Vurt

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The civil serpents (a play-on-words of the job 'civil servant') are trying to control everything that happens in the future, and try to stop randomness. The 'Supreme Serpent' is the controller of the serpents, and hints at the fact that he is Satan himself. The idea of rituals as a kind of vast psychogeographic machine is the sort of grand and bizarre idea that Noon’s work abounds with. The Nyquist novels at times feel like loving tributes to the genres that shaped their author, but they’re also anything but pastiche. Just as Jeff Noon’s fictional investigators probe the boundaries between the real and the surreal, so too is their author venturing into uncharted realms, and finding out what happens when unexpected stories suddenly converge.

Scribble - the eyes through which we see this world and the obvious protagonist - let’s talk about him. He’s a junkie. You feel for him initially because he lost his lover in the Vurt and is trying to find her. Then you realize that this lost lover is also his sister and, surprisingly, you just don’t care for him that much any more. Could I ever care about a main character in an incestual relationship? Sure, if you give me a million words spread across five books and your name is George RR Martin. Getting what one desperately needs has hardly ever been such a mind boggling, confusing, psychedelic trip. Creeping Jenny takes a subtle swerve in its last quarter, maintaining its sense of folk horror but embracing a kind of speculative element as well. One character refers to the idea of the saints as “a sort of computational device.” This device, then, might serve some higher purpose: “a way of forcing us to experience many different kinds of behavior, a lot of it extreme in nature, on a regular basis, year after year.”Como complemento a Vurt es interesante, pero creo que el primer libro era mejor, al menos por la novedad del futuro que planteaba, un ciberpunk psicodélico alejado de los tópicos americanos. En el Archivo de Nessus hay reseñas a Vurt y a Polen, al que por cierto le dan una puntuación más alta que a Vurt. Otro cosa rara es que los libros los edita Mondadori que no tiene en su catálogo mucha ciencia ficción que digamos. That however is not the major flaw in the book. While the setting could have used some explaining here and there, the plot of the story was still clear enough to follow. I got what was going on, even if I didn't understand everything in the world. The book's fatal flaw was in the characters. While they were certainly vivid, outgoing, and memorable, they were also flat and acting without sensible motivation. As the plot progresses and secondary characters are risking their lives, helping, or loving the main character, there is no expiation as to why the go out of the way to help him. Even when character motivation is attempted, it's done poorly. One character claims to be aiding Scribble (the lead) for his brother. While we know his brother, and their story, there is no link between what he does for Scribble, and the brother. A new character is brought into the group at the beginning of the story, Scribble treats her poorly, and she puts her life on the line to help him be reunited with his sister. The character interactions remind me of a table top role playing game. "You all are in a group, it doesn't matter why, but you have to help each other. Even if it goes against what you think you're character is, in the end, you help because that's what keeps the game, and my plot, moving forward."

Game Cat – the maestro, the near mythical being who knows and shares the inside info in his "Game Cat" periodical

Pollen is the sequel to Vurt and concerns the ongoing struggle between the real world and the virtual world. When concerning the virtual world, some references to Greek mythology are noticeable, including Persephone and Demeter, the river Styx and Charon, and Hades (portrayed by the character John Barleycorn). The novel is set in Manchester. Jeff Noon’s Vurtis one of the most beautiful speculative fiction works of the past several decades. Andrew Wenaus’ new book does justice to Vurtin its full mind-blowing complexity, tracing out how the novel offers us new ways to think and to feel.” (Steven Shaviro, DeRoy Professor of English, Wayne State University)

Jeff Noon is a novelist, short story writer and playwright whose works make extensive use of wordplay and fantasy. Noon describes Automated Alice as a "trequel" - it is a companion piece of sorts to Lewis Carroll's books Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking-Glass. The novella follows Alice's journey to a future Manchester populated by Newmonians, Civil Serpents and a vanishing cat named Quark. Noon's first four novels, which share ongoing characters and settings, are commonly referred to as the 'Vurt series' (after the first novel). I used to cover the mirrors up with the hotel towels. I couldn't stand the sight of myself. I've always had problems with mirrors – ever since – even though I haven't drunk in such a long time. In Falling Out of Cars – his last novel before his years of silence, and his farewell to Manchester – all the mirrors are covered up in that book … covered up or broken. That definitely comes from that period."Angry Robot Books will publish a 30th anniversary edition of the “seminal” science-fiction novel Vurt from Jeff Noon with a foreword from author Adam Roberts.

The three short stories that have been added to this twentieth anniversary edition make only tangential reference to characters from the original novel but they are all finely crafted gems that make welcome additions to Noon’s world building. Vurt offers its readers a host of original visions even as it riffs off the classical myth of Orpheus and Eurydice. Like one of Noon’s dream feathers, it is well worth consuming this book for it transports you to a richly imagined world of distorted realities and twisted fantasy. Its highly inventive blend of poetic and grotesque imagery lingers in the mind like the residue of a powerful dream. The world of Slow Motion Ghosts is one where alternate personas, rituals, and parallel subcultures all factor into the plotline in various ways. Lucas Bell was best-known for his onstage persona, known as “King Lost.” This, in turn, ties in with references from Lucas’s past to a mysterious place known as “Edenville,” which may or may not exist. A group of musicians debates an act that would “conjure up Luke’s spirit”—one of several moments in the novel where Noon suggests the presence of supernatural activity.

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Spanton added: “I’d not long been an editor when Vurt first came out. Publishing was very different then and so was SF. But Vurt feels as original now as it did when it arrived in 1993. It won the Arthur C Clarke that year and it has been an unruly and inspiring influence ever since: always entertaining, it refuses to be tied down or corralled into this or that sub-category of SF and the genre always needs books like that.” There have been a few comic adaptations of the novel, including Vurt – The Comic Remix, with art by Lee O'Connor. Hailed as the novel that reinvented cyberpunk, The 30th Anniversary edition of Jeff Noon’s award winning cult classic, Vurt. This isn't a book. It's an A1, tip-top, clubbing, jam fair. It's sandwich of fun, on ecstasy bread, wrapped up in a big bag like disco fudge...