The Book of the New Sun by Gene Wolfe

The Book of The New Sun is actually a compilation, or rather the complete collection, of the four volumes that make up the series.

Gene Wolfe is simply one of the best writers in the world alive today. Some discount genre fiction altogether, as if you can't speak to the fundamental realities of human life without using fantastic character or settings, although for some reason they don't say that about the Bible. Well, that's their loss. If you don't read science fiction, you're already missing some of the best literature available by default, since Gene Wolfe is included in that category.

Gene Wolfe gives an incredibly powerful vision of the future in which the sun is dying, bathing the Earth in dim red light. Humanity is on its way out, but remnants hold on in the few civilized parts of the world. Severian is one such human, a member of the Torturer's guild, living in Nessus and practicing his craft. The story is told entirely from his point of view, and as Wolfe has put it, he is not capable of forgetting, but entirely capable of lying. This makes the story a tricky read, as Wolfe writes it like the author doesn't want to tell all his secrets, yet is motivated by a desire to tell his story. This necessarily leads to some exaggeration and ommissions. And yet Wolfe, through Severian, manages to create a picture of a world that is both dismal and fantastic.

My purpose is not to give a synopsis of the novel, but I will give a brief outline. Severian is forced by events not completely in his control to leave his home in the Torturer's Guild. He takes to the road with several travelling companions on a quest to find the leader of the rebellion (the rebels are fighting against the totalitarian rule of the Autarch). He has many adventures on the way, learning more of his world and himself along the way. In the end he reaches the end of his quest, but it's not the end he expects. In reality, to finish the story you have to read the following novel, The Urth of the New Sun. However, this book is quite a treasure by itself.

Gene Wolfe's mastery of the English language is displayed on every page. It's written in a style which is not always easy to read, but it's not supposed to be. Like Hodgson (or Tolkien, for that matter) the way the language is used is a tool to set the style and tone of the novel. This is not set in present-day times, and the language is not from the present day. It's kind of like the way the Bible is translated with all the thees and thous. It can be translated into plain English (like the New International Version), but it doesn't necessarily retain a sense of the archaicness of its origin. And there's the point: the setting of the future is reminiscent of the medieval past. Science is both so far advanced and so unavailable to the average person that for all intents and purposes, it might as well be magic. This is a feudal society ruled by nobility and a monarch. The average people live by doing things people did in any pre-technological society, yet there are technological marvels all around. Severian is aware that the Torturer's tower was a rocket ship, but it's immaterial to him. He's never seen a rocket take flight, nor do any of the towers that are ships look like they could.

Severian's journey takes him through a wild country, filled with peasants and monsters. The monsters, as any technologically aware person can see, are either genetically engineered or mechanical in nature, but of course this is knowledge that is denied to characters in the book. Thus this book, like Hodgson's, is like seeing a science-fiction future through the lens of fantasy. That is not something that is easy to achieve and it's harder to do it well all the while crafting a magnificent story and characters that are actually memorable. Even if you end up not liking the book, you have to give credit to Wolfe for achieving that.

And that, in short, is why you must read this book (or series, depending on how you get it). And if you consider yourself a sci-fi fan or expert, you can't not read this series and make that claim. I hope and expect that if you do read it, you'll be left wanting more. Luckily there is, as Wolfe wrote two more series sort of in this world but afterwards.