A pleasing romp through a realm of Asian gods in The Eternal Sky

From The Week of April 20th, 2014

Living, as we do, in a world shaped by science and empowered by technology, it is difficult to imagine how society would function without them. Religion would certainly step out from its forced confinement backstage to reclaim its civil authority, but religion is only the dogmatized distillation of a power that runs far deeper, that may well have been with us longer than any other human concept. Mythology... For in a world without systems of logic and procedure, when truthseeking is reduced to hunches and hubris, mythology must be the genesis of both society and its customs, forged by the will of visionaries into a sword of belief that everyone can carry. What would it be like to live in such a world, where such concepts, such gods, are real, their powers shaping the lives of millions? Elizabeth Bear imagines in this engaging and bloody trilogy.

In a world of empires and Jin, warriors of the step and wizards of the tower, a ruthless conspiracy is afoot to bring chaos and war to the known realms. Having worked its corrupting will into the tribalism of the Plains and the politics of the imperial court, it has cleverly warped the existing bonds of family and law that have kept the realms relatively stable, manipulating them until brother besets brother and clan besets clan in a bid for discord and despair that it is uniquely positioned to capitalize on.

Standing in the way of this ruthless powergrab are two unlikely allies. Temur is a warrior of the step, grandson of the great khan who was left for dead on a battlefield that has robbed him of clan and future. Samarkar is a princess, sister to the reigning Emperor who has made a singular sacrifice to attain the powers of a wizard. He is powerless and alone. She is exiled and friendless, but as the conspiracy unfolds, and the land is riven by plague and infighting, they are thrust together by circumstance to try to right a wrong and discover just what is tearing their worlds apart. Joined by friends with their own pasts, their destinies will be written in blood across a changing sky, reconfiguring a world that has tried, and failed, to kill them many times over.

Imaginative fantasy fiction from an author of many literary disciplines, the Eternal Sky is an entertaining romp through a world drenched in myths and consequences. Eschewing the typical proto-European backdrop that characterizes so much of the genre, Ms. Bear has drawn from a more eastern inspiration, chiefly, the customs and politics of Mongolian Asia, when the Khans were at the height of their power. But the author does not simply flirt with this fascinating time in Asian history when the Mongol nations violently clashed with dynastic China and caliphate Islam, briefly creating a vast united empire that was ruled from horseback, she delves deeply into the stories and the traditions of these great powers and conjures from them monsters and mayhem, magic and malignancies that not only buffet her heroes, but drape the world of The Eternal Sky in the cloak of familiarity and authenticity.

Despite its pleasingly atypical setting, The Eternal Sky could have been just another trilogy, the churning out of familiar tropes for the entertainment of audiences wishing to gorge themselves on such familiar fare. But Ms. Bear, who has frequently exhibited a fondness for cutting against the usual grain, has generated a series of winning characters that further set her chronicle apart. Temur is a fearsome warrior who, despite the cruelties he's endures, maintains a core of decency that makes him eminently relatable despite his tribal upbringing. Samarkar is a newly minted mage who, despite her noble blood and her physical charms, rejects the narrowness of a life proscribed to her class and her gender and, instead, becomes a person not afraid to get her hands dirty in a world that desperately needs her. Even Hrahima, the half-woman half-tigress who accompanies them, is animated beyond the typical nonsense of such fantasy breeds to become a fearsome creature with whom the reader can sympathize.

These are not easy accomplishments. That they are so effortlessly achieved is both a credit to the author and a boon to the reader.

However, while the setting and the characters are winners here, the plots leave something to be desired. Ms. Bear has opted for the standard approach of the quest that binds together the brave band of heroes which, without twists, feels tired unto exhaustion. This feeling is not at all abated by repetitive surprise attacks upon the band which, in both style and substance, are tiresomely reminiscent of adventure games spanning the decades. But while these are flaws that hobble the work to some degree, they are in no way fatal blows upon what is otherwise delightful work.

A pleasing creation that gives us a taste of worlds we rarely see and demons we rarely fight... Well worth the time and money... (4/5 Stars)

http://www.amazon.com/Steles-Sky-Eternal-Elizabeth-Bear-ebook/dp/B00FO77KRA/ref=tmm_kin_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&sr=&qid=

Comprehending the self and its states of being in Being And Nothingness

From The Week of April 20th, 2014

Who we are, and defining how we fit into the world in which we find ourselves, has been a problem preoccupying philosophers for thousands of years. In millennia past, where human understanding of science - particularly biology and physics -, was poor, it was an unanswerable question. After all, how can the self be understood without any conception of neurology? But even as the steady march of progress endows us with knowledge the ancient Greeks could've only dreamed of, the debate continues. Can we truly be reduced to component parts? Can all of our memories and emotions, our actions and our insights, be summed up in neurological code? Or do the desires and the motivations of a conscious being extend beyond science and into realms both theological and psychoanalytical? It may be many more centuries before proof removes these questions from the argumentation of philosophy, but in the meantime some of our greatest minds will continue the discussion in hopes of answers. Being And Nothingness is Jean-Paul Sartre's contribution.

Being and Nothingness is a defining work of Existentialism, a philosophical movement that seeks to characterize the human experience as a subjective amalgam of consciousness, emotions and actions. Existentialism contends that humans are, as far as we know, unique in that we have both existence, defined as awareness of self, and essence, defined as existence as an object - a human is a human in the same way as a table is a table. Because we are endowed with self-awareness, we can make choices in ways objects cannot. And if we can make choices, then it follows that we are profoundly free in ways objects cannot be. We are individuals, enslaved to no will but our own. We can fulfil our desires, obtain knowledge, achieve our goals, all without subjecting ourselves to anyone else's definition or mastery.

Being and Nothingness further refines this idea by laying out Sartre's key components of Existential existence: Being For Itself - awareness of self and of the world around us -, Being In Itself - the object that we are, the physical human form -, and Being For Others - the subjective and objective selves that we put forward for public consumption. He argues that to be conscious is to be free, to act, to choose, but that this freedom is refined and reduced by not only our own actions but the regard of others. For when other conscious beings look at us, they objectify us. We become a thing in their reality just as they become a thing in ours. These tensions are deepened by what Sartre calls Bad Faith, the tendency of conscious beings to objectify themselves, to squander their freedom by reducing themselves to form and function. This struggle, the subjective with the objective, the Being For Itself with the Being In Itself, he argues, damages us, defeats us, in ways profound and disturbing.

A dense, 630-page treatise on the nature of consciousness and social interaction, Being And Nothingness is, despite its length and its complexity, a statement about the nature of personal responsibility. Mired in the midst of an ugly war in which Mr. Sartre not only witnessed many of his countrymen willingly surrender to the Nazis, but found himself imprisoned by the Third Reich, the famous philosopher had a great deal of experience with the complexities and difficulties of personal choice. These experiences lie heavily on this work, charging it with a kind of pessimism about human nature that seems both understandable and tragic.

And yet, the Second World War acts as a kind of proof for Sartre's key insight here, that humans continuously squander their freedom by suborning themselves to either their own weaknesses or to the power of others. How else to explain not only the millions who senselessly died in the absurdity of WWII, but the equally numerous excuses that poured out from the survivors, excuses that either sought to justify their inaction in the face of Hitler's society of hate or sought to play down their role in it.

Excuses have no place in a life lived well. Consciousness either endows us with freedom or it doesn't. If it doesn't, then we are slaves to our genes and none of this matters. But if we are free, then we are completely responsible for our choices. We may choose well; we may choose badly, but we can choose. Even a prisoner, stripped of all dignity, all physical freedom, can choose how to endure his or her deprivation. To excuse away our choices is to reduce ourselves to objects. It is to claim that we are not free, that something or someone else rules us, defines us. And to do that is to become nothing more than a table.

This is an insight as fascinating as it is powerful. It endows the individual with total responsibility while giving him or her nowhere to escape to when matters go against them. It compels the individual to live a life of honesty, both with the world and with the self, that must foster both consistency of action and authenticity of being that would be both welcome and rewarding.

And yet, this is harsh. For it leaves little room for what seems to me an understandable, and justifiable, distinction between reasons and excuses. The success and failure of our actions are often determined by circumstances beyond our control. Uncovering those circumstances and incorporating them into the justifications for our choices seems reasonable. And yet, it is almost impossible to define when these justifications descend into the realm of excusemaking. This is not just a slippery slope. It's a slippery slope in the midst of a darkness so complete we don't know we're even on the slippery slope. Making some accommodation for this weakness in our cognitive character seems warranted.

Which is why Being And Nothingness feels incomplete. Yes, once one gets past the stuffiness and the headache-inducing defining of terms and conditions, is inarguably potent manifesto for human responsibility which, many would argue, is the perfect tonic for our age. But it is also too much of its time. It is drenched in a kind of grim certainty that must, at least in part, stem from one of the darkest, most violent periods in human history. It argues for a doom that does not seem appropriate for a more peaceful age, one in which the self is not under constant siege. It feels as though Mr. Sartre was looking for an analytical cure for the helplessness that anyone would feel in the midst of colossal warfare and that states of being in conflict with one another was the result.

As difficult as it is insightful... (3/5 Stars)

Serendipity, chance and the anatomy of discovery in Happy Accidents

From The Week of April 6th, 2014

Serendipity is a constant throughout our lives. Whether it is the tragedy narrowly avoided or the good news received at just the right moment, its unexpected gifts and arrows have the power to delight, to terrify and to change our world. For who hasn't had the course of their existence altered by a moment unlooked for, a circumstance not considered? But for all of serendipity's capacity to change our moods and our lives, is it not, on some level, merely a means by which to explain the strange oddities that chance sometimes throws up? Is it not an evocation of some external force to explain a lack of vision? The absence of the mental clarity to consider all that lies before us? Whatever its implications, it lies at the heart of this fascinating history of medicine from Mr. Mayers.

Of all the industries that have been redefined over the last two centuries, few have experienced more change, and more advancement, than medicine. As late as the 19th century, doctors were little more than priests when it came to their capacity to heal. They had a handful of steadfast remedies with which they could attempt to mend the broken, but their knowledge of the human body was about as poor as their comprehension of the world around them. Germs and diseases had yet to be discovered, let alone studied. And curatives were often as poisonous to the patient as the affliction. Comprehension of the world and all its forces was so poor that, even when radiation was discovered at the turn of the 20th century, it was thought to be beneficial, even therapeutic. It wasn't until cancers began to erupt from these applications that the true cost of playing with such fundamental forces was revealed. Ignorance, creating assumptions, creating dogmas, until those dogmas were shattered in the face of hard truths.

But as dark as the 19th century may have been for medicine, the 20th was a revolution. Where prior centuries had been a wasteland of discovery and understanding, treatments for cancer, Tuberculosis, bacterial infection, heart attacks and high blood pressure all became widespread. Even the mysteries of the brain were, to some degree, conquered with drugs that successfully fought numerous strains of mental illness. In les than a hundred years, the doctor's toolbox expanded from prayer and good fortune to hundreds of possible remedies for any of a host of formerly lethal conditions. But just how did these magnificent discoveries eventuate? Were humans suddenly smarter, more intuitive, more understanding of the human form and its connection to the broader world, or were there other forces at play?

A persuasive argument for the virtues of screwing up, Happy Accidents is an engaging adventure through the slap-dash, serendipitous world of medicine and the discoveries that have shaped its last hundred years. Morton Mayers, himself a medical doctor, divides his chronicle up into sections, each of which sheds light upon the fundamental workings of the heart, the cell,the circulatory system, the blood and even the brain. His intent is not so much to give his readers a refresher on high-school biology, though he does this admirably, as to illuminate the anatomy of the breakthroughs, the circumstances that surrounded the key insights that not only pulled back the curtain on the innerworkings of these systems, but that lead to revolutionary cures that have restored life to the terminal and sanity to the doomed. In each case, from antibiotics to antipsychotics, from Lipitor to Lithium, he exposes a startlingly clear pattern of ignorance that was dispelled by happenstance, leading to awareness and, finally, to solutions.

Underpinning Mr. Mayers' work here is the understanding that humans invariably operate based on a collection of assumptions that become, in their certainty, unhelpfully dogmatic. X should not work on Y because of Z. But of course, truths are only true until they are proven false. The sun revolved around the Earth until it didn't. The Earth was 6,000 years old until it wasn't. Emotions stemmed from the heart until they didn't. Certainty; giving way to puzzlement in the face of contradictions; forcing the forging of newer, better certainties; starting the process all over again until perhaps something like knowledge is possessed. However, given the discomfort of living in constant doubt, we like certainty. We cling to it and we are damned by it. For it blinds us to the discoveries, the connections, that would be obvious to us if we were willing to try everything rather than being dismissive out of hand and waiting for random chance to drop fortunate outcomes into our laps.

But as wonderfully as the author constructs this argument, and as much knowledge as he drops on the reader during its repeated demonstration, his proscriptions for its rectification seem inadequate. Mr. Mayers levels an accusatory finger at everyone, from big pharma to big government, to explain why this age of rapid discovery has slowed, why fewer treatments than ever are being discovered. And perhaps he is right to blame these forces interfering with good research. However, Happy Accidents is nothing if not a book about the narrow mindedness of humanity, of how we have to practically be smashed over the head with a gong before we see what's before us. And so crediting serendipity for the golden age of medicine and then blaming institutions for its end seems, at best, inconsistent and, at worst, blind to the possibility that we have plucked all the low-hanging fruit. We have made most, if not all, of the simple discoveries that it's possible for chance to gift to us, that what remains are more systemic discoveries that will require open minds and collaborative efforts to achieve.

Happy Accidents is a dense and deeply rewarding adventure through the human body and the men and women who reduced it from mysterious phenomenon to a highly complex machine that we've gone a long way to explaining. For this knowledge alone, a must read. For those intrigued by happenstance and randomness, no disappointment will be found within these pages. But for those looking for solutions to the intriguing problems posed here, the answers will have to be sought out elsewhere. (4/5 Stars)

an entertaining, if overly explosive, near, nanotech future in Nexus

From The Week of April 6th, 2014

Although progress has been a constant throughout human history, successive generations building on the discoveries of those who came before, it has often come so slowly, so gradually, that humans have rarely had to confront the notion that progress might change their entire world. Certainly, there have been inventions that instilled such fears, particularly those produced by societies beginning to industrialize, but even these advancements only affected certain walks of life. Only in the last 50 years has technological progress reached a sufficiently high velocity to challenge our deeply instilled sense of stability, of sameness. And the result? Nearly universal anxiety about where our civilization is headed, whether or not we are enslaving ourselves to the utility of technology, and the degree to which we are raising children zombified by being forever plugged in. We want the world to be predictable. We want to be what we know. It's precisely this hunger that Mr. Naam exploits so well in these first two volumes of an engaging future of the synthesis of man and machine.

The year is 2040 and, quietly, humanity is on the brink of a revolution as consequential as it is irreversible. Nexus, a drug based on neurological nanotechnology, allows for the voluntary linking of human minds. Not only can experiences and emotions be shared, but thoughts can be exchanged effortlessly, individuals entwined until they can become united far more than they were apart. Moreover, Nexus allows humans trained in its use to hack their own brains, unlocking doors to potential previously only dreamed of. Homeostasis can be monitored and tweaked. Bodies of knowledge, of skill, can be compiled into apps that Nexus users can run, empowering them with instant abilities. Even memories can be blocked, manipulated and selectively forgotten. The brain has not be cracked. It has been reduced to a coding platform that is the playground of geeks everywhere.

But this is also precisely why Nexus is banned throughout the West. The potential for Nexus to create transhumans, to create species distinct from baseline humanity, terrifies western governments. Coming on the heels of any number of disastrous encounters with cloning and mind-control, it is seen as an existential threat to an entire way of life. Which is why it must be controlled at any cost. In America, this responsibility falls to the ERD, the emerging Risks Directorate, a branch of Homeland Security which arms its agents with the newest bio-enhancements and unleashes them upon the producers and peddlers of Nexus. Arrests are made, careers threatened, lives ruined, but for one promising scientist, kaden Lane, their threats are provoking, not quelling. For they have evoked in him a desire for revenge and freedom that might just accelerate humanity's date with destiny, permanently upending the world order.

An entertaining if formulaic jaunt through an exciting, potential future, the first two volumes of the Nexus series are worthwhile science fiction. Ramez Naam establishes an engaging world of bright parties, experimental drugs and unshackled ambition that feels pleasingly and authentically global. Nexus may have been dreamed up in Silicon Valley, but it's adopted, played with and accelerated to its potential in an increasingly powerful Asia which has had little, if any, history with, much less time for, the tricky balance of state power versus individual freedom. It is a playground of experimentation that proves deeply fertile for nexus, a playground that the West, through means both covert and otherwise, tries to manipulate and pollute. In this way, Nexus becomes a future analogy for today's oil politics, with the US acting as it sees fit, with little to no care for the consequences, let alone for international law.

At the series' heart lies a fascinating question. Should knowledge, that could potentially be put to ill use, but that also has immense utility for those who will not abuse it, be regulated by governments? Nexus will change the world. It will break down the traditional notion of the individual and create a new kind of permanently connected person, one incubated in the ideas and philosophies of we rather than I. But however revelatory, howevermuch it may expand the horizons of the human experience, this is potentially powerful for certain abusive personalities who could use this technology to enslave their followers, or their dependents. But should such potentialities be a death knell for any technology? By positioning his heroes as non-conformists, and by giving near omnipresent surveillance technologies into the hands of his government villains, Mr. Naam convincingly argues that knowledge should be free and that we ought to trust in the goodness of people to ensure that it is not put to wicked ends.

Superficially, however, Nexus and Crux are techno thrillers. The author may ask interesting, philosophical questions about the nature and responsibilities of knowledge, but these queries are far-too-often sandwiched by adrenalized action scenes aimed straight at Hollywood. While there's nothing inherently wrong with this approach, it does cause the characterizations here to suffer. Mr. Naam never manages to create anything close to a functioning, rational actor. His characters are puppets being jerked around to his masterful end. Often, the action and the technologies hide these flaws, but they inevitably re-surface to remind the reader that the author cares far more about saturating his pages with set pieces of total mayhem than he is in developing real people we can relate to.

This is a fascinating journey, one that won't soon be forgotten. Mr. Naam is right to point out that, with the advent of certain technologies, our world could radically change in months, maybe even weeks. But one doubts that such change, however exciting and chaotic, would be quite so bloody, or labyrinthine. (3/5 Stars)

The criminality of the death of the Celtic Tiger in Ship of Fools

From The Week of April 6th, 2014

For society to function properly, for it to have hope for more than chaos and discord, the people must have trust in the State. There is no other way to maintain the rule of law. The State collects taxes in exchange for providing services. If those services are corrupted or dysfunctional, then taxation becomes, in the minds of the citizenry, just a nice word for extortion. And the moment the individual realizes this, then resistance against this unfair system is the only ethical course of action.

As clear cut as this may seem, however, there are complications. After all, only the most cynical citizens want to believe the State is broken. Thus, we grant it chance after chance to convince us otherwise. It is far easier to give the government a second chance than it is to overthrow it. But one can only give so many second chances. Once those are exhausted, there are only two options, rebellion or surrender. Sadly, the latter seems to be the path in Ireland, a tragic reality stingingly illustrated in Mr. O'Toole's engaging polemic.

From 1995 to 2007, the Republic of Ireland experienced a 12-year economic boom that, for a brief time, made this moribund country the envy of the world. After centuries of oppression, misrule and sectarian discord, the Celtic Tiger, as these boom times were christened, finally seemed to be lifting the near-permanent shadow from the heart of this benighted place and giving it a glimmer of hope for a brighter future. For once, jobs were plentiful, allowing the Republic to claim one of the world's best unemployment rates. For once, real-estate developments were inviting the famed and the fortunate to Irish shores, making the emerald isles a place to see and be seen. For once, foreign investment, particularly in the IT field, appeared to be offering a higher quality of life for the average citizen. There was just one problem. It was built on a lie.

Through reckless lending policies and criminally lax procedures, private Irish banks fuelled the Celtic Tiger by extending astronomical sums to already wealthy Irish developers who in turn used that money to develop a country that did not need it. This form of trickle-down economics may have happily continued on for years to come. But when the credit crisis detonated Wall Street in 2008, quickly sweeping the globe, those German and French banks that happily lent those Irish banks money to pass on to Irish developers suddenly wanted their money back. Unable to cover their debts, these Irish banks instantly collapsed under the strain of absurdly skewed ledgers and would have drifted into oblivion but for the Irish government who, in stepping in and nationalizing the debts of these banks, instantly burdened every Irish taxpayer with additional debts of more than 50,000 Euros. How this calamity came to be, both the systems that permitted it and the government that refused to stop it, illuminates these pages and sets fire to the notion that there ever existed a reasonable, moral Irish state.

Ship of Fools is is a blistering, convincing broadside to the Celtic Tiger and the government that manufactured it. Fintan O'Toole, a journalist and public intellectual, walks the reader through the last 50 years of Irish economic policy, an adventure that ought to put his every reader to sleep. But how could a single eyelid even threaten to droop when every turned page reveals another scam, another dropped ball, another scandal by which the Irish government revealed itself to be nothing more than a public-facing shell corporation for the Republic's obscenely wealthy elites, a small cadre of men who, over decades, established an Irish gentry that not only held the reins of business, but collared the government and the regulatory bodies designed to contain them. In this, the author lays down a painfully obvious pattern of corrupt and selfish behavior that made the death of the Celtic tiger both obvious and inevitable.

Though Mr. O'Toole largely keeps his critical focus on the government dysfunction that allowed the Celtic Tiger to all-but destroy the Irish state, he does not spare neoliberalism its fair share of the blame. It may well be that this business-first system of low taxes and small government has merit. Perhaps, in a vacuum, it could be executed admirably and allow every citizen a chance to succeed on their own, without aid or succor from governments. Certainly, there's appeal to economists in this scheme. After all, governments act in the interests of their constituents and from the necessities of politics, not caring what the consequences of these half-informed decisions might be. Removing this power from government removes the temptation to act which will allow a well-engineered system to operate smoothly.

However, a free market invariably evolves into one dominated by massive, conglomerated firms that use their outsized power to not only crush their competition, but to silence their opposition. The moment they've succeeded in ensuring that no one can say no to them, they act as only they see fit regardless of the consequences. It is the very definition of a doomed state.

The State cannot exist to service business interests. It cannot exist to facilitate the wealthy. It must exist for everyone, to give everyone a fair chance at life. And as Ship of Fools makes painfully clear, this has never been the case in the Republic of Ireland where self-serving economic policies and a hollowed-out government have created the worst of all worlds. A sad but powerful indictment... (4/5 Stars)

The horror of ethnic war and the cost of human difference in The Cage

From The Week of March 31st, 2014

Much of the conflict in our modern world is powered by our differences. Yes, economics and natural resources are also wellsprings of human violence, but these battles pale in comparison to the societal discord spawned by the desire of minority cultures to be distinct and free. From Ireland to the Middle East, from the Jews to the Tutsis, we've witnessed cultures deploy their languages and their customs to distinguish themselves from their neighbors, to define themselves as else. Which may be well enough until some form of hardship comes to the region, driving desperate people to find someone to blame for their stumbles. Who better than the other,? Who better than those we do not understand?

Bloodshed of minorities, causing their traditionalists to entrench and hold the ground their fellows have died for, causing them to make virtuous the ultimate sacrifice for their way of life... Leading to radicalization, the hardening of their hearts to those who've stolen from them, beaten them, killed them. Cycles within cycles until all that is left is death and victory... This grim lesson underpins Mr. Weiss' powerful and disturbing work.

Sri Lanka has existed, in some form or another, for 2,500 years. Settled ed by visitors from nearby India, it was, for centuries, a Buddhist kingdom in the heart of one of the world's most beautiful and idyllic regions. One would have expected the centuries to smooth out any significant differences that might have existed between the various social groupings on such a picturesque island. But a series of divisive internal conflicts in the 13th and 14th centuries, profoundly worsened by western colonization in the 18th and 19th centuries, hardened these differences into distinctions worth dying for.

Consequently, Sri Lanka has been, for generations, two island, with the south ruled by the more populous and culturally dominant Sinhalese and the north governed by the minority Tamilese made fearful by colonialist reforms that they believed would deeply favor the Sinhalese. It would be the Sinhalese who would comprise the government, who would receive the important jobs, who would wield all the influence, not the Tamilese who were merely the remnant of a long-dead kingdom. Ignited by political riots in the 1950s, and fanned by widespread killings in the 1980s, the political discord between these two groups would escalate into a civil war that would not only take the lives of tens of thousands, it would introduce into this idyllic place the corrosiveness of modern terrorism which the Sinhalese government would use as a pretext for a vicious crackdown that would finally end the war, but not before the strife had left a permanent scar on a wounded nation staggering into the 21st century.

A detailed history of the last days of this cruel conflict, The Cage is chilling non-fiction. Gordon Weiss, a journalist and a former official with the United Nations, establishes a rough history of Sri Lanka before plunging head-first into its civil war, documenting many of the unfathomable deprivations that characterized it. A firm believer that both sides perpetrated war crimes, the author equally condemns government and Tiger. The former he accuses of concealing the degree to which it allowed its armed forces to butcher, rape and starve-out Tamilese civilians while blaming these attacks on the enemy. The latter, meanwhile, he rightfully criticizes for taking up the virulent and destructive weapons of modern terrorism: forced conscription of civilians, the use of child soldiers, and the deployment of suicide bombings. Worst, however, was the cult of personality created by the charismatic leader of the Tamil tigers who ritualized and elevated martyrdom into a virtuous end, a worthy achievement for a noble cause.

The Cage, though, is far more than a polemic against the various sins of both the Sri Lankan government and the Tamil Tigers. It cares about their schemes, their despotism, their pieces of propaganda, but only as a means of illustrating the suffering of innocents, some of whom are given voice here. Frequently, Mr. Weiss removes himself from the narrative, surrendering it to those who've lost families, partners, and their own health and vitality to a self-destructive war perpetrated by individuals who exercised no restraint and certainly no decency. Their words are alternately terrifying and plaintive, recitations of crimes that no one should have to endure, crimes for which there is no recovery, crimes that leave marks on those who do them as well as those who suffer them. In this, we come to witness the utter madness of war, particularly, war perpetrated by children and conducted like children.

While The Cage does not directly ask the question, the reader cannot help but wonder what any of this suffering is for. Wars do have purposes. They can be means by which wrongs are rectified and newer,b better balances established. Without the chaos of the two World Wars, the European Union would not have existed. Without the deprivations of the American Civil War, the united Union would not have economically accelerated the 20th century. Some good can come of violence. But as inevitable as the Sri Lankan civil war was, its purpose is utterly absent. To what end, all of this torment? So that ethnic groups can preserve their linguistic codes? To protect their religious dogmas? To husband their ethnic foods? Are these differences worth dying for? Are they worth plunging an entire country into madness and agony? The answer, for anyone even moderately steeped in history, must be an emphatic no. And yet, these conflicts continuously crop up, the result of minorities being radicalized, or radicalizing themselves, on the basis of perceived differences. It is a tragedy without peer or end.

Yes, The Cage could have been more thorough with its history of Sri Lanka. It could've included the testimonies of more innocents. It could have been a rallying cry for the betterment of humanity. But these absences are minor flaws in what is otherwise a moving example of a modern nation, of the value of destiny, and the dangers of despotism. Mesmerizing work... (4/5 Stars)

A thoughtful glimpse of civilization's fall in The Last Policeman

From The Week of March 31st, 2014

Civilization is so pervasive, so consequential, that it's all-but impossible to imagine our lives without it. It has sparked ideas and ignited industrialization, enshrined the rule of law and elevated the power of the people, but it has also virtually blinded us to the truth, that it has bound us up in its conformist chains. This is a good bargain. After all, whatever we lose by way of personal freedom we more than gain back in enlightenment and wealth. This is indisputable. But just what have we surrendered? Is the absence of civilization truly so destructive? Would a world predicated on personal freedom necessarily be anarchic? Philosophers and anthropologists have been asking themselves these questions for generations, but Mr. Winter's has run the experiment. And though the destination may not be revelatory, the journey certainly is entertaining.

It is virtually certain that, in six months, everyone on Earth will be dead. This is the truth that confronts Harry Palace one unforgettable morning when he wakes to the news that a planet-killing asteroid is on a collision course with Earth. A policeman in a quiet, new-England town, one would expect that he, like every other living human, would be tempted to throw off the boring mundanity of daily existence, either by revelling in the freedom of these final days, or by ending it all on their own terms. But Harry Palace is not like the thieves and the opportunists, the professors and the pilots, who have forsaken their lives and their posts for a final, explosive experience. Harry palace holds the thin blue line against the darkness, righteously holding up the law in a world going to pieces.

The only problem is that it's almost impossible to be a policeman in the endtimes. Cell service is spotty, hospitals are barely staffed and the police force's investigative powers are being shut down. After all, what's the point in solving any sort of crime when there's so little time left? But to harry palace, truth is truth, right is right, and an oath is an oath. And even if it kills him, he's going to hold that line until the bitter end, as best he knows how.

An engaging journey through a tragicomic landscape, The Last Policeman and its successor Countdown City are pieces of imaginative near-future fiction. Ben Winters, though far from the first to attempt to conceive of a world careening through its last days, nonetheless manages to lay it out with style, with passion and with originality. His post-Announcement New England is vividly and organically drawn, a place where, though law and order is practically maintained, the soul has been ripped out of the community. There remains a societal superstructure within which to operate, but families are deteriorating, services are decaying and people are wandering off to please themselves before the end. Consequently, the author's world is not one of instant and gratuitous violence, but one in which the social, economic and civil webs that bind us all together are being sundered thread by thread, widening existing holes through which yet more vulnerable people slip into oblivion.

More than its rich environment, though, The Last Policeman's protagonist is also relatively rare. In a world slowly fraying at its seams, harry Palace is a humble, even geeky, rock of stability. He's a square, a man who does good because he has never thought to do anything else. While many of his fellows escape their obligations, he stays to do the job he's always wanted to do, an unthanked, unwanted, and unacknowledged pillar of civilization that someone will eventually break. In this, Palace does the series wonderful service as both an object of amusement and admiration. The former comes as the reader snickers at his naivety and his earnest doggedness; the later arrives when we come to understand just how much he must sacrifice in order to stand up in the face of a tide that even he seems to know will wash him away.

The first two volumes of the Last Policeman are by no means perfect. The author's mysteries are as threadbare as they are insignificant. Thus, as Harry labors to solve them, we are left to snicker and scorn him for either his thick-headedness or his gullibility. And given that Harry was already a square, having these attributes emphasized in this way is less than flattering. Moreover, we're often left with the impression that Harry's humanity only exists as a means by which to highlight its absence in everyone else around him. Which draws scrutiny to Harry's spotless character that it cannot withstand. Howevermuch the works may be flawed, the extent to which Mr. Winter's has avoided the cliches of apocalyptic fiction, and attempted instead to ask intriguing questions about what the world would realistically look like if all our deaths were as certain as sunrise, grants his work imagination and depth that easily overcomes its shortcomings.

An interesting idea that is neither boring or derivative... (3/5 Stars)