The Windup Girl (Unabridged) [Audio Download]

I am one of the `Malayan Chinese' as depicted in this novel, and I am simply astonished at how real and accurate Bacigalala's grasp and hold of the socio-political undertones of Thailand and the Malaysian Chinese are in this novel. Many times I find myself flipping to the front to check the author's name to see if he really isn't Asian and then to the tiny write-up of himself to see if he lived in Asia for decades. Iowa born. Hmmm.....
Lot's of great dystopian lit out there, but this one really hit home for me simply because of its Asian setting. Could actually picture dystopian Bangkok all around me as I read this book.
Ok constructive rascist views aside, this book is one of the best pieces of dystopic science fiction I have ever read, my other favorite being Dune (by the original Frank Herbert). I'm usually not one to pounce on new unheard of authors, but I came onto this having just finished Bagicalalala's YA novel Ship Breaker which blew me away (and is not in an Asian setting but in the Gulf of Mexico). I started the book with the presumption that this was no way going to be better than Ship Breaker. But the book proved me wrong 15 minutes in. An exciting, thrilling, dystopic romp to the finish. I am hungry for more Bacgialala now.
Why the hell is it taking till December for paperbacks of Pump Six (his short story collection) to be released?!??!!!! I simply can't afford the hardcover versions going for $400 over at the moment!!!!
Congratulations for being my new number one author farang Paolo. Hurry up and show us what else is in your imagination.

Paolo Bacigalupi has been touted as being a "next big thing" for a while now (I believe that he's already won awards for his short-stories?)

This, his debut novel, is the first thing of his that I've read. It's a post-oil, post climate-change novel (he talks about the "expansion" and the "contraction"). His imagined future sees a time where we, firstly, don't have access to cheap energy as we do now (instead they have to rely on that good old stand-by human and animal muscle-power) and secondly, our lifestyle now has led to devastation in low-lying areas.

The titular Wind-Up Girl is a woman genetically engineered to perform for the pleasure of rich men. She's been stranded by her Japanese owner in a fiercely independent Thailand simply because it's cheaper to leave her there. The novel deals with the consequences of multinational corporations indulging in genetic engineering without thought for the consequences. I think that it's handled well; I didn't feel that it was particularly hectoring or adopting a knee-jerk "GM=bad" view of things. Rather it was concerned with the potential human (and not scientific) consequences of unregulated engineering (Thailand remains independent because they don't allow corporations power there). The novel considers the potential for exploitation that comes with genetic engineering. For example: terminator genes that force farmers always to buy their seeds from the manufacturer; engineered diseases that will again force farmers to buy from them.

From this point of view I found the novel to be intelligent and thoughtful. It is also, in places, quite an exciting read. It kept me turning the pages and I finished it pretty quickly. I think he's a talented writer and look forward to what he'll do next.

It's a multi-layered novel too. There are a number of plots running through the story and, though it may not be immediately clear, they all feed into the main story. A big concern of the novel is how energy is obtained and used. The Thai government in the novel, as well as being concerned with what is being forced upon their people by multinationals (and to reiterate, the argument isn't that GM doesn't work; it does. The argument isn't that he science is bad, it is that the people that can afford to control it are) is concerned with energy use. They carefully regulate the supply of gas (gained from the decomposition of waste and coloured so that you know it's legit) as does everyone.

Occasionally, also, we get glances back at our own time; in times where a main character early on is trying to discover what an apparently new type of fruit is, considering how profligate we were (from his point of view). Looking back a photographs of what seemed like a different world (and indeed in many ways was.

The world that it's set in is interesting too. It's undoubtedly dystopian and yet hi-tech. And yet not in some ways that we may be used to. Things like computing power are rationed purely by dint of the fact that power computing has high energy costs. The biological technology displayed is also extremely hi-tech, and the reliance on human muscle and animal power seems entirely fitting.

So, my first impressions of Paolo Bacigalupi are good; I'd recommend this book to fans of the genre (hell, give it to non-fans too; it's as good a place to start as any).

However, I do feel that it's greatness has been somewhat overstated (actually, if I'm honest, I'd say it's a 3.5 star book, but felt it fairer to round up, because I did really enjoy it). It's up for a Hugo this year and there has been a great deal of "best thing evaaar" type chat amongst fandom. It's good, but jeez, allow the guy room to grow it *isn't* the greatest thing ever and I can think of several novels from last year that were better (Start with Adam Robert's "Yellow Blue Tibia: A Novel" it's super, certainly his best). I'm not sure if all the spluh is because people are desperate to find "next big things" all the time?

It is rare to find an advertising blurb on a book that exactly captures your feelings about it. For this book the blurb compares it to William Gibson's 'Neuromancer' which is spot on, as this book could be the first of a new science fiction sub-genre. Like Neuromancer, it is set in the nearish future, but this future is very different from Gibson's.

It is set after the Contraction, which occured when the previous era, the Expansion (which is us), ran out of energy and resources. Rather then a new limitless virtual world, what we see here is the opposite: a resource-limited physical world, powered by muscle fed on staple foods, which have to be gene-hardened against a range of mutatated blights. Most live hand to mouth. All the old racial, national and religious fault lines have blown wide open again. Global warming still continues. The novel is set in Bangkok which is now below sea level and protected both by a ring of dams and the prayers of Buddhist monks.

Since the power infrastructure has gone, energy from muscle-power is stored in compressed springs. The novel opens in a factory making springs, and one sub-plot is the secret plan of its 'yellow card' immigrant Chinese manager to steal the blueprints for a revolutionary new type of spring. The factory is owned by an American food company. It, and a few other large companies, now 'own' the genotypes for staple foods. These companies are powerful enough to threaten nation states: Thailand preserves its independence by having a secret genetic seed bank and an ex-company gene hacker who can exploit it. Another sub-plot concerns a 'calorie man', an executive/spy working for a big American food company, whose cover is manager of the spring factory, but whose real assignment is to uncover the seed bank and its rogue hacker. The final sub-plot concerns the in-fighting between the Environment Ministry, who police energy and genetic misuse and the traditional security forces. The former are known as 'white shirts' and check for suspected genetic mutations, misuse of resources etc. Finally, the 'Windup Girl' of the title is a bar girl/prostitute. She is a product of Japanese genetic engineeering and not considered a real person at all. She moves in a jerky manner, hence her nickname. Through her all the main characters and sub-plots converge. It all ends badly.

This is not a cheerful novel (and neither was Neuromancer). But it brings the concerns of science fiction into sharp focus in a near(ish) dystopian future that looks all too likely. Unlike Gibson's vision, which was unrealistic, but poetic, this novel tries hard to be both realistic in style and in technology (the spring 'batteries' notwithstanding). The only thing lacking is a name for this novel's style - 'gene noir' maybe? For free tasters see the online stories 'The Yellow Card man' and 'The calorie man', which segue into this novel.