Tuesday, May 21, 2002
Title: lucifersDragon
Author: Jon Courtney Grimwood
Publisher: Earthlight
lucifersDragon is the second novel by John Courtenay Grimwood, and the only one that I haven't read. Along with his first book neoAddix, it had been out of print, while I had found an old copy of neoAddix second hand lucifersDragon had eluded me till now. Back in print for the first time in a number of years, with a cover style that is consistent with the later novels reMix and redRobe, unlike the early edition of neoAddix, which featured a hideous SF cover work. lucifersDragon fits in with these other three novels as part of his sort of alternate-history/near future cyber punk thing. Linking in with some contribution from the characters Alex Gibson and Razz from neoAddix, as well as a more global feel. lucifersDragon is perhaps the most convoluted of the four books, and despite the fact that is perhaps meanders, and at times in a confused manner, is probably the best of the sequence. The title comes from a semi-AI computer game, in which the player can experience the apocalypse either as the archangel or the dragon. The doge is a kind of child king/corporate figure head for neoVenice, and he is a big fan of the game, which he is playing when he and his exotic bodyguard Razz are attacked. All sorts of rumours spread around the shanty towns that surround neoVenice, while the corporate structures of the city itself try to clamp down. The book follows, from that start, the trail of Razz who having been killed is in a new body, the Doge's cousin Karo who is trying to get revenge, and the police officer who has been assigned as a token gesture to solve the crime at the start. In the process, the police officer is trying to understand how this all fits together with the island construct that is neoVenice, and so we back track in time with him, following a spoiled daughter of a mafia billionaire as the tries to pull of her cunning plan to build her own island. As with the rest of Grimwood's work this is a pretty straight forward read - filled with drugs, violence and tech. Winding the threads, he manages to bring them to a point where they have a certain momentum, and it is easy enough to get caught up in that. Though to some degree I was conscious of just how convenient those events seemed, and how unlikely it is that something wouldn't have been done sooner to prevent the momentum from building. Interestingly there are a couple of strong inferences that are worked into the text, which are never laid straight out, which was novel and refreshing.
RVWR: PTR
May 2002
