I recently read Charles Stross’s The Atrocity Archives, a book that blends the spy thriller, the cosmic horror of H. P. Lovecraft, and the techno-institutional absurdist politics of Dilbert into one magnificent novel. I recommend it very, very highly.

The Atrocity Archives — Charles Stross

Rating: 5/5

After reading Singularity Sky by Charles Stross I was willing to give the hyperbolic statements about the author the benefit of the doubt. Singularity Sky was a well-written, thought-provoking book that held my interest and delivered the goods. A couple weeks ago, my uncle sent me a copy of The Atrocity Archives, which apparently was Mr. Stross’s first published novel in the UK. Only recently has this novel been published in the US, which is flat out crazy as this is one of the best books I have read in a long time.

The Atrocity Archives is a book that blends strands from three traditional novel genres: espionage or secret service thrillers; eldritch horror a la H. P. Lovecraft; and cyberpunk-influenced science fiction. The story centers on the Laundry, a secret British government agency charged with, in Men In Black style, protecting the public from being attacked by or even knowing about the various bizarre entities that threaten our reality. The central character is Bob Howard, a computer programmer and systems administrator for the Laundry, who has recently had his application for field service approved by his supervisors. Bob immediately gets sucked in over his head on his first mission, as he exposes a conspiracy that could threaten the existence of our entire universe.

The Atrocity Archives is written in first-person, which gives the reader a greater sense of immediacy. It also encourages greater identification with the character as well as providing a rationale for not revealing information that might prematurely spoil the dramatic tension until Bob actually stumbles over it himself. I found the main character extremely easy to identify with, as he is close to my age and shares my profession and interests. Others’ mileage may vary.

The book is written in a fast, active style that reminds me of Neal Stephenson in some ways. Bob liberally salts his narrative with pop culture, hacking, and H. P. Lovecraft references, so familiarity with these subjects will greatly enhance your ability to pick up on the many in-jokes that spice the text.

One of the real triumphs of this book is that it manages to outdo or transcend most of its inspirational material. The occult and esoteric terrorism that the Laundry has to combat give a much more gut-churning feel of urgency and impending disaster than the elaborate ballet of monolithic state diplomacy that was the Cold War. The just-scientific-enough explanations of what the Great Old Ones and their kin really are make it much easier to suspend disbelief in Stross’s versions than in H. P. Lovecraft’s, with a correspondingly greater level of terror. His use of computer technology is not in itself anything groundbreaking, but he does remain remarkably true to the realities of computers and software as much as it’s possible, which adds to the verisimilitude of the stories.

Stross ties all these threads together with deft writing skills, lending humanity and personality to both his main and supporting characters. As a first-person novel, Bob obviously gets the lion’s share of the characterization effort, but there are a number of other characters that don’t necessarily get much page time that take on full three-dimensionality while they are there. In addition, he switches almost effortlessly between well-researched hard science and well-researched esoterica with ersatz-science backing. Perhaps the best example of this is when, in two adjacent paragraphs, he succintly describes both the internal structure of an implosion nuclear weapon and the construction and function of a Hand of Glory. He does this with enough confidence that the two may as well be equally grounded in known science.

My only problem with this book was that it was too short. I wanted more adventures in this setting. Fortunately, Charles Stross apparently does also. A sequel, entitled The Jennifer Morgue, will be coming out in 2006, in plenty of time to deal with the looming threat of Case Nightmare Green in September 2007 when the Great Old Ones return from beyond the stars to eat our brains. But you didn’t hear that from me.

With this book, Stross moves near the top of my list of recommended authors. I highly recommend The Atrocity Archives and hope you enjoy it as much as I did.

Singularity Sky — Charles Stross

Rating: 4/5

Charles Stross’s Singularity Sky is an interesting novel. Combining concepts from both hard and soft science fiction, and plot formulas from old-time space opera to the modern concept of Singularity (as originated by Vernor Vinge), the result provides an interesting look at the consequences of almost unimaginable future shock from the perspective of both the totally clueless and those that understand what is happening.

In science fiction, the term “Singularity” refers to a period of extremely rapid, unpredictable technological and societal change: the ultimate future shock. The word “Singularity” is meant to conjure up the image of an undefined point on a graph of a mathematical function. For example, the simple function y = abs(1/x), when graphed, is undefined where x is equal to zero, since division by zero is illegal. When graphed, this function rapidly shoots off to infinity on the y axis as x gets closer and closer to zero. This particular function, once x passes zero and goes negative, comes back from infinity equally rapidly, behaving normally from then on. That point on the graph where x is equal to zero is a singularity: a point where the behavior of the function is undefined and the rates of change are enormous.

In some respects, the term “Singularity” is a bit misleading. There are actually several possible ways of looking at a Singularity and its aftermath. If the Singularity reflects a point of unimagninably rapid change, it’s unrealistic to expect that everything would just go right back to the way it was before. If the society experiencing a Singularity doesn’t return to its initial conditions, the term “Discontinuity” might be better. Everything changes in one moment and nothing is ever the same again.

Another possible type of Singularity event is as a period of unimaginably rapid change, followed by a return to relative normalcy afterwards. If the Singularity was caused by external forces, and once those forces are removed the changes are unable to persist on their own, you might have this second type.

Charles Stross incorporates both versions of Singularity in this novel. At some time in the novel’s past, humanity managed to perfect instantaneous transmission of information via quantum entanglement. According to special relativity, this is (mostly) equivalent to time travel. Once humanity built a computer capable of transmitting information into its own past, it quickly bootstrapped to near-godhood, declared itself the “Eschaton”, and instantaneously shipped nine-tenths of the population of Earth off to myriads of new worlds within a radius of about 1000 LY. Obviously, Earth would never be the same. This is the first type of Singularity, and the ongoing ramifications of the Eschaton’s existence serve to set the constraints of Stross’s milieu.

The novel revolves around the effects of the second type of Singularity, as invoked by the Festival, as it blossoms for a short period of time on Rochard’s World, one of the most backwards colony worlds inhabited by humankind. It starts as the planet experiences a rain of telephones from the sky, heralding the arrival of the enigmatic “Festival”. The telephones promise to grant wishes in exchange for entertainment. As the oppressed underclass of Rochard’s World get some of their more grandiose wishes granted, it becomes obvious to the power structure in the colony that the Festival, and more specifically the Singularity that the Festival is inducing on the planet, is a threat to the very structure of their society. They immediately call for help to their capitol world, and a fleet is dispatched to attack the Festival. Of course, the admirals and ministers at the capitol have no idea what they are dealing with. They hatch a risky and extremely dangerous plan to hit the Festival at a point of weakness, a plan that other forces are determined to undermine.

One of the difficulties of writing — at least somewhat believably — about Singularity events is that almost by definition there’s no way to adequately imagine all of what might happen during one. And indeed, much of the hyper-advanced technology Stross includes is described metaphorically or functionally, as a primitive might explain a chainsaw or a helicopter. Technology closer to current levels of understanding is described much more completely, in as hard a fashion as possible.

Another problem with Singularity fiction is that as individual humans experience exponential growth of their cognitive abilities and perceptions, it becomes harder and harder for the author to describe their motivations and thought processes adequately, let alone make the readers care deeply about the characters. Stross avoids this problem through the deus ex machina of the Eschaton, which forbids certain types of causality violations and thereby keeps humanity from completely transcending. In addition, setting the novel in the New Republic, which is reactionary with technology to the point of Luddism, ensures that the major characters will be approachable by merely human readers.

Stross’s characters are believable and sympathetic, with motivations that are unclear enough to be interesting but alluded to enough to avoid irrelevancy. His space travel and combat scenes are well-written, with extensive detail and dramatic tension. Some of the combat scenes seemed a bit long, but this is a minor issue. The high-tech espionage aspects were exceptionally well done and provided the main focus for the latter half of the novel.

Overall, this was an enjoyable read. It’s very refreshing to see an author write thoughtful science fiction that deals with the full potential hinted at by the most modern scientific research. As all Singularity authors seem to have to do, he uses a plot device to shield readers from the full impact of the extreme future shock of the setting, but as plot devices go, the Eschaton is outstanding. I recommend this book without reservation to anyone that likes hard science fiction.