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VELLUM
(THE BOOK OF ALL HOURS)
Author:
Hal Duncan
Publisher: Macmillan / 600pp / £17.99
ISBN: 1405052082
For
something that’s supposed to take us to
unknown realms and expand our sense of wonder,
sometimes the Fantasy genre can feel terribly
familiar. With so many novels exploring variations
on the same old High fantasy clichés of
evil kings, lone heroes and plucky heroines, it’s
easy to think we’re doomed to remain stuck
in a loop, reading the same stories over and over
again.
Not, however, if author Hal Duncan has anything
to do with it. Setting fire to the fantasy rulebook
in the first five minutes, Vellum is a mind-blowing
read that’s genuinely unlike anything you’ve
ever read before. Forget any of the traditional
Tolkien references- the biggest influences here
are James Joyce, Samuel R. Delaney, and especially
Michael Moorcock and his dazzlingly experimental
Jerry Cornelius novels.
With a plot that can leap realities in the middle
of a paragraph, and a cast of characters who regularly
switch identities or re-incarnate as completely
different people, it’s the kind of novel
where piecing together what’s going on is
a major undertaking, and Vellum certainly redefines
the concept of ‘demanding reading’.
Essentially, it’s the tale of three characters–
biker girl Phreedom Messenger, her brother Thomas,
and runaway soldier-turned-angel Seamus Finnegan–
and their battle to try and survive as the fight
between Heaven and Hell begins in a cyberpunk-style
near future America.
It’s also, however, the tale of university
student Reynard Carter and his journey into the
eternity of the Vellum- the infinite realm that
our own world is ‘written on’- as
he follows the paths in the Book of All Hours.
It’s the tale of Jack Carter and his terrifying
discoveries in Eastern Europe. It’s a rewrite
of Sumerian mythology and the story of Prometheus.
It’s a love story, a satire, and a history
of rebellion and unrest in the 20th Century. Not
your average fantasy, in other words…
A book that’s designed to be felt rather
than described, this is a towering Everest of
a novel that’s incredibly hard work to climb,
but does offer the most astounding views once
you reach the summit. Combining a complex, multi-layered
mythology with totally off-beat and non-linear
storytelling is risky as hell, but Duncan somehow
manages to pull it off, essentially handing the
reader hundreds of jigsaw puzzle pieces and making
them work it out for themselves.
The imaginary worlds that he dreams up throughout
the book are stunning, and he’s just as
comfortable describing the hallucinatory, limitless
worlds of the Vellum as he is in the grimy hell
of World War One. There’s wit and humour
to be found here, as well as some genuinely shocking
violence, but probably the most surprising element
is that the characterisation doesn’t get
swamped by the bizarre prose style. Instead, Duncan
delivers a serious emotional punch and ensures
that there’s a genuine heart beating underneath
the whacked-out strangeness of the story structure.
The only major down-side is that this is only
the first half of a much larger work. In normal
circumstances, that’d mean a frustrating
cliffhanger- but here, the result is that Vellum
is one half of an equation, and we’re not
going to know exactly what it means until the
climactic volume Ink arrives sometime in 2006.
Duncan’s literary adventures may be the
future of the genre, or they may be a magnificently
bonkers stylistic one-off, but love it or hate
it (and it’s a book that will firmly divide
opinion), Vellum has expanded the limits of Fantasy
like nothing that’s been published in years.
Rating:
* * *
* *
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THE X-FILES: SEASON NINE
DVD
RELEASE
2001-2002 Dirs: Various
Starring: Gillian Anderson, Robert Patrick, Annabeth
Gish, Mitch Pillegi
Cert: 15 Running Time: 860 mins
RRP: £79.99
Sometimes,
success can be a problem. The global phenomenon
that THE X-FILES became during its first years
on the air made David Duchovny and Gillian Anderson
household names, as well as arguably kicking off
the 1990s sci-fi screen renaissance. Unfortunately,
it also meant a pretty fragile central concept
got pushed way beyond the point of no return.
The biggest sin of the show’s ninth and
final season is simply that it ran out of places
to go. While his 18 episode absence proves conclusively
David Duchovny wasn’t essential for the
show’s success, the element of surprise
was;- and even in the traditionally more satisfying
standalone episodes, it’s difficult not
to think that we’ve seen it all before.
The black oil/aliens/supersoldier plotline just
gets more and more incomprehensible, while the
Duchovny-starring finale conclusively confirms
the widespread belief that Chris Carter never
had the faintest idea where his grand “arc
plot” was heading.
It’s never less than watchable, however,
with the ensemble dynamic between Anderson, Patrick
and Gish suiting the show surprisingly well- especially
in quirky episodes like LORD OF THE FLIES. The
tone may be dated and pompous in this post-BUFFY
world, but without THE X-FILES’ massive
initial success and it’s willingness to
experiment, everyone’s favourite vampire
slayer might never have got beyond the 1992 movie.
One day, Chris Carter may finally get around to
making the second X-FILES film- but he’d
possibly be wiser to let it be and allow this,
for all its flaws and mistakes, to be the show’s
swan song. It may not end with a bang- but Season
Nine isn’t quite the whimper you might expect…
Disc Extras:
Two separate discs of extras may look promising-
but this is a thin, unimpressive mix with plenty
of padding. Along with a couple of brief retrospectives,
there’s the “Secrets of the X-Files”
documentaries previously seen on video, a handful
of commentaries, international clips, and about
10 deleted scenes. And that’s your lot.is.
Rating:
* * * Extras:
* *
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