The City & The City by China Mieville (6-May-2011) Paperback

Complex but a really good read.

Two cities occupying neighbouring, or even the same, spaces. The inhabitants of both have been trained to ‘unsee’ those in the other. Failure to obey the rules draws down on them a visit from ‘Breach’ and a disappearance to who-knows-what fate.However the death of a young American graduate takes Inspector Tyador Borlú into a mystery that spans both cities and the truth about the so-called Third City.First the good points: the dark, crumbling, world of the twin cities is well-drawn and the writing delivers a real feel of walking down those streets. Tyador is a great creation; I enjoyed my time in his company and will really miss his voice. Plus the story telling was strong enough to make me want to read to the end.The negative points: the fact that the story is set in an area that is vaguely Eastern Europe means a lot of the characters’ names are harder to memorise and with a large cast it became hard to keep a grasp on who was who (a glossary at the front of the book would really have helped). Plus there is a lot of political discussion which became difficult to disentangle at points. But by far the worst aspect from my point of view was the fact that the story never tackled the questions I wanted answered – viz, how did the whole daft twin-city idea start and why have Breach never questioned the entire futility of their existence.I ended up unsure whether the book was very clever or this was a kind of literary equivalent of the King’s new clothes. Whichever, it’s definitely not for me.