Review of The
Cat and the Moon
March 2005
I don't think I'm being very original or going out on a
limb to point out that on some level fiction writing is
an elaborate con job.
Not only for the reader, who has to "suspend disbelief"
(I always liked that phrase, even though it makes me picture
something very heavy floating over my head) but for the
writer as well. Because if the writer doesn't believe in
what they're writing, I don't think they'd be able to convey
that sense to the reader. I'm not saying that those fantasy
writers out there have to strap on the loincloth and sharpen
their swords for some neighborhood dragon slaying (though
there is something to be said for field research) but in
order to create a believable world, needless to say, you
have to have some stake in the reality of the world itself.
If you're not constantly asking questions and trying to
make logical conclusions based on your own parameters, then
you may find yourself standing over quite a few inconsistencies.
Still, with that said, I think it's clear I'm not talking
to that portion of the prospective writers out there who
wish to be the next John Grisham or Danielle Steel. Since
those types of novels take place in what could be quaintly
called "the real world" the reader hardly has
to do any work at all to bring themselves into the fictional
world. It's the same one that exists right outside their
doors, albeit with better endings and beautiful people and
a "I hope they don't break into my house or blow up
my car" type of suspense (as opposed to "I hope
I get a tax refund" type of suspend, though that can
be a little more satisfying, depending on how it goes .
. . and for the record, I didn't get one). Those lucky writers
who choose to dabble in the world of SF and fantasy might
find the battle a little more uphill, because now your task
is to create an entire world, complete with a history
and cultures and make it just as complicated as our world,
except it has to be entertaining.
Some writers, as we've seen, go all out. Tolkein, who did
a trilogy you might have heard of, remains the king of world
building in my book, creating literally notebooks of material
that really wasn't meant to see the light of day. Every
reference in the trilogy, every single place, every offhand
comment had an entire ream of history to back it up, right
down to nuances of language. It was nuts, in a way, but
it was also genius and part of the reason that the books
resonate so well with people even to this day is because
the whole land is so well thought out that you can't help
but want to live there, even with the risk of getting eaten
by orcs. We see it in SF, as well, though probably not to
the crazy extent that it exists in epic fantasy. The first
real example was probably Frank Herbert's Dune, where
the author actually went to the trouble of plotting out
such details as the ecology of the world and the people
who would live there and did it in such a way that he could
show it off to the reader without resorting to academic
lectures and thus boring the crap out of people. This later
led to such hard SF concepts as Larry Niven's "Ringworld"
which is a sound structure from an engineering standpoint
(although some MIT students later found a quirk in it that
would cause it to wobble, something that Niven fixed later).
But you know what? Just because you've come up with this
sprawling land mass that you've populated with made up countries
with funny names doesn't mean you know how to write a good
story and there's a lot of fantasy out there where people
just took some clichés and stereotypes, gave them
exotic names and put them all through their paces . . .
to the utter disinterest of the reader. Some of the best
fantastic fiction consist of taking something small and
making it utterly real, like a city. From David Zindell's
Neverness to the weird city of Viriconium of M. John Harrison
to Mervyn Peake's decidedly odd castle of Gormenghast (as
opposed to the places beyond the castle, which don't feel
real at all) and many others, you can stake your claim on
any piece of literary real estate, large or small and given
some agile planning, you can come up with something that
has a bit of weight to it.
And since we're talking about cities, this is a good time
to bring up the story I'm supposed to be discussing, "The
Cat and the Moon" by GC Dillon. What a nice segue.
Almost like I planned it that way. Now I don't know anything
about Mr or Ms Dillon (at the risk of striking the wrong
gender and causing unintentional offense, I'm probably going
to refer to you as "the author" from here on out
. . . I don't mean nothing by it) and how much planning
actually went into the fictional city of Shandaloor (it
could all be made up as they went along or the author's
house might be wallpapered with maps of the city) but the
first few paragraphs alone are a good sign, not only bringing
the reader into the story, almost like they're on a boat
gliding into the harbor and the sights and sounds of this
new place are settling on them like new leaves. The writing
and the descriptions are ornate, calling to mind an Asian
or Arabic sort of city, exotic in the way only those cities
can be because most Westerners have never been anywhere
near such locations. Over here, we have cities, but not
like this, we're closed in and caged, our cities are locked
chambers with towers poking at the sky, everything is hemmed
in and compressed and there's a grimy sort of optimism to
the way we shuffle about in the shadows of things we can't
see. In contrast things in this place are open and sprawling,
the shouts of voices, the whiff of spices brought from faraway
lands, the salt spray of water striking your face, even
though the harbor is some distance away. There are glimpses
of roads we won't be going down, but the hint that something
does lie beyond such roads, if you could see far enough
beyond the horizon. There's hints of a culture that we can
watch but not totally understand, because we don't live
here and we can't lock ourselves into the city's pulse,
the same way I'll never understand the ebb and flow of New
York City. Just because I live near it doesn't mean I'll
even figure it out, the way a lifelong resident might. We
can get peeks into these things, like what James Joyce gives
us of Dublin in Ulysses or Alasdair Gray's Glasgow
in Lanark but we won't be able to live in it. Which
is right, I think. Cities are knotted, complicated beasts
and not accessible to those from the outside, small subcultures
bound purely by a shared location.
This place is no exception and it does feel unique. It
almost becomes a real thing, a character in its own story,
immersing the reader is what appears to be a fairly simple
plot. Khym the merchant gets involved with the religious
and sexual politics of some of the local people, but as
an outsider he's not even really a participant but a bystander.
The level of detail is almost pornographic in scope, the
camera eye lingering on every jewel, every nook and cranny
of the temple, in contrast to the sparse, almost cold dialogue
between the merchant and the priestess. In this lush settings,
is there any place for communication, for a connection,
or does the city itself supply those emotions and every
one is just going through the motions, living out the city's
dream and being its entertainment without knowing why. We're
allowed glimpses of these people but we aren't allowed to
know them. Khym lets us believe he's an honorable merchant
but maybe something else as well. He states he's been around
for centuries, which could be hyperbole or simply the natural
lifespan of his people. We're not on familiar ground here
and the rules can't be regarded simply because it's all
we know. There's a whole realm of complicated politics that
we can't quite figure out, the way the cultures relate to
each other and to themselves. We're not told what is myth
and what is real, here, in this fictional place. Khym's
story of his princess might be true or it just be an elaborate
lie, his version of a subtle jest. We don't know, we're
outsiders to the characters just as much as we're outsiders
to the city, going by only what they do and how they act,
knowing nothing about their internal thoughts. Khym might
be horrified by all of this but he doesn't say and we can't
know. In a way it's not important because the star here
is the setting, and the atmosphere it causes. It's quite
possible that Khym is the fabled Admiral Chu and the Emperor's
lost son . . . or maybe not. The story hints at it and maybe
wants you to believe it, but in the end it's only a splash
of local color. Khym is the witness but not the main character
here and any focus on him seems to be purely accidental.
All we know about the people is what other's say about them
and what conclusions we can draw ourselves, even though
all our visions are seen through the biased lens of the
author, who only lets us see what they want (but I think
I've had this particular discussion already, so we won't
go into it again).
But in the end it comes down to a (literal) cat fight between
two women over the love of a muscular man. What this man
has done to deserve the attentions of two rather attractive
women we have no idea and we never really find out because
the only glimpse we have of this amorous barbarian is right
in the beginning. Still, he lives out all our dreams. On
the banks of the river, it ends, although I do think it's
classy that the high priestess is hiding out in the bushes.
Khym watches the whole affair go down and attempts to intercede
but it makes little difference and he remains a passive
observer, an anomaly in the story, for he did nothing to
cause any of the events in the tale, he merely wanders in
and it all happens around him. The whole city remains a
glittering snowglobe to us, the interior remaining vital
but we can't experience anything about it. The argument
between the women remains elusive, with Z'Harizaam telling
Khym that she'll "reveal the truth" but not getting
a chance to say what they truth might be (maybe she's going
to tell that she's one of the M'rrr, or the offspring of
an odd union). When Shamma appears she says that Vydassion
will not be coming, implying that he was going to leave
with Z'Harizaam, even though she already said she wasn't
leaving (at least not on the boat). Then she implores for
Khym to reveal the truth, that he was hired to take Z'Harizaam
away (even though he already stated he would only take her
if she was willing) but doesn't indicate if this was the
truth that she was about to reveal.
So it comes down to magical battle, two women fighting,
shouting spells at each other until one loses. And when
Shamma does, her opponent turns into a giant cat and walks
away, although the story never says what happens to Khym
and how he reacts to all of this. Perhaps he just takes
it in stride, another symptom of a mad city, a place where
anything can happen. There's a sophisticated pulp sense
to the whole affair, Robert Howard with a little more polish
and I don't think Conan would have felt like too much of
a stranger in a place like this, where any merchant can
get caught up in affairs that don't concern him, watch them
flare up and crash down without even lifting a finger.
This story succeeds purely and brilliantly on atmosphere,
on the dangerous allure of a foreign place, of teasing us
with unknown sights and sounds. The plot is blessedly simple,
broken down it basically amounts to "this happened
and this happened and then this happened and then it's over"
but the devil is all over the details so that in the end
we're treated to just another story, a tale no different
than following around your average businessman on the streets
of the Big Apple, but as it turns out we've been tricked
into an amended travelogue, a brochure for the fine city,
giving us a taste of its wonders even as it treats the fantastic
as the mundane. This type of thing may be an everyday occurrence,
we have no idea. But trapped in the heady atmosphere, it
doesn't matter. It doesn't matter that we really don't get
to know the characters beyond base motivations and a few
lines of dialogue. It doesn't matter that the plotting is
simple A to B, with few twists (the end might count, but
since we don't know what it means, its impact is lessened).
What matters is that the author has created a place, in
a few pages, that feels real, that feels inhabited, alive
and vital. There's endless stories that could be told here,
without ever leaving the city limits, what we've just seen
is one of them, and it's not the most epic or the best,
but it's a story nonetheless. As someone who used to have
his own piles of notebooks lying around for reference material
(I carry it all in my head now, especially since I gave
up all pretense of maintaining accessibility) I can only
admire the effort that produced the level of detail required
to bring this place to life in so few pages. If this is
merely the groundwork for more stories, that's fantastic,
if this is only a one shot deal and the author's interests
lie elsewhere, then to do all that for just one tale speaks
of a level of commitment I certainly don't have.
This is a snapshot of a place that doesn't exist, but for
the span of a few pages it does come to life and we're better
for it. It succeeds on style and I look forward to someday
seeing tales of more weight set here, tales that take us
from the derelicts on the streets to the rich men who sit
in the high towers and do the unspeakable things that keep
the city running, of the people who run between the two
extremes and play one off the other, of the folk in the
shadows who just exist because it's all they know how to
do, those that love the city above all else and those would
like nothing more than to see it all taken down.
But for now, for this moment, what we have here is enough.
It gets us in the door, enough so that we can glimpse some
of the sights beyond the gateway, even as the sun gets in
our eyes. It opens the way and makes it clear.
It's a start. It's all you need.
- MB
2.26.05
"But did you see what people do, and when you saw it
you did it too, and now your children are twice the size
of you and they come in at night . . ." - Augie March,
"The Hole In Your Roof"
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