Watcha Think?

So how's everyone doing with the book?

I have a few initial thoughts to share, but I'm only 200 or so pages in at this point.

First, I'm enjoying/paying attention to the structure of the novel. It's certainly not a canonical linear narrative. It's more like a web. So far, central to the web are the twins, Lecha and Zeta. The rest of the story and the characters are spun around them. They, because in part of their relationship as girls with their grandmother Yoeme, are special. More on the web, the twins, and Yoeme in a future post.

I'm also seeing some themes showing up here & there. One is change and loss -- "People now weren't the same. What had become of that world which had faded a little more each time one of his [Sterling's] dear little aunts had passed" (88)?; "The white man [Lecha/Zeta's father] had violated the Mother Earth, and he had been stricken with the sensation of a gaping emptiness between his throat and his heart" (121).; "Old Yoeme had made a big point of shaming those who would sell the last few objects of the people who had been destroyed and worlds that had been destroyed by the Europeans . . ." (132); "She [Lecha] sensed the change as if the power were turning its face, and its eyes, to look toward the world that was emerging" (161).

Another is crime -- I won't quote you guys to death on the rest of these. Another, death. Another, sex. Another, western medicine and blood. Another, return (returning home, returning to the past, returning to cultural/racial roots). Another, misogyny. Another, police corruption.

I don't know about you all, but this is challenging, fun, and horrifying all at the same time.