The Thumbnail Book Reviews
by John Q McDonald --- 8 February 2021
by Gene Wolfe
Which would you rather do: read Moby Dick or sit down with Nathaniel Hawthorne and have him describe what it was like to write Moby Dick? That's the essential premise of this short strange novel, the last published by Gene Wolfe, shortly after his death. It turns out he'd already envisioned this premise in the book The Borrowed Man to which this is a sequel. Oddly constructed as it is, this book, more or less, stands well enough on its own. It's an odd notion, though. In the not too distant future, you can check an author out of the library just as you would a book. These people are clones and reclones of the original authors and they serve as a resource for library patrons. It's a little unclear to what purpose. They can tell only the stories the original authors wrote, are prohibited from writing books of their own, and they can be disposed of by fire if they're not checked out of the library often enough. The reclones are less than human, or considered as such. They are slave-like possessions who are obliged to do as asked by their patrons, things well outside their "text", even if those tasks are ostensibly prohibited. Within this construct, Wolfe explores the nature of identity and meaning. It's an interesting prospect, but one is left with wondering a bit, why have such resources in libraries.
This future is vaguely distopian. It is evident that the nation is largely depopulated and its centers of civilization greatly shifted. Ern Smithe is the reclone of a mystery writer (met in the earlier novel), checked out with two of his fellow resources, via interlibrary loan from the midwest to a remote seaside town in the far northeast. Adah Fevre is a mentally questionable woman living in a big old house. Her husband disappeared seven years ago and she has discovered what amounts to a treasure map she hopes will lead Smithe and her back to him. What ensues is a strange wandering mystery to a frozen island in the North Atlantic, a couple of murders, a couple of resurrections, an overdue fine at the library, a sort of twin paradox, the odd experience of meeting an older version of yourself, and a journey across dimensions to another planet. Sadly, the book has an unfinished feeling to it. There are odd breaks, strange editorial glitches, characters that float in and disappear, plots that drop only to be replaced by another featuring a fast-talking cowboy reclone. As Wolfe's last published book, could it be that the author didn't have a chance to run through at least one more edit? There are incomplete ideas here, and a drifting quality that makes the book feel like the reporting of a long strange dream. It has the distorted logic of dreams. It is unfortunate, as the result is curiously engaging and idiosyncratic. Perhaps, for this reader, it wasn't the right book to read first from Wolfe's works. At the very least, The Borrowed Man surely feels more complete. What you have is a quirky read, perhaps an essential oddity for the devoted Wolfe fan. It isn't a bad book. Just don't expect it, by the end, to make a whole lot of sense.