|
|
4.0étoiles sur 5
Deceptive depth, Aoû 26 2000
Halfway through reading Fine Prey, I started wondering: when do we get to, you know, the *plot*? It seemed like I was reading layer upon layer of introductory material, exposition - and as it's a relatively slim book, I could not figure out when Fine Prey would get around to the action. In fact, the exposition is the action. Fine Prey is a fascinating novel - a science-fiction/linguistics thriller, if there is such a thing. If not, Scott Westerfeld has invented it. Although the missing plot elements, like conflict, mean the novel is a bit slow in places, each chapter is driving the main character, Spider, towards the linguistic resolution. Just as interesting as the central premise is the world in which Spider lives. In Fine Prey, Earth is a colony world; we've been taken - bloodlessly, I would imagine - by the remote, peculiar, and mostly benevolent Aya. They've given us technologies that utterly exceed our meager abilities, and we've succumbed to their patronage. In most SF novels, that would be the source of the plot, the conflict - in this one, it's the merest background. More a part of Spider's life is the mechanics of the Hunt, a popular game born out of Earth's old equine sports and the Aya's new technologies. Though the detailed descriptions of individual hunts are a bit gruesome, there aren't many of them, and the rest of the Hunt world is fairly interesting. Overall, Fine Prey, which seems so light and insubstantial for most of the reading, is an involving book with a gripping premise and an unusual and well-described world. I think most SF fans would be glad to read this book.
|
