Triffids Beard 2 - The Bearded Triffid

Ah -- so now I was having earthquakes in my teeth. I wasn't reassured.
"Can you do anything with it?"
"Oh yes, fix it in a jiffy. Nice clean break, no sign of decay, soon get it back together. Do you want a local
anaesthetic?"
Yes I wanted a local anaesthetic. I'm a coward about these things. GIVE ME DRUGS! Drugs were duly
forthcoming...
Stephen Baxter's Titan tells a profoundly moving story of the swansong of the American space effort.
Paula Bennacerraf is in charge of the dismantling of the shuttle fleet. The space race is over, the glory
days are gone and so is the money. But in these dying days, the Cassini probe reports anomalous
findings on Titan, and Paula and Isaac Rosenberg (a scientist at JPL) suspect that life may have been
discovered. Paula's budget is not large, but by playing politics here and calling in favours there, she and
Rosenberg put together one last planetary mission. Rusting Saturn rockets, mothballed Apollo capsules
and the few remaining shuttles are pressed into service.
The novel is a grittily realistic account of a space mission; all the way from woe to go (and it forms a
fitting companion piece to Baxter's earlier novel Voyage). The politics, the personalities and the
technologies are brought vividly to life. The book grabbed hold of me and wouldn't let go -- though I
could have done without the saccharine last chapter and the epilogue.
I've always enjoyed the mainstream novels of Iain Banks (without the 'M'), but A Song of Stone simply
doesn't work. It is set some time after a mysterious war. Armed gangs of ex-soldiers roam the land and
refugees are an almost constant stream along the road by the castle. The occupants of the castle join
the refugees, hoping to escape. However they are caught by the lieutenant of an outlaw band and
returned to the castle where they are forced to minister to the outlaws. The novel explores the
microcosm of this conflict (perhaps in relation to the macrocosm outside the castle walls). However the
narrator is so cold and distant and unfeeling (other than in a very analytical way) that the novel never
catches fire. It is unemotional and as a result is quite dull.
In The Moon and the Sun, Vonda McIntyre tells one of the best alternate history stories I have ever
read. To the court of Lois XIV in seventeenth century France comes Father Yves de la Croix, the Sun
King's natural philosopher, returned from a voyage of discovery. He has brought back a living sea
monster with a double tail, webbed hands, long tangled hair and a gargoyle face. The novel is partly
about the scientific investigation of the sea monster by Yves and his sister Marie-Josephe, and partly
about the politics of the Sun King's court. I remain ambivalent about the King -- all the way through the
book I could never decide if he was weak or strong, wise or stupid. Was his conviction that immortality
was the gift of the sea monster only an affectation, or was he genuinely a believer? Both interpretations
can be convincingly argued. I suppose that makes him a consummate politician -- impure and far from
simple.
Yves proves to be a weak and stupid man, too easily manipulated by the political cynics at court. His
sister Marie-Joseph, despite her naiveté was far wiser, and a considerably better scientist. The
relationship she builds with Sherzad the sea monster is the core of the book, and with Sherzad Vonda
McIntyre has again demonstrated her usual enormous skill at making the alien and unfamiliar acceptable,
understandable and even sympathetic.
Soon my jaw was numbing nicely and the dentist bustled around preparing the usual assortment of
devices that gave every appearance of having been patented by Torquemada. Then it was time to begin.
"Open wide."
First we had the ultrasonic drill and the water spray. That wasn't too bad. Then we had the grinding of a
more ordinary drill.