Beyond Reality discussion

Which characters did you like best or least?

And a quick observation: I thought the idea of Tyador's 2 girlfriends who were completely unaware of each other was such a clever parallel with "unseeing".

It was.

I actually like Tyador's assitant. The female detective who helped him out. I just can't remember her name at the moment.

It may be fairly predictable, but I really like Tyador. He is straight out of a Dashiell Hammet novel.

Corwi was her name, Chris.

I liked Tyador too, but I was surprised by how much I liked Dhatt. I thought Ul Qoma and Besz here killer characters as well.

Thanks Brad. I actually loaned my copy to a friend (one who teaches urban studies), so I couldn't look it up.

What I liked about all the characters was that they were believable. They were real.

I do have to say, though, in some ways it reminded me of Sergei Lukyanenko's Watch books.

I think this is the second time someone has mentioned Lukyanenko and the Watch books in connection with this novel. What is it about those books that ties in? Are they good? (This is the first I've heard of Lukyanenko and it sounds like I should find some of his work.)

Lukyanenko's Watch books are set in Moscow. They are about a group of beings called Others. People who are magicians, werewolves, vampires, other shapeshifters. The Others are divided into three groups or Watches. This was done to enforce peace or status quo. There is Night Watch which is comprised of Light Others (the "good" ones). They keep the peace during the night. There is the Day Watch which are the Dark Others (the "bad" guys). There is Dusk Watch(sometimes translated as Twilight Watch). This group is made up of Dark and Light others and makes sure both sides are playing by the rules. The first book in the series is kinda slow, but they are all good. The first two, at least, were made into movies. In Russia, apparently were huge blockbusters there. The fourth book is The Last Watch.

For me, the connection is in the tone of the writing, as well as the idea of the Breach, which reminded me very strongly of the Dusk (or Twilight) Watch.

Frankly, I found the characters pretty forgettable and kind of cliched. For me, this book was all about the mystery and the concept of the superimposed cities.

Sandi wrote: "Frankly, I found the characters pretty forgettable and kind of cliched. For me, this book was all about the mystery and the concept of the superimposed cities."

The cities are definitely meant to be characters, I think. And I wouldn't be surprised if they are the characters Mieville most wants us to connect with.

Sandi wrote: "Frankly, I found the characters pretty forgettable and kind of cliched."

I liked the characters, but can't deny they were a bit clichéd in some ways. It is similar in a way to The Yiddish Policeman's Union (which I read a few months ago) which combines an unusual alternate-history setting and an unusual society with a fairly traditional detective-novel structure and fairly traditional detective-novel characters.

Do you think the characters had to be somewhat cliched for this book to work the way it does? For me, a lot of the interest of the book lay in how the realistic, familiar aspects both contrasted with the novel ones (unseeing, breach, etc.) and made them seem more believable (because they were treated just as matter-of-factly as the more mundane elements). The standard detective-novel characters and trappings were part of that familiarity.

That's a great point. The strangeness of the setting is amplified by the fact that the novel's tone and characters and structure are fairly standard detective-noir.

That is a good question, C12vt. I think the familiarity of the characters and the plot let the setting stand out.

The cliches are definitely intentional in terms of Mieville's attempt at the genre, but what a nice piece of insight C12vt. It really does provide telling contrast with the weirdness of the cities.

I like that the contrasts of their cities and our own culture was allowed to develop slowly. If he had written the novel from the perspective of one of the archaeologists, it all would have seemed extremely exotic right from the start. I appreciate the slow burn.