The Child Garden (S.F. Masterworks)
£3.02
Raw emotion - What an incredible book this is! The premise outlined in the blurb is promising (children grown in gardens in a tropical london educated via viruses). Seems gloriously messed up and it is easy to happily resign yourself to an exploration of these themes and their ramifications...Instead you will read of the emotional and physical journey of one of the most remarkable heroines in modern literature. It is through her that we are guided around this very odd world. There are some fantastic shifts in narrative pace and style. Apologies for ruining anything for you but there is a breathtakingly beautiful 50 page chapter which leaves you in such a tangle of emotions that you realise you are totally embroiled in the world of the book and the peaks and troughs of Milena. It is a blistering moment of clarity when all those little questions, that sci-fi books like to throw up, are given some kind of disjointed but final closure. The most fantastic thing about that chapter - indeed, the reason I am writing this review, is that the end leaves you only halfway through a book which you will remember forever. I have been searching for something new this heartfelt in sci-fi for a while and I have found it. Geoff Ryman is one to watch.
The secret of a good book - Fantastic book!! I just wish I could have a chat with Geoff Ryman and clarify a few little questions in my mind -did it make perfect sense to everybody else when they read it as I think I was with it most of the time, but got slightly lost when they were putting on the show in space - I really enjoyed it though!!
Forget it! - If you have read the elegant and clever book 253 and are expecting more of the same, you ll be disappointed. In this long, rambling story, I lost all symapthy with main character and couldn t care less what happened to her. Getting to the end was an orderal.I got my copy from a second hand book stall and that s where its going back to!
Easily the best book I have ever read - The Child Garden is one of the few books I have read that has really moved me, and one of even fewer that I would instantly cite as the best book I have read in my life (and I ve read quite a few!). The future it describes could be a dystopian commentary of our own society, but instead it s a story about people, who are ultimately the most important components of any society. It s a future where people are still flawed and petty, and life is not easy of perfect, and that there are always some people who will stand out and make their mark on history. Milena is one such person, a heroine who grows up during the course of the book, and painted so well by Ryman that your perception of her changes as she does. For any London dweller the description the city with a coral reef and rice paddies, sub tropical temperatures and the night lit by oil lamps is one that will strike into the heart and awake the imagination. You cannot help but be touched by its depth, and a little haunted by the future that we could all inherit. Read it, you won t be sorry.
A love story in reverse - It is years scince I read Child Garden- I think it was 9 years ago or thereabouts. I ve re-read this masterpiece 3 times scince then. Each time I can t believe how much the book changes. Milena, the heroine, is fabulous. You will love the Bears and the decription of the eastend and the southbank in London. Ryman s future London is hot, humid and covered in Rhodopsin (a photosynthetic chemical) and bamboo. People are almost dickensian and elaborate. The world has scaned the limits of genetic engineering and amongst this Milena looks for reality, love and truth. Stays with you.