Alice, confusing Alice

Tags: Danish Me Review Science fiction

Review of Alice, Alice by Inge Eriksen.

Outline: The satelite/space station Alice is a kind of paradise. The people are pacifist and rich, and the children are free. 8,500 humans (led by Aliki, among others) work hard to make Alice owned by them selves. Gulpilil VII (musician/magician) is one of the connections back to the Alice of Earth. Sandy and Minoru are parents of Aiko, and Minoru works on the ship Bella. And then there's Sascha. But everything changes when Alice is occupied by Carpenter and Duchess.

Is it science fiction? The starting point is the paradisean Alice, meticulously created, so we can see a completely new kind of society. And all of the book is about the meeting between Alice and the old fashioned reality. So, yes.

Themes:
The occupation is accepted, and there's cooperation. (Is the occupation of Denmark in the 40s close to mind here?) And in the end the occupation changes both the occupied and the occupiers (a kind of Stockholm-syndrome?) Duschess has a thing going with Gulpilil, and there's a strange triangle between Carpenter, Sascha and Aliki.
Alice really is a different environment: spots of weightlessness, lots of timezones, and everything is based on the beepers (cell phones) and conversation/consensus. And the Alicians does not really understand occupation and violence.
Lots of sex and attraction. And being gay is okay as well.
A poetic style, and lots of imagery.
He felt lonely in a dry, hopeless way, he was burned to death and doomed to live in a rotating silk spinning mill. (p. 146)
The explosion was an echo in him, echoing so violently, that his flesh kept bursting and flying away to all sides. The only thing surviving was his hand, within his fathers. (p.170)

Is it good? Well. The style is so poetic, that it often confuses me. And there are parts of the plot, I never nailed. The style means to me, that the book is fuzzy around the edges. Why did they say that to each other? This confusion means, that I don't like the book. The confusion would probably be sorted, if I read the book again. But I don't quite have the energy.

Created: 11 June, 2009 - Last changed: 11 June, 2009 - Comments (0)