by Ray Nayler
Overall: A fascinating and original work of science fiction, The Mountain in the Sea takes place on Earth at an unspecified future date. Humans have managed to create a conscious android and fully autonomous AI and have devastated vast swaths of the planet’s ecosystems. On a small island off the coast of what we would call Vietnam, a scientist named Dr. Ha Nguyen has been recruited to work with a small team investigating whether a species of octopus may have evolved to the point of developing language and culture. At the same time, a hacker named Rusten has been recruited to break into one of the world’s most complex and heavily guarded neural networks, and a man named Eiko is being forced to work as a slave on an automated ship illegally fishing in the Pacific. The links between the three timelines and narrators gradually grow more apparent as the danger for all involved – especially the octopus species at the heart of the story – increases.
Likes: I love high-concept sci-fi (think Octavia Butler, Ursula K. Le Guin, Liu Cixin, or Frank Herbert), and The Mountain in the Sea is a fantastic new addition to the genre. The details about the octopus species and Ha’s research are grounded in what we currently know about cephalopod intelligence, but are enhanced with outstanding creative touches. The characters all felt new, unique, and complex; I especially liked the book’s take on androids. Sometimes high-concept sci-fi can get lost in the clouds, but this book is grounded in gritty sensory experience: the texture of sand, the smell of rotting fish, the sounds of the jungle canopy, the taste of a macaroon. The sense of ominous foreboding rachets up with each chapter, but who is the monster – the octopuses? The machines, many of them intelligent, who have come to dominate the world? Or us, the well-intentioned but fallible humans, who may or may not be in control?
Dislikes: Really none. But this is intense sci-fi, friends, with deep meditations on DNA, evolution, AI, neural networks, & technology. If that makes your eyes cross, this isn’t the book for you.
FYI: murder, violence, slavery, references to war and PTSD.
Liz Helfrich 