April’s book, Natural History, by Justina Robson, was the third in the chronological series of best science fiction novels written by women in the previous decade which we are reading here at Torque Control over the course of 2011. Published in 2003, it is the first of three books we will be reading from that year alone – clearly a significant one. Whether it was significant because it really was a bumper year for good science fiction, or because it takes seven years to truly judge, digest, and yet still remember a book, I leave to your judgement.
In my posts on the book, I focused on the parts which interested me the most: the fascinating Forged hybrid people, created, categorized, literally enmeshed in the debate over whether or not form dictates function; the alien technology which sparks off the storyline among the Forged and Unevolved; and the impression that ultimately, for all the things I like about it, I like this book better as a thought experiment than I do as a novel per se. And I really do like and admire it in that capacity.
Thank you to all who joined in reading or re-reading this book.
Discussion: Part 1 (Cladistics); Part 2 (Space and Stuff); and Part 3 (Conceptual Resolution)
Chris Moriarty at SFness
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