A long time coming doesn’t seem to quite
sum it up. His first short story
appearing in 2002, fourteen years and more than eighty stories later, Ken Liu’s
first collection finally hits shelves in 2016.
The delay is to the point that when things were finally settled, editors
were able to compile a collection of which two-thirds is either an award winner
or nominee. More a best-of than a
representative sample of a certain period of work, for those waiting and
waiting for Liu’s lauded short works to appear in one place, The Paper Menagerie and Other Stories (Saga Press) is finally here.
The short stories collected in The Paper Menagerie trace many lines,
from exercises in imagination to pure science fiction, sensationalism to
didacticism, but most often cling to Liu’s cultural heritage, Chinese, and most
often Chinese culture in the context of other culture or cultures. The title story “The Paper Menagerie” finds Liu playing the pity card on the last hand,
but playing it with respect, or at least a real world correlation. The story of a boy born to an American man
and Chinese woman, the resulting culture tension plays itself out in poignant,
and at least initially playful terms, toward its emotional if not manipulative
conclusion. “Good Hunting” is a
story set at the turn of the 20 th century.
A time when China too was transitioning into the industrial age, it
tells of a traditional Chinese ghost hunter and the evolution he witnesses and
undergoes in technology around him.
Another morally simplistic story, this one moves in unexpected,
steampunkish directions.
There is a lot of bad blood between the
Chinese and Japanese, and Liu does not waste the opportunity to plug Chinese
interests in the matter. Having
successfully played the pity card in “The Paper Menagerie,” Liu applies the
same tactic in “A Brief History of the Trans-Pacific Tunnel.” A story about a transportation tunnel being
built beneath the Pacific, for as lucidly as it is written, it nevertheless reopens
old wounds. The final handful of pages
an obvious ploy for justice, it does little to progress relations between the
two sides. That being said, it could be
construed as raising awareness for an atrocity that is not well known in the
West. “The Man Who Ended History: A
Documentary” uses the same Japanese atrocities as foundational story material,
but presents a wider variety of perspectives.
A device invented that allows people to re-live moments of the past, Liu
uses it to give modern people the chance to view Japanese actions in China
during WWII. The story more didacticism,
it does, however, do a better job of representing the differing views, even if
the underlying sentiment remains one-sided.
Perhaps the most thought-provoking piece in the entire collection, see here
for a longer review.
Setting aside cultural interests (but
not the simplistic approach), scattered throughout the collection are a handful
of stories less historical and more futuristic, science fictional as it
were. Black and white storytelling that
gives a moment’s pause thinking how deep google has infiltrated our lives and
could in the future, “The Perfect Match” is the story of Sai and his computer
assistant Tilly. Unable to do anything
without her voice in his ear guiding him, Sai learns some hard lessons after
turning his life over to a data network.
Not the most profound of stories, it nevertheless retains its relevancy.
Something of PKD in the story, “Simulacram” tells of the inventor of
simulacrams. The next phase in
photography and video, it captures 3D renderings of people and things, and is
able to inject the simple essence of the real person or thing into the reproduction. A cautionary tale a la Ted Chiang, the story exposes the dark side of the inventor’s
mind, juxtaposing it against his daughter’s reaction. (Robert Charles Wilson’s “The Cartesian
Theater” remains the superior story in the simulacra vein.) “The Regular” is about a private eye investigating
a dead prostitute and the serial killer who murdered her. Though lucidly described, contrived scenes
move the story away from original and toward conventional—save the real world
bit of modern science that ‘breaks the case’.
And finally is “Mono no
aware.” A story that presents an
interesting view to American culture (“Then
we’ll improvise,” Mindy says. “We’re Americans, damn it. We never just give up.”) that hinges upon
a heroic act. Telling of a space mission
gone wrong, the cultural heritage of the main character, and how it plays into
said heroic act, the import of the story seems more Hollywood than refined
(hence the awards?).
At some point in The Paper Menagerie, the reader senses a pattern forming: build a
sympathetic character, then chop them off at the knees—figuratively or
literally—for dramatic effect. After reading the opening pages of “All the
Flavors,” it’s possible to guess that the main character will be wronged in
some violent fashion before the end. Liu
does not disappoint. A partially
successful splicing of Romance of the
Three Kingdoms, western pulps, and American history, the ending does not
quite have the tenor sought—despite the likable character and “knee-chopping.” Likewise with “The Litigation Master
and the Monkey King,” the reader may guess the personable village lawyer who
enjoys playing games with the local magistrate will eventually meet his
match. Again, Liu does not break
formula. While it’s possible to
appreciate the placement of Chinese history into the crosshairs of criticism
(in the context of the collection), the appreciation is offset by the fact the
reader knows what is going to happen to the main character beforehand. Good
man trod by the system, going down with righteous words…
In perhaps the most purely fictional
aspect of The Paper Menagerie, there
are a small number of stories that show Liu’s flights of imaginative
fancy. Stanislaw Lem observing on the
wings, the collection opens with “The Bookmaking Habits of Select Species.” Pointing indirectly at the manner in which
humans transpose ideas into written form, it is as much interesting commentary
as it is an abstract example of writing in itself. Again working with thought, “An Advanced
Reader’s Picture Book of Comparative Cognition” is another exercise in
imagination intended to shed light on the human condition. In this previously unpublished story (the
only in the collection), Liu achieves a relatively unique vision describing
alien modes of sentience, but with less synergy than “The Bookmaking Habits of
Select Species.”
In
the end, The Paper Menagerie and Other
Stories is a solid yet simplistic collection that plays itself into the
hands of mainstream genre readers. I
personally have several hang ups regarding the lack of a conciliatory approach
in some of the stories’ reflection of Japanese-Chinese relations (the tone more
victim/justice oriented than progressive/forgiving), they are nevertheless very
readable, even stimulating, for the reaction they induce. For this, it would seem Liu in long form,
e.g. The Grace of Kings, has the
space he needs to properly build and locate profound ideas.) Thus, while most of the stories are less
sophisticated morally and culturally than what some of Liu’s peers are
producing these days, there is no denying their appeal—as contrived and
manipulative as they can be. After all,
that so many of the stories are award winners and nominees is indicative of
their popularity beyond my miniscule corner of the web.
The
following are the fifteen stories included in The Paper Menagerie and Other Stories:
Preface
(by Ken Liu)
The
Bookmaking Habits of Select Species
State
Change
The
Perfect Match
Good
Hunting
The
Literomancer
Simulacrum
The
Regular
The
Paper Menagerie
An
Advanced Reader’s Picture Book of Comparative Cognition (unpublished)
The
Waves
Mono
no aware
All
the Flavors
A
Brief History of the Trans-Pacific Tunnel
The
Litigation Master and the Monkey King
The
Man Who Ended History: A Documentary
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