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A review by justabean_reads
The Practice, the Horizon, and the Chain by Sofia Samatar
3.0
I think this is the point where I conclude that Samatar's writing doesn't really work for me. I've read this and A Stranger in Olondria and both hit me as doing something very interesting, while at the same time not really grabbing me as a reader. Though at least this one was short enough to sit down and read through in one sitting (fact check: I just looked up the length for her first one, and it's only three hundred pages, so it only felt like upwards of seven hundred at the time).
I've spent a lot of time since finishing it thinking about why it didn't grab me (especially when friends with reliably good taste loved it), and I think not giving most of the characters names was a mistake. And yes, I know that means I'm missing the point, but stick with me for a second.
To circle back, our setting is a fleet of mining fleet exiled from Earth by some kind of climate catastrophe. The population is divided into three castes (probably four, as the owners seem to be their own thing, but are invisible to the story): Chained miners, ankleted blue collar workers and the upper class of actual people. The book says that only the upper class people get names, and refers to the characters from the other two classes with descriptors like "the boy," "the professor" or "the jaded elder." Which is both incredibly on the nose and not how humans work, but sure, let's go with the metaphor. Only, it later turns out that of course everyone has a name, and the narrative (which is told from the point of view of "the boy" and "the professor") has just decided to... not use names so that it can make the point about caste bias and whose names get remembered? Unclear? There's a similar thing with chains as bonds and connections that worked for me as a metaphor, but as a story element left me somewhat baffled, since the ending just felt so handwavy. (This review brought to you by the person who still doesn't understand why the railroad in Colson Whitehead's Underground Railroad was literal. Sometimes I just don't get fiction, and that's probably a character flaw.)
I did like the way Samatar wrote about the interactions between the castes, and how the blue collar workers kept getting strung along to be complicit with the oppression of the miners, and indeed their own oppression. There were some fantastically drawn character dynamics, and moments of people both fooling themselves, and finally understanding what was happening to them, as well as some academia satire, which I always enjoy. The university politics generally felt the most real, with the rest being a bit distant and drifty.
In the end, I wish it'd been more character-centred, and less like a parable/focused on making a point.
I've spent a lot of time since finishing it thinking about why it didn't grab me (especially when friends with reliably good taste loved it), and I think not giving most of the characters names was a mistake. And yes, I know that means I'm missing the point, but stick with me for a second.
To circle back, our setting is a fleet of mining fleet exiled from Earth by some kind of climate catastrophe. The population is divided into three castes (probably four, as the owners seem to be their own thing, but are invisible to the story): Chained miners, ankleted blue collar workers and the upper class of actual people. The book says that only the upper class people get names, and refers to the characters from the other two classes with descriptors like "the boy," "the professor" or "the jaded elder." Which is both incredibly on the nose and not how humans work, but sure, let's go with the metaphor. Only, it later turns out that of course everyone has a name, and the narrative (which is told from the point of view of "the boy" and "the professor") has just decided to... not use names so that it can make the point about caste bias and whose names get remembered? Unclear? There's a similar thing with chains as bonds and connections that worked for me as a metaphor, but as a story element left me somewhat baffled, since the ending just felt so handwavy. (This review brought to you by the person who still doesn't understand why the railroad in Colson Whitehead's Underground Railroad was literal. Sometimes I just don't get fiction, and that's probably a character flaw.)
I did like the way Samatar wrote about the interactions between the castes, and how the blue collar workers kept getting strung along to be complicit with the oppression of the miners, and indeed their own oppression. There were some fantastically drawn character dynamics, and moments of people both fooling themselves, and finally understanding what was happening to them, as well as some academia satire, which I always enjoy. The university politics generally felt the most real, with the rest being a bit distant and drifty.
In the end, I wish it'd been more character-centred, and less like a parable/focused on making a point.