The year in books #16: Palimpsest

As a sub-quest for this year's 50 Book Challenge, I have undertaken to read all of the novels nominated for this year's Hugo Award. The Hugo is the most prestigious award for science fiction, created in 1955 to fill a glaring hole created by what was most likely a copy-editing error in Alfred Nobel's will (he clearly meant to write "for advances in science fiction"). During the ten (dear lord) years that I spent attending university, I had so little money and time to spend reading books of my choosing that I've felt detached from the world of sci-fi, and picking up the six best-received novels of the last year felt like a good way to get back into the genre I love so much.

The first of this year's nominees to hit my bedside table was Catherynne M. Valente's Palimpsest, which immediately and then repeatedly blew my mind. Holy crap can the woman write! Palimpsest's hauntingly evokative prose is so gorgeous that I repeatedly found myself reading passages three and four times just to savor the language. Writing so powerful could easily lift a mediocre story into the realm of readability, but the fairytale that Valente weaves is itself an incredible piece of work.

I find myself at this point, as so often when reviewing good stories, deeply reluctant to spoil the fun of discovering the world in which this book takes place, because so much of the fun of such a novel is in the "ah hah!" moments that punctuate it. Let me reveal as little as possible: Palimpsest is about four people from all around the world (one, to my delight, from Kyoto) who stumble into the secret of the cryptic, magical city from which the book derives its name. The four are a locksmith, a train enthusiast, a book printer and a beekeeper, and the exploration of their personalities and the manner in which they experience and influence the city of Palimpsest is as fascinating as the city itself.

Palimpsest shares with a great many novels I've read the hook of the unknown; as you read such books, it is your curiosity about the world that provides suspense, and the revelation of aspects of the world that provide the pleasure of the reading experience. A great many such books are disappointing for various reasons: often, the reveal is unbelievable or not compelling, or the story is driven so much by its world and so little by its characters that it simply ceases to be interesting once the mysteries have been exposed. In Palimpsest, though, the reader is drawn in as through an onion, with each layer exposing another, the mysteries explained in rapid, believable and satisfying succession, but always leaving the reader primed for more.

I have only one complaint about this book, and it's so minor and nitpicky that I'm slightly ashamed for even calling your attention to it. One of the characters, as I mentioned above, comes from Kyoto, and visits Ginkakuji, commenting on the appearance of the silver coating the pavilion's walls. Unfortunately, Ginkakuji rather famously has no silver on its walls; its name ("Silver Pavilion") comes from the fact that its builder intended to have it coated in silver when he planned it, but that plan was never carried out. The occasional such error is unavoidable and completely forgivable, and I mention it only because I can't think of a single other thing to decry in the book's pages, but having visited Ginkakuji any number of times, I found myself jerked quite entirely out of the story for a few moments by the error.

Anyway, I can wholeheartedly recommend this book. Go read it. Seriously. It's good.