Jayaprakash Satyamurthy
Knivesout no more
Here's a little introductory piece on one of my favorite new SF authors that I've been bandying about:
A lot of SF is rather conservative, for such a speculative genre. Golden Age SF fundamentally works on the premise of the best of liberal western democracy extending itself into the stars (yes, that's an oversimplification, bear with me). Writers in the 60s and 70s brought in new literary techniques and psychological depth to the mix. A little later, the cyberpunk wave flung a whole new vision of the future into the fray, a vision that is coming true a lot sooner than the Space Age envisioned by the earliest SF, and that continues to haunt much of the genre.
Ken MacLeod serves as a sort of antidote to this conservatism. He traces a future that is shaped by various shades of Red, complete with Trotskyists in space. His books have been seen as an attempt to map out a possible left-wing version of libertarianism, and his more recent books have even been interpreted as presenting elements of a rather materialist gnosticism.
However, his books are not weighed down by, or restricted to these political speculations. MacLeod brings into play the entire range of technologies SF has played around with over the years - faster than light space travel, a form of hyperspace travel, nanotechnology, cloning, cybernetics, virtual reality, the whole deal. His technological extrapolations are plausible and well thought out.
He also creates well fleshed-out characters, who are never cut and dried heroes or heroines but far more complex and realistic people. His plots are also open-ended, ambiguous in all the ways that matter, while charting out bold conceptions of the future of the human species.
He has written 7 novels to date - the first four chart a particular vision of future history over the next few millennia, with a few characters whose lives are enhanced by anti-aging treatments or cloning serving as connecting threads. The last volume of this loosely structured series , The Sky Road, actually deconstructs a lot of the 'history' charted in the previous volumes, in a typical MacLeod touch.
His second set of novels, the Engines of Light trio (trilogy seems a rather trite word to use) jump into an entirely different vision of the future, drawing on various aspects of 20th century UFO/abduction paranoia to create another unique set of worlds.
The best thing about Ken MacLeod is that his books are such fun - he writes in a riveting, often breakneck pace, creates visually striking set-pieces and injects a great deal of dry humour into his stories.
There's a sense in some of his works that he is not trying hard enough - that he's winding things up a little too quickly, perhaps, but the stories are still quite strong.
He may not be the most important new talent in SF (I sort of feel he is at least one among them) but he is a fresh, interesting SF writer who delivers exciting stories packed with ample brain-candy.
Here are some interesting links about MacLeod:
[url]http://kenmacleod.blogspot.com/ [/url]
The Early Days of a Better Nation: MacLeod's blog. Filled with commentary on politics, current events and the occasional thoughts on the SF genre.
www.infinityplus.co.uk/nonfiction/kensf.htm
SF After the future went away: An article by Ken MacLeod on SF which helps place his own approach to the genre.
www.zone-sf.com/kenmacleod.html An interview
www.salon.com/books/feature/1999/07/27/macleod_interview/ Another interview
www.strangehorizons.com/2003/20030113/macleod.shtml
The Gnostic Potboilers of Ken MacLeod[/link] A very good review of Engine City, his most recent work.
www.trashotron.com/agony/columns/2003/07-12-03.htm
The Real MacLeods & A Vertical Strategy[/link]: A very good article which also talks about Ian R MacLeod and some Japanese sf-related manga and novels.
A lot of SF is rather conservative, for such a speculative genre. Golden Age SF fundamentally works on the premise of the best of liberal western democracy extending itself into the stars (yes, that's an oversimplification, bear with me). Writers in the 60s and 70s brought in new literary techniques and psychological depth to the mix. A little later, the cyberpunk wave flung a whole new vision of the future into the fray, a vision that is coming true a lot sooner than the Space Age envisioned by the earliest SF, and that continues to haunt much of the genre.
Ken MacLeod serves as a sort of antidote to this conservatism. He traces a future that is shaped by various shades of Red, complete with Trotskyists in space. His books have been seen as an attempt to map out a possible left-wing version of libertarianism, and his more recent books have even been interpreted as presenting elements of a rather materialist gnosticism.
However, his books are not weighed down by, or restricted to these political speculations. MacLeod brings into play the entire range of technologies SF has played around with over the years - faster than light space travel, a form of hyperspace travel, nanotechnology, cloning, cybernetics, virtual reality, the whole deal. His technological extrapolations are plausible and well thought out.
He also creates well fleshed-out characters, who are never cut and dried heroes or heroines but far more complex and realistic people. His plots are also open-ended, ambiguous in all the ways that matter, while charting out bold conceptions of the future of the human species.
He has written 7 novels to date - the first four chart a particular vision of future history over the next few millennia, with a few characters whose lives are enhanced by anti-aging treatments or cloning serving as connecting threads. The last volume of this loosely structured series , The Sky Road, actually deconstructs a lot of the 'history' charted in the previous volumes, in a typical MacLeod touch.
His second set of novels, the Engines of Light trio (trilogy seems a rather trite word to use) jump into an entirely different vision of the future, drawing on various aspects of 20th century UFO/abduction paranoia to create another unique set of worlds.
The best thing about Ken MacLeod is that his books are such fun - he writes in a riveting, often breakneck pace, creates visually striking set-pieces and injects a great deal of dry humour into his stories.
There's a sense in some of his works that he is not trying hard enough - that he's winding things up a little too quickly, perhaps, but the stories are still quite strong.
He may not be the most important new talent in SF (I sort of feel he is at least one among them) but he is a fresh, interesting SF writer who delivers exciting stories packed with ample brain-candy.
Here are some interesting links about MacLeod:
[url]http://kenmacleod.blogspot.com/ [/url]
The Early Days of a Better Nation: MacLeod's blog. Filled with commentary on politics, current events and the occasional thoughts on the SF genre.
www.infinityplus.co.uk/nonfiction/kensf.htm
SF After the future went away: An article by Ken MacLeod on SF which helps place his own approach to the genre.
www.zone-sf.com/kenmacleod.html An interview
www.salon.com/books/feature/1999/07/27/macleod_interview/ Another interview
www.strangehorizons.com/2003/20030113/macleod.shtml
The Gnostic Potboilers of Ken MacLeod[/link] A very good review of Engine City, his most recent work.
www.trashotron.com/agony/columns/2003/07-12-03.htm
The Real MacLeods & A Vertical Strategy[/link]: A very good article which also talks about Ian R MacLeod and some Japanese sf-related manga and novels.
