Spook Country (Blue Ant) Paperback – March 3, 2009

Spook Country is the follow up to Pattern Recognition only so much as it takes place in the same world. If you came to the novel expecting more of the same, then you came to the wrong place. But if all you want is more of the same, why read any of Gibson's novels? Not that Pattern Recognition wasn't brilliant and fun (which it was both in spades), but Spook Country resonates with our reality a little more than PR did. Whereas PR allowed you to escape a little from the real world, Spook Country slams you head first into the windscreen of the now, and as unsettling, confusing and very often trivial as our real world has become, so are the events of the novel.The prose is typical Gibson, beautifully contrived and laced with a staggering breadth of pop and not-so-pop cultural knowledge. The story switches between three primary characters and the transitions in these context switches are for the most part handled very well, hardly missing a beat. Particularly striking are the chapters which cover the same sequence of events from differing viewpoints and manage to do so with perfect rhythm. There are shades of Neal Stephenson beginning to show in the book in the way Gibson handles these transitions -- in a good way.I won't spoil it for you, but the story is not Good Spy vs. Bad Spy. If it were, it wouldn't be Gibson. Those who feel lost in the story, or wish that the conclusion were more clearly drawn have missed the point of the book. This is about today. This book represents, in narrative, the situation we all find ourselves in post 9/11. None of us really know what's going on. The people running what's going on don't know what's really going on anymore. It's too large, too complicated, too organic for any of us to comprehend anymore. The world stopped making sense some time ago, and we ignored that fact until the fears of 9/11 made us aware of it. This book is about the human reaction to the human-made and yet completely unknowable world that is emerging around us.It is simply brilliant, and the most fun I've had with a novel since Pattern Recognition.

Spook CountryWilliam GibsonPenguin/VikingWilliam Gibson is justifiably renowned as one of the key founders of the now vast realm of cyberpunk. His 1986 novel Neuromancer was a foundation stone for a new style of futuristic fiction; high tech but gritty. The opening line of the novel said it all: "The sky above the port was the colour of television tuned to a dead channel."In Gibson's world voodoo met with artificial intelligence. It was a dark realm of worrisome virtual realities. It was a soaring burst of imagination that, at the time, had no equivalent.Since that time Gibson has gradually been re-inventing himself, coming closer to the present day with each book. His latest, Spook Country, is very much placed in the here and now, resonant with references to 9/11, the Iraq war and corruption within the current American administration. At heart it is a thriller, without the flourishes of remarkable futurism that marked Gibson's earlier works and as such it will be a disappointment to those hoping for the surreal leaps of vision in his earlier works. But Spook Country remains resolutely a Gibson book, replete with references to the gods and goddesses of voodoo belief. Here the iPod meets the goddess Ochun and a drug called RIZE clashes with the muscular, athletic god Oshosi.The promotional blurb for Spook Country claims that the novel is "J.G. Ballard meets John Le Carré", but the novel is far too American for it to fit into such a bizarre English context. One suspects that the Canadian-born Gibson is more influenced by the paranoiac sci-fi of Philip K. Dick and the stylistic tropes of Raymond Chandler, both denizens of Los Angeles where much of the novel is set.Sense of place is a major aspect of Spook Country. Elements of LA and New York City are captured brilliantly. As one of the key protagonists, the youthful Cuban exile Tito, sprints through Canal Street in New York one can envisage the setting immediately. But although this is New York post-9/11 - a fact that is central to the story - Gibson fails to capture the sense of displacement many New Yorkers still feel, a sensation rendered palpable in Don DeLillo's latest novel, Falling Man.Like DeLillo, Gibson uses an artist as one of his triggers to get the action rolling, in this case an artist who uses a kind of virtual reality recreation of past events such as the death of River Pheonix. The artwork is the ostensible subject of a feature story for a not-yet existent magazine called Node to be written by a former indie-rock singer Hollis Henry. It rapidly becomes apparent that Node will probably never exist and its' supposed publisher is seeking something else entirely. Running parallel to this story are the mysterious goings on of a group of Cubans, especially the athletic Tito who summons the aid of Ochun and Oshosi when necessary, a CIA-type thug and a drug addled character called Milgrim.Central to the book is the `producer' Bobby Chombo, a paranoid and reclusive troubleshooter for manufacturers of military navigation equipment who refuses to sleep in the same place twice. Hollis Henry has been told by her editor to find him but not told why.With his sprawling matrix of characters the narrative moves along at break-neck pace. Mis-information transfer run by the Cubans - often via i-Pod - constantly misleads shadow-agents of the government. Also central is the fortune of American cash set aside to help re-build Iraq that has been pirated away for other, unspecified, but clearly corrupt, uses.At times Gibson's narrative soars, at others it is dogged down by slightly lame character development. It is ideal Winter reading but fails to claim anything like the cultural potency of Neuromancer.

Like so many of William Gibson's novels, you need to really pay attention during the first 50 pages. The characters arrive in a blizzard and the plot elements need careful watching or they'll fade from your memory (mine, at least) before the framework is completed. But it's a very good story, one which reminds the reader that Gibson possesses a world class imagination to go with his wonderful ability to craft memorable, affecting characters.Don't miss it.

None of Gibson's work lives up to Neuromancer and Count Zero.

I've read this book (and the other two that make up the Blue Ant trilogy' twice ... What amazing writing, what riveting detail, how compelling. I expect to read these over and over again, as I have many of le Carre's. I've seen reviewers puzzle about the storyline and the details, and it's true, sometimes you're not sure what's happening, but the reading is so enjoyable and engrossing it really doesn't matter if you've lost the plot ... just another excuse to read it again, and again. William Gibson started out as the bestselling author of Neuromancer (which was pretty good) but his later work is on another level. This trilogy and the one about the community that establishes itself on the Golden Gate Bridge in the near future (Virtual Light, etc) are marvels. And his next, 'The peripheral' is coming out soon, just in time for my 60th birthday (I've pre-ordered it). I was raised on Ray Bradbury and Isaac Asimov, 'Amazing Stories' et al, and IMHO this genre (which I think we call 'speculative fiction' these days) just gets better and better.

I've read all William Gibson's books. The Neuromancer trilogy was just wonderful. But then, slowly, his books changed; through Idoru, All Tomorrow's Parties and then Pattern Recognition, he moved into a different time. Not really a different genre though. I mean, you could say that Pattern Recognition and Spook Country are thrillers, spy novels, but they're not. They're really not.Whenever I read a Gibson novel, I find myself wishing that I lived in his world. But then I realise that, basically, I do. And that's what's so magical about them. It's Gibson's take on our existing world that makes you look at it in a new way, from a new perspective. Surely that must be one of the greatest things a novelist can do. His prose is so tight, so condensed and yet has so many echoes, so many extra-cultural references that it's like reading a novel, a map, a web-page, a history book all wrapped up together.Look up Hubertus Bigend on Wikipedia. That's what one of his characters does. If you do, you'll find an entry referencing this book. This kind of reflexivity is central to this book. The merging of quite separate worlds - rock music, money laundering, marketing, geo-politics, voodoo religion - suggests a side of globalisation not explored anywhere else in this form. Referring to global brand names is simply one side of this - a Brabus Maybach for heaven's sake! (have a look at the Brabus web-site, with sound on) - just grounds this in something akin to a material fantasy.In some ways, the characters represent these different worlds, or at least different aspects of them. Milgrim, addicted to Ativan (1987 Ativan advertisement. "In a world where certainties are few...no wonder Ativan® (lorazepam)C-IV is prescribed by so many caring clinicians.") seemingly captured by Brown (the secret agent?), finally just walks away, free to go back to his favourite book on the history of heresy. Brown, scary but fundamentally old school and out of his depth, violent in his ignorance, Tito, of indeterminate race and innocent esoteric skills, Hollis, ex obscure rock star, lost all her money in the dot com bubble, cynical, worldly-wise, and Bigend, manipulative but still somehow childlike, playing with ideas and technologies.The story is good. The characters are good. The premise is good. The execution almost faultless. A gripping read. A fab book.

A big fan of his, it is the first time I do not read one of his book all at once....