Connie Willis' BLACKOUT/ALL CLEAR
Feb. 24th, 2011 09:47 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
memelainaDon't be fooled into thinking these are two books. It is one book in two volumes - as much so as THE LORD OF THE RINGS is one book in three volumes. Have both books in your hands before you read the first chapter. The story takes place almost entirely during WWII in London. There are a few small pieces early on in Oxford of 2060 where the time travel crew at Oxford University are based, but it's not the back and forth time travel of some of her books. This book is set firmly in the war years in London.
It's hard for me to believe that those years happened just before I was born. The characters are not historical models but modern people living with unbelievable bravery in a horrifying time. One of the themes of the book is clearly heroism. Another theme, I think, is contempt for today's American society where the demand for safety in all we do has replaced the concepts of freedom and bravery. Connie points out, page by page, trivia by minutiae, how people keep going in impossible conditions, and how those hundreds, thousands, millions, of small steps and actions pile up to win the war.
The main characters in the book are a diverse and dispersed group of Oxford history students whose focus moves, though the book, from observing history to becoming part of history. Trapped in the past, their attitudes and motives slowly change from the need to save themselves to the need to win the war - and that, of course, is what the book is all about.
I wonder what it would be like to read BLACKOUT/ALL CLEAR without having read THE DOOMSDAY BOOK? Now I knew what THE DOOMSDAY BOOK was about before I ever started it, and I got sucked in anyway. There I was, three-quarters of the way through the book, and you had villages, and manors, and households full of well-defined contemporary characters, and I said to myself, well, nobody's died yet, I guess it won't be as bad as I thought. But she kills off every single one of them. No survivors.
So I suppose it's no wonder that, going into BLACKOUT/ALL CLEAR, I was a little concerned about where the book would end. There were times in the story when I thought everyone would live, and there were times when I was deeply afraid that everyone would die. I fell open-eyed into every single trap and twist that Connie set. And while I do think that I saw the penultimate twist coming - and was right - I wouldn't have been at all surprised to have found that I was wrong. And as for that final, ultimate twist - I'm not even positive that it was there, right on the last two pages, but I think it was. You'll have to read your way to it and let me know what you think.
It's hard for me to believe that those years happened just before I was born. The characters are not historical models but modern people living with unbelievable bravery in a horrifying time. One of the themes of the book is clearly heroism. Another theme, I think, is contempt for today's American society where the demand for safety in all we do has replaced the concepts of freedom and bravery. Connie points out, page by page, trivia by minutiae, how people keep going in impossible conditions, and how those hundreds, thousands, millions, of small steps and actions pile up to win the war.
The main characters in the book are a diverse and dispersed group of Oxford history students whose focus moves, though the book, from observing history to becoming part of history. Trapped in the past, their attitudes and motives slowly change from the need to save themselves to the need to win the war - and that, of course, is what the book is all about.
I wonder what it would be like to read BLACKOUT/ALL CLEAR without having read THE DOOMSDAY BOOK? Now I knew what THE DOOMSDAY BOOK was about before I ever started it, and I got sucked in anyway. There I was, three-quarters of the way through the book, and you had villages, and manors, and households full of well-defined contemporary characters, and I said to myself, well, nobody's died yet, I guess it won't be as bad as I thought. But she kills off every single one of them. No survivors.
So I suppose it's no wonder that, going into BLACKOUT/ALL CLEAR, I was a little concerned about where the book would end. There were times in the story when I thought everyone would live, and there were times when I was deeply afraid that everyone would die. I fell open-eyed into every single trap and twist that Connie set. And while I do think that I saw the penultimate twist coming - and was right - I wouldn't have been at all surprised to have found that I was wrong. And as for that final, ultimate twist - I'm not even positive that it was there, right on the last two pages, but I think it was. You'll have to read your way to it and let me know what you think.
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Date: 2011-02-24 06:55 pm (UTC)And yes, I'm really glad I waited until I had both books in hand before I started reading them.
As an interesting side note, we recently visited the Kansas Cosmosphere, which is basically a museum of the history of rocketry and space flight. They have a whole room dedicated to the V-1 and V-2 rockets (with actual examples on display). And in the background they have a soundtrack playing that is the sound of blackout sirens, interspersed with what sounds like a badly-tuned motorcycle engine that suddenly cuts out. Having just read Blackout/All Clear, when I heard that, my scalp got all tingly, because it was exactly the way Connie described the sound of a V-1 rocket. I don't remember whether she listed the Cosmosphere as one of her references or not, though. It was still pretty cool, seeing and hearing the things she'd described in the book.
And as for that final, ultimate twist - I'm not even positive that it was there, right on the last two pages, but I think it was.
I think it was, too.