Hoo boy!
Do I ever have mixed feelings about this book. As one review I read put it, there are two main characters in Kay Kenyon’s Bright of the Sky: Titus Quinn, and the Entire.
I’ll start with the Entire. It’s not really a character. The Entire is a parallel universe. Kenyon calls it a radial universe. It’s a large, relative flat place. Not really three dimensional like our universe is. In the center is a large sea, over which floats the Ascendancy, the capital city of the Entire. Around this are various areas called sways
, something like countries with areas larger than planets or solar systems. The size of each of these sways is not constant. The physics of the Entire cause the area to vary. Smaller areas spike off each sway. They are bounded by an actual edge to the universe, and at weak points the Entire can see into our universe (the Rose
), though not predictably. The Tarig rule, ruthlessly. Other sentient creatures occupy various places. Some are created by the Tarig as copies of humanity. Others have untold origins.
I really like the Entire. I love exploring new worlds, seeking out strange new civilizations. Some of it is kind of clunky and I don’t really think things would work out too well the way Kenyon describes them. The social fabric seems too much like a Jenga tower of blocks. But really I don’t care. The Entire has a fun feel. It’s a new place to explore. It’s different, very different. Most of the creatures found are not humanoid. That’s awesome! Star Trek kind of sucks because everyone they ever ran into looked human with a few prosthetics molded on. There’s some human looking races in the Entire, but they were copied from human. Though at the point I am in the book currently, there’s no real explanation why. In fact, at this point I kind of wish Kenyon would get around to explaining why, since the social fabric is kind of weird and off-putting.
On the other hand, I’ve found nothing redeeming so far about Titus Quinn, amnesiac space ship pilot and the first human to travel to the Entire. Accidentally of course. He appears suddenly on a distant planet with only mad fleeting dreams of his time away. He’s thought to have lost his wife and kid in the space ship accident, but in reality they were all captured by the Tarig rulers in the Entire. Somehow Quinn escaped. Now his employer Minerva has found a way back and Quinn signs up to go, so he can find out what happened to his loved ones and possibly bring them back.
What’s so annoying about Quinn is that he doesn’t make choices. He always picks the most difficult way to do something, and then gets in everyone’s face is they dare question him. He insists on going back alone. Once there, he won’t listen to anyone who allies themselves with him. He continually goes off on his own and arouses suspicion. He threatens and bluffs his way to getting what he wants without offering anything in return. Kenyon bristled in an interview at calling Quinn an anti-hero. I’m not sure she’s read her own book! At a minimum, he’s an anti-hero. I actively hated the guy at the halfway point of the book and switched to a mind set of hoping he’d get eaten by aliens. This is more than hate. There have been characters I thought were evil before. Quinn I hate contemptuously. In wrestling, there are faces and heels. Good guys and bad guys. You want to root for the babyfaces and boo the heels. Except some wrestlers you don’t want to even boo; you just want them off your TV screen because they irritate you. Titus Quinn is one of those characters.
It might be good to give an example. Quinn has traveled to the Ascendancy, the central city, where he needs the approval of a high prefect to travel to a distant sway to retrieve his daughter. Quinn’s heretofore guide Je Anzi was not allowed into the city. But she has told him: But she’d said he was ready. He thought so to. He had to be.
Mind you, the human analogues in the Entire, the Chalin, are based on Chinese culture. Everything revolves around proper obeisance to authority. What did we last see Quinn do prior to ascending the chain of government? Bluster Je Anzi into the city at the gate when she was denied entrance. Made a scene, in other words. The man is not constitutionally capable of going along to get along. Ever. And he thinks he is ready to tackle a hostile enemy bureaucracy on his own? What a crock! I’m sure Kenyon will have him finagle his way through somehow, but it will defy everything we know about the character.
I think I have a bigger problem with the writing though. It’s not just Titus Quinn who behaves oddly. Granted, this is a made-up world where everything can be exactly how Kenyon wants it. But in her world, every contact between people is a test of wills. Every contact in the book becomes a struggle between characters to see who comes out on top. Cooperation is only feigned. That’s an awful world, and it isn’t limited to the Entire. All the interactions in the Minerva corporation on Earth follow the same pattern. I’ve spent time in corporate America, and I never saw anything like that. Hell, I’ve spent time in high school, and even there where emotions run high and kids all worry about who is popular, nothing goes to the extreme with which Kenyon imbue s everything.
A deeply unsatisfying book, even if the world-building is imaginative.
Title: Bright of the sky
Author: Kay Kenyon
Cover artist: Stephan Martiniere
Series: The Entire and the Rose; 1
Imprint / publisher: Pyr / Prometheus
Format: Paperback
Length: 451 p.
Publication date: February 2008 (hardcover in April 2007)
ISBN-13: 978-1-59102-601-3
LC classification: PS3561.E5544B75 2007
