What do you think of David Mitchell's Cloud Atlas?

wish i hadn't read BSG before reading CA, because i missed the significance of the frobisher/eva references in BSG. still, i love both, although nabisco is otm™ about the mechanical vs thematic connections. the thematic stuff was way stronger, and the mechanical stuff was a little frustrating. i kept thinking that the birthmark stuff was weak and was waiting for some kind of payoff. it seems like mitchell agrees, at least judging from the winky part about the structure of 'cloud atlas sextet' where he writes something like "revolutionary or gimmick? i won't know until it's finished." ghostwritten did almost the exact same thing to much better effect imo, although cloud atlas is way more entertaining and probably better written (it's been so long since i've read ghostwritten, i don't remember the prose very well).

looking forward to his new one: http://www.amazon.com/Thousand-Autumns-Jacob-Zoet-Novel/dp/1400065453/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1265140939&sr=8-1

Just finished "The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet".

He's done away with the clever forms, and just allowed his narrative sleight-of-hand to exist on a chapter by chapter basis. The prose style is, when dealing with the European characters, a gorgeous Melville pastiche, like the first part of Cloud Atlas. It's denser than his previous books and very rewarding. I preferred Black Swan Green to Mitchell's previous books; when he keeps his social commentary bubbling underneath a more urbane coming-of-age story--or in Jacob de Zoet's case, a romance--it has more resonance. Mitchell is one of my favourite authors and "de Zoet" is his best book.

Sounds great! Think this is going to be a good summer book for me. Cheers, Ówen.

I have to warn you, though, that this is another one of those one-sitting reads. I read Cloud Atlas in a feverish three days and this one in two. Don't start it when you have work to do.

Hmm, yes, thanks for that as well. Do love those books, and the experience of one-sitting reads, where they briefly take over your life, but it's nice to have a clear run at 'em.

oh shit, I didn't realize this was out.

it's not. looking forward to it though.

it's out in two weeks here and in two months where you are.

dang. well I already added it to my library hold list.

any euros want to send me a copy? i can paypal you for it!

i think you could buy it from amazon.co.uk if you are that eager.

I really loved this (Thousand Autumns). Not much more to say yet, in terms of it's placing within his work. I guess you could say it's more traditional, but then so was BSG in a way. Still some genre shifts (an abortive attempt to become a Kurosawa film/ninja story, for example). I suppose culture clash as dialectic seems like a natural thing for him to (re-?)explore, but it works great as a straight story - one of those books I can happily recommend to friends who make fun of 'serious' literature. So yeah, dug this.

thanks to jaymc, nabisco, and n/a for pushing me to buy Cloud Atlas and Black Swan Green.

Ghostwritten is excellent too. I like Number 9 Dream as well but it's pretty different from his other books so I hesitate recommending it.

He's done away with the clever forms, and just allowed his narrative sleight-of-hand to exist on a chapter by chapter basis.

^^ I really like the idea of this. I mean, I do like his attraction to (and skill with) those narrative tricks that seem a tiny bit geeky or sci-fi -- I don't think that's a problem. But I remember half-wondering if Black Swan Green was maybe his simple way of seeing how things worked without that kind of structure and pure invention (you know, start "small," do a short, contained story with a young narrator in a setting you know), and I like the idea of his continuing that way...

I like Number 9 Dream as well but it's pretty different from his other books so I hesitate recommending it.

I love number9dream! It's better than all but the center section of Cloud Atlas. So entertaining, with a really solid emotional foundation. Maybe it's the ending people don't like? Yeah, it's a little gimmicky, but very effective.

Look forward to reading number9dream. Liked Cloud Atlas a lot (wd agree the central section is the strongest), would by and large agree with the James Wood review of Thousand Autumns, really good in lots of ways, but does have a weird lack of purchase, not a bad thing necessarily, but having subsequently read Black Swan Green which I thought was wonderful, does feel like a bit of a loss.

Still, more power to his elbow imo, imaginatively delightful and with a strong heft of non-conventional emotional content.

Maybe it's the ending people don't like?

I think it's the Goatwriter section that people really dislike, it's pretty much the worst thing he's written. The book as a whole takes the Murakami homage thing a bit too far, although I love the video game bits and the gangster subplot in the middle.

so excited to read his new one.

I do like Number9Dream, it just feels different from the rest of his books.

I think it's the Goatwriter section that people really dislike, it's pretty much the worst thing he's written.

Really? It didn’t bother me, and there wasn’t much of it anyway. It’s just for fun -- silly wordplay, a fairy tale, a meta joke with a good punch line.

I've been meaning to read this one, one of my art teachers loves it. It sounds quite great.

read this for the first time a few weeks ago and fell in love... i thought i had written on this thread but i guess it was ~~one of my past lives~~~~~

new one was really well written but I had trouble getting as excited about it as his other books.

also:

(SPOILER)

it wasn't clear to me why the British ship just stopped attacking the city. Were there clues about this that I missed, or is it just supposed to be a mystery?

I finished Ghostwritten a couple of hours ago. The middle sections – Holy Mountain, Mongolia, Petersburg – are engrossing. The last eighty pages really tail off though.

after slagging him off speculatively two years ago i still have yet to read him, although i did take home a copy of cloud atlas the other day

SPOILER

it wasn't clear to me why the British ship just stopped attacking the city. Were there clues about this that I missed, or is it just supposed to be a mystery?

de Zoet standing on the lookout tower about to be annihilated by the captain of the brit ship reminded the captain of the brit ship of his own son who had been lopped in half by a chain gun some years earlier. (it makes sense in the context of the book)

huh ok, I guess I missed that, thanks.

ghostwritten was like 80% of a superamazing book, and 20% of lead-up with no follow through. it felt like the kind of foreplay that goes on too long and everybody gets chafed or bored or tired and just kind of tuckered out, and you say 'oh, that was nice' but don't really feel into it any more.

That's about right. I found Laura Miller's rather tetchy review, which I read, to my regret, before I'd finished the novel. When I did, my mind kept returning it, and she's right in suggesting that the novel's a virtuoso performance without giving us a clue about what Mitchell cares about or where he'll go next.

i remember liking the end of ghostwritten, it was a nice surprise to find myself in a doomsday sci-fi story (seemed very asimov-y iirc, not in a bad way)

what was the last section? tokyo underground?

Yeah -- about the Tokyo bomber.

lol, i forgot about that until you mentioned it. the last thing i remembered was the radio show.

oh god that damn chapter was endless.

he's the neil gaiman of writing

― thomp, Sunday, June 8, 2008 12:29 AM (2 years ago) Bookmark

do you know, i think i might stand by this? enjoying this a great deal though, wish i could remember what happened to the copy of number9dream i bought like five years ago

I am going to hear him read tonight. Is the new book worth buying in hardback?

It's a nice looking thing (at least in its European incarnation), and well, having a book in hardback can increase the pleasurable sense of ceremony reading a new book can bring. It wasn't my favourite of his - plenty to be getting on with tho.

just finished ghostwritten. i think i liked it more than cloud atlas, even--less of a focus on a specific reincarnative weirdness and more a generalized kind of... butterfly effect? the way things ripple across the sections is pretty amazing, and he does it in this incredibly beautiful way that makes certain themes and objects and ideas actually kind of echo instead of being all DO YOU SEE DO YOU SEE.

i love, too, what he does with the practice of reading--the way you have to give up entirely on your training to expect an ending or a conclusion; you simply read and trust mitchell to make everything interesting. as in cloud atlas i was bummed out every time a section ended and then immediately enthralled by the next one.

the only bit that dragged was the bat segundo radio show. i didnt like bat very much, and i was a little sad that the book climaxed in that bit. although the conversation between the zookeeper and the noncorprum almost sent shivers down my spine!

"Please don't worry, Bat. I traced the caller. He won't interrupt us again."

I loved the Holy Mountain section; that's what hooked me.

i think i'm enjoying this (ca) a lot more for how i'd been warned off some stuff by the above posts

tbh the endings of the second halves so far are causing a sort of inner 'haha YESSSS' for the most part

the the people at the top of the thread were weirdly down on cloud atlas, dunno what their problem was

i liked it even though i criticised it a bit.

the way things ripple across the sections is pretty amazing, and he does it in this incredibly beautiful way that makes certain themes and objects and ideas actually kind of echo instead of being all DO YOU SEE DO YOU SEE.

think this pretty well encapsulates the probs i have with cloud atlas and why i still find ghostwritten a better book.

as in cloud atlas i was bummed out every time a section ended and then immediately enthralled by the next one.

This is basically what I loved most about this. I was particularly super-pissed when the Somni story ended on a cliffhanger, and for 2 pages at least of "Sloosha's Crossin'..." was convinced there was no way it could live up to it. But then of course "Sloosha's Crossin'..." quickly became my favourite.

the only bit that dragged was the bat segundo radio show. i didnt like bat very much, and i was a little sad that the book climaxed in that bit. although the conversation between the zookeeper and the noncorprum almost sent shivers down my spine!

― max, Friday, July 23, 2010 6:25 PM (2 weeks ago) Bookmark

What are other people's interpretations of this final chapter? I've never had the opportunity to discuss it with anybody.

for what its worth im not opposed to the idea of a dialogue (well monologue, almost)-only chapter, and in certain ways i like the "concept," i just found it irrtating because the character is so irritating, and a lot of it felt forced

I'm in the middle of Cloud Atlas, and absolutely love it.

They're making it into a movie with a pretty impressive cast , to put it mildly.

It seems almost impossible to make a satisfying 2 1/2 hour movie from this book. Do you think they'll try to do all six stories?

I just checked it out of the library, a few weeks after reading Ghostwritten and Black Swan Green.

I wish they would stop making films of popular books.

I haven't read this yet (carefully skimming the thread) but enjoying Ghostwritten. Pretty sure Tom Tykwer has never actually made a good film.

Cloud Atlas is good but it's not in Gatsby/Anna Karenina territory! The thing about Cloud Atlas is that it would actually make brilliant schlocky Hollywood cinema but I don't really trust the Wachowskis not to blow it.

fantastic (long) interview: http://www.theparisreview.org/interviews/6034/the-art-of-fiction-no-204-david-mitchell

I liked the story about the businessman in Hong Kong and the mythical story best. I liked the dystopian stories least. (Dystopia seems hard to imagine or temporary, fleeting, and situated.)

"dammit weed" lol

so psyched.

http://www.thebookseller.com/news/new-david-mitchell-novel-out-next-autumn.html

I was a bit this way and that on de Zoet but this is goi to be grebt:

The Bone Clocks.

while i loved this book and plan on reading everything else of his i was in exactly the same position as nabisco

My weird nagging issues on this are totally mechanical, though -- he does so much to toy with the idea that there's a mechanical in-the-book connection between all these characters, but he doesn't have one! For some reason this bugged all hell out of me: why keep hinting that you've got a concrete, non-thematic explanation for the form when you really, really don't? The many airy allusions to reincarnation are blown apart by (among other things) Luisa Ray: Cavendish would have been born around the point Frobisher died, so why is there a character from a thriller shoehorned between them? This wouldn't normally be a problem, but there's something about the form that leads you to believe the second halves of the story will give you a change to figure something out about the connections -- not something thematic, but something physical -- and yet with a lot of those second halves he seems to be writing purely for plot, just enjoying wrapping up the tales themselves, as if most of his content was on the page by the middle section, and everything thereafter is just tidying up.

So beyond the center section, I was mostly just chopping through to get the thing done, pushing through a lot of pages looking for some connections that didn't seem likely to crop up.

before the second half i was CONVINCED there was some epic connection that was going to string them all together. my best guess was some kind of rift in time thing where adam ewing somehow travels through time to the post apocalyptic future. zachry refers to "pa n' adam" being captured by kona, so i thought maybe autua was zachry's father, and he and adam had traveled through time due to something that would conspire once they'd reached hawaii. would've worked out perfectly, too, since frobisher hadn't found the second half of adam's diary yet, and luisa hadn't read the second half of frobisher's correspondence yet. then some connection with the nuclear reactor, her father maybe? i hadn't worked out the details past that point. anyways, IMO kind of a missed opportunity and i do agree with nabs that it hinted too much at a connection that wasn't there. but oh well, still an amazing read. is the new one good?

also if luisa is fictional then so are zedelghem and pacific diaries, no? i got the impression it was true crime but as n points out that blows apart the reincarnation thing, although i think mitchell might have just legit fucked up in that regard, as there's an ironic in-joke where timothy cavendish says that he would edit out the suggestion that frobisher and luisa are the same person, at which pt the reader is supposed to knowingly lol like, dude you are that person too!