Sip by Brian Allen Carr
My rating: 4/5 cats
Sometimes bad decisions keep lasting forever.
the most hardyesque statement i’ve ever encountered outside of wessex.
before we get into the review proper, i must confess that at first i was OUTRAGED when i saw this described as a “debut” novel on its back cover, because i thought carr was somehow disavowing penning the magnificent Motherfucking Sharks – one of the best shark books of all time. but APPARENTLY, that book (and all of his others, many of which i own but have yet to read – eep!) are novellas, which i guess is technically accurate, but if you write a book as awesome as Motherfucking Sharks, you really need to be boasting about that as much as you can.
squinting at you, carr…
this is a weird little book. (although not as little as a novella – hhmph). it depicts an unsettling vision of the future, one in which people have learned how to get high by drinking the shadows cast by living things. once shadow addicts have depleted their own (apparently finite) shadows, their needs drive them to steal the shadows of others – either from animals or from other humans. those who have had their shadow completely sipped lose the ability to sleep, and must either become sippers themselves, or go mad from sleep deprivation. another crime rampant in this world is forcible amputation. i’m not even going to try to explain the reason for that one – it would make me sound like a crazy person, but it definitely makes sense within the context of this world.
and it is a dark world, indeed – pun half-intended. humanity is split between domers – rigid and ascetic militaristic societies protected from the outside world and its new horrors by domes around which trains circle relentlessly, whose occupants are trained to shoot any who approach their enclaves, and …. well, everyone else. life outside the domes is dangerous and wild, but it is also human – with food that isn’t squeezed out of a tube, and the luxury of making choices instead of following orders. but also the risk of being shadow-raped or amputated. so it’s shitty either way.
this is a difficult book to review, in terms of plot. it’s like describing a dream – it totally makes sense, but as you start to describe it, you realize you have to backtrack and explain lots of surrounding contextual details that you can shortcut in your own mind, but which need explaining to others. and the plot of this book mostly makes sense – there are a few details i’m still fuzzy about, but the fuzziness in no way diminished my enjoyment – confusion in small doses is invigorating. it’s just a tricky plot to pin down and describe in a way that will make you wanna read it without getting bogged down with specifics that’ll make your head feel as muddled as a shadow-addict. and you do wanna read it. despite its complete absence of sharks.
i will say that one of my favorite things about this book is carr’s complete lack of interest in fulfilling a reader’s expectations. whenever you’re reading a book or watching a movie, there are certain narrative cues that you register subconsciously that set up probable outcomes – this is happening so these two characters can reunite, hook up, have a confrontation, etc., and it may not even be on your radar enough that you’re making any sort of conscious predictions about it, but you sure as shit notice when the expectation is subverted. which carr does again and again. some situations resolve in a predictable manner, but there are some wonderful deviations here, where characters aren’t given dramatic closure, or absolution – events occur as sudden and messy as life, and i appreciate the balls of that so much.
this is one you need to read for yourself – i’ll only make a mess of it if i try to encapsulate it for you with clumsy words. but it’s odd and sad and sweet and gross and i laughed aloud at one part, which i would ordinarily quote n’ share, but even that would make no sense, or be remotely funny, if you haven’t read it, so i will keep it to myself.
go read this one and then show me how to review it.
