Most helpful customer reviews
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5.0 out of 5 stars
Sci-fi that dares to be different., Sep 9 2006
Elena Irinova was a scientist and 'would be' cosmonaut with the Soviet space programme. Since the fall of Communism in the U.S.S.R. she is reduced to cleaning office floors and dreaming of building a new life in Canada. Ilya Muromyets is a drug addict who wishes only for death. Unfortunately for him he is immortal, one of the Russian 'Heroes' of folk tales, and he cannot die except at the hands of another immortal but he's the only one of his kind left.
Elena finds a strange object, a small ball that seems to absorb light, the scientist in her wonders what its purpose is. Ilya is approached by the representative of a mysterious organisation and is asked to find this artefact. Eventually Elena and Ilya come together and learn just what this object and its purpose are.
Nine Layers of Sky is one of those rare books in the sci-fi genre in that it is actually 'different'. Liz Williams has proven, with this latest novel, that she is not a 'one trick pony' and can write an original story that is fast paced and absorbing. Her style can be a little dark and oppressive at times but that suits her stories and in no way detracts from them. It's not a style that will please everyone but for anyone looking for something different, they would go a long way to find better than this.
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5.0 out of 5 stars
Elena and Ilya go down the Silk Road, Feb 25 2004
"Nine Layers of Sky" is another great novel by the very impressive Liz Williams. This time out she takes her readers on a tour of the Silk Road states of Central Asia (and apparently that's a part of the world Williams is familiar with), ending up in Uzbekistan, in the ancient city of Samarkand.Elena, now cleaning offices in Almaty, Kazakhistan, was once a scientist in the Soviet space program. After acquiring a strange metallic object she hooks up with Ilya, an 800-year-old "Bogatyr" (once a hero of Russia, now a junkie), and together they attempt to solve the object's mystery. That in turn leads them to a parallel world, and then things really start to hum, as they encounter many strange and nefarious characters while they shuttle between this world and the parallel one, in which the Soviet Union didn't exactly die. Williams is a playful author with a great sense of place. She makes the decay and despair of the former Soviet Republics seem very real--the rundown busses, the abandoned space facilities, the failed attempts to construct subways. And yet, this mock heroic quest is slightly tongue in cheek. Think of it as Elena and Ilya in Wonderland and you'll half get the point. And, as with the Carroll classic, the journey's far more important than the destination. Until now, Williams hasn't done sequels (and an advert in the back of the book would indicate that her next novel will surely not be one), but she's left a few loose ends here (and she's far too clever to have done so by accident), so maybe some day a sequel there will be. We can only hope.
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5.0 out of 5 stars
close to perfect, Nov 16 2003
Sometimes a science-fiction novel comes along which I'd almost swear was written especially for me! Lisa Mason's "The Summer of Love" is one such novel. "Nine Layers of Sky" is another. The setting, the characters, the quest -- all strike such a chord; it's even archetypal. It's the beginning of the 21st century and the Soviet Union dissolved a decade ago. Along with it, the career and dreams of astrophysicist Elena Irinovna. From launching rockets to washing floors; she can only dream of emigrating to Canada. To realize this dream will take money, so Elena is forced into smuggling across the Kazakhstan border. During one harrowing crossing, she discovers an unidentifiable spherical artifact in the snow, apparently stolen from a strange dead man. The object is bewildering, because it is warm. Out of scientific curiosity, she keeps it, not knowing that it is already being pursued by people who will kill to reclaim it. And by another who will protect her at all cost. Ilya Murom'ets is a legendary Slavic hero, one of the original bogatyri, now an immortal weary of living. For 800 years, he has wondered why he cannot die, even fatally wounded in battle. Why do the rusalki, those fey females who inhabit Russian woods and waters, always find him and heal him before he can find his release in death? His only release these days comes from vodka, and his heroin addiction acquired during the Afghanistan War. No one believes in heroes or rusalki any more. Reduced to working as a mercenary, Ilya has been hired by mysterious, not quite human strangers to retrieve the missing artifact. He locates Elena in time to save her from a rusalka; then they find that death seems to follow the artifact. And Ilya remembers, as if in a dream, where he has seen this artifact before. Seventy years ago, he was paid to kill a renegade scientist who had created a technology to open a portal to another realm. That realm, B'elovod'e, is a parallel Russia, one in which the perfect Soviet utopia has been accomplished. It is a Russia in which citizens are comrades and rusalki and other mythical creatures inhabit the wild places. But there is a dark secret which the citizens of B'elovod'e do not know -- their utopia exists by stealing the dreams of the real Russia. Mechvori (dream-thieves) are the alternate Russia's counterpart of the KGB, feared by the populace and military alike. The problem is: as the dreams of the real Russians are disappearing, their country and lives become more depressing and hopeless. And as the artifact opens rifts between the worlds, it brings devastation and panic to B'elovod'e. It also allows Ilya's ancient Islamic nemesis, also an immortal, to cross between the realms in hopes of radicalizing the nomadic horse tribes of B'elovod'e. As the mystery which has united them unfolds, Elena and Ilya together embark on the quest to save their world. Pursued by Mechvori, rusalki, and the horsemen of the Golden Warrior, they discover, in eachother, something worth dying for. And ultimately, a dream worth living for. I enjoyed every moment of this delicious read, and was sorry to reach the end, which seemed to be just a little rushed. I think I'm in love myself... with Elena and Ilya and Russia and the writing of Liz Williams! I'm definitely going to read her other novels.
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