[Abyss]

Well... that was trippy.

"From HarperCollins.ca: Eric Sanderson is jolted awake one morning to discover that he does not know who he is or where he is. All that he has to cling to is a series of letters and packages—which he is warned not to open—signed “with regret and hope” from the First Eric Sanderson. Attacked in his own home by a force he cannot see and memories he cannot ignore—including those of a perfect love now lost—Eric tears open the parcels and discovers he is being relentlessly pursued by a shark that may exist only in his mind, but which stalks him through the flows and streams of language and human interaction. Hunting the answers as he is hunted, Eric is led on a journey that will either bring the First Eric Sanderson back to life or destroy both Eric Sandersons forever.A daring and unique novel that confronts readers with literary hieroglyphs as well as an intensely original story, The Raw Shark Texts plumbs the depths and dangers of language, the fluidity of memory and the bittersweet ripples of loss.""

I think sharks are neat. I was one of those kids who couldn't sleep for three days after seeing JAWS for the first time, then had nightmares for a week. Then watched it again.

I also think books are neat, and i really like when an author is prepared to try something new and different.

So i spotted the RAW SHARK TEXTS a while ago, and sooner or later i was bound to read it.

And well... like i said, trippy. And awesome. Maybe doesn't go as far as it could in terms of sheer mind-fuck in text form, but overall i enjoyed it. There are points in Steven Hall's THE RAW SHARK TEXTS where i was convinced this was one of the coolest most original books i have ever read. The entire book isn't as strong as all that. It starts slow, but once it gets moving, it pushes along at a good pace, buildling to a final confrontation with various elements that come into play in the story.

I can't discuss the end of the book without spoiling it. Suffice to say, i enjoyed the ending, tho i would have liked to have seen it done more in keeping with the rest of the book. That said, it works.


I can't say this book is for everyone. It requires some thought, some patience, and a serious suspension of disbelief. It's sci-fi, but rooted in reality, and utterly far-fetched but plausible at the same time. There is action, and it's well written, but the action scenes are even better when taken in the context of, not just a shark trying to eat a person, but a conceptual shark, swimming through the walls, trying to eat the memories of someone who is drowning in the concept of water in an otherwise dry room...

I can't even do it justice in description. It's an interesting, different, challenging book, not without its flaws, but overall worth checking out.

Great characters, Eric, the protagonist, is a good narrative voice, convincing and readable.

Now SPOILERS
SPOILERS
RAW SHARK TEXT SPOILERS
SPOILER SHARK WILL EAT YOUR SPOILER BRAINZ AND LEAVE YOU
SPOILERS
EMPTY AND ALONE AND SPOILERS
SPOILERS FUCKING SPOILERS

Aside from the innate coolness of the book, there are also points, notably at the end, where i was convinced the author, having gone as far as he could with his ideas, didn't know how to end the story.

Or maybe he didn't actually end the story because he's planning on coming back to it. It's possible, because there is ample room to expand.

Still, it was a neat conceit that the only way to stop a conceptual shark is to invoke the collective consciousness of the finale of JAWS... it's just, while i really really enjoyed the idea of the shark attacking from anywhere and how those attacks played out, the transition to the ''conceptual ocean" and what followed was just too... literal. I would have liked to have seen it all play out inside the stack of books, with the finding a way inside and the conceptual loops being used to block it and failing and... well, instead we got a revamp of Roy Schneider shooting Jaws in the head.... Shark attacks Hero, Hero throws plot-device laptop in Shark's mouth, Shark 'splodes. Ummm... what? After letterbombs and meme clones and sheilds made of audio loops, i was expecting something a bit more... cerebral... i mean, it works as far as it goes, and there are implications to it... as tho the Shark is actually First Eric's death wish trying to wipe Second Eric out... but it's really left to the reader to decide, perhaps too much so.

Scout and/or Clio may become the genre fanboy fantasy girl that Trinity was back in the Matrix days. Especially if a film gets made. I am annoyed that the connection between the two women was never explained.

Mycroft Ward was an excellent bad-guy concept. Too bad we never really saw it.

And while i was initially sceptical about them dragging the cat along, he turned out to be a totally fun minor element to the story.

I am bugged bythe ending, especially the new clip suggesting Eric's body was found. The implication is that much if not most of the story was in his head, or else him, Scout and Ian lived happily ever after in conceptual greek island naxos... which was only in Eric's head and thus makes less sense...

I'm not so bugged by the ending that i didn't enjoy it - i really enjoyed the book, i would recommend it to someone to read, and i'll pickup whatever Hall tries next.


Anyone else?

- Abyss, ...~~~~|\~~~~ ahhh! Shark!!!! SHARK!!!

[Yellow]

I read this a few months ago. I thought it was a great idea, and it started very well... but damn, the ending pretty much ruined it for me. I won't go into spoilers, but I guess I agree with Abyss about the "revamp" (i.e. when the author ran out of imagination). Completely deflated the whole book for me.

Ah well. I'd recommend it to anyone, because it was definitely a refreshing read, and maybe people won't be as let down as I was.

By the way - I thought I'd worked out a major plot twist really early on. There's a woman in there called Clio Aames, which I was convinced I'd worked out that it was an anagram of "I am close" and I was just waiting for the twist. And then it never happened because I fucked up the anagram and forgot about the extra "A"