Tuesday 20 March 2012

Book Review: Hull Zero Three by Greg Bear



Greg Bear is a big name in contemporary British science fiction, taking his cue from the harder, more epic side of the genre. While refreshing in the face of the glut of 'speculative fiction' like The Hunger Games or Oryx & Crake, his brand of grandiose high-concept storytelling sometimes falls a little short of that magical creativity which marks the work of contemporaries like Banks or Gaiman. That's the problem plaguing Hull Zero Three, which in isolation is a perfectly decent science fiction thriller, but suffers from comparison with some much more worthy predecessors, as well as modern films and video games.

It's a classic tale of a generation ship: an idea first proposed (in print, at least) in the 1920s and used ever since by science fiction authors looking to inject a degree of realism into their work. Considering that faster-than-light travel is impossible (or at least, so we believe), the only feasible way for humanity to colonise the stars is by travelling in enormous arks capable of either sustaining life in suspended animation or allowing the creation and survival of a multi-generational society during the journey. It's an idea that's been used time and time again in books, TV programmes and even some surprisingly mainstream films (Wall-E, for one).

Hull Zero Three is a novel in that grand tradition, opening with the messy and disorientating expulsion of our protagonist from his cryogenic pod, into a nightmare of predatory robots, malfunctioning gravity and confusion. The narrator of the story - unnamed but generally referred to as Teacher due to his demeanour - is a passenger on a generation ship woken early in a nightmarishly confusing situation. The character's total amnesia allows us to discover what's going on at a reasonable pace, given the eventual complexity of the plot and, inevitably, the science. Bear's descriptive prose is stark and clinical, which makes it difficult for the less scientific reader to imagine exactly what's being described; where some would talk about doughnuts, Bear talks about tori.

Minor complaints aside, the problem with Hull Zero Three is not that it isn't intriguing or gripping - it is! - but that it has shades of half a dozen other, more memorable sci-fi settings that tend to crowd your senses and make it hard to enjoy the book for what it is. Given the generation-ship-malfunction plot the immediate connection to make is with the spectacular Non-Stop by Brain Aldiss. This tale of a society built up in the damaged wreckage of a generation ship as it drifts through space is a classic of the genre and is superior in almost every way. The characterisation is better, the world more deftly realised and the pay-off at the end much more profound and affecting.

Early sections of the book are reminiscent of BioShock (and in particular of the Little Sisters) and certain plot elements bring cinematic corridor-horror-fest Pandorum immediately to mind. In books like Hull Zero Three, the setting is the novel and there's only so much you can do with it without stepping on other people's toes. It feels sometimes as though less time should have been spent on establishing the nature of the environment - which after all, is always going to echo past works on a similar theme - and instead focus on character and plot development.

Bear does tread some interesting new ground towards the end; the implications of the epilogue are by far the standout parts, drawing together the speculation and uncertainty of the preceding chapters into something resembling closure. Prior to this last-minute gasp the resolution of events seems strangely unsatisfying, rambling along to a conclusion without a particular climax.

Basically, Hull Zero Three is a passable if not particularly memorable addition to the genre. It adds little in the way of new ideas to concepts first laid down in the late 1950s and, while in any other genre that would expected, for a science fiction novel from such a celebrated writer you can be forgiven for expecting more.

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