Tărâmul verii

by Hannu Rajaniemi, Mihai-Dan Pavelescu (Translator)

Moartea e doar începutul. Crima e irelevantă.

„Se citește ca John le Carré, dacă acesta ar fi consumat LSD înainte să scrie Cârtița.“ (NPR)

În 1938, moartea nu mai e capătul vieții. Dimpotrivă, este o continuare în altă dimensiune, pentru că oamenii au descoperit viața de apoi. Imperiul Britanic s-a extins până la Tărâmul Verii, o metropolă pentru cei recent decedați. Dar Britania nu e singura care vrea puterea în viața asta – și în următoarea. Spionii sovietici sunt și ei acolo, cu tehnologia potrivită pentru a construi un nou zeu.

Agenta Rachel White nimerește în miijlocul unui complot și trebuie să facă imposibilul: să prindă un om care e deja mort.

„Conspirații și intrigi tipice romanelor cu spioni, dar cu un fundal extrem de ingenios.“ (Chicago Tribune)

„Ca tot ce era permanent în Tărâmul Verii, casa fusese clădită din suflete. Fiecare dintre cărămizile ei era o piatră luz, miezul adamantin care rămânea după Destrămarea completă a unui suflet, când gândul și memoria nu mai existau. Cu milenii în urmă, Vechii Morți – denumirea escatologilor pentru cei din civilizația pierdută care precedase epoca modernă – le adunaseră și le utilizaseră pentru a crea Orașul Verii. Iar apoi străvechii constructori dispăruseră. După ce inventarea ectofonului deschisese explorarea vieții de apoi, la începutul secolului, sosiseră morții Angliei. Eterhitecții remodelaseră orașul, inclusiv casa lui Peter, care devenise o reședință victoriană potrivită unui gentleman. Însă cărămizile păstraseră și alte memorii și, dacă nu le arătai cine era stăpânul, se cam risipeau.“

Genres: Science Fiction, Fantasy, Fiction, Alternate History, Historical Fiction, Speculative Fiction, Espionage

295 pages, Paperback

First published June 28, 2018

About the author

EN: Hannu Rajaniemi is a Finnish author of science fiction and fantasy, who writes in both English and Finnish. He lives in Edinburgh, Scotland, and is a founding director of a technology consultancy company, ThinkTank Maths.

Rajaniemi was born in Ylivieska, Finland. He holds a B.Sc. in Mathematics from the University of Oulu, a Certificate of Advanced Study in Mathematics from the University of Cambridge and a Ph.D. in Mathematical Physics from the University of Edinburgh. Prior to starting his Ph.D. candidature, he completed his national service as a research scientist for the Finnish Defence Forces.

While pursuing his Ph.D. in Edinburgh, Rajaniemi joined Writers' Bloc, a writers' group in Edinburgh that organizes semi-regular spoken word performances and counts Charlie Stross amongst its members. Early works included his first published short story Shibuya no Love in 2003 and his short story Deus Ex Homine in Nova Scotia, a 2005 anthology of Scottish science fiction and fantasy, which caught the attention of his current literary agent, John Jarrold.

Rajaniemi gained attention in October 2008 when John Jarrold secured a three-book deal for him with Gollancz, on the basis of only twenty-four double-spaced pages. His debut novel, The Quantum Thief, was published in September 2010 by Gollancz in Britain and in May 2011 by Tor Books in the U.S. A sequel, The Fractal Prince, was published in September 2012 by Gollancz and in November 2012 by Tor.

FI: Hannu Rajaniemi on Edinburgissa, Skotlannissa asuva suomalainen tieteiskirjailija, joka kirjoittaa sekäs suomeksi että englanniksi. Rajaniemi on opiskellut matemaattista fysiikkaa Oulun ja Cambridgen yliopistoissa ja väitellyt säieteoriasta filosofian tohtoriksi Edinburghin yliopistossa. Hän on perustajajäsen matematiikan ja tekniikan konsulttiyhtiössä nimeltä ThinkTank Maths.

Opiskellessaan Edinburgissa Rajaniemi liittyi kirjoittajaryhmään, joka järjesti tekstien lukutilaisuuksia. Hänen varhaisia novellejaan on ilmestynyt englanniksi Interzone-lehdessä ja Nova Scotia -antologiassa. Näistä jälkimmäinen kiinnitti Rajaniemen nykyisen kirjallisuusagentin kiinnostuksen vuonna 2005.

Vuonna 2008 Rajaniemi solmi kustannussopimuksen kolmesta romaanista brittiläisen Gollancz-kustantamon kanssa. Valmiina oli silloin ainoastaan romaanin yksi luku. Esikoisromaani The Quantum Thief ilmestyi syyskuussa 2010. Hänellä on näiden kolmen romaanin julkaisusopimus myös yhdysvaltalaisen Tor-kustantamon kanssa. Suomeksi Rajaniemen esikoisteoksen julkaisee Gummerus nimellä Kvanttivaras.

Reviews

[Chelsea Humphrey · Rating 3 out of 5]

When I first saw Summerland pop up on NetGalley, I got my feisty finger out and click-clickity-clicked as fast as I could. When you read as many books as I do, it's easy to start feeling the dreaded book slump start to take over and for your reading list to grow stale, but look at how unique and exciting this premise is! While I'm glad I picked this up, as it was a unique and very different read for me, I think I had a different image in my head of what this would be vs. what it actually was.

No spoilers here, but I first noticed that there was a reveal of a certain piece of information early on that I felt would have built the tension and engaged me as a reader a bit more if it had been used as an element of mystery. (I do feel I might be alone in this thought though, as my mystery/thriller/suspense background takes over in these situations.) I also don't read a ton of spy fiction, so many of the elements other readers will enjoy and appreciate were lost on me. Again, these are all personal reaction and opinions and in no way suggest this isn't a quality read, because...

The writing was excellent! Seriously, this is high quality character development and world building. I'm in awe that the author was able to take such a short novel and do so much with it. Bows down Between the characters and the world building, I think readers who are more familiar with spy fiction and science fiction will be thrilled with Rajaniemi's latest novel.

*I received a review copy from the publisher via NetGalley.

[Bradley · Rating 4 out of 5]

As a bonafide fanboy of Rajaniemi, first for his trilogy and then for his short story collection, I was really chomping at the bit for ANYTHING he might write next. His imagination is by far some of the most hard-hitting spectacular steam-rolling post-singularity tour-de-force circuses I've ever come across.

So what was my initial reaction when I heard he was writing about 1938 pre-war spy fiction where the afterlife is not only accessible but is actively involved in politics in that alternate world?

COOL.

For me, I've never been a gung-ho fan of Le Carre spy fiction, and although this is apparently written in a very similar style, I can't go completely ga-ga over it because I'm not starting out as a fan. Fortunately, I have read enough similar stuff to enjoy it, at least intellectually. And so I dove in. Keeping an open mind.

Both the Soviets and the English have their own separate afterlives. Not everyone has the means to stick around after they die, however, and so a kind of economy is set up. A Meritocracy. Only the deserving can keep from fading away. But what's worse is the fact that the really old politicos don't go away. Ever. The living is ruled by the dead and wars are a fantastic mixture of Ideology (Communism vs Socialism), Religion (or lack thereof), and of course all the other trappings of temporal power, including resources, economics, and all the other things that the living are interested in. :)

I think the novel was fantastically researched and developed. It's more finding reasons to stay with a particular side kind of novel than discovering who might be the bad guy. Or even if there IS a bad guy. This kind of spy fiction is about ideas, plain and simple. And a few great reveals later that paint the whole situation in a very different light.

For me, I have no problems with the novel as it is. Not the characters, the subjects, or the action. I enjoyed getting to know both the main characters from either side of the ideological (and temporal) divide. :)

FINAL ESTIMATION. It ain't the same kind of novel, by a long shot, to his other trilogy! Don't expect it! It's quite an easy read so long as you're fine with your history, too. You know, like the contents of the Spanish Civil War. Or extrapolations of a world that can't get over Queen Victoria WAY past her expiration date.

Double-crosses, mystery, murder, ectoplasm! Dark secrets, darker times... where life seems rather meaningless because life is almost the same after you die! It's all there. And it's pretty fantastic. :)

So why didn't I give this a five star if I'm such a fan? Because I tend to bounce off Oooooldschool spy fiction. It's okay. I just don't usually resonate that well with it. The same is true here. I liked the novel. The characters, all the elements, but something got sacrificed for the sake of being more accessible, IMHO.

I LOVE his wilder stuff. :) Plain and simple. It's not fair to this novel, of course, because it's very much ahead of its competition. I think of Ian Tregellis's trilogy, in particular, which I liked a lot. Also, Larry Correia.

Rajaniemi kills it on the ideological forefront. :)

[Philip · Rating 1 out of 5]

DNF at 60%

I really enjoyed the beginning, and think the ideas and concepts are great. The writing is actually very confident and seasoned too. However, about halfway through I hit a wall that I could not get past. While I like Rachel, one of the main characters, the other main character, Peter, is hard to sympathize with and is just plain boring. The plot eventually becomes so burdensome it's virtually impenetrable. After painfully slogging through the last couple chapters, I have no desire to continue reading so I'm giving up.

[Gary · Rating 4 out of 5]

Originally posted at https://1000yearplan.com/2018/06/25/s...

The afterlife hardly seems like a suitable subject for science fiction, but authors as far back as Edgar Allan Poe – whose pseudoscientific proto-mockumentary “The Facts in the Case of M. Valdemar” hoodwinked newspaper readers in 1845 – have sought to portray the pre-scientific notion of consciousness after death in post-scientific terms. Some of the more famous examples since then come from Philip José Farmer (Riverworld series) and Philip K. Dick (Ubik), and of course the 1990 star-studded b-movie “Flatliners”. More recently, the idea of a digital afterlife – spurred by technological advances in brain mapping, digital storage, and the ever-increasing verisimilitude of virtual reality and computer simulations – has taken hold in popular science fiction. Considering this development, it is a little curious that Cambridge/Edinburgh-educated mathematician Hannu Rajaniemi, author of the diamond hard sci-fi Jean le Flambeur trilogy, would dip his toes into so abstract a pond as the good old-fashioned, pre-digital afterlife in his new novel Summerland. But then again, abstraction is the essence of mathematics, and the Jean le Flambeur books largely dealt with the same philosophical investigations into mind-body dualism that fuel even the most occultish conceptions of life after death.
Set in an alternate, Nazi-free 1938 in Great Britain, Rachel White is an agent for the Winter Court, the British intelligence (SIS) organization for all things afterlife-related. The dead (at least those lucky enough to obtain a Ticket) reside in the aetheric metropolis of Summerland, and the SIS branch there is known as the Summer Court. Rachel learns that one of their agents in the Summer Court – a ghost named Peter Bloom whom she briefly served with before he died – is a Soviet mole, but she’s left hanging by her superiors and must go rogue to expose him. The Spanish Civil War rages in the background, and most of the novel’s intrigue revolves around Britain’s stake in the outcome. Britain has grudgingly thrown its support behind Franco’s fascists, if only to counter the Soviet Union’s support of Spain’s communist factions. Bloom himself is basically untouchable – he is shielded from suspicion by everyone up to and including the prime minister – and can do a lot of damage as a Soviet spy; not only in affecting the outcome of the Spanish war, but also in steering the fate of the world at large. The Soviets have created a god-like machine called the Presence to guide their empire, one that the chosen few can be joined with after death – an allure that Bloom, and presumably many others, cannot resist.
Summerland is the kind of story that begins in media res and unpacks its layers gradually. Rajaniemi is sly about explicating his extraordinarily complex world: there are certainly little pockets of exposition and info-dumping here and there, but most of the architecture is revealed through the little edges that poke out as the details of plot and character emerge. Summerland is not a long novel and the fact that Rajaniemi manages to keep his cat-and-mouse plot moving at a crackling pace while inventing an entirely new physics to explain how the world works is nothing short of sensational.
Neither does the plot’s momentum slight the characters’ inner lives in the least: Rachel’s circumstances – being the only woman operative in the SIS – make it so she can expose herself to recruitment by Bloom without even having to create a fiction to explain her motives. Overworked and undervalued, her results are questioned and often disregarded despite her sterling track record. Early in the novel we even witness her superior passively suggest that violence would be an appropriate punishment for her perceived insolence. When she literally must turn traitor to make her unsanctioned pursuit of Bloom, the effect is all the more colorable by such contingencies. Bloom is also a fascinating character, caught somewhere in between the radicalism of his youth and a new kind of wariness that comes when one is safe in the knowledge that death is not the end. At one point he acutely reveals the basic injustice of his own plight: now that the soul has been commoditized he has nothing to look forward to but an eternity in civil service. At least the Soviets are offering communion with God.
The tricky balancing act that Rajaniemi mostly pulls off with Summerland leaves little to complain about: even on the few occasions where its convolutions start to dogpile, taking a step back to untangle the threads is part of the pleasure of reading it. If I were to express any disappointment in my experience, it would only be that the novel sprouts so many miraculous possibilities and teases so many underutilized potentialities that no amount of satisfactory narrative closure could ever seem like enough. I would gladly welcome, even long for, a return trip to Summerland.

Many thanks to Netgalley and Tor Books for the opportunity to read this ARC.

[Cathy · Rating 5 out of 5]

„You are a cruel woman, Mrs. Moore,“ he said between sips.
Reminiscent of Marvel‘s Agent Carter, Mrs. Moore is a secret agent... but that is just the beginning. Set in 1938, we get espionage and counter espionage, glimpses of the Spanish Civil War, the Old Boy‘s Clubs ruling Great Britain, one disenchanted female agent, communism, an alternate reality or rather, a netherworld of ghosts and mediums. Because in this world you go places, when you die. If you have something important to do and own a Ticket...

A little confusing at first, pretty good world building from the start. I had to refreshen my lacking knowledge of the Spanish Civil War, which was a lot of fun in itself.

Real spies and double-agents added extra interest to the story. And a whole bunch of other characters from real life, fitted into this ingenious world. I had a lot of fun looking up all of them.

Is the Zöllner camera based on Johann Karl Friedrich Zöllner? Herbert Blanco West took me a bit to figure out... Very educating read, besides being entertaining.

Good pacing, suspenseful, not too predictable, well developed characters. I had a hard time picking sides, because I liked pretty much all of them. And in the end you do not (only) get the expected, which makes it fun. I would pick up a sequel, if there will be one. But this is fine as a stand-alone.

I received this free e-copy from Tor/Forge via NetGalley, in exchange for an honest review, thank you!

[Trish · Rating 2 out of 5]

This was my first novel by this author, who came highly recommended.

The premise of there being an afterlife, making death no big deal, as well as all the political repercussions (Queen Victoria is still ruling Britain, although from Summerland which basically is "the other side") sounded intriguing. The people here not only have a way of talking to the dead on a special phone, the dead can also rent a medium's body to walk among the living. We also have a spy story full of agents, moles, double-agents and whatnot. And then there is something wrong with this other world, the souls and ghosts/spirits.

Unfortunately, I did not connect with this AT ALL. Maybe it's because I'm not made for spy stories or maybe it's because I was hoping for a bit more otherworldliness.

Whatever it was, I did not connect with any of the characters.
While I hated how Rachel was treated simply for being a woman (this takes place in the late 1930s so sexism, especially in the Service, was even worse than it is nowadays), I also didn't care (except for one of her decisions and that made me hate her).
Peter, Roger, Max, Joe, Nora, Otto, the Prime Minister ... it really didn't matter at all. There was a back-and-forth like a tug-of-war as in any spy story and the writing really was solid but it didn't tickle any of my senses.

Sadly, the same goes for the last effort to make the supernatural more intriguing. I like the idea of God not being dead but hungry and of the old ghosts eating the young eventually, with some fading and some young enduring to become the new old ones, making the cycle go on and on and on much like the idea of the Presence was kinda funny. However, like I said, I was not invested despite that.

Still, thanks go to Netgalley and the publisher for the chance to reading this ARC.

[✘✘ Sarah ✘✘ (former Nefarious Breeder of Murderous Crustaceans) · Rating 4 out of 5]

Sci-Fi meets Alternate History meets bloody shrimping original concept meets super extra cool afterlife meets espionage and counter-espionage and counter-counter-espionage meets subversion and counter-subversion and counter-counter-subversion meets traitorous traitors meets scrumpalicious contraptions meets Franco and Stalin and Lenin, oh my meets ectoplasmic everything =



➽ Full review to come and stuff. Hopefully some time before 2078.

P.S. A person who likes orange marmalade cannot be all bad. In case you were wondering.

[Ed McDonald · Rating 5 out of 5]

Full disclosure: I received an advance copy of Summerland because I got to read the first pages at Worldcon, got hooked and then bugged the publisher until they gave me a copy. No spoilers.

I've always felt that there are concept books, and then there are plot-based books. The concept books take an idea and explore it thoroughly, and you umm and ahhh at the marvellous imagination of the writer. Plot books send you somewhere that's familiar enough that the strange world the author has created doesn't get in the way of the rush through the thrill ride. But Summerland manages to do both.

The premise of the story is grand in scale. The more you read, the more you learn just how different the world Hannu has created is. It's important that early on you abandon the mundane and the ordinary, that you open yourself to the possibilities of a world that's so thoroughly changed and yet entirely familiar, because boy, does it get weird at times. The depth of imagination is staggering.

This book feels to me almost to be cross genre. It's undeniably fantasy, but it's not the familiar, safe fantasy that usually comes my way, and it makes a great palette cleanser for any reader that feels that the genre is getting stale or that they've read it all before.

Engaging writing, tight plotting and fantastic imagination are sure to make Summerland a hit when it reaches shelves in June.

[The Captain · Rating 4 out of 5]

Ahoy there me mateys! This be the third book in me Ports for Plunder – 19 Books in 2019 list. I knew I wanted to read this alternative history sci-fi novel after reading about it in matey Lashaan @ bookidote’s awesome review. As he nicely puts it, “It might not be the most accessible story that you could pick up, but it is without a doubt enthralling and authentic.”

And aye, that be exactly what this was. The story takes place in an alternate 1938 where the dead are still very much a part of the affairs of the living. Summerland is a metropolis for the deceased. Be a good citizen and earn a Ticket to become a member of this city when ye die. Yer prior interests can still remain. Continue to run yer company. Talk to yer living loved ones. There are endless choices.

This book focuses on two characters. The first is a living agent named Rachel who works for the SIS. The second is Peter who is a resident of Summerland and has secret agendas. Rachel is wrapped up in conspiracy when she discovers there is a mole in the agency feeding secrets to the Russians. But instead of being rewarded for this intelligence, she is rebuffed for her womanly emotional delusions. But Rachel can’t let this information go and decides to find out the truth even if it ruins her career.

It is true that this book is hard to get into. Ye get tossed into the deep end with very little exposition. The concepts of Summerland and how they work did take a while to make any sense. I will admit that at least twice I contemplating giving up but I wasn’t sure if it was me mood or the writing that was the problem. Turns out that I needed to just let the thoughts and ideas percolate while reading. Because suddenly the story clicked and I was engrossed and had to know what happened next.

The spy story aspect of this novel was fun but the highlight really did become Summerland and the world-building that stems from it. From mundane tasks like document retrieval to more complex tasks like allowing ghosts the use of a medium’s body, the consequences were just so fascinating. And of course there is the threat of war looming and how Summerland affected politics were weird and cool. Plus I actually loved the ending!

This story won’t be for everyone because of the writing style. Some of the concepts like four dimensions and mathematical theorems might be hard to grasp as well but I am so glad that I read and finished it. Arrr!

Check out me other reviews at https://thecaptainsquartersblog.wordp...

[K.J. Charles]

An alt-30s spy thriller only life after death exists. Old spies do die, and then they get a job on the other side.

It's a pretty weird concept, made weirder by the very strongly alt setting which has diverged considerably from our reality but uses a lot of people even so. Expect Kim Philby, Roger Hollis, Stalin, Mansfield Cumming etc, all not doing what you might think. That basically works, even if it's confusing, but what does not is to add a New Woman called Ann Veronica and the discoverer of how to exploit the afterlife, one Herbert West. That works great in a fantasy, but if you're doing an alt-reality I don't think you can fold in fictional characters without serious jarring.

It's well developed and has a twisty spy plot. I felt the weakest part was the characterisation, especially of the heroine, who had a lot of page time but not a lot of depth or complexity. I am not much of an espionage novel reader or a hard SF reader, and suspect I'd have enjoyed it a lot more if I was both.

[Jason · Rating 5 out of 5]

5 Stars

Summerland by Hannu Rajaniemi lived up to my high expectations. Let me simply state that Rajaniemi has vaulted himself to the top as one of my very favorite science fiction authors writing today. This is a cool mystery set in a world where we can go to an afterlife place called Summerland. A really cool concept with great characters and great writing.

A must read.

[Quintin Zimmermann · Rating 3 out of 5]

Summerland is a peculiar novel with the unique premise of mashing together the disparate concepts of the afterlife with Cold War spy tradecraft .

Almost the entire book takes place in an alternate 1938, where the dead are able to relocate to a fourth dimensional afterlife via a meritocratic system of Tickets that are offered to the deserving. The dead can further interact with and manifest themselves in a very real way in the world of the living via ectophones and mediums. Imagine being able to phone a loved one who has passed away whenever you like and you begin to understand the draw of the Ticket.

The first protagonists is the perennially underappreciated Rachel White investigating the existence of a mole, while battling the bureaucracy of English privilege and male chauvinism. The second is Peter Bloom, our mole, who inhabits the afterlife.

From virtually the beginning of the book, Peter Bloom is identified as the mole, which for me, much deflates the tension. Summerland is rather about our protagonists underlying motivations, the growing realisation that all is not well and questioning the nature of a true patriot.

And therein lies the rub. A character driven novel is dependent upon the depth of its characters and I struggled to identify with the these characters and I was not drawn into this world in a meaningful way.

Summerland contains some ambitious concepts, but lacks the characters to realise the massive potential of this novel.

[Lashaan Balasingam · Rating 4 out of 5]

You can find my review on my blog by clicking here.

There’s always something intimately satisfying in picking up a book that jolts your mind with refreshing ideas that only seemed inconceivable at first. Author of the critically-acclaimed Jean le Flambeur trilogy Hannu Rajaniemi returns for a stand-alone espionage story infused with a whole dose of science fiction in Summerland. Pulsating with passion and creativity, this story is the very archetype of what novelty is all about. Far from being a story focused on a typical narrative structure with an exposition that leads to a resolution, this is a story that proudly waves its firm grasp on ideas that could only have been thoroughly thought through by Hannu Rajaniemi himself.

Summerland takes place in an alternate 1938 reality where the afterlife is not a thing of fiction anymore. Following this discovery, the British Empire has expanded their power by creating a metropolis for the deceased called the Summerland. Based on a meritocracy where only those who possess a Ticket before death can access the afterlife, the world no longer revolves around the same principles as it once did. On the brink of what is to be known as the Spanish Civil War, SIS agent Rachel White however finds herself befuddled in front of an unexpected lead regarding a Soviet mole. In order to catch said spy, she will have to go through loops that will force her to do things she never thought she would.

At heart, Summerland is an espionage story set in a world with its own rules, norms and secrets. With a woman as a lead protagonist, you can quickly comprehend the extensive strain put upon her shoulder to always perform and outdo others, while also always having the short end of the stick no matter how well she does. Her gender plays a crucial role throughout the story and is a major element to Hannu Rajaniemi’s story as it highlights the means that she will need to mull over if she wants to reach the ends she so desperately needs to reach. Although her character isn’t easy to connect with, she effortlessly captures the essence of being a spy and the difficult choices she needs to make if she wants to strive in her business.

While the spy story is the foundation of Summerland, I found myself appreciating this novel much more for its jaw-dropping conceptualization of the afterlife. In fact, my immersion was completely due to Hannu Rajaniemi’s unbelievable world-building. The ways he finds to include ectoplasm within his story and to form a whole science behind it is one of the most stunning innovation I’ve read in a while. With a whole system in place to cover any possible plot holes to his creation, he cleverly brings to life a universe where the dead are still alive, and very capable of interacting with the living thanks to ectophones and mediums. Even emotions and thoughts don’t limit themselves to the mind and body as they break loose and become much more malleable after dead, requiring even more mastery of one’s self, especially within the world of spies.

Summerland is an idea given a new lease of life. Despite its story being conventional in the espionage genre, its concepts of afterlife rejuvenates it to offer a stunning and impeccable world that only the mind can fancy. It might not be the most accessible story that you could pick up, but it is without a doubt enthralling and authentic.

Thank you to Raincoast Books and Tor Books for sending me a copy for review!

Yours truly,

Lashaan | Blogger and Book Reviewer
Official blog: https://bookidote.com/

[Scott · Rating 4 out of 5]

The afterlife exists! There is life after death! You can pick up a phone and call your deceased relatives for a chat!

Oh, one thing though, the afterlife has been colonised by the British Empire and (providing you have a ticket) your personal heaven will most likely look like a celestial office job in the English colonial bureaucracy :)

That's the very interesting (and slightly horrifying) setup that underlies Hannu Rajiniemi's Summerland, a novel overflowing with great ideas and engaging tension.

The action is set in the 1930s, decades after the discovery of the afterlife and the end of a first world war that was turbocharged by the terrifying spectral technologies that the new spirit science has unleashed. Britain and the Soviet Union are now engaged in a cold war, the British running agents in this world and the next, while the Soviets have elevated Lenin into a sort of post-human god in the afterlife, an entity whose essence is composed of multitudes of Russian souls.

On the front lines of this war of espionage and skulduggery is Rachel White, an agent for what is known as the Winter Palace - Britain's corporeal spy agency, the flip side of the Summer Palace in the afterlife. Rachel is in charge of interrogating and protecting a valuable Soviet defector, and she has both the Communist regime and the sexism of the British establishment public schoolboy network (I imagined a 1930s Boris Johnson as a secret agent) working against her. As the story progresses she will be forced to challenge both, with very interesting results.

Her journey is a hell of a ride, the action going from London to the afterlife to Civil War Spain.

You may have encountered Rajaniemi before via his brilliant SF work The Quantum Thief, itself a riot of imaginative storytelling that sucked me in from page one. So it is here. Summerland reads like a very deft mixture of SF and John LeCarre, and that blend really works very well.

Rajaniemi keeps the action and the tension coming, and he builds a completely convincing alternative 1930s London, where death isn't a big deal, providing you have a ticket to the British afterlife. He paints a world where mothers continue to henpeck their children from beyond the grave, where company owners run their empires from death, and where medical science has completely stalled as a result (why prolong life if people can simply cross over and call you on an ecto-phone ten minutes later?).

It's a lot of fun to read, and my only real criticism is that it ends a little quickly for my liking. I would happily have spent more time in Rajaniemi's world, but he is clearly an exponent of the showbiz axiom of leaving his audience wanting more.

Overall, I Loved Summerland, and I'm very much looking forward to reading more set in this fascinating, convincing new universe.


Four-and-a-half "Are you eating properly? Wear that scarf I knitted you or you'll catch your death!" phone calls from beyond the grave (out of five).

[Jenny (Reading Envy)]

I finally started to get the premise of this novel, spies in the afterlife during World War II. Ectoplasm included. And the government is somehow in control?

I decided not to finish for the following reasons:
-I loved the quantum novels by the author, partly because they felt so heavily based in potential science, even if I couldn't quite grasp it all of the time. This novel does not benefit from the same realism and it was hard to accept it enough to enjoy it, for me.
-A badly written/handled miscarriage scene which used quite disturbing imagery in a weird way
-Random sex scene that seemed out of character with the plot and characters... I don't mind sex but I do mind when it feels like authors are throwing scenes in there because they are bored or fear you as the reader might be.

[Denise · Rating 3 out of 5]

It was hard to believe this was written by the same author who wrote The Quantum Thief, one of my favorite books. In many ways the plot was similar to The Ghost Walkers by Wells. Perhaps it was the plot or world in both books but I didn’t love either. Perhaps other readers will enjoy this more than I did.

[Anna · Rating 3 out of 5]

Although it purports to be a very different sort of book, I found ‘Summerland’ strangely akin to Hannu Rajaniemi’s The Jean le Flambeur Trilogy: The Quantum Thief, The Fractal Prince, The Causal Angel. While the latter are hard sci-fi space adventures, the former is an alternate history supernatural spy story. Yet all are intoxicated by intricate world-building, which crowds out the characters and story. The central concept in ‘Summerland’ is admittedly brilliant: after Marconi managed to contact the dead, the afterlife has become part of the British Empire and ghost spies are interfering in the Spanish Civil War. The USSR is ruled by a hive intelligence derived from Lenin’s ghost; the UK by the ghost of Queen Victoria - as far as I could tell. All the aetheric technologies for communicating with and weaponising the dead are fascinating, as are the descriptions of the afterlife. However the plot isn’t anywhere near as complex and nuanced. I found a similar asymmetry in Radiance and Aurorarama: beguiling alternate worlds that are not matched by equally interesting plot or characters. In the case of ‘Summerland’, I never felt the sense of tension or paranoia that should characterise spy stories. The main point of view character Rachel White is unfortunately not that compelling and resorts to some rather tired cliches like getting drunk and making a scene, sleeping with a colleague as cover for spy shenanigans, and having a tragic rift with her husband due to lack of communication. All of these tropes can be done well, but weren't here as they felt rushed. Despite the flashbacks to his youth, Bloom also remains something of a cipher. Perhaps my standards for spy stories are very high thanks to John le Carré? If he wrote a novel set in this alternate universe, it would be incredible. As it stands, ‘Summerland’ has a great deal of potential yet couldn’t quite live up to it. The stakes are unclear then abstract, the plot terribly linear, and the characters much less vivid than the world they inhabit.

[Richard G · Rating 5 out of 5]

Hannu Rajaniemi has done it again. Summerland is a superbly crafted, immersive and thought-provoking novel. Instead of a deep space caper, Summerland is a pre-Cold War Era espionage mystery set in 1938 England where the East-West theatre is on the brink of the Spanish Civil War. Bureaucratic rivalry between the living and the dead in the British Intelligence intersect with private indiscretions of the elite, since in this alternative world, death is not the end but entre to a better place. In Summerland, land of the dead, political leaders continue to influence their political scene, spy masters continue operations and mothers still expect a call from their children. As in his Flambeur Trilogy, Mr. Rajaniemi expects his readers to jump in and discover the world he has crafted in context. World specific words are sparingly explained and Infodumps are anathema save for occasional info-tweets. The novel incorporates the air of the Fairy Courts where lightness and darkness shift intensity and an amalgam of Le Carre elements, such as a disgraced operative shuttled off to a financial department, a spy master named George and the post-mortem analysis of the care, maintenance and manufacturing of the perfect spy. Mr. Rajaniemi incorporates historical characters, such as members of the Cambridge Five, seamlessly with his own creations like a PM who would make Machiavelli sit back and cackle, “Oi, that’s a good one, mate.” Each element is distinct and integral to the ambiance of a community of keepers of secrets, keeping secrets from each other and themselves. His writing is tempered to the elements he is presenting. He has a dab hand in presenting logic and philosophical questions and is equally at ease channeling the shades of Chandler and Hammett: “The raindrops tasted like fear.” “...gunshots...like two keystrokes of an electric typewriter.” “He had…one of those voices that tickled your belly, no matter what he said.”

Summerland is a brilliant engaging read. Bravo.

[Dezideriu Szabo · Rating 4 out of 5]

Trebuie sa recunosc ca omul acesta are o imaginatie greu de egalat. Si chiar daca nu ma dau in vant dupa povestile de spionaj, faptul ca aceasta este cea mai stranie istorie alternativa pe care am citit-o pana acum m-a tinut "agatat" de paginile romanului.

[Mikko Saari · Rating 4 out of 5]

Säkenöivää tavaraa. Enpä olisi ensimmäiseksi odottanut Rajaniemen tarttuvan seuraavaksi vuoteen 1938 sijoittuvaan vakoojatrilleriin, mutta hyvä että tarttui, tämähän oli kerrassaan oiva teos. Mieleen tulee ennen kaikkea China Miévillen Toiset, koska tässä oli jotain samaa nyrjähtäneisyyttä – koska tokihan tämä ei ole mitenkään aivan suoraviivainen kirja.

Kirjan todellisuudessa kuolema nimittäin on kaikkea muuta kuin loppu – se on vain välivaihe, koska tuonpuoleisessa elämä jatkuu Kesämaassa, jos on sattunut saamaan lipun sinne eläessään. Ja kun elämä jatkuu, jatkuu moni muukin asia: Britannian ja Neuvostoliiton tiedustelupalvelut käyvät vakoojasotaansa myös rajan takana.

Kirjan päähenkilönä on agentti Rachel White, joka saa vihjeen Kesämaassa toimivasta kaksoisagentista. Rachel aloittaa jahdin, mutta miten napata kuollut kaksoisagentti, jolla on selvästi ystäviä korkeilla paikoilla?

Hieno kirja!

[Jen]

I normally don't write reviews here for items that I am supposed to review for LJ, but I do want to add that the synopsis that GoodReads has listed is incorrect. This is not about "the bastard daughter of Harry Houdini" or a "map of the Other Side". That does sound very intriguing, but those items are not anywhere in this particular book.

Review to follow in the Library Journal.

[Alex Sarll]

Rajaniemi's Jean le Flambeur trilogy was a marvel; tricksy, baroque post-singularity space opera, and as such exactly the sort of thing I was always likely to love. His first novel outside that...isn't. It's set in an alternate 1938 where, four decades earlier, scientists made irrefutable contact with the afterlife. So the Great War was won with ectotanks and flyers, people channelling the energy of the dead - and now, the battle between the Republicans and Franco looks set to draw the great powers into conflict once more. Except that here, with Germany more thoroughly crushed, it's Britain backing Franco - something which makes a horrible kind of sense when you consider that the erosion of the boundary between living and dead mean the older generation need never relinquish control, so Victoria and her contemporaries are still pulling the strings from behind an increasingly tattered veil. Which, yes, on one level is a good way to prod at the increasing feeling of our own younger generations that their predecessors aren't getting out of the way, that we're all suffering through an unending baby boomer purgatory. And set against that, the attraction/repulsion of the Presence, the Soviet overmind, a vast collective intelligence which seems equally plausible given the dreams of the early Communists, the true history of the Immortalisation Commission. And yet. As tends to be the case with st**mp*nk, there's that faintly annoying sense of boxes being ticked. So when we get to Spain and there are mentions of Comrade Eric, Pope Teilhard, a Georgian dissident Communist...it feels a little obvious, somehow. A little 'Oh, those guys. Yeah.' Which in turn makes it all the more odd once we meet the British Prime Minister, and despite blatantly being HG Wells, he's had the serial numbers filed off and is named 'HB West'. Surely it would make more sense either to do that for everyone, or none of them?

The other problem, and this is probably going to affect fewer readers, is that the whole set-up reminds me a bit too much of Wraith: The Oblivion - the none-more-goth nineties roleplaying game for people who didn't find Vampire quite morbid enough. The way that there exist cities in the afterlife, but ones replicating and in some ways amplifying the inequities of the living world. The abyss beyond and beneath that world, the living realm above it. The gradual fading of spirits without anchors, the way that old souls become the stuff of the realm so that prosperity is literally built from the souls of the dispossessed...this is all very familiar. Worse, once you've hit on that, the big reveals become very easy to predict. But as against the way that Wraith made everything sound suitably portentous, here it all feels a bit tickety-boo, the mid-century British jauntiness robbing the whole idea of much mystery. Yes, the term 'Spooks' for posthumous spies was probably inevitable, but the fact that the favoured are assured of their post-mortem integrity by possession of a 'Ticket'...well, it's that bit too Willy Wonka for me. I'm sure this is at least in part deliberate - an intentional move to show how capitalism can rob the world, and here even the next world, of its magic and mystery. And yet, to return to the RPG comparison, it makes me think less of the Spectacle's sins, and more of the sort of system where the players game the magic system for effect, without ever feeling the faintest touch of mystery.

Fundamentally, though, I think my problem is that I was just too in love with how free-floating and wide-ranging the Flambeur books were. An Earthbound story about mid-twentieth-century people was always going to be more constricted, both by research and by the manners of the time. There's more research to hold everything back (though not without very occasional glitches - I find the idea of a 1930s Brit saying "My husband - he has some issues" implausibly anachronistic, though of course this might be one of those times when we think a phrase arrived later than it did). And yes, on one level, I respect Rajaniemi for not just plugging away at that same thing we know he can do, forever. But on the other...well, remember how outside the Culture, Banks still found time to create three other excellent SF worlds for single novels? I think I expected something more like that. Whereas this feels a little too much like the substitute of his non-M books.

Still, if you're more into mid-twentieth-century spy thrillers than I am, I imagine this would be considerably more satisfactory. The idea of souls being visible to the dead as shapes of light, betraying emotion &c, is absolutely perfect (it's pretty much how I've always pictured them), and puts an interesting spin on the necessary games of deceit and misdirection - without making the whole business quite so absurd as it was in the espionage plotline of Pullman's Belle Sauvage*. The way in which the body image of the deceased can falter at times of stress, so suddenly they show the injury that killed them, or themselves as a child...well, I think we can all identify. And the logic games at the story's thematic heart, the notion that "if you started with a contradiction, you could prove anything"...it nags at me, in good ways. This is by no means a disaster. But for my own tastes, and compared to that magisterial debut trilogy, it is a disappointment.

*As it happens I was talking to a friend about this at the weekend, and we concluded - why doesn't the obviously dodgy guy with the obviously dodgy hyena daemon at least try to disguise it? Quick coat of paint, some fake ears, and "No, this is definitely a Labrador, that famously trusting breed. STOP LAUGHING, FIDO."

(Netgalley ARC)

[Viharmacska · Rating 5 out of 5]

4,5 fél, pedig az elején kedvencgyanú a világ miatt, de majd később, mert éhesen nem fair értékelést írni, főleg nem Hannu bácsiról.

[Rachel (Kalanadi) · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 stars -- full video review: https://youtu.be/N0nUK-D7E6c

[Tim · Rating 2 out of 5]

I had never heard of or read anything by Hannu Rajaniemi until I received a copy of his latest work, 'Summerland'. Looking up his name, one of his novels, 'Quantum Thief', showed up and yes, that cover rang a bell.

'Summerland' is a novel of various aspects: historical fiction, uchronic, spy-novel, ... The story is set in 1938, before World War II and during the Spanish Civil War with Franco, who's firmly ruling his country. However, the story is not an exact retelling of history, but a uchronic version, a "what if?". Great Britain and the Soviet Union are the sole, grand political powers in Europe. France and Germany don't play a role, or rather a minor one.

The British discovered a parallel world, Summerland, one where deceased people can continue their lives whilst keeping the age they had when they died in the real world. However, one must be of proper descent to have the means (vim, luz, etc.) to survive in that world; when those are depleted, one "dissipates" if personal levels are not recharged. To have access to that world, one needs a Ticket. Such souls can return to the real world via the bodies of real people, who offer their services as host; a sort of crown/halo serves as connector. Connection with Summerland occures via ecto products: ectophone, ectomail, ectotanks, ... Everything is 'ecto' in Summerland. As mentioned on Wikipedia: "(...) a prefix from Greek έκτός (ektós) meaning 'outside'."

The Soviet Union, Great Britian's enemy, also wishes to explore that world, but GB will do everything in its power to prevent that. Hence Rachel, working for the Winter Court, having to investigate the suspicious activity, as spies of the Summer Court have entered Summerland. Unfortunately, it was very unclear to me what these courts were, who/what was Winter Court, who/what was Summer Court, what they represented. If I recall correctly, this was not explained in the story. As Genesis used to sing: Land of Confusion. And there's more that soon enough became blurred for me: the various characters and who's who.

While a wide range of characters comes along, including political figures, you have to keep your mind to it, as there is no dramatis personae. Not every name is mentioned often enough. Some examples: C (which is a pseudonym, the real name was mentioned only a few times), Unschlicht, Shpiegelglass, West (prime minister?), ... Their names are mentioned a few times, though without a proper explanation of their roles. Especially later in the story such reminders are vital, yet very much absent. And they're all men, as you can see. It was a men's world, women were regarded as inferior. Rachel had to work harder than her male counterparts/colleagues. Not that she had other battles to fight, like her husband suffering from shell shock or generally described, his experiences in World War I. He can't and doesn't want to explain it to her, even refuses help. In the end, he'll even go back to the army to fight, the urge is too big. The late George Carlin once used Joe's condition in one of his performances. See here.

Rachel's and Peter's story lines will ultimately come together in a sort of all's well that ends well. And yet...

I may have overlooked something, maybe some actions/events went over my head - I won't deny that external circumstances might have influenced my reading, but still... -, maybe something was lost in translation - I did find the style a little burdensome, to be honest -, but I had a hard time "seeing" what was going on, connecting the dots, and why Spain was important. Apparently (as read in an other review), the British were not sure whether to root for Franco or for Joseph Stalin, who saw his political ambitions thwarted by Lenin, therefore seeing Spain's situation as a new opportunity.

Long story short: The original premise of a parallel world influencing the real world looked very interesting, I even thought of Iain Pears's recommended 'Arcadia' (see my review here). Unfortunately, how Mr Rajanimi put his story to paper didn't really convince me, despite my liking for historical fiction and uchronic stories. A proper explanation of the various characters, a little more (historical) background information on the political events, and other details would have made 'Summerland' all the more attractive, in my humble opinion.

P.S.: For an excellent novel set during the Spanish Civil War, even if it's an allegory, I recommend Terre de sang et de sueur (La Machine, #1) by the Belgian author with Spanish roots, Katia Lanero Zamora. See my review here. Book 2 is to see the light of day in spring 2023.

----------

I was sent this book by Éditions ActuSF for review. Many thanks to them for the trust.

[Gică Andreica · Rating 3 out of 5]

Singura certitudine pe care o avem ca oameni este moartea. Fie că vorbim despre cauze naturale, fie despre o boală gravă, posibil incurabilă, sau despre un accident, ea intervine și își face propriul joc, un proces care nu poate fi controlat și care, în consecință, este imposibil de oprit. Odată cu acest fenomen ireversibil, iau naștere cele trei  eterne întrebări. Ce se întâmplă cu sufletul după ce părăsește corpul? Există o lume de dincolo? Și dacă răspunsul este da, atunci cum arată ea și ce se află mai exact acolo? La fel ca în cazul celorlalte mari religii, creștinismul vine și încearcă să dea un răspuns cât se poate de clar. Însă, pentru a crede într-o posibilă variantă, ai nevoie de dovezi palpabile, lucru pe care nu ți-l poate oferi nimeni. Dar, dacă vorbim strict despre literatură, există mai mulți autori de science-fiction care au preluat și exploatat subiectul, iar unul dintre aceștia este Hannu Rajaniemi, care în romanul său, „Tărâmul verii”, ne propune o viziune pe cât de fascinantă, pe atât de tulburătoare.

Recenzia:
http://www.cartilemele.ro/2022/03/rec...

[Charlotte · Rating 3 out of 5]

I'm extremely confused by what's going on with this book. There's some interesting (if incomplete) worldbuilding, but the plot manages to be mostly unsurprising and kind of dull. The political reality also makes no sense - either in the sense of domestic or global politics. It reads like there were some great ideas here that just didn't cohere into a book.

For a book with such a big scope, Summerland just feels too small. It's like there are only fifteen real people in the world. This is the kind of book where a character can walk into a famous members' club and immediately stumble across the one person they desperately needed to see. Everything seems to take place in an extremely narrow slice of England - mostly London, with a few places in the home counties thrown in. Even the portions of Summerland that we see are functionally the same as Whitehall. We see about five seconds of action on the front in the Iberian Peninsula, and that's it.

Oh, and Rachel, the main character, grew up in India. She's called Rachel White and she's very pale (she refers to her pale complexion as her "best feature" at one point and this thought is not like, examined in any way....) and her mother has an extremely English-Upper Class name so I'm assuming she is a posh British child who was brought up in India as the daughter of a colonial officer of some kind. India is mentioned a handful of times, mostly as somewhere with better weather than England, or through Rachel's childhood nanny, who talked to her of spiritual things. That's about it, for India, though. In this book, it's a faraway warm place and it smells of spices.

I'm not saying this book is uncritical about the British Empire. But its criticisms look inwards. They focus on the crumbling nature of the white male patriarchy that runs the intelligence agencies, and not that much else. It's a book trying to be about big, expansive, almost global matters. But all it cares about is England.

Even Russia is just a faraway place where Lenin once lived, and which occasionally snares British agents and turns them with the promise of all-knowing typewriters and the promise of your spirit one day becoming part of God.

All of this means that I never felt that the war in Spain was real (and not just some theoretical bargaining chip that would bend to the exact will of whichever faction won control of it). In this world, too, 1938 Germany conveniently has nothing going on. Somehow nor do any of southern Europe or Asia or like, the USA or anywhere else in the world. For the story to make sense, the UK and the Soviet Union are the only world powers that matter. It doesn’t work. I am unconvinced. When the final act of the book suddenly tries to make the stakes into the survival of the afterlife it’s just not convincing. I can believe in a fictional world where Victorian spiritualism is real. But I can’t believe in a fictional 1938 with such a simple, basic geopolitical reality.

I found H.P. West very interesting but don't know enough about H.G. Wells to get as much out of his inclusion as some readers will. I think it's plain that Rajaniemi enjoyed writing him because he's written with a lot of kindness and empathy that shine through small details that are used to build a picture of him and his life - and we don't necessarily always see those for all of the other characters, although for the most part I thought that Rachel and Peter were both handled well.

But... in a book that is supposed to be so occupied with the threat of global war (because the threat of another world war is constantly mentioned, even though so much of the world is absent)... many of the most engaging scenes involved West crouched over his Small Wars (a type of war-game played with small figurines). Or they involved Rachel and her pet birds. Or... actually my favourite scene might involve a clandestine meeting in a strange wax museum.

Rajaniemi's prose is mostly pretty good, and at times I really enjoyed reading this. It's just a shame I also spent a lot of the time frustrated. Rajaniemi can write! He can write thrilling action scenes and affecting small moments and he can create characters I care about. But tying those together with an engaging world and a coherent plot that works on multiple different scales/scopes has eluded him here.

[Oleksandr Zholud · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is an alt-history novel, where afterlife is not only real, but is able to communicate with our reality. This is my second book by Hannu Rajaniemi after The Quantum Thief. I was impressed with the latter, but with this one – not so much. It is interesting to note that the book was published in 2018, when a book with the similar time period and similar importance of souls (albeit in as different way), namely Witchmark.

It is 1938 and British Empire not only covers the globe but has a foothold in underworld, called Summerland. The Afterlife is real, but to get there in full mental capacity one needs a Ticket, which gives access to a kind of virtual energy to keep consciousness together. Without it a soul quickly loses its memories and cognitive capacities, “drinks from Lethe”.

Enter Mrs. Rachel White, a middle age English woman, who works for Her Majesty Secret Service (Old Queen Victoria still rules – from the other side). She is one of the few women there, “only because you went to Eton with Sir Stewart and are able to pee standing up”, similar to our history’s 1930s. she works with a Soviet defector, who informs her about a mole in the service, gives his name and handle and they commits suicide. The mole is Peter Bloom, a ghost of the illegitimate son of the current PM, Herbert Blanco West (who is poorly hidden H.G. Wells). No one in the service believes her, so she assumed hysterical and put aside from ‘serious work’. She wants to prove her rightness by any means necessary.

Meanwhile Peter Bloom handles a contact in civil war Spain, which gives him info that notorious defector from the USSR, one Iosif Dzhugashvili (Stalin). Unlike our history, after Lenin died, in the USSR a group called ‘The God-Builders’ decided that “the Soviet people needed a God, and so they made an electric one. And now we have little Tombs everywhere, his eyes, watching everything. He is a sterner father than the Tsar ever was. And when we die, we become Him.
‘That was to be my reward, you see. I have served our radiant Father too well. I was chosen by the Immortalization Commission to return home and to undergo the Termin Procedure, to merge my meagre soul with that of Vladimir Ilyich Lenin. An honour beyond measure.’”.

While the novel is well written, characters are interesting, it is more or less a quick read without striking new ideas. Some things were simplified, like Spain is just a field in the Great Game between the British and the Soviet, there are fascist (backed by the British) and what happened with Germany and Italy we don’t see, for they just don’t fit in this story. The WWI seemed to be won by the Entente with use of ecto-tanks and other spirit weapons (probably without entry of the USA). The world is described only as much as needed for the story, so simplifications rule the day but worsen my personal experience.

[Vladimir Ivanov · Rating 4 out of 5]

Смерть больше не страшна. На рубеже ХХ века лондонские спиритисты (те самые, с вызовом духов и эктоплазмой) установили контакт с загробным миром, а нейробиологи разработали психотехники, защищающие свежеумершую душу от неизбежного растворения в эфире. И вот уже на дворе тридцатые, Британская Империя покоряет Страну Вечного Лета, строит города и дворцы, засылает призрачных шпионов в молодую Советскую республику. Большевикам есть чем ответить — на их стороне сверхчеловеческий коллективный разум, сконструированный Львом Терменом на основе сознания умирающего Ильича.

Британией правит посмертно вечная Королева Виктория, а премьером при ней — Герберт Уэллс. Он тут почему-то переименован в Герберта Уэста (реаниматора?), но все равно узнается безошибочно. Классические католики превратились в маргинальную фрик-секту, ватиканский трон занял новый папа — Тейяр де Шарден (ну а кто же еще!) Товарищ Сталин, не имея шансов прийти к власти в СССР, греет руки на пламени гражданской войны в Испании. Ким Филби пока еще молодой, честный и не перевербованный. Короче, альтернативно-исторических отсылок — море.

Технологии тоже не стоят на месте. На поле боя сражаются эктотанки, в баках которых вместо бензина горят души убитых врагов. Умершие родители по вечерам звонят живым детям по эфирному телефону. У большевиков в ходу телеграфы прямой связи с пост-сознанием Ленина. Медиумы с почасовой оплатой сдают свои тела в аренду мертвецам (но это недешевое удовольствие, менее состоятельные мертвецы вынуждены удовольствоваться электрическими куклами Эдисона).

И вот на таком роскошном, без преувеличения, холсте намалевана простецкая шпионская интрига, где британская разведка добывает сведения о наличии в своих рядах советского "крота" и в один ход выманивает его на классического живца. Очень мало говорится по делу, очень много про детство всех персонажей. В финале случается поворот от ле Карре к Лавкрафту, но он исполнен так робко, что по сути и не в счет.

7/10. Раньяеми, как всегда, придумал бомбический сеттинг, но с фабулой не справился совсем. В результате вышло неплохо, но не более. Лучше прочесть лазарчуковского "Штурмфогеля" — те же щи, только в разы гуще.

[Bee · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.5 Stars

Rajaniemi is an exceptional author. I have been deeply impressed with everything he's written. This is dark and mature story of loss and duty. A very strange world between the living and the dead, and a rather good spy vs spy story that unfolds.

I can't really say why I loved it so much, but it was a superb story that i finished in very few sittings. (The joy of Covid Lock Down I guess)