BEGIN:VCALENDAR
VERSION:2.0
PRODID:-//wp-events-plugin.com//7.2.3.1//EN
TZID:Europe/London
X-WR-TIMEZONE:Europe/London
BEGIN:VEVENT
UID:34@sciencefictionbookclub.org
DTSTART;TZID=Europe/London:20120625T190000
DTEND;TZID=Europe/London:20120625T220000
DTSTAMP:20251215T170043Z
URL:https://www.sciencefictionbookclub.org/events/36968672/
SUMMARY:THE MOUNT - Carol Emshwiller
DESCRIPTION:Charley is an athlete. He wants to grow up to be the fastest ru
 nner in the world\, like his father. He wants to be painted crossing the f
 inishing line\, in his racing silks\, with a medal around his neck. Charle
 y lives in a stable. He isn't a runner\, he's a mount. He belongs to a Hoo
 t: The Hoots are alien invaders. Charley hasn't seen his mother for years\
 , and his father is hiding out in the mountains somewhere\, with the other
  Free Humans. The Hoots own the world\, but the humans want it back. Charl
 ey knows how to be a good mount\, but now he's going to have to learn how 
 to be a human being.\n\nPhilip K. Dick Award Winner Best of the Year: "Loc
 us\, Village Voice\, San Francisco Chronicle\, Book Magazine" Nominated fo
 r the Impac Award\n\n\n\n\n"I've been a fan of Carol Emshwiller's since th
 e wonderful "Carmen Dog. The Mount" is a terrific novel\, at once an adven
 ture story and a meditation on the psychology of freedom and slavery. It's
  literally haunting (days after finishing it\, I still think about all the
  terrible poetry of the Hoot/Sam relationship) and hypnotic. I'm honored t
 o have gotten an early look at it."\n--Glen David Gold\n\n"Carol Emshwille
 r's "The Mount" is a wicked book. Like Harlan Ellison's darkest visions\, 
 Emshwiller writes in a voice that reminds us of the golden season when spe
 culative fiction was daring and unsettling. Dystopian\, weird\, comedic as
  if the Marquis de Sade had joined Monty Python\, and ultimately scary\, "
 The Mount "takes us deep into another reality. Our world suddenly seems wr
 ought with terrible ironies and a severe kind of beauty. When we are the m
 ounts\, who--or what--is riding us?\n--Luis Alberto Urrea\n\n"We are all M
 ounts and so should read this book like an instruction manual that could h
 elp save our lives. That it is also a beautiful funny novel is the usual b
 onus you get by reading Carol Emshwiller. She always writes them that way.
 "\n--Kim Stanley Robinson\n\n"This novel is like a tesseract\, I started i
 t and thought\, ah\, I see what she's doing. But then the dimensions unfol
 ded and somehow it ended up being about so much more."\n--Maureen F. McHug
 h\n\n"'The Mount' is so extraordinary as to be unpraiseable by a mortal su
 ch as I. I had to keep putting it down because it was so disturbing then p
 icking it up because it was so amazing. A postmodernist would call it The 
 Eros of Hegemony\, but I'm no postmodernist. Nearly every sentence is simu
 ltaneously hilarious\, prophetic\, and disturbing. This person needs to be
  really\, really famous."\n--Paul Ingram\, Prairie Lights Bookstore\n\n"Br
 illiantly conceived and painfully acute in its delineation of the complex 
 relationships between masters and slaves\, pets and owners\, the served an
 d the serving\, this poetic\, funny and above all humane novel deserves to
  be read and cherished as a fundamental fable for our material-minded time
 s."\n--"Publishers Weekly"\n\n"Emshwiller's prose is beautiful"\n--Laura M
 iller\, "Salon"\n\n""The Mount "is a brilliant book. But be warned: It tak
 es root in the mind and unleashes aftershocks at inopportune moments."\n--
 "The Women's Review of Books"\n\n"Carol Emshwiller has been writing fantas
 y\, speculative and science fiction for many years\; she has a dedicated c
 ult following and has been an influence on a number of today's top writers
 .... it is very easy to fall into the rhythm of Emshwiller's poetic and sm
 ooth sentences."\n--"Review of Contemporary Fiction"\n\n"Emshwiller's them
 es--the allure of submission\, the temptations of complicity\, the pervers
 e nature of compassion--are not usual fare in novels of resistance and rev
 olt\, and her strikingly imaginative novel continues to surpass our expect
 ations to the very last page."\n--"The Philadelphia Inquirer"\n\n"Both fan
 tastical and unnerving in its familiarity. And like her work in romance an
 d westerns\, its genre-twisting plot resists easy classification."\n--The 
 Village Voice\n\n"Emshwiller uses a deceptively simple narrative voice tha
 t gives "The Mount" the style of a young-adult novel. But there's much goi
 ng on beneath the surface of this narrative\, including oblique flashes of
  humor and artfully articulated moments of psychological insight. The Moun
 t emerges as one of the season's unexpected small pleasures."\n--"San Fran
 cisco Chronicle"\n\n"A memorable alien-invasion scenario\, a wild adventur
 e\, and a reflection on the dynamics of freedom and slavery."\n--"Booklist
 "\n\n"A brilliant piece of work."\n--"Bookslut"\n\n".a beautifully written
  allegorical tale full of hope that even the most unenlightened souls can 
 shrug off the bonds of internalized oppression and finally see the light."
 \n--"BookPage"\n\n"A fable/fantasy/cautionary tale along the lines of\, sa
 y\, "Animal Farm." It's the story of Charlie\, a preadolescent human who's
  being used as a horse by shoulder-riding alien invaders known as Hoots. C
 harlie wants nothing more than to become a great Mount\, a loyal slave and
  servant\, until his father\, a renegade Mount who has fled from the Hoots
  and now lives in the mountains\, comes to take him away. Like so much of 
 Emshwiller's work\, "The Mount" asks difficult questions--in this case\, W
 hat is freedom? The issue is particularly appropriate at a time when "free
 dom" in America is increasingly defined as "security"--freedom from uncert
 ainty\, freedom from fear\, freedom from want. All of which is\, in the en
 d\, not really freedom at all."\n--"Time Out New York"\n\n"In a recent int
 erview with "Science Fiction Weekly\," Ursula Le Guin called Emshwiller "t
 he most unappreciated great writer we've got." "The Mount" proves Le Guin 
 right.... If Emshwiller is not already on your top bookshelf\, "The Mount"
  will put her there."\n--"Rambles"
CATEGORIES:Book Discussion
LOCATION:The Gladstone\, 64 Lant Street\, Borough\, London\, SE1 1QN\, Unit
 ed Kingdom
GEO:51.500958;-0.095183
X-APPLE-STRUCTURED-LOCATION;VALUE=URI;X-ADDRESS=64 Lant Street\, Borough\, 
 London\, SE1 1QN\, United Kingdom;X-APPLE-RADIUS=100;X-TITLE=The Gladstone
 :geo:51.500958,-0.095183
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VTIMEZONE
TZID:Europe/London
X-LIC-LOCATION:Europe/London
BEGIN:DAYLIGHT
DTSTART:20120325T020000
TZOFFSETFROM:+0000
TZOFFSETTO:+0100
TZNAME:BST
END:DAYLIGHT
END:VTIMEZONE
END:VCALENDAR