašā ievadā, taču viņš ir pacenties, lai, izlasot katru stāstu, lasītājs piedzīvotu pārsteiguma momentu.
Taču izlasot šo aprakstu nevajag sabīties; grāmata nav tikai lēts detektīvs, tas ir nopietns zinātniskās fantastikas darbs. Kā mēs redzam Zemes iedzīvotāju nākotni? Standartā tā ir Saules sistēmas kolonizācija, kur varbūt cilvēki savā starpā plēšas, bet ne pārāk daudz. Džeka Glasa pasaulē viss ir daudz, daudz drūmāk. Saules sistēmas iedzīvotāju skaits sniedzas triljonos. Cilvēki lielākoties dzīvo stiklosilīcija burbuļos, kas izkaisīti pa visu Saules sistēmu. Pārtiek no substances gunk (kuru sintezē baktērijas) un lielākoties nodzīvo savu mūžu burbulī, kurā no aukstā kosmosa viņu šķir vien pārdesmit centimetru plastmasas. Visu Saules sistēmu pārvalda Ulanovu dinastija, kura daļu no savas absolūtās varas ir deleģējusi pāris ģimenēm, kas savukārt nodevusi daļu no pilnvarām dažādiem konsorcijiem, tie mafijām utt. Parastais Saules sistēmas iedzīvotājs rij gunk un nekontrolēti vairojas. Laiku pa laikam viņiem galvā ienāk revolūcijas organizēšana, taču policija, ja par to uzzina, rīkojas bez žēlsirdības, sašauj burbuli un revolūcija beidzas.
Džeks ir citāds revolucionārs, bet tieši kādā veidā savādāks, to varēs uzzināt tikai pašās grāmatas beigās. Jāatzīst, ka man par nožēlu arī es pats lasot grāmatu nespēju atrauties no taktiskā problēmu risinājuma un paskatīties uz visu stratēģiski. Ja sākumā Džeks izskatās standarta terorists, kurš idejas pārņemts cenšas gāzt pastāvošo iekārtu, lai iznīcinātu Ulanovu dinastiju par katru cenu, tad grāmatas beigās bilde nemaz vairs nav tika viennozīmīga. Džeka ideja par revolūciju un tās mērķiem pārsteidz ar savu dziļumu, un jo vairāk es domāju, jo vairāk man nākas Džekam piekrist, lai kā negribētos visu tūlīt, tomēr nopietnam pasākumam vajag sagatavot pareizu augsni, lai tā nenorītu savus bērnus, lai cilvēcei būtu cerības to pārdzīvot. Un kas ne mazāk svarīgi, lai cilvēce izmainītos pietiekami nopietni pirms tā iegūtu dažas ļoti kārdinošas tehnoloģijas.
Kā tad ir ar tiem autora solītajiem pārsteiguma momentiem. Pirmais stāsts ir visepiskākais un netradicionālākais bēgšanas mēģinājums, kuru vien man nācies lasīt. Te ir nedaudz no Monte Kristo un nedaudz no daudziem izciliem bēgšanas mēģinājumiem. Taču nekas nepārspēj pārsteiguma momentu, līdz tam es pat nebiju aizdomājies. Otrais stāsts, vairāk ir lai ieskicētu Saules sistēmas sociālās problēmas un es nemaz necentos mistēriju atrisināt, jo sapratu, ka nekas nesanāks. Piekritu grāmatas varonei Evai. Nav ko krāmētie, nāves sods visiem aizdomās turamajiem un pievēršamies citām problēmām. Piemēram, kādēļ laiku pa laikam par supernovu, kļūst zvaigzne ar nepietiekamu masu. Viņas māsai Diānai, gan kriminālo noziegumu izmeklēšana ir vājība un viņa nonāks līdz patiesībai. Arī šajā stāstā bija piesolītais pārsteiguma moments. Lai gan ne tik liels, kā pirmajā. Trešajā stāstā pārsteiguma moments izpalika. Autors nav pie vainas, viņš visu sarakstīja meistarīgi. Pie vainas ir tas, ka pārāk labi zinu relativitātes teoriju un tādēļ mozaīkas gabaliņus ne vien pamanīju pirms tie salikās kopā vienā bildē, bet katru no tiem jau gaidīju iepriekš.
Grāmatai lieku 10 no 10 ballēm, viņu var lasīt un vajag lasīt vairākos sižeta slāņos. Te ir piedzīvojums, detektīvs un noziegumi. Te ir filozofēšana par iespējamām nākotnes tehnoloģijām un to pielietojuma iznākumiem. Pārdomas par to kāda ir cilvēce bez mērķa, kas notiek, ja no Zemes mēs atrausimies tikai tādēļ, lai aizvāktu no turienes liekās mutes, kā pārvaldīt triljons cilvēkus. Un galvenais, kā noķert īsto brīdi, lai paceltu cilvēkus uz pārmaiņām. Ja vēlies izlasīt cieto zinātnisko fantastiku aizraujošā izklāstā, noteikti lasi.
Džeks Glass ir slepkava. Tas ir fakts, par kuru lasītājs tiek informēts jau no paša sākuma. Grāmata sastāv no trīs stāstiem, no kuriem pirmais ir bēgšana no cietuma un ne jau šāda tāda cietuma. Tālajā nākotnē par cietumu kalpo asteroīdi, un no turienes prom tiec tikai pēc soda izciešanas. Taču Džekam Glasam ir savas metodes, viņš sēž savā cietumā un slīpē stiklu. Otrais stāsts ir īsts krimiķis, slepkavība lauku mājā, vainīgo skaits ierobežots un atliek tikai noskaidrot motīvus, lai atrastu vainīgo. Trešais stāsts ir noziegums slēgtā istabā, un arī te lasītājam ir par ko palauzīt galvu. Autors no lasītāja nekā neslēpj, daudz kas tiek pateikts jau pašā ievadā, taču viņš ir pacenties, lai, izlasot katru stāstu, lasītājs piedzīvotu pārsteiguma momentu.
Taču izlasot šo aprakstu nevajag sabīties; grāmata nav tikai lēts detektīvs, tas ir nopietns zinātniskās fantastikas darbs. Kā mēs redzam Zemes iedzīvotāju nākotni? Standartā tā ir Saules sistēmas kolonizācija, kur varbūt cilvēki savā starpā plēšas, bet ne pārāk daudz. Džeka Glasa pasaulē viss ir daudz, daudz drūmāk. Saules sistēmas iedzīvotāju skaits sniedzas triljonos. Cilvēki lielākoties dzīvo stiklosilīcija burbuļos, kas izkaisīti pa visu Saules sistēmu. Pārtiek no substances gunk (kuru sintezē baktērijas) un lielākoties nodzīvo savu mūžu burbulī, kurā no aukstā kosmosa viņu šķir vien pārdesmit centimetru plastmasas. Visu Saules sistēmu pārvalda Ulanovu dinastija, kura daļu no savas absolūtās varas ir deleģējusi pāris ģimenēm, kas savukārt nodevusi daļu no pilnvarām dažādiem konsorcijiem, tie mafijām utt. Parastais Saules sistēmas iedzīvotājs rij gunk un nekontrolēti vairojas. Laiku pa laikam viņiem galvā ienāk revolūcijas organizēšana, taču policija, ja par to uzzina, rīkojas bez žēlsirdības, sašauj burbuli un revolūcija beidzas.
Džeks ir citāds revolucionārs, bet tieši kādā veidā savādāks, to varēs uzzināt tikai pašās grāmatas beigās. Jāatzīst, ka man par nožēlu arī es pats lasot grāmatu nespēju atrauties no taktiskā problēmu risinājuma un paskatīties uz visu stratēģiski. Ja sākumā Džeks izskatās standarta terorists, kurš idejas pārņemts cenšas gāzt pastāvošo iekārtu, lai iznīcinātu Ulanovu dinastiju par katru cenu, tad grāmatas beigās bilde nemaz vairs nav tika viennozīmīga. Džeka ideja par revolūciju un tās mērķiem pārsteidz ar savu dziļumu, un jo vairāk es domāju, jo vairāk man nākas Džekam piekrist, lai kā negribētos visu tūlīt, tomēr nopietnam pasākumam vajag sagatavot pareizu augsni, lai tā nenorītu savus bērnus, lai cilvēcei būtu cerības to pārdzīvot. Un kas ne mazāk svarīgi, lai cilvēce izmainītos pietiekami nopietni pirms tā iegūtu dažas ļoti kārdinošas tehnoloģijas.
Kā tad ir ar tiem autora solītajiem pārsteiguma momentiem. Pirmais stāsts ir visepiskākais un netradicionālākais bēgšanas mēģinājums, kuru vien man nācies lasīt. Te ir nedaudz no Monte Kristo un nedaudz no daudziem izciliem bēgšanas mēģinājumiem. Taču nekas nepārspēj pārsteiguma momentu, līdz tam es pat nebiju aizdomājies. Otrais stāsts, vairāk ir lai ieskicētu Saules sistēmas sociālās problēmas un es nemaz necentos mistēriju atrisināt, jo sapratu, ka nekas nesanāks. Piekritu grāmatas varonei Evai. Nav ko krāmētie, nāves sods visiem aizdomās turamajiem un pievēršamies citām problēmām. Piemēram, kādēļ laiku pa laikam par supernovu, kļūst zvaigzne ar nepietiekamu masu. Viņas māsai Diānai, gan kriminālo noziegumu izmeklēšana ir vājība un viņa nonāks līdz patiesībai. Arī šajā stāstā bija piesolītais pārsteiguma moments. Lai gan ne tik liels, kā pirmajā. Trešajā stāstā pārsteiguma moments izpalika. Autors nav pie vainas, viņš visu sarakstīja meistarīgi. Pie vainas ir tas, ka pārāk labi zinu relativitātes teoriju un tādēļ mozaīkas gabaliņus ne vien pamanīju pirms tie salikās kopā vienā bildē, bet katru no tiem jau gaidīju iepriekš.
Grāmatai lieku 10 no 10 ballēm, viņu var lasīt un vajag lasīt vairākos sižeta slāņos. Te ir piedzīvojums, detektīvs un noziegumi. Te ir filozofēšana par iespējamām nākotnes tehnoloģijām un to pielietojuma iznākumiem. Pārdomas par to kāda ir cilvēce bez mērķa, kas notiek, ja no Zemes mēs atrausimies tikai tādēļ, lai aizvāktu no turienes liekās mutes, kā pārvaldīt triljons cilvēkus. Un galvenais, kā noķert īsto brīdi, lai paceltu cilvēkus uz pārmaiņām. Ja vēlies izlasīt cieto zinātnisko fantastiku aizraujošā izklāstā, noteikti lasi.
February 13, 2018
Adam Roberts is one of the most consistently interesting sci-fi writers that I've come across. His novels tend to contain a strikingly bizarre central concept, the implications of which are then spun out. My favourite example of this is Land of the Headless, probably the only novel you will ever read in which the main characters have been decapitated before the story begins. In 'Jack Glass', the central conceit is stylistic - the reader is told of three murder mysteries and that the eponymous anti-hero is the murderer in each case. Knowing this, each third of the book is spent trying to work out how and why each killing took place. This caused a marked reluctance on my part to put the book down until I'd finished it, as I genuinely wanted to know the answers and felt compelled to make (incorrect) guesses.
The interlinked murder mysteries take place within a very intriguing and well-drawn world, a few hundred years in the future. Although elements reminded me of novels by Gwyneth Jones, John Courtney Grimwood, Alaistair Reynolds, and Neal Stephenson, the overall feel of it was fresh and original. I especially appreciated the discussion of how the economics in this world operated, and how this interacted with the political situation. The range of religions mentioned was also amusingly satirical, especially when economics-as-religion came up. The politics had an unsubtle neo-Marxism about them, which I liked. I found the depth of world-building impressive, given that that the book read like a marriage of straightforward sci-fi adventure with a murder mystery sequence.
'Jack Glass' is perhaps weaker when it comes to characterisation. The progression of events drives the narrative, dragging the characters along behind it. I would have liked to hear more from Sapho, especially in the discussion of revolution. At one point I caught a reference to her being in one place having been previously stated to be in another, then assumed this would have some key significance. It did not, so I assume it was a typo. I approve of Jack Glass himself remaining something of an enigma, though, and Diana Argent seemed like a realistically self-absorbed teenager.
Overall, 'Jack Glass' was a very entertaining, clever, and beautifully imagined novel. Long may Adam Roberts continue to have such great ideas. Now I need to find a copy of By Light Alone.
The interlinked murder mysteries take place within a very intriguing and well-drawn world, a few hundred years in the future. Although elements reminded me of novels by Gwyneth Jones, John Courtney Grimwood, Alaistair Reynolds, and Neal Stephenson, the overall feel of it was fresh and original. I especially appreciated the discussion of how the economics in this world operated, and how this interacted with the political situation. The range of religions mentioned was also amusingly satirical, especially when economics-as-religion came up. The politics had an unsubtle neo-Marxism about them, which I liked. I found the depth of world-building impressive, given that that the book read like a marriage of straightforward sci-fi adventure with a murder mystery sequence.
'Jack Glass' is perhaps weaker when it comes to characterisation. The progression of events drives the narrative, dragging the characters along behind it. I would have liked to hear more from Sapho, especially in the discussion of revolution. At one point I caught a reference to her being in one place having been previously stated to be in another, then assumed this would have some key significance. It did not, so I assume it was a typo. I approve of Jack Glass himself remaining something of an enigma, though, and Diana Argent seemed like a realistically self-absorbed teenager.
Overall, 'Jack Glass' was a very entertaining, clever, and beautifully imagined novel. Long may Adam Roberts continue to have such great ideas. Now I need to find a copy of By Light Alone.
August 31, 2016
This is the first case I encounter where a book's marketing("golden age SF and golden age detective" - this sounds so good that it got obsessively repeated by every reviewer; pre-chewed thoughts for everyone!), a book's cover and it's prologue are the best parts of a book. Actually, they are the only good parts about it.
First story: starts slow, couldn't care less about the characters, a lot of nothing happens, get the feeling that maybe the writer was payed by the number of pages. Solution: there is A LOT of suspension of disbelief required to accept the ending. Like turning off your brain for a couple of pages.
Second story: again 30 pages of boring useless introduction, a lot of uninteresting characters thrown in just for the sake of it, lots of tempo-breaking descriptions, far too many repetitions(we're told the girls are geniuses every third paragraph, although they only act like mentally challenged spoiled brats) and really annoying characters. Solution: a lot of disappointment.
Third story: will not read it.
These were the worst mystery stories I have ever read. You cannot expect to be taken seriously as a writer if you provide laughably bad or impossible soutions to the big questions in your book. And if it's a case of journey > destination, then at least try to create a good pacing and likeable characters.
First story: starts slow, couldn't care less about the characters, a lot of nothing happens, get the feeling that maybe the writer was payed by the number of pages. Solution: there is A LOT of suspension of disbelief required to accept the ending. Like turning off your brain for a couple of pages.
Second story: again 30 pages of boring useless introduction, a lot of uninteresting characters thrown in just for the sake of it, lots of tempo-breaking descriptions, far too many repetitions(we're told the girls are geniuses every third paragraph, although they only act like mentally challenged spoiled brats) and really annoying characters. Solution: a lot of disappointment.
Third story: will not read it.
These were the worst mystery stories I have ever read. You cannot expect to be taken seriously as a writer if you provide laughably bad or impossible soutions to the big questions in your book. And if it's a case of journey > destination, then at least try to create a good pacing and likeable characters.
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