Shrine Of Stars (Confluence) [Hardcover]

In the first volume, Child of the River, McAuley sketched a strange world with many wonders, and introduced an intriguing main character, Yamamanama (fortunately called Yama by most of the characters). This world, Confluence, is an artificial construct, built thousands of years ago at the behest of the Preservers (apparently descendants of Earth humans), by their servants the "Builders". The Preservers then populated the world with thousands of "bloodlines", apparently "uplifted" animals, as well as the "indigenous" races, apparently aliens of some variety. In the first volume all this is presented as mythic history, and the book has the feel of fantasy. Yama, it is hinted, is the last remnant of the bloodline of the Builders. He sets out on a journey up the huge River of Confluence to the capitol city, Ys, while a long war rages on between the Heretics and the established authority of Confluence. Over the first two books, Yama journeys to Ys, then back down the river to his home. He becomes involved in the war, and meets many of the bloodlines of Confluence, as well as remnants of humans from long before Confluence, and he learns much about his own, very considerable, powers.

Many mysteries are introduced in the first two volumes, and they are slowly dispelled. But in Shrine of Stars, McAuley actually delivers on the implied promise of the first two books: the nature of Confluence, and the nature of Yama, and the answers to the mysteries of the first two books, are all revealed in logical and satisfying ways. In the end the three books are clearly, unambiguously, far future Science Fiction, in a way that for example such models as Jack Vance's The Dying Earth and Gene Wolfe's The Book of the New Sun aren't, quite. This is both good and bad, but it seems to be entirely McAuley's intention. That is, the remaining mysteries, and the religious symbolism, of Wolfe's great tetralogy are a feature certainly intended by the author: and in many ways they enhance the book. It may be that that is the reason I still consider Wolfe's series better than The Book of Confluence, or it may be simply that as good a writer as McAuley is, and he's quite good, Wolfe is still better. But at any rate such comparisons, though inevitable, aren't quite fair to McAuley's work: in the end, he has written an individual work, with its own plan, its own intentions, and I think he succeeds marvelously.

Shrine of Stars, thus, follows Yama and Pandaras after they are separated, as Yama begins to be possessed by a machine implanted in his body, and as Pandaras tries to find Yama, unwillingly bringing Prefect Corin back on Yama's trail. After many trials, Yama comes to full understanding of himself, and of his fate. There are very explicit religious echoes (including a plan for Yama to be executed on a structure of wood), but even as McAuley emphasizes these echoes, he provides rational and consistent explanations for them all. Finally Yama must make a journey off Confluence to another planet, and he must come to a solution to the problem of the future of the bloodlines of Confluence that deals with the apparent coming destruction of Confluence. His solution is satisfying, and McAuley neatly wraps up the series with an ending that is perhaps reminiscent of Charles Harness, only a bit more logical. This is one of the better extended works of SF in the last years of this century, in many ways a fine capstone for a long history of "far future" SF.

McAuley seems to compress far too much in Shrine of Stars, rather than let the story build it's way to a finale, he jams so many scenarios and near misses that the reader becomes a little jaded towards the end. Time after time the antagonist(s) reappear after you think they have been eliminated. The effect is that you're never surprised that another antagonist shows up again (in fact the question becomes: which one will appear next?).

But most importantly McAuley lets the reader down. After almost three books where Yama looks for his human bloodline, the results are disappointing and not really worthy of the buildup the author coaxes the reader to expect.

One wants to know more about humanity: what happened, why and so on. Instead the meeting becomes another mini-adventure in a trilogy of mini-adventures that ends in disaster for humans. And still there's no really fulfilling explaination of the past. After three novels what a disappointment! The ultimate end is of an unsatisfying "loop of time" variety.

There is a part in Shrine of Stars where Dimas tells Yama that he can tell him all about the history of humanity, why Confluence exists and what exactly happened. Yama's reply is that he doesn't want to know.

Yama might not want to know, but the reader does.

Its a bit of a criticism on an otherwise magnificent work, but I think the last half of the book relies TOO much on tropes from Gene Wolfe's Book of the New Sun novels, especially URTH OF THE NEW SUN.

By the end of the book, however, this reviewer was more than satisfied with the arc of Yama's story. Even with mining the same terrain as Wolfe, the Confluence series is a far easier read--more SF, less allegory.

One last editorial bit. I bought the first and subsequent books of Confluence in hardcover since they were published in that "small, $14 edition" that made getting a hardcover practical. I wish more publishers would publish books this way. Confluence was a definite keeper and I look forward to re-reading it more than once.