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Starship & Haiku
The Millennial War left a sullen void where civilization once stood. But then the whales began their song -- a mysterious song that resounded throughout the polluted seas and told an ancient heartbreaking tale that moved the survivors to revive and honored ritual . . .
Mass Market Paperback
First published September 1, 1981
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324 people want to read
About the author
S.P. Somtow
180 books156 followersCalled by the Bangkok Post "the Thai person known by name to most people in the world," S.P. Somtow is an author, composer, filmmaker, and international media personality whose dazzling talents and acerbic wit have entertained and enlightened fans the world over.
He was Somtow Papinian Sucharitkul in Bangkok. His grandfather's sister was a Queen of Siam, his father is a well known international lawyer and vice-president of the International Academy of Human Rights. Somtow was educated at Eton and Cambridge, and his first career was in music. In the 1970s (while he was still in college) his works were being performed on four continents and he was named representative of Thailand to the Asian Composer's League and to the International Music Commission of UNESCO. His avant-garde compositions caused controversy and scandal in his native country, and a severe case of musical burnout in the late 1970s precipitated his entry into a second career - that of author.
He began writing science fiction, but soon started to invade other fields of writing, with some 40 books out now, including the clasic horror novel Vampire Junction, which defined the "rock and roll vampire" concept for the 80s, the Riverrun Trilogy ("the finest new series of the 90's" - Locus) and the semi-autobiographical memoir Jasmine Nights. He has won or been nominated for dozens of major awards including the Bram Stoker Award, the John W. Campbell Award, the Hugo Award, and the World Fantasy Award.
Somtow has also made some incursions into filmmaking, directing the cult classic The Laughing Dead and the award winning art film Ill Met by Moonlight.
He was Somtow Papinian Sucharitkul in Bangkok. His grandfather's sister was a Queen of Siam, his father is a well known international lawyer and vice-president of the International Academy of Human Rights. Somtow was educated at Eton and Cambridge, and his first career was in music. In the 1970s (while he was still in college) his works were being performed on four continents and he was named representative of Thailand to the Asian Composer's League and to the International Music Commission of UNESCO. His avant-garde compositions caused controversy and scandal in his native country, and a severe case of musical burnout in the late 1970s precipitated his entry into a second career - that of author.
He began writing science fiction, but soon started to invade other fields of writing, with some 40 books out now, including the clasic horror novel Vampire Junction, which defined the "rock and roll vampire" concept for the 80s, the Riverrun Trilogy ("the finest new series of the 90's" - Locus) and the semi-autobiographical memoir Jasmine Nights. He has won or been nominated for dozens of major awards including the Bram Stoker Award, the John W. Campbell Award, the Hugo Award, and the World Fantasy Award.
Somtow has also made some incursions into filmmaking, directing the cult classic The Laughing Dead and the award winning art film Ill Met by Moonlight.
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Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews
July 2, 2017
Okay so, this book is a little bit of a mess and doesn't quite hit the mark but...I love it. It has the wonderful lyrical prose that I just get obsessed with and underline a million times and think about over and over until the original line has mutated into something that's all my own and I just adore it!!!
I'm obsessed with WW2, atomic bombs, and Japan's history with the two - so this was perfect for me. Starship & Haiku felt like a rare one of a kind book when I was reading it (even though I ordered a brand new paperback online). I felt like no one else had ever read it and that it was a story someone had passed me in a note. I was a good feeling.
So while it might not be a "good" book, I loved it very much.
May 27, 2023
I love a great sci-fi and they often come with not just aliens, but alien ideas and ways of thinking. While this book centers on humans, I found their ideals and desires completely alien to me. Enough that I struggled to identify with or appreciate the characters and the plot. This book may not be the right fit for me.
September 9, 2008
An interesting read if not a modern one. I really liked the Japanese-style story-telling right up until it devolved into 'good guys' vs. 'bad guys' But before that it was great. Call this one 2/3's of a good book.
May 7, 2011
Um, what?
October 12, 2019
An interesting premise that ultimately fails, literally and figuratively, to take flight, Starship & Haiku is the first novel by the prolific S. P. Somtow under his real name, Somtow Sucharitkul. Somtow is a Thai-American musician/composer and the author of speculative and horror fiction. Starship & Haiku won the 1982 Locus Best First Novel Award.
Speculative fiction is an area of interest for me, but it was, believe it or not, haiku that drew me in as a particular passion of mine. The five main haiku that help create a frame upon which the story hangs are all classics, by Onitsura, Issa, Buson and two by Bashō. Each of these haiku roughly represents one of the five seasons (in the traditional Japanese calendar, New Years is the fifth season). Throughout the novel there are a few other haiku to be found.
When I say the plot is impossible to describe, I mean this strictly in terms of its execution and not the details. As a result of the "Millennial War," civilization on earth seems to be coming to a slow, painful end. There are sentient whales, spaceships prepared to take survivors to the stars, a young boy, Josh, and his mute brother, Didi, a young woman named Ryoko (a Japanese high minister's daughter who communicates telepathically with whales), and a Death Lord, whose mission is to get the remaining population of Japan to do the beautiful, honorable thing and give themselves over to death/suicide.
Though it is tempting to label this a glorious failure or a spectacular mess, more acurrately it can be thought of as an idealistic, novice novelist reaching far too far. A cosmic tale that never leaves earth, Starship and Haiku is too short on specific details, literally, and too long, and deep, on semi-philosophic scientific gobbledy-gook to coalesce into anything approaching a cogent story.
Since this is an award-winning novel, more positive takes for those inclined, as I was, to a strange and weird confluence of science, fiction, philosophy and poetry, may be found here and here.
As a final note, how about what drew me to this book in the first place: the haiku. The English language translations are not credited so, for argument's sake, let's assume they are the author's own translations. They are relatively successful as English language poems, one or two are a bit muddy, but, all in all, generally good. Beyond the main five, mentioned above, there are seven more scattered throughout the text. The general feel of the themes touched upon in the haiku underscore culturally those of the novel, particularly in the areas of honor and death from a Japanese perspective. More epigrammatic than essential in their inclusion, still, they are a nice touch, especially if one is reaching, literally and figuratively, for the stars.
Speculative fiction is an area of interest for me, but it was, believe it or not, haiku that drew me in as a particular passion of mine. The five main haiku that help create a frame upon which the story hangs are all classics, by Onitsura, Issa, Buson and two by Bashō. Each of these haiku roughly represents one of the five seasons (in the traditional Japanese calendar, New Years is the fifth season). Throughout the novel there are a few other haiku to be found.
When I say the plot is impossible to describe, I mean this strictly in terms of its execution and not the details. As a result of the "Millennial War," civilization on earth seems to be coming to a slow, painful end. There are sentient whales, spaceships prepared to take survivors to the stars, a young boy, Josh, and his mute brother, Didi, a young woman named Ryoko (a Japanese high minister's daughter who communicates telepathically with whales), and a Death Lord, whose mission is to get the remaining population of Japan to do the beautiful, honorable thing and give themselves over to death/suicide.
Though it is tempting to label this a glorious failure or a spectacular mess, more acurrately it can be thought of as an idealistic, novice novelist reaching far too far. A cosmic tale that never leaves earth, Starship and Haiku is too short on specific details, literally, and too long, and deep, on semi-philosophic scientific gobbledy-gook to coalesce into anything approaching a cogent story.
Since this is an award-winning novel, more positive takes for those inclined, as I was, to a strange and weird confluence of science, fiction, philosophy and poetry, may be found here and here.
As a final note, how about what drew me to this book in the first place: the haiku. The English language translations are not credited so, for argument's sake, let's assume they are the author's own translations. They are relatively successful as English language poems, one or two are a bit muddy, but, all in all, generally good. Beyond the main five, mentioned above, there are seven more scattered throughout the text. The general feel of the themes touched upon in the haiku underscore culturally those of the novel, particularly in the areas of honor and death from a Japanese perspective. More epigrammatic than essential in their inclusion, still, they are a nice touch, especially if one is reaching, literally and figuratively, for the stars.
July 11, 2020
Full review: https://sciencefictionruminations.com...
"'Nature does not write haiku. Men write haiku. The world cannot end in chaos, with things running wild, with gangs running rampant, with cannibals, with dog eating dog and plague-deaths and the abominable mutations. O, I know it is so in some other countries, but we are Japanese. We are the children of the whale, who have committed the original sin of patricide… but we have pride, and we must die in beauty' (131).
Somtow Sucharitkul (S. P. Somtow after 1985) is a fascinating individual. He’s a Thai-American SFF author/composer who moved back and forth between Thailand [...]"
"'Nature does not write haiku. Men write haiku. The world cannot end in chaos, with things running wild, with gangs running rampant, with cannibals, with dog eating dog and plague-deaths and the abominable mutations. O, I know it is so in some other countries, but we are Japanese. We are the children of the whale, who have committed the original sin of patricide… but we have pride, and we must die in beauty' (131).
Somtow Sucharitkul (S. P. Somtow after 1985) is a fascinating individual. He’s a Thai-American SFF author/composer who moved back and forth between Thailand [...]"
October 1, 2025
After a cataclysmic war which even fractured the moon, the Earth is dying and only Japan maintains any sort of antebellum civilization. For Josh Nakamura and his brother Did getting to Japan and possibly getting aboard a derelict Russian starship in Earth orbit is paramount. As the seas fester whales start communicating telepathically to a few receptive humans and they inform us that they are distantly related to us and that getting humans to another planet may also save the whales... Somtow Sucharitkul immerses us in the world of ritual suicide and Japanese worship of flawed beauty in his first novel. Worth the few hours spent on it. Very zen.
January 13, 2024
This is among the types of sci fi books that is more on Armageddon instead of hard sci fi. The interesting / uniqueness of this book is on the Japanese understanding of beauty and symbolism and death and an Americans lack of understanding and trying to share some of that. I know a tiny bit of Japanese and of the ancient poets and so it was quite enjoyable for me from that perspective.
There was definitely something in the water around this time to attach whales with aliens / space beings in sci fi writing.
Some telepath elements and hilariously “far future” of 2022-2024.
Ymmv
There was definitely something in the water around this time to attach whales with aliens / space beings in sci fi writing.
Some telepath elements and hilariously “far future” of 2022-2024.
Ymmv
October 8, 2017
Scifi novel from that era in the early 80s when it was okay to have a complete unabashed hard-on for Japanese culture.
June 14, 2025
Intense and different
Powerful and thoughtful story of the end of the world as a Japanese haiku. Beautiful imagery. A beautiful mind wrote this.
Powerful and thoughtful story of the end of the world as a Japanese haiku. Beautiful imagery. A beautiful mind wrote this.
February 28, 2013
Increasingly bonkers with each passing page, I'm about halfway through and not sure if I'll finish it.
The author does capture a nice apocalyptic the-end-is-really-here culture shock and some of the bizarro cultural responses that this might elicit, but he does so in ways that range from potentially intriguing to massively problematic.
One dimensional characters speak and think in cliches, and so do entire nations apparently. Every other page seems to contain one character or another commenting on their level or lack of "Japanesness", and then there's the whale reveal, which is pretty troubling once you get past the sheer ridiculousness of it. And not just for the role Ryoko plays.
The author does capture a nice apocalyptic the-end-is-really-here culture shock and some of the bizarro cultural responses that this might elicit, but he does so in ways that range from potentially intriguing to massively problematic.
One dimensional characters speak and think in cliches, and so do entire nations apparently. Every other page seems to contain one character or another commenting on their level or lack of "Japanesness", and then there's the whale reveal, which is pretty troubling once you get past the sheer ridiculousness of it. And not just for the role Ryoko plays.
February 23, 2015
This felt like feminine science fiction, although I have learned that the author is a guy. I'm recommending STARSHIP AND HAIKU although I don't think it is for everyone, not even all science fiction fans. If you read this book, you'll discover that the major themes include the end of the world, Japanese civilization, and whales. The story is one of the saddest I've read in a while, yet it has a message that speaks to possibilities and growth. Author Somtow is an interesting person as well, being a famous Thai opera composer, and a one time Buddhist monk. With all that said, STARSHIP AND HAIKU deservedly won the Locus Award for best first novel after it was published in 1981.
April 13, 2013
This science fiction could be interesting if you know about old Japanese culture. I think (as Japanese) the author accurately captured some pieces of it but it wasn't enough to keep the story exciting.
Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews