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Bone Dance: A Fantasy for Technophiles
Back in print, Bone Dance is a classic techno-fantasy from Emma Bull, author of the bestselling Territory
Sparrow's my name. Trader. Deal-maker. Hustler, some call me. I work the Night Fair circuit, buying and selling pre-nuke videos from the world before. I know how to get a high price, especially on Big Bang collectibles. But the hottest ticket of all is information on the Horsemen―the mind-control weapons that tilted the balance in the war between the Americas. That's the prize I'm after.
But it seems I'm having trouble controlling my own mind.
The Horsemen are coming.
Sparrow's my name. Trader. Deal-maker. Hustler, some call me. I work the Night Fair circuit, buying and selling pre-nuke videos from the world before. I know how to get a high price, especially on Big Bang collectibles. But the hottest ticket of all is information on the Horsemen―the mind-control weapons that tilted the balance in the war between the Americas. That's the prize I'm after.
But it seems I'm having trouble controlling my own mind.
The Horsemen are coming.
320 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1991
48 people are currently reading
2035 people want to read
About the author
Emma Bull
83 books690 followersEmma Bull is a science fiction and fantasy author whose best-known novel is War for the Oaks, one of the pioneering works of urban fantasy. She has participated in Terri Windling's Borderland shared universe, which is the setting of her 1994 novel Finder. She sang in the rock-funk band Cats Laughing, and both sang and played guitar in the folk duo The Flash Girls while living in Minneapolis, Minnesota.
Her 1991 post-apocalyptic science fiction novel Bone Dance was nominated for the Hugo, Nebula, and World Fantasy Awards. Bull wrote a screenplay for War for the Oaks, which was made into an 11-minute mini-film designed to look like a film trailer. She made a cameo appearance as the Queen of the Seelie Court, and her husband, Will Shetterly, directed. Bull and Shetterly created the shared universe of Liavek, for which they have both written stories. There are five Liavek collections extant.
She was a member of the writing group The Scribblies, which included Will Shetterly as well as Pamela Dean, Kara Dalkey, Nate Bucklin, Patricia Wrede and Steven Brust. With Steven Brust, Bull wrote Freedom and Necessity (1997), an epistolary novel with subtle fantasy elements set during the 19th century United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland Chartist movement.
Bull graduated from Beloit College in 1976. Bull and Shetterly live in Arizona.
Her 1991 post-apocalyptic science fiction novel Bone Dance was nominated for the Hugo, Nebula, and World Fantasy Awards. Bull wrote a screenplay for War for the Oaks, which was made into an 11-minute mini-film designed to look like a film trailer. She made a cameo appearance as the Queen of the Seelie Court, and her husband, Will Shetterly, directed. Bull and Shetterly created the shared universe of Liavek, for which they have both written stories. There are five Liavek collections extant.
She was a member of the writing group The Scribblies, which included Will Shetterly as well as Pamela Dean, Kara Dalkey, Nate Bucklin, Patricia Wrede and Steven Brust. With Steven Brust, Bull wrote Freedom and Necessity (1997), an epistolary novel with subtle fantasy elements set during the 19th century United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland Chartist movement.
Bull graduated from Beloit College in 1976. Bull and Shetterly live in Arizona.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 126 reviews
April 17, 2024
THIS BOOK IS HARD TO PITCH, FOR SEVERAL REASONS:
1) It defies genre boundaries. It's fantasy/scifi/post-apocalyptic/noir/cyberpunk. It will bounce from tarot reading to nuclear war to voodoo goddess to bioengineering and back again.
2) The plot is not straightforward enough to easily synopsize.
3) Part of the fun of this novel is figuring out what's going on. The book does not easily give you the premise or the plot; you get to work for it.
I CAN SAY THIS:
4) This book follows Sparrow, who sells black market VHS tapes in a post-apocalyptic city. The horsemen who brought the apocalypse are coming again, and Sparrow gets caught up in it.
5) This book has powerful themes of identity and bodily autonomy.
6) When I first read this book (at age 15), it was a little too strange and heavy for me. I didn't fully appreciate it then, tho I did enjoy it. Some of the marketing for this book says it's YA, but I would never put it there. Our main character is a teenager, but the themes/content-warnings/worldbuilding/out-of-this-world-Weirdness put the book firmly in the Adult category.
Now, I completely loved it. It's even better on a reread.
1) It defies genre boundaries. It's fantasy/scifi/post-apocalyptic/noir/cyberpunk. It will bounce from tarot reading to nuclear war to voodoo goddess to bioengineering and back again.
2) The plot is not straightforward enough to easily synopsize.
3) Part of the fun of this novel is figuring out what's going on. The book does not easily give you the premise or the plot; you get to work for it.
I CAN SAY THIS:
4) This book follows Sparrow, who sells black market VHS tapes in a post-apocalyptic city. The horsemen who brought the apocalypse are coming again, and Sparrow gets caught up in it.
5) This book has powerful themes of identity and bodily autonomy.
6) When I first read this book (at age 15), it was a little too strange and heavy for me. I didn't fully appreciate it then, tho I did enjoy it. Some of the marketing for this book says it's YA, but I would never put it there. Our main character is a teenager, but the themes/content-warnings/worldbuilding/out-of-this-world-Weirdness put the book firmly in the Adult category.
Now, I completely loved it. It's even better on a reread.
September 13, 2020
I'm not sure how to describe this book really, except to say that it is one of the very few where I just have to hang on by the skin of my teeth in order to know what's going on. That's appropriate in many ways because the main character, Sparrow, is having to do the same thing in order to make sense of his life in a very complicated dystopian future (which I always picture in my head looking a lot like Ridley Scott's Blade Runner crossed with Joss Whedon's Firefly series).
Be that as it may, this is my fourth time reading the book and it's been long enough that I only remember the very basic elements of the story. Once again, I'm hanging on by a thread, but loving the ride. Emma Bull is an author that more people should know about. She's written regrettably few books but the ones she has written are choice. This is the choicest of them.
Be that as it may, this is my fourth time reading the book and it's been long enough that I only remember the very basic elements of the story. Once again, I'm hanging on by a thread, but loving the ride. Emma Bull is an author that more people should know about. She's written regrettably few books but the ones she has written are choice. This is the choicest of them.
Read
July 12, 2016This book blew my socks off. I grabbed it on a whim, expecting some basic ’90s sci-fi, and it was so much better than I anticipated. Bone Dance is your typical post-apocalyptic story, and a lot of the expected tropes are there, but there’s so much more to it. The main character, Sparrow, survives in the gritty, deal-driven world of the Night Fair by tracking down books, movies, and audio recordings that have become precious (and sometimes forbidden) relics. But when a customer requests information about the Horsemen – the mysterious figures whose mind-control powers are rumored to have brought about the apocalypse – things quickly spin out of control. The plot is fast-paced and entertaining, and at the same time delves into issues of gender, sexuality, asexuality, morality, choice, and personal autonomy. This is a great pick for anyone who enjoys character-driven, thoughtful sci-fi.
– Zoe Dickinson
from The Best Books We Read In June 2016: http://bookriot.com/2016/06/29/riot-r...
– Zoe Dickinson
from The Best Books We Read In June 2016: http://bookriot.com/2016/06/29/riot-r...
June 21, 2007
The post-apocalyptic urban fantasy in which body-snatchers called Horsemen may be on the loose, and a small-time wanderer named Sparrow may have an epic job to do, but no one can quite explain what it is.
I enjoyed this, but it has some flaws. Chiefly, as with many books involving voodoo, there's a deus ex machina problem. I like the stakes to be high but human; things lose urgency for me if the main players are gods. Also, the gods are apparently the only ones who really know what's going on; Sparrow is ignorant from the first page to the last page, which is very frustrating.
The pacing is odd -- breakneck motion punctuated by long stays at various idyllic houses.
Considering how significant the power monopoly turns out to be, it's a problem that I wasn't really aware it existed until it was almost time to battle against it.
Also, seriously, why wasn't Tom riding A.A. Albrecht? The fact that he wasn't leaves Albrecht as a useless occupier of space, a dead end of forces.
I swear that my criticism isn't entirely just because this book wasn't War for the Oaks.
I enjoyed this, but it has some flaws. Chiefly, as with many books involving voodoo, there's a deus ex machina problem. I like the stakes to be high but human; things lose urgency for me if the main players are gods. Also, the gods are apparently the only ones who really know what's going on; Sparrow is ignorant from the first page to the last page, which is very frustrating.
The pacing is odd -- breakneck motion punctuated by long stays at various idyllic houses.
Considering how significant the power monopoly turns out to be, it's a problem that I wasn't really aware it existed until it was almost time to battle against it.
Also, seriously, why wasn't Tom riding A.A. Albrecht? The fact that he wasn't leaves Albrecht as a useless occupier of space, a dead end of forces.
I swear that my criticism isn't entirely just because this book wasn't War for the Oaks.
May 16, 2020
Progress report: Weak & confusing start. So far this dystopian novel seems incoherent, and I don't know how far I'll get. It's been on my TBR for years, & I finally came across a used copy.
Took a look at other 2 & 3-star reviews, which reinforce my unease. I haven't quite given up (yet). Tom Whalley's 2-star seems on target: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...
"For a book that was specifically recommended to me by a friend, and a book that seemed so interesting on the blurb, I gotta say that I'm disappointed in myself for reading this all the way through. I should have dropped it at the start of the third chapter, when I first began to have doubts."
I'm not quite ready to recycle my copy, but it's on indefinite hiatus, & likely headed for a DNF. Oh, well.
Took a look at other 2 & 3-star reviews, which reinforce my unease. I haven't quite given up (yet). Tom Whalley's 2-star seems on target: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...
"For a book that was specifically recommended to me by a friend, and a book that seemed so interesting on the blurb, I gotta say that I'm disappointed in myself for reading this all the way through. I should have dropped it at the start of the third chapter, when I first began to have doubts."
I'm not quite ready to recycle my copy, but it's on indefinite hiatus, & likely headed for a DNF. Oh, well.
June 9, 2010
Voodoo meets cyberpunk in this post-apocalyptic urban fantasy....
A bit of a similar feel to the stories she did for Bordertown/Borderlands... but these characters are playing for higher stakes.... our protagonist is Sparrow, an androgynous character with a love for old movies and a talent for electronic tinkering; her friends include a young tarot card reader and a nightclub DJ/VJ... but when old legends of mysterious individuals who have the ability to switch bodies at will start surfacing, the average citizens of this decaying version of Minneapolis (?) are out of their depth....
good stuff!
A bit of a similar feel to the stories she did for Bordertown/Borderlands... but these characters are playing for higher stakes.... our protagonist is Sparrow, an androgynous character with a love for old movies and a talent for electronic tinkering; her friends include a young tarot card reader and a nightclub DJ/VJ... but when old legends of mysterious individuals who have the ability to switch bodies at will start surfacing, the average citizens of this decaying version of Minneapolis (?) are out of their depth....
good stuff!
May 11, 2010
A taut post apocalyptic science fiction novel where Sparrow, the hero, is a special kind of being, who has to combat the Horseman, modern day weapons, who have come to Sparrow's world.
Has some nasty bits, but by and large, is another example of Bull's ability to tell a tale.
Nominated for Hugo, Nebula and World Fantasy Award.
Has some nasty bits, but by and large, is another example of Bull's ability to tell a tale.
Nominated for Hugo, Nebula and World Fantasy Award.
March 25, 2012
Weirdly forgettable post apocalyptic story of body-hopping genetically engineered super soldiers and a battle with the old gods. A coming-into-self story narrated by an intersex person (or possibly a sex-neutral person, this was not clear to me). I'm trying to remember if I've ever seen it on any of those LGBT scifi interest booklists that float around, because I feel like I haven't and that maybe everyone else forgets this book, too. I've never been as impressed with Emma Bull as a lot of people I know, but I feel like this one wasn't me. This one was a hodge-podge book that was trying to do something interesting with the narrator's lack of gender, but executed it in such a way that I seriously thought our first two narrative clues about what was going on were copyeditorial mistakes. Some warm emotional stuff here about forging connections out of isolation and recovering from violence, but I was distracted by the 'throw it at the wall, see if it sticks' A-plot, and by the way my mind seemed to magically slide off this book even as I read it.
I should stop wandering randomly around Bull's catalog and just read War for the Oaks already, shouldn't I?
I should stop wandering randomly around Bull's catalog and just read War for the Oaks already, shouldn't I?
October 14, 2019
Storyline: 2/5
Characters: 3/5
Writing Style: 2/5
World: 2/5
The first few chapters have to be read as feeling rather than narrative. The main character is disoriented, and the world isn’t one any reader will be familiar with. We stumble into lots of proper nouns, but are they people? places? events? There’s dreams and drug use in night scenes that are already ill or sporadically lighted. The writing is as much slang, mumbo jumbo, and figurative embellishment as it is comprehensible subject-predicate. The reader has a dual challenge, then, of not only determining what is real but what it all means. The first several chapters are fairly brutal; this is probably a book that many give up on. Bull doesn’t give one enough assurance that it is all going to make sense. There’s a real possibility, still at chapter three or four and perhaps even five, that this is going to remain experimental art rather than a story. Read on, however. When the world and narrative do take an order, its appearance is as shocking as its earlier absence. There isn’t a particular page one can point to where the writing is tamer and the events more intelligible, but it does occur. It is not clear when exactly the main forms for the city and its general outlines take shape, but they’re there, and for a little while, at least, there’s an easy-to-follow story with a clear cast of characters, conveyed constraints, and identifiable goals. The best part of the story is when that overall picture forms, when you know that there was some reward for all the fugue and uncertainty. At that point the book had its most potential. Bull was doing something creative with cyberpunk – undeniably building off it but substituting the “cyber” and going different directions with the “punk.” There is a point at around the first quarter mark when one thinks that this could actually be a great book.
It never got to be a great book. I could believe someone who told me that there is actually a rich and rewarding thread through this if they understand arcana. In the dedication Bull notes: “The section headings are paraphrased from Bill Butler’s Dictionary of the Tarot (Schocken Books, 1978), a wonderful book for anyone interested in the comparative symbolism and interpretation of the tarot.” That could have been an interesting way lead us through the story. What it ended up meaning was that there were lines of gibberish at the start of each chapter. Here I trusted Bull too much, and this is the book’s greatest failing. That gibberish never takes form. Bull is not bringing you along while she gradually builds a picture that will snap into focus. This required prior knowledge of religious/mythical symbols and characters that I lacked, and Bull does not do readers such as myself the service of introducing us into and familiarizing us with that world. Knowledge and understanding of is assumed. Much of what happens with the story is inexplicable: personas arrive that I didn’t know existed and do things I didn’t know were possible. Options appear and decisions are made that are nonsensical or, worse, uninterpretable. There was real effort in this book to make something extraordinary, but many, many key pieces were missing. This reminds me of some other science fiction, fantasy, or alternate history books that put a lot of effort into the story only to end up as weird disappointments.
Because the resolving picture is the highlight of the book, and so much about the world and the characters is purposefully kept hidden until specific moments in the book, this is a story that will be ruined by many reviewers revealing to you that information before you start.
P.S. .
Characters: 3/5
Writing Style: 2/5
World: 2/5
The first few chapters have to be read as feeling rather than narrative. The main character is disoriented, and the world isn’t one any reader will be familiar with. We stumble into lots of proper nouns, but are they people? places? events? There’s dreams and drug use in night scenes that are already ill or sporadically lighted. The writing is as much slang, mumbo jumbo, and figurative embellishment as it is comprehensible subject-predicate. The reader has a dual challenge, then, of not only determining what is real but what it all means. The first several chapters are fairly brutal; this is probably a book that many give up on. Bull doesn’t give one enough assurance that it is all going to make sense. There’s a real possibility, still at chapter three or four and perhaps even five, that this is going to remain experimental art rather than a story. Read on, however. When the world and narrative do take an order, its appearance is as shocking as its earlier absence. There isn’t a particular page one can point to where the writing is tamer and the events more intelligible, but it does occur. It is not clear when exactly the main forms for the city and its general outlines take shape, but they’re there, and for a little while, at least, there’s an easy-to-follow story with a clear cast of characters, conveyed constraints, and identifiable goals. The best part of the story is when that overall picture forms, when you know that there was some reward for all the fugue and uncertainty. At that point the book had its most potential. Bull was doing something creative with cyberpunk – undeniably building off it but substituting the “cyber” and going different directions with the “punk.” There is a point at around the first quarter mark when one thinks that this could actually be a great book.
It never got to be a great book. I could believe someone who told me that there is actually a rich and rewarding thread through this if they understand arcana. In the dedication Bull notes: “The section headings are paraphrased from Bill Butler’s Dictionary of the Tarot (Schocken Books, 1978), a wonderful book for anyone interested in the comparative symbolism and interpretation of the tarot.” That could have been an interesting way lead us through the story. What it ended up meaning was that there were lines of gibberish at the start of each chapter. Here I trusted Bull too much, and this is the book’s greatest failing. That gibberish never takes form. Bull is not bringing you along while she gradually builds a picture that will snap into focus. This required prior knowledge of religious/mythical symbols and characters that I lacked, and Bull does not do readers such as myself the service of introducing us into and familiarizing us with that world. Knowledge and understanding of is assumed. Much of what happens with the story is inexplicable: personas arrive that I didn’t know existed and do things I didn’t know were possible. Options appear and decisions are made that are nonsensical or, worse, uninterpretable. There was real effort in this book to make something extraordinary, but many, many key pieces were missing. This reminds me of some other science fiction, fantasy, or alternate history books that put a lot of effort into the story only to end up as weird disappointments.
Because the resolving picture is the highlight of the book, and so much about the world and the characters is purposefully kept hidden until specific moments in the book, this is a story that will be ruined by many reviewers revealing to you that information before you start.
P.S. .
Read
April 4, 2018william gibson/albert pyun/supernatural YA/vhs worship, all the cool shit you imagine from looking at the cover + musing on identity/gender/faith/humanity
August 2, 2011
A neo-noir post-cyberpunk faux-apocalyptic urban fantasy. The first two kind of go hand in hand but the latter two... let's just say that I, as a sucker for post-apocalyptic nonsense and a... whatever the opposite of a sucker is for urban fantasy, find myself pretty indifferent to this book.
Why "faux-apocalyptic?" We are reminded over and over again that this takes place about 50 years after "the Bang" destroyed civilization in the Western hemisphere, and yet everything seems to play out exactly like in all the other delightfully outdated cyberpunk novels from the period, only without cyberspace. You know what I mean: the protagonist's social circle exists on the edges and in the frayed cracks of the city, thumbing their noses at The Establishment and throwing off-the-grid underground raves and repurposing artifacts and using crazy street lingo and what have you. I guess instead of cyberspace here we have voodoo as a metaphor for social systems, which is unfortunate (and, honestly, particularly uninteresting to me as fodder for a story by a white woman). Everyone seems to pretty much have what they need (and the characters are, I think, supposed to be part of the less privileged class?), there's a functioning government and even a border patrol between the US and Canada... the less things change, the more they stay the same.
This Bang was caused by the Horsemen, mind-controlling soldiers created by the US government for use in their war against the nations of South America. You might think that Bull would relate this somehow to the voodoo spirits/gods active in this world (deus ex machinas abound), but... she does not. The narrative here concerns a confluence of the surviving horsemen and the pawns they manipulate (who are also being manipulated by the voodoo spirits and who are, the protagonist especially, basically just a bunch of chumps), and something about a power monopoly in the City (Minneapolis), which isn't mentioned until about 2/3rds of the way through the book, and which doesn't seem to have anything to do with anything, frankly.
Also the much-lauded gender stuff here basically boils down to pronouns/semantics, which is cool I guess but not really thought-provoking or as deep as I expected.
Why "faux-apocalyptic?" We are reminded over and over again that this takes place about 50 years after "the Bang" destroyed civilization in the Western hemisphere, and yet everything seems to play out exactly like in all the other delightfully outdated cyberpunk novels from the period, only without cyberspace. You know what I mean: the protagonist's social circle exists on the edges and in the frayed cracks of the city, thumbing their noses at The Establishment and throwing off-the-grid underground raves and repurposing artifacts and using crazy street lingo and what have you. I guess instead of cyberspace here we have voodoo as a metaphor for social systems, which is unfortunate (and, honestly, particularly uninteresting to me as fodder for a story by a white woman). Everyone seems to pretty much have what they need (and the characters are, I think, supposed to be part of the less privileged class?), there's a functioning government and even a border patrol between the US and Canada... the less things change, the more they stay the same.
This Bang was caused by the Horsemen, mind-controlling soldiers created by the US government for use in their war against the nations of South America. You might think that Bull would relate this somehow to the voodoo spirits/gods active in this world (deus ex machinas abound), but... she does not. The narrative here concerns a confluence of the surviving horsemen and the pawns they manipulate (who are also being manipulated by the voodoo spirits and who are, the protagonist especially, basically just a bunch of chumps), and something about a power monopoly in the City (Minneapolis), which isn't mentioned until about 2/3rds of the way through the book, and which doesn't seem to have anything to do with anything, frankly.
Also the much-lauded gender stuff here basically boils down to pronouns/semantics, which is cool I guess but not really thought-provoking or as deep as I expected.
September 29, 2018
Hoodoo and tarot in a post crash setting, this is more fantasy than science fiction - though many reviews at the time mentioned cyberpunk. Electronics feature prominently, but no computers. The setting and characters (and villains) are strong - this would make a good movie.
This is likely set in Minnesota, though no locations I recognize were mentioned. The world is hinted at without being explicitly shown or discussed, which is perfect for this tale. Along with electronics, our main character Sparrow deals in videotapes of old movies, preferably original releases, and other ephemera - which was fun to follow.
Published in 1991, the measuring stick of the day was cyberpunk, and arguably this has aspects of that. That said, the main focus is the characters, the balance of magic, and the tarot. My only complaint is that I kept putting the book down for other things - it never grabbed me until the end. It would make a decent movie or miniseries, but even without that it's a good story - 4 stars and recommended.
This is likely set in Minnesota, though no locations I recognize were mentioned. The world is hinted at without being explicitly shown or discussed, which is perfect for this tale. Along with electronics, our main character Sparrow deals in videotapes of old movies, preferably original releases, and other ephemera - which was fun to follow.
Published in 1991, the measuring stick of the day was cyberpunk, and arguably this has aspects of that. That said, the main focus is the characters, the balance of magic, and the tarot. My only complaint is that I kept putting the book down for other things - it never grabbed me until the end. It would make a decent movie or miniseries, but even without that it's a good story - 4 stars and recommended.
March 10, 2009
Emma Bull's other great book (after "War for the Oaks") also set in the Twin Cities of Minneapolis/St. Paul... but this is a far different city with a far different protagonist. Set in a post-apocalyptic future, we are introduced to the city through the experiences of Sparrow, a loner and audiophile with surprisingly many connections despite a predilection for insulting friends and driving them away.
I really can't go into more detail about the plot without revealing some of the wonderful twists and turns, but I love this book. There might be a flaw or two, but it hardly detracts from the unfolding of the clever and engrossing plot.
I really can't go into more detail about the plot without revealing some of the wonderful twists and turns, but I love this book. There might be a flaw or two, but it hardly detracts from the unfolding of the clever and engrossing plot.
November 2, 2019
The Horsemen shifted the war, leaving the world in ruins; it is here that Sparrow lives, gathering and selling off memories of the past - until these powerful beings begin a final showdown, where violence and deception drag Sparrow into a battle that may lead beyond the physical realm...Bull will draw in readers with vivid descriptions and an intriguing buildup of suspense and mystery, only to lose them with a confusing narrative, unnecessary use of course language, and uninteresting exploration of the spiritual fantasies of this shakily woven story. What role could Sparrow possibly play when the battle involves those who are of both the past and present?
January 11, 2015
I started reading Emma Bull when I was practically ordered to read War for the Oaks, so I read all her novels, then started in on her significant other's books (Will Shetterly).
July 2, 2020
“Death, the Sun, the Lovers. Lots of major arcana. Your future's controlled by others. There's powerful people playing with it. You're gonna have to fight to get it back...this is the country of truth. There the Devil, the Star, the Tower. In this country of truth, where your spirit lives, your life still isn't your own. Other stronger spirits, or maybe gods--they've got the say in what happens to you.”
Content warning for talk about sexual and physical abuse and minor spoilers for Bone Dance.
In a city gripped by a single man with a monopoly on energy, Sparrow is what I’d call a Nostalgist. They find old curiosities and sell them to people who can afford to collect remnants of the past in a future that only serves the wealthy and privileged.
“Happiness, in the land of Deals, is measured on a sliding scale. What makes you happy? A long white silent car with smoked-glass windows, with a chauffeur and a stocked bar and two beautiful objects of desire in the back seat? An apartment in a nice part of town? A kinder lover? A place to stand that's out of the wind? A brief cessation of pain? It depends on what you have at the moment I ask that question, and what you don't have. Wait a little, just a little. The scale will slide again.”
After a big deal, Sparrow remembers nothing of the night before, waking up with a killer headache. Turns out it isn't booze. A horseman took her body for their own and now powerful forces are coming for Sparrow. It's harrowing and heavy material and not for the faint of heart.
“Suddenly I could imagine all the things my body might do when I wasn't there to stop it and I felt so vile they might as well have happened. Maybe they had; they just hadn't left marks. I thought about a future full of blank spaces, and I knew I couldn't bear it. If that was the future, I had to escape it.”
I say “them” because, in this young adult cyberpunk novel, fantasy elements are bolted on; often to great effect. The story goes that years back these horsemen created by the government were made to be perfect weapons. They can infiltrate anyone’s mind, pushing their consciousness down—sometimes long enough to kill them outright. They made political changes and shaped the future, engaged in social engineering, topples empires from the inside. But their lives also cultivated a kind of insanity within them. The Big Bang. A horseman turned a key and detonated a nuclear bomb, ushering in a dystopia.
This same government also created androgynous bodies supposedly devoid of thought that were to be used by these horsemen. One of the main points of tension is the origin of Sparrow however, because bodies such as theirs are meant to be empty and waiting. They pass for male or female depending, generally, on the people they’re around at the time. Sparrow leveraged this to fade into the background and make a life in the shadows. They don’t really have close friends and their life, ironically, is in their media collection, which is massive and references pop culture from before the book was made. This past is the only thing they care about. Not their own; the history of others.
“Her skin was translucent pale, the complexion of the rich. Money made an excellent sunblock.”
But that anonymity is no longer an option as they get embroiled in a plot that puts them at a crossroads with horsemen at the other ends.
As the story unfolds, we learn about Sparrow as they learn about themselves. Often painfully. Cyberpunk often puts marginalized on display but this time it’s embodied fully in Sparrow. Performing gender, unfair power dynamics, and forces and powers people really don’t understand but are none-the-less leveraged for their own selfish ends are placed front and center in the fiction.
“The origin of my body and my mind didn't matter. I, the part of me that learned, that called on my memories, that knew I'd pulled a plant like this before, that had moved this hand to do it, was fifteen years old and innocent of evil or good. Neutral. From here forward, I was blank tape; what would be recorded there, and when, and why, was up to me.”
A major component to the fantasy elements in Bone Dance is Voodoo. The perception of nature parallels the discovery Sparrow goes through as they have to confront their past and rely on others for help in a way they’ve never allowed themselves to do before. Humanity’s view on supernatural forces, specifically in terms of Tarot and its subjectivity, is similarly paralleled. The major chapters are even introduced with tarot cards. But those answers rely on an interpretation which is flawed for the reader (at least, in my own experience) because of the power dynamics we’ve created with capitalism; so this information often acts as misinformation.
“From the lip of the Ravine, I could see the Deeps on the other side, hard gray and brown brick on wood on the nearest structures, shading further in to rose, bronze, black pearl, and verdigris in spires of stone, metals, and brilliant glass. The empress of it all, rising from the center, was Ego, the tallest building in the City, whose reflective flanks had no color of their own, but worse the sky instead--relentless, cloudless blue today. The towers of the Deeps, rising in angles or curves, were made more poignant by the occasional shattered forms of their ruined kin.”
Bone Dance is also filled with some of the best prose I’ve read. A character that is unique and intersectional. One in which feels like the handling around gender identity is done well, though I can’t speak to that much. I’m not one for fantasy usually, but this, as with other genre mashups I’ve read lately, has some of the very best work in cyberpunk I’ve consumed. Published in 1991, it’s interesting that there is another example of intersectional cyberpunk that is more progressive than most of what was coming out in that space at that time (and discards some of the problems in the first wave) and was released 2 years before it was declared dead with Snow Crash, no less.
While Sparrow discovers themself, they also have to confront their place in the world via these themes around nature because their body doesn’t fit the societal norms. This is tethered to the notion around popular spirituality being polluted by the environment we’ve created. How can we really have a grip on a truth that might be held in spirituality and spiritualism when our reality is rooted in capitalistic notions that conflict with and destroy nature. It’s also about trauma and how Sparrow chooses to process theirs. And the marks it leaves under the skin, forever.
"I don't trust memory, anyway. Why should I? Memories, however undependable, ought to be the stuff on the sand when the tides of experience recedes. As long as they're part of that process, there's something valid about them, something that ties them to real life."
Content warning for talk about sexual and physical abuse and minor spoilers for Bone Dance.
In a city gripped by a single man with a monopoly on energy, Sparrow is what I’d call a Nostalgist. They find old curiosities and sell them to people who can afford to collect remnants of the past in a future that only serves the wealthy and privileged.
“Happiness, in the land of Deals, is measured on a sliding scale. What makes you happy? A long white silent car with smoked-glass windows, with a chauffeur and a stocked bar and two beautiful objects of desire in the back seat? An apartment in a nice part of town? A kinder lover? A place to stand that's out of the wind? A brief cessation of pain? It depends on what you have at the moment I ask that question, and what you don't have. Wait a little, just a little. The scale will slide again.”
After a big deal, Sparrow remembers nothing of the night before, waking up with a killer headache. Turns out it isn't booze. A horseman took her body for their own and now powerful forces are coming for Sparrow. It's harrowing and heavy material and not for the faint of heart.
“Suddenly I could imagine all the things my body might do when I wasn't there to stop it and I felt so vile they might as well have happened. Maybe they had; they just hadn't left marks. I thought about a future full of blank spaces, and I knew I couldn't bear it. If that was the future, I had to escape it.”
I say “them” because, in this young adult cyberpunk novel, fantasy elements are bolted on; often to great effect. The story goes that years back these horsemen created by the government were made to be perfect weapons. They can infiltrate anyone’s mind, pushing their consciousness down—sometimes long enough to kill them outright. They made political changes and shaped the future, engaged in social engineering, topples empires from the inside. But their lives also cultivated a kind of insanity within them. The Big Bang. A horseman turned a key and detonated a nuclear bomb, ushering in a dystopia.
This same government also created androgynous bodies supposedly devoid of thought that were to be used by these horsemen. One of the main points of tension is the origin of Sparrow however, because bodies such as theirs are meant to be empty and waiting. They pass for male or female depending, generally, on the people they’re around at the time. Sparrow leveraged this to fade into the background and make a life in the shadows. They don’t really have close friends and their life, ironically, is in their media collection, which is massive and references pop culture from before the book was made. This past is the only thing they care about. Not their own; the history of others.
“Her skin was translucent pale, the complexion of the rich. Money made an excellent sunblock.”
But that anonymity is no longer an option as they get embroiled in a plot that puts them at a crossroads with horsemen at the other ends.
As the story unfolds, we learn about Sparrow as they learn about themselves. Often painfully. Cyberpunk often puts marginalized on display but this time it’s embodied fully in Sparrow. Performing gender, unfair power dynamics, and forces and powers people really don’t understand but are none-the-less leveraged for their own selfish ends are placed front and center in the fiction.
“The origin of my body and my mind didn't matter. I, the part of me that learned, that called on my memories, that knew I'd pulled a plant like this before, that had moved this hand to do it, was fifteen years old and innocent of evil or good. Neutral. From here forward, I was blank tape; what would be recorded there, and when, and why, was up to me.”
A major component to the fantasy elements in Bone Dance is Voodoo. The perception of nature parallels the discovery Sparrow goes through as they have to confront their past and rely on others for help in a way they’ve never allowed themselves to do before. Humanity’s view on supernatural forces, specifically in terms of Tarot and its subjectivity, is similarly paralleled. The major chapters are even introduced with tarot cards. But those answers rely on an interpretation which is flawed for the reader (at least, in my own experience) because of the power dynamics we’ve created with capitalism; so this information often acts as misinformation.
“From the lip of the Ravine, I could see the Deeps on the other side, hard gray and brown brick on wood on the nearest structures, shading further in to rose, bronze, black pearl, and verdigris in spires of stone, metals, and brilliant glass. The empress of it all, rising from the center, was Ego, the tallest building in the City, whose reflective flanks had no color of their own, but worse the sky instead--relentless, cloudless blue today. The towers of the Deeps, rising in angles or curves, were made more poignant by the occasional shattered forms of their ruined kin.”
Bone Dance is also filled with some of the best prose I’ve read. A character that is unique and intersectional. One in which feels like the handling around gender identity is done well, though I can’t speak to that much. I’m not one for fantasy usually, but this, as with other genre mashups I’ve read lately, has some of the very best work in cyberpunk I’ve consumed. Published in 1991, it’s interesting that there is another example of intersectional cyberpunk that is more progressive than most of what was coming out in that space at that time (and discards some of the problems in the first wave) and was released 2 years before it was declared dead with Snow Crash, no less.
While Sparrow discovers themself, they also have to confront their place in the world via these themes around nature because their body doesn’t fit the societal norms. This is tethered to the notion around popular spirituality being polluted by the environment we’ve created. How can we really have a grip on a truth that might be held in spirituality and spiritualism when our reality is rooted in capitalistic notions that conflict with and destroy nature. It’s also about trauma and how Sparrow chooses to process theirs. And the marks it leaves under the skin, forever.
"I don't trust memory, anyway. Why should I? Memories, however undependable, ought to be the stuff on the sand when the tides of experience recedes. As long as they're part of that process, there's something valid about them, something that ties them to real life."
February 3, 2020
The Quick Take
Bone Dance is a psychological thriller, a low-tech cyberpunk noir, a novel of spiritual and self-discovery, and a classic “oh shit, we gotta stop the baddie” book. This identity crisis results in issues of pacing and development that made finishing the book a slog despite there being moments of beauty and depth.
[I read old fantasy and sci-fi novels written by women authors in search of forgotten gems. See more at forfemfan.com]
The Proper Review
Part of Bone Dance's identity crisis makes it impossible to talk about Bone Dance without spoilers. So while I’m not going to tell you how it all ends, be forewarned that I don’t think I can write a more traditional review without giving away something that’ll detract from the reading experience.
To make both writing and reading this review easier, I’m going to start with a big one.
Sparrow, the main character, is neither male nor female. On account of unusual anatomy, they describe themselves as gender neuter. While Sparrow doesn’t seem to give a fuck themself about their anatomy or gender identity, they are terrified of people learning this lest it betray their unusual origin story. Thus, they have no close friends.
Lots of folks reference this with awe. I found it lacking depth and realism.
First off, Sparrow’s anatomy and gender identity don’t really matter. Their purpose in the book is to drive a wedge between Sparrow and the world, but other things could have easily filled this role: an identifying tattoo, for example. And as proof that Sparrow’s gender identity isn’t anchored enough in the writing, it wouldn’t even be particularly difficult to re-write the novel swapping it out for something like a tattoo.
Secondly, wouldn’t it make more sense for Sparrow to embrace one gender, rather than exist in an androgynous state where everyone’s second-guessing and, thus, discussing their gender identity?
If I had reason to believe that Sparrow struggles between being themself and blending in—boom, no questions asked. But Sparrow specifically doesn’t want to stand out and is described as looking androgynous. It’d be easy enough to assume one gender identity when facing the world, and far, far less likely to garner unwanted scrutiny.
I don’t get it.
But there are lots of things I don’t get. Most of the book, if I’m being honest. The depth of voodoo lore woven through everything is so strong I felt like I needed a companion book that explained the pieces I was missing. The low-tech cyberpunk world surrounds Sparrow, but on account of way too much ground to cover, it felt hollow and incongruous. I still don’t really get the ending—every review under the sun references it being a deus-ex-machina sort of thing, and it really is, but I don’t even get what the deus-ex-machina did, why it did it, or the significance of the outcome.
Like, okay, Tom Worceski is an awful guy, but the post-apocalyptic city of Minneapolis seemed like it was doing damn well despite existing on the bad side of the apocalypse. I didn’t see a single example of personal strife.
(Aside: this is part of my confusion over world building)
Why was busting up A. Albrecht’s shit so important? And how was that the climax of a book that started with Sparrow going “why am I blacking out for no reason and waking up missing days of my life” when Albrecht has absolutely nothing to do with that opening premise?
I could forgive all of this, every last one of these sins, if something compelling strung them all together. It doesn’t. Between the beginning and the end, we get to watch Sparrow settle into multiple perfectly accepting and respectful communities, run away from multiple bad guys who end up being good guys who then join Sparrow in running away from future encounters with bad guys who end up being good guys. Characters appear or are invented at random and convenient intervals, then are sidelined or killed the second their presence is a problem. I swear to cod one character was invented just to introduce a side-quest about getting school books to a kid so some postcards would land in Sparrow’s hands in time for a small plot point a few pages later.
There has to have been a better way to do that.
Obviously, it couldn’t be all bad or I wouldn’t have finished Bone Dancer likability. Those early chapters that leaned towards psychological thriller enticed me, and I desperately wanted to learn more about why they were happening. A secondary character—Frances—was a delight, and not just because she was the only secondary character with any sort of depth. And while it seems a little funny now, I do appreciate Sparrow’s genuine love of 1990s technology. There’s nothing like hearing tell of a 27-inch monitor with awe.
My first draft of this review was over 2,000 words long. I have feelings about Bone Dance. I have to admit, though that I have those feelings because I want to like it. Terrible books without merit I trash quickly and diss easily. Books that finish almost despite myself, and then labor over a negative review, I do so because there was something there I really, really like. It’s unfair of me to say, but I almost feel betrayed.
There is so much potential in Bone Dance, and Emma Bull is a fabulous writer. This might be a weird analogy, but reading it felt like simultaneously eating a pale, cafeteria version of something utterly delicious like pad Thai while smelling pad Thai from my favorite restaurant. Just infuriating and dissatisfying and a reminder of what I’m missing out on.
Bone Dance is a psychological thriller, a low-tech cyberpunk noir, a novel of spiritual and self-discovery, and a classic “oh shit, we gotta stop the baddie” book. This identity crisis results in issues of pacing and development that made finishing the book a slog despite there being moments of beauty and depth.
[I read old fantasy and sci-fi novels written by women authors in search of forgotten gems. See more at forfemfan.com]
The Proper Review
Part of Bone Dance's identity crisis makes it impossible to talk about Bone Dance without spoilers. So while I’m not going to tell you how it all ends, be forewarned that I don’t think I can write a more traditional review without giving away something that’ll detract from the reading experience.
To make both writing and reading this review easier, I’m going to start with a big one.
Sparrow, the main character, is neither male nor female. On account of unusual anatomy, they describe themselves as gender neuter. While Sparrow doesn’t seem to give a fuck themself about their anatomy or gender identity, they are terrified of people learning this lest it betray their unusual origin story. Thus, they have no close friends.
Lots of folks reference this with awe. I found it lacking depth and realism.
First off, Sparrow’s anatomy and gender identity don’t really matter. Their purpose in the book is to drive a wedge between Sparrow and the world, but other things could have easily filled this role: an identifying tattoo, for example. And as proof that Sparrow’s gender identity isn’t anchored enough in the writing, it wouldn’t even be particularly difficult to re-write the novel swapping it out for something like a tattoo.
Secondly, wouldn’t it make more sense for Sparrow to embrace one gender, rather than exist in an androgynous state where everyone’s second-guessing and, thus, discussing their gender identity?
If I had reason to believe that Sparrow struggles between being themself and blending in—boom, no questions asked. But Sparrow specifically doesn’t want to stand out and is described as looking androgynous. It’d be easy enough to assume one gender identity when facing the world, and far, far less likely to garner unwanted scrutiny.
I don’t get it.
But there are lots of things I don’t get. Most of the book, if I’m being honest. The depth of voodoo lore woven through everything is so strong I felt like I needed a companion book that explained the pieces I was missing. The low-tech cyberpunk world surrounds Sparrow, but on account of way too much ground to cover, it felt hollow and incongruous. I still don’t really get the ending—every review under the sun references it being a deus-ex-machina sort of thing, and it really is, but I don’t even get what the deus-ex-machina did, why it did it, or the significance of the outcome.
Like, okay, Tom Worceski is an awful guy, but the post-apocalyptic city of Minneapolis seemed like it was doing damn well despite existing on the bad side of the apocalypse. I didn’t see a single example of personal strife.
(Aside: this is part of my confusion over world building)
Why was busting up A. Albrecht’s shit so important? And how was that the climax of a book that started with Sparrow going “why am I blacking out for no reason and waking up missing days of my life” when Albrecht has absolutely nothing to do with that opening premise?
I could forgive all of this, every last one of these sins, if something compelling strung them all together. It doesn’t. Between the beginning and the end, we get to watch Sparrow settle into multiple perfectly accepting and respectful communities, run away from multiple bad guys who end up being good guys who then join Sparrow in running away from future encounters with bad guys who end up being good guys. Characters appear or are invented at random and convenient intervals, then are sidelined or killed the second their presence is a problem. I swear to cod one character was invented just to introduce a side-quest about getting school books to a kid so some postcards would land in Sparrow’s hands in time for a small plot point a few pages later.
There has to have been a better way to do that.
Obviously, it couldn’t be all bad or I wouldn’t have finished Bone Dancer likability. Those early chapters that leaned towards psychological thriller enticed me, and I desperately wanted to learn more about why they were happening. A secondary character—Frances—was a delight, and not just because she was the only secondary character with any sort of depth. And while it seems a little funny now, I do appreciate Sparrow’s genuine love of 1990s technology. There’s nothing like hearing tell of a 27-inch monitor with awe.
My first draft of this review was over 2,000 words long. I have feelings about Bone Dance. I have to admit, though that I have those feelings because I want to like it. Terrible books without merit I trash quickly and diss easily. Books that finish almost despite myself, and then labor over a negative review, I do so because there was something there I really, really like. It’s unfair of me to say, but I almost feel betrayed.
There is so much potential in Bone Dance, and Emma Bull is a fabulous writer. This might be a weird analogy, but reading it felt like simultaneously eating a pale, cafeteria version of something utterly delicious like pad Thai while smelling pad Thai from my favorite restaurant. Just infuriating and dissatisfying and a reminder of what I’m missing out on.
July 6, 2022
I'm not sure what I was expecting from this book, but what I got was a whirlwind of images and feeling and sounds. Incomprehensible to the brain but resonating in the heart, the way poetry sometimes does. All I could do was lie back and let the ride run its course.
On my t0-read-again list; I'm curious how different it will be with the mysteries solved, how the riddles in the text will unfold when you have a hope of finding the answers.
On my t0-read-again list; I'm curious how different it will be with the mysteries solved, how the riddles in the text will unfold when you have a hope of finding the answers.
September 24, 2020
I haven’t the foggiest notion how to go about talking about this book. The best I think I can do is: holy smokes, what a ride. Loved it.
October 31, 2015
Bone Dance is a strange but enjoyable mixture of the post-apocalyptic with the supernatural. Sparrow is a trader of old videos and discs from before the nuclear missiles were set off by a group of psychics known as the Horsemen. But Sparrow’s been blacking out and losing memories. What’s going on?
Sparrow is an agender protagonist who’s never given pronouns. Sparrow’s only comment on the matter is this:
While this is fitting with Sparrow’s somewhat prickly personality, it’s not helpful for writing this review. Therefore for the remainder of the review I will be referring to Sparrow with the singular “they/them” pronouns. Sparrow’s physical sex or gender is not discussed until about a hundred pages in, about where a number of different pieces of the book start coming together. There’s not a lot about this element I can say without running into spoilers (although I think there is a key point worth noting), but this article on Sparrow’s gender is worth reading if you’re willing to brave the spoilers.
Sparrow was easily my favorite part about Bone Dance. When you first meet Sparrow, they are keeping themself permanently isolated and aloof from others. A large part of Bone Dance is diving into Sparrow’s concept of themself, as they learn to accept who they are and to open up to other people and form connections. Sparrow’s confident and snarky, but also in over their head with the current situation. They go through some real difficulties, and I was feeling for them the entire time.
The post-apocalyptic world of Bone Dance isn’t the lawless mad lands you tend to see in fiction. Sparrow lives in a city (clues point towards it being Minneapolis) that still has electricity, even if it’s controlled by the one man who rules the city government. There’s markets and nightclubs and people running theaters of salvaged televisions. In short, there’s some form of civilization, even though it’s only been fifty years since the nuclear missiles went off.
As I mentioned in the first paragraph, Bone Dance is a mixture of science fiction and fantasy. The fantasy mainly comes in through the use of the psychics, tarot, and what the book calls hoodoo (I’ve got no idea if this is the same thing as voodoo, but it seems similar). These supernatural elements all play a large role in the plot. At times this can result in a mystical element that accounts for a large part of why I found the book strange.
I liked the prose of Bone Dance. Emma Bull really has a way with words, and I probably should have been marking pages for quotes as I read. Unfortunately, the pacing of Bone Dance is all over the place. The beginning is slow. Then there’s bits of action interspersed with large periods of reflection. While I think the reflection periods were important for Sparrow’s character growth, it did a number on the pacing.
I would recommend Bone Dance, though I’d want to note the poor pacing and strangeness of the plot. Still, I really love the lead character and there’s some interesting thematic material going on. I in no way regret reading it.
Originally posted at The Illustrated Page.
Sparrow is an agender protagonist who’s never given pronouns. Sparrow’s only comment on the matter is this:
“You wouldn’t have so much trouble,” I muttered, straightening up carefully, “if you didn’t talk about me in the third person.”
While this is fitting with Sparrow’s somewhat prickly personality, it’s not helpful for writing this review. Therefore for the remainder of the review I will be referring to Sparrow with the singular “they/them” pronouns. Sparrow’s physical sex or gender is not discussed until about a hundred pages in, about where a number of different pieces of the book start coming together. There’s not a lot about this element I can say without running into spoilers (although I think there is a key point worth noting), but this article on Sparrow’s gender is worth reading if you’re willing to brave the spoilers.
“We’re all born nameless, aren’t we? And the name we end up with has only peripherally to do with our family tree.”
Sparrow was easily my favorite part about Bone Dance. When you first meet Sparrow, they are keeping themself permanently isolated and aloof from others. A large part of Bone Dance is diving into Sparrow’s concept of themself, as they learn to accept who they are and to open up to other people and form connections. Sparrow’s confident and snarky, but also in over their head with the current situation. They go through some real difficulties, and I was feeling for them the entire time.
The post-apocalyptic world of Bone Dance isn’t the lawless mad lands you tend to see in fiction. Sparrow lives in a city (clues point towards it being Minneapolis) that still has electricity, even if it’s controlled by the one man who rules the city government. There’s markets and nightclubs and people running theaters of salvaged televisions. In short, there’s some form of civilization, even though it’s only been fifty years since the nuclear missiles went off.
As I mentioned in the first paragraph, Bone Dance is a mixture of science fiction and fantasy. The fantasy mainly comes in through the use of the psychics, tarot, and what the book calls hoodoo (I’ve got no idea if this is the same thing as voodoo, but it seems similar). These supernatural elements all play a large role in the plot. At times this can result in a mystical element that accounts for a large part of why I found the book strange.
I liked the prose of Bone Dance. Emma Bull really has a way with words, and I probably should have been marking pages for quotes as I read. Unfortunately, the pacing of Bone Dance is all over the place. The beginning is slow. Then there’s bits of action interspersed with large periods of reflection. While I think the reflection periods were important for Sparrow’s character growth, it did a number on the pacing.
I would recommend Bone Dance, though I’d want to note the poor pacing and strangeness of the plot. Still, I really love the lead character and there’s some interesting thematic material going on. I in no way regret reading it.
Originally posted at The Illustrated Page.
May 18, 2024
Crazy. Strange book. This is another from my pile of books I’ve had for eons and had to read or else it gets donated. So glad I made that commitment because this one was so good and I don’t know that I ever would’ve gotten to it otherwise.
My brain kept seeing Cyberpunk:Edgerunners, John Dies at the End, Bladerunner, plus a more serious Dirk Gently. This is one of those books that is super confusing for the first 50ish pages, and you just have to hang in there. This story is wild and I had a wild time.
My brain kept seeing Cyberpunk:Edgerunners, John Dies at the End, Bladerunner, plus a more serious Dirk Gently. This is one of those books that is super confusing for the first 50ish pages, and you just have to hang in there. This story is wild and I had a wild time.
March 5, 2014
An unusual loner passes quietly through life in a post apocalyptic world finding and selling items from the past, now nearly extinct such as video tapes.
I found this book unusual and a challenge at first, both in layout and content. The chapters are grouped together under the headings of tarot cards, I always felt I was missing a clue with these. The writing itself sometimes seemed to expect you to know who a group of people were without introducing them. It wasn't until I was over a third of the way into the book, by which time I was seriously considering cutting my losses, that I connected and began to enjoy it more. At times it felt like a Neil Gaiman book in the respect that you enjoy it but aren't certain what is going on though.
I thought the gender issues were interestingly handled, but I also think they made it harder to connect to the main character, at first I wasn’t sure if it was switching between points of view. I felt the connection was often stronger to other characters, as if the author was undecided if this was going to be a first or third person novel.
Most of the settings felt rich and vibrant, especially the ones worst affected by the apocalypse. They left the reader uncertain of what could happen or was likely to next. I felt this authenticated the protagonist's seeming neuroticism about security.
I didn't feel the ending did justice to the rest of the novel, it tied up too smoothly and too fast.
I found this book unusual and a challenge at first, both in layout and content. The chapters are grouped together under the headings of tarot cards, I always felt I was missing a clue with these. The writing itself sometimes seemed to expect you to know who a group of people were without introducing them. It wasn't until I was over a third of the way into the book, by which time I was seriously considering cutting my losses, that I connected and began to enjoy it more. At times it felt like a Neil Gaiman book in the respect that you enjoy it but aren't certain what is going on though.
I thought the gender issues were interestingly handled, but I also think they made it harder to connect to the main character, at first I wasn’t sure if it was switching between points of view. I felt the connection was often stronger to other characters, as if the author was undecided if this was going to be a first or third person novel.
Most of the settings felt rich and vibrant, especially the ones worst affected by the apocalypse. They left the reader uncertain of what could happen or was likely to next. I felt this authenticated the protagonist's seeming neuroticism about security.
I didn't feel the ending did justice to the rest of the novel, it tied up too smoothly and too fast.
August 2, 2011
I really liked this book at first, and had a hard time putting it down. My interest didn't exactly wane, but I was a little disappointed in the direction the story took, and when the characters finally got around to having a goal, all I could think was "really? That's it?"
I didn't like that the book had no real sense of place, other than "North America somewhere". Sometimes I thought it was in Minnesota (all the covered sidewalks), and other times I thought it was New Orleans (all the voodoo).
One major element of the story kept reminding me of Magic Bites by Ilona Andrews; those of you who've read both stories will know what I mean. I think Andrews' version was a little more fun, though.
I didn't like that the book had no real sense of place, other than "North America somewhere". Sometimes I thought it was in Minnesota (all the covered sidewalks), and other times I thought it was New Orleans (all the voodoo).
One major element of the story kept reminding me of Magic Bites by Ilona Andrews; those of you who've read both stories will know what I mean. I think Andrews' version was a little more fun, though.
September 13, 2009
To have muscle memory or to have race memory or any other skill that seems to be one with ones soul. This is the book to read that makes clear not all balances are even and not all reasons for being are better than others. I think this is better than the new impending movie "surrogates" without even seeing it because this is special to one person and allows many life threads to weave into a complex tale. Life is not lead by a ouiji board, yet our lives are guided outside ourselves and highly open to fiddling with the rudder a bit. meeting the universe halfway. The book is highly plausible and you can lend yourself to that world and understand it. That is what I think led to Emma Bull being nominated for the Hugo.
xx-dnf-skim-reference
September 19, 2020Too much for me. Too dark, too crazy, too creative, too literary. I might have liked it more when I was younger & more ambitious. But more & more I read for information and for joy, am less interested in books that make me work hard to learn about a world that I'm glad that I don't live in. That being said, there's a lot of value here, and I do recommend it if you're interested.
Especially if you know some group called Steeleye Span, or is the reference actually to Maid of Tottenham? D'd if I know. Or by now care....
Ticks button for 'non-binary main character' in a very interesting way. Urban fantasy?
Especially if you know some group called Steeleye Span, or is the reference actually to Maid of Tottenham? D'd if I know. Or by now care....
Ticks button for 'non-binary main character' in a very interesting way. Urban fantasy?
March 29, 2011
I loved this book. It was technically my first cyberpunk. And most of all it helped me through the depression of my teenage years when I was struggling with gender dysphoria. But it really deserves a re-read for a proper review.
Unfortunately I lent my copy to my gf about 8 or 9 years ago. Not sure what the etiquette is for approaching an ex-gf that you rarely speak to about som ething you lent them 8 years ago... :S
Unfortunately I lent my copy to my gf about 8 or 9 years ago. Not sure what the etiquette is for approaching an ex-gf that you rarely speak to about som ething you lent them 8 years ago... :S
May 4, 2023
Three and a half stars
This is a story that does not fit neatly into genre boundaries, it depicts an interesting and detailed post-apocalyptic world with what tech remains as well as fantastic elements.. The character journey of Sparrow is at the heart of everything and along the way we visit questions of self autonomy and personhood and gender. A thoughtful book, if somewhat oddly paced and occasionally confusing.
This is a story that does not fit neatly into genre boundaries, it depicts an interesting and detailed post-apocalyptic world with what tech remains as well as fantastic elements.. The character journey of Sparrow is at the heart of everything and along the way we visit questions of self autonomy and personhood and gender. A thoughtful book, if somewhat oddly paced and occasionally confusing.
January 19, 2010
Reread newly available as an ebook. A little weirder than I remember, but in a good way. Some of the plot points (videotapes in a post apocalyptic world) are somewhat dated, but not in any way that bothered me. Still a brilliant book.
November 3, 2008
Another of my very favorite books. Yeah Emma!
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