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Mar. 10th, 2003 08:24 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
chelseagirlthoughts on William Gibson's *Pattern Recognition* before it recedes too far into the past horizon:
A bit too much that the protagonist is named Cayce; I suspect intertextuality was intended, not, uh, cuteness. (Case -- protagonist of Neuromancer)
Liked this more than I have anything new of his for awhile. Even his X-Files ep. had the same basic plot as Neuromancer: what I think of as the "Sailing to Byzantium" plot, really: "Once out of nature I shall never take, my bodily form from any natural thing" Here, the ending felt a bit rushed and I never really got a good enough sense of the resolution of the "footage" plot. The fact that I read the last 50 pages in the middle of the night in the throes of an attack of insomnia may have something to do with my being less impressed than with the rest of the book.
Particularly appreciated Cayce's constant references to London/England as the mirror world of New York/US. I made some notes on that on my last trip over, though I was tedious and associated it with the Freudian uncanny. I suspect M. still feels like he's living through the looking-glass most days. Also loved the Tommy Hilfiger event horizon, beyond which nothing can be more derivative. Generally, the commercial culture critique was interesting, though for someone with a phobia about it, Cayce seemed to obsess about her brand-name jacket on every third page.
Looking glasses reminds me of the other book I just read, China Mieville's *The Tain*. I picked it up and put it down a few times. Partly I didn't want to read the last thing of his I'd yet to read, and have nothing new. But partly the whole post-apocalyptic ruined London setting had me saying to myself, no. Not again. I should have trusted, though -- once again, he's made something really new.
A bit too much that the protagonist is named Cayce; I suspect intertextuality was intended, not, uh, cuteness. (Case -- protagonist of Neuromancer)
Liked this more than I have anything new of his for awhile. Even his X-Files ep. had the same basic plot as Neuromancer: what I think of as the "Sailing to Byzantium" plot, really: "Once out of nature I shall never take, my bodily form from any natural thing" Here, the ending felt a bit rushed and I never really got a good enough sense of the resolution of the "footage" plot. The fact that I read the last 50 pages in the middle of the night in the throes of an attack of insomnia may have something to do with my being less impressed than with the rest of the book.
Particularly appreciated Cayce's constant references to London/England as the mirror world of New York/US. I made some notes on that on my last trip over, though I was tedious and associated it with the Freudian uncanny. I suspect M. still feels like he's living through the looking-glass most days. Also loved the Tommy Hilfiger event horizon, beyond which nothing can be more derivative. Generally, the commercial culture critique was interesting, though for someone with a phobia about it, Cayce seemed to obsess about her brand-name jacket on every third page.
Looking glasses reminds me of the other book I just read, China Mieville's *The Tain*. I picked it up and put it down a few times. Partly I didn't want to read the last thing of his I'd yet to read, and have nothing new. But partly the whole post-apocalyptic ruined London setting had me saying to myself, no. Not again. I should have trusted, though -- once again, he's made something really new.
