Declare [Audio CD]

Tim Powers has a tendency to lash many of his fantasies so securely to known historical facts that the plot and the fantastical elements get lost in a welter of truthful, but exhausting, detail. The classic example of this is The Stress of Her Regard, in which a kind of vampire story is drowned in more than anyone needs to know about the Romance poets. On the other hand, when Powers is willing to freestyle a little more, he is capable of great flights of imagination such as those that powered his modern fantasy Last Call and his immemorial classic The Anubis Gates.

Declare is one of Powers's history-bound fantasies, in which Powers challenges himself to create a fantasy in a known historical subject without contradicting any of the historically estalbished facts. However, he avoids many of the pitfalls into which he has stumbled in his prior forays down this road. Rather than wearing his readers down with true biographical details the only real significance of which is how cleverly Powers works them into his own story, he seems to select details for their objective value as points of interest for the reader. Here, we are immersed in details drawn from the world of international espionage from World War II to the middle of the Cold War. Instead of seeing how Powers can work the fact that two historical figures stayed at hotels ten miles away from each other on a certain day into a story, we get to see his protagonist using interesting espionage techniques -- telegraphing information to headquarters from radios hidden in occupied Paris, forming groups of Bedouin nomads for spying missions. This keeps the story moving.

And Powers does a better job integrating the fantastical elements of the story, too. The supernatural creatures who, it turns out, had a lot to do with the Cold War turning out the way it did, are fascinating -- awesomely powerful, terrifyingly alien, and fully imagined. Powers manages to work them into history without making them seem small. The supernatural occurrences in On Stranger Tides or Stress of Her Regard seemed reduced in scale as compared to the supernatural beings in regular fantasy novels -- like Powers was fitting them into tiny chinks between established historical facts. But Declare's djinn have a frightening majesty that makes it seem as though history has accommodated itself to them rather than vice versa. Their appearances in Declare are always spectacular.

This may well be the perfect Powers "history to fantasy" novel -- eventful, suspenseful, well written (of course), satisfying -- but it still smacks of trickery. This is Powers pulling off the amazing feat of writing a successful fantasy while adhering strictly to minute historical details. This is Powers handicapping himself, and still winning the race. But I still think Powers does better when he does not start himself out at a disadvantage. As much as Declare impressed me, I like Powers better when he gives himself freer rein.

I had a small idea of what i was in for after reading the reviews for this book. I had no idea how well researched Tim Powers was on everything. I highly recommend reading the notes about the book afterward, it is incredible how he uses so much real history and just how little he fills in the gaps with absurd fiction. And even the fantasy part is based on legends of Saudi Arabia, I'm talking about the Djjin, which are demon creatures.
The demons in this story are not your horrorific demons with red horns and fangs. These demons are seen more of as forgotten and lost angels, very complicated as a race, and very real. Throughout the story, we visit the lost city of Wabar (might also be called Sodom and Ghomorrah) Mt. Ararat, and many other places.
This book is stimulating on many levels, and you really get the idea that Powers was trying to make this novel a lot more than just a novel that gets one point across. The story is about secret governemnt cover ups and ancient histories linked to today, but what I thought when i read this book, interestingly enough, is that all of that fantasy aspect was really just a scenerio to run along a love story. Underneath all of the adventure and complication, in the end, this story ends up a simple story about a boy and a girl. It's an adolescent fantasy that takes our main character, Andrew Hale, as a spy at the age of 18, falling in love with another young spy named Elena, who he must partner with. After they are separated for twenty years is when the story of Ararat, and the Djjin really picks up, and by the end of the book, you get the vibe that that was all introductory to what happens at the end.
The climax of the story surrounding the Djjin on Mt. Ararat I thought was a little abrubt, but again, I don't think that was supposed to be the main and most important aspect of the book. The ending AFTER that is brilliant and is one of the most satisfactory endings I've read in a long time, in a long stream of quickly ended books. I had to re-read the very last paragraph of the book several times because it was so brilliant.
I highly recommend this book if you like stuff that's very historical, or if you like stuff that's very whacky, or if you just want a simple story about a spy and his long lost love. I stress that you can't be easily offended if you want to read this book. They toy with a lot of things in religion, like The Bible and The Koran. I am a christian, and i liked this book. I'm just saying that they present some ideas about the origin of The Ark (the one we think we know of, anyway) and Solomon's splitting of the baby proposal, that are very bizzare, just to name a few. But I highly recommend it.

I started reading "Declare" with a great deal of scepticism. I had previously read "Stranger Tides" and "Anubis Gate," and was very leery of what looked like it was going to be a standard spy story. OY! What a surprise! I plowed through the entire book in only three days!

Powers doesn't get around to putting a firm identification of the What behind the mysterious goings-on of Operation Declare until page 160, but by then he has laid a firm groundwork of interesting characters and events of which the reader wants to learn more. Once we learn something in "Declare," however, Powers builds on it, and builds beautifully.

Although "Declare" deals with Andrew Hale and Elena for hundreds of pages, it's actually inspired by (seemingly minor character) Kim Philby, and, in his afterward, Powers states that his intent was to write a novel about Philby which explored his life and work without changing any of the well-known facts of Philby's life. Its the interpretation which Powers puts on the events of Philby's life which make "Declare" mind-bogglingly good. Who, after all, REALLY knows what goes on in the deepest, darkest recesses of the world of espionage? Maybe some of the weirdness of the Looking Glass World really is due to a supernatural element, and if that supernatural element happened to be extremely ancient....

The title "Declare," which hardly compels at first, DOES make sense. Don't miss the reference to Job near the beginning of the book ("Declare, if thous hast understanding...."), and note the reactions of various characters to the word's use, and you won't be surprised yourself when the word turns up with greater frequency in various dialogues. One of the habits of Powers as a writer is his dropping of clues willy-nilly in plain sight, clues which only become significant when they've been seen again and again from different angles. In some books this has been an annoyance; in "Declare" it is a virtue and an art. (Consider the recurring phrase, "O Fish ..." -- at first it is gibberish in a dream, then begins to make sense, and then takes on a meaning so terrible that merely hearing the words can kill.)

From the Cotswolds to Cairo to the Rub al-Khali; from Paris to Berlin to al-Kuwait; from Beiruit to Mount Ararat to Moscow, "Declare" weaves around the world of The Great Game in Europe and the Middle East, and jumps backwards and forwards in time with breath-taking rapidity, but Powers has learned his craft well, and "Declare" never disappoints. The number of "slow" pages numbers less than a dozen among 600+ pages.

I highly recommend this book to anyone who has any interest in thrillers, spy novels, histories, or the supernatural. It straddles all of those genres with ease. Although it makes no reference to the "Cthulhu Mythos," it would fit snugly into any "Cthulhu Now" framework, and Powers is a far better writer than most of the Mythos writers, including H. P. Lovecraft himself.