|
-
News
- Features
- Blogs
- Events
Calendar
- Editorials
- Monthly
Zine
- Offworld
Report
- Our Daily
RSS Feed
- Movie/TV
Reviews
> Recent movies
> Movies by year
> Movies by title
- Book
Reviews
> Recent books
> Books by year
> Books by title
- Home
- Worlds
- Biography
- Bibliography
- Appearances
- Reviews
- Blog
- Community
- Press
- Links
Become
an Advertiser
- Web
Site Directory
- Search
the Net
- StephenHunt.net
- WoodenRocket.com
- Check
your E-mail
- Non Sci-Fi
News
|
HARM by Brian W. Aldiss
01/06/2007 . Source: Geoff Willmetts 
pub: Del Rey/Ballantine Books. 223 hardback. Price: $21.95 (US), $27.95 (CAN). ISBN: 978-0-345-49671-3. Buy HARM in the USA - or Buy HARM in the UK  check out website: www.delreydigital.com
I have to confess that in my youth I found a lot of Brian W. Aldiss' stories rather dry. It was only in recent years after enjoying 'Hothouse' that I just put it down to my age.
'HARM' - an acronym for Hostile Activities Research Ministry - is a story in two parts. Paul Fadhil Abbas Ali, a first generation British subject from a Muslim heritage and author of 'The Pied Piper Of Hament' is captured and detained while in the Middle East. His book has just been released there and what he thought was a joke about blowing up the British Prime Minister said by some drunken characters is taken as incitement for action. Systematically, through the course of this book he is tortured and interrogated.
He also has a dysfunctional part of his brain that allows him release into the fantasy world of Stygia, a new human colony world where the existing inhabitants are insect-like but filling in various niches in their own ecology. As Fremant and one of the palace guard, he is being encouraged to kill their tyrant leader Astaroth, who learns of the plan and has him locked up. He escapes with the help of some colleagues and lives with them off the beaten track.
Already you should notice some similarities between the two persona although Fremant is a lot more brutal in the early part as he learns his humanity. Abbas Ali, also known as Prisoner B, is less fortunate. The switch between the two lives practically happens within a paragraph and sometimes so subtle you have to go back and check when it happens. Initially, I did think this was a little strange but it avoided the obvious cliché of a prisoner creating a world deliberately to hide in to hide from the abuse. If anything, Abbas Ali's unconscious mind is protecting him even if only to a degree.
In an interview at the back of the book, Aldiss says this book is his reaction to the Bush effect in the Middle East after 9/11. The fact that some of the torturers are American CIA tends to suggest he's also leaving a lot of material here for you to ponder as to the implications. Certainly, there is an effect on free speech and being a British citizen doesn't hold much water, even if you no longer support the Muslim faith.
This is a powerful book. Oddly enough, at least at the time of the interview, there is no British release for 'HARM' so if you want to read, you'll have to get the American issue. I suspect it will get a lot of comment. As it blends two genres together and the Science Fiction element is more to do with Aldiss' background of choice, I can also see it appearing in the general genre category as well. It's certainly thought-provoking and allows much discussion.
GF Willmetts
|
|
