In Green's Jungles

Rating:
Summary: Challenging--but as brilliant as it gets
Review: (...)
The Book of the Short Sun will be one of the finest reading experiences of your life... if you can get through the thing. The difficulty in extracting those rewards out of the text is considerable and not to be lightly discounted. Reading these books will require supreme effort. Willing readers will have to be intensely interested with how individuals relate to historical and semi-mythical figures, religion, and their own personality as influenced by these themes. These books are about as far as you can get from the popular concept of "space opera" and thrilling, "page-turning" fiction. An analogy to Moby Dick is probably very appropriate as that work due to the very slow pacing, the introspection, and the great literary symbols stomping through the setting reified and alive. Any scholar of literature should be deeply fascinated by these books.

WHY YOU SHOULD PASS:

There is no shame in not reading these books. They are terribly difficult and an exercise in stamina though we feel most people should at least try once. If you have attempted Shakespeare and been turned back because of the language; if you have attempted Moby Dick or novels by Henry James only to be turned away by the lack of progression in the plot; if you have attempted James Joyce's Ulysses but been baffled by the interior monologue, then Short Sun is probably going to daunt you as well. But we feel the rewards of this book are equal to those giants in literature.

(...)

Rating:
Summary: The compelling tour de force continues
Review: For those of us who have been reading Wolfe avidly for years now, it is stunning to think that ten additional volumes have now been released in this wondrous series since the debut of The Shadow of the Torturer in the early '80s. Wolfe is the unrecognized genius of modern fiction, and the appearance of In Green's Jungles cannot be compared with the latest releases of our Jordans, our O'Brians, or our Rowlings. For this work is not merely another installment in an ongoing series of independent picaresque adventures. Rather, it represents a deepening and a refinement of Wolfe's epic exploration of the human condition.

And the universal condition as well. The series follows the spiritual journies of its three protagonists: Severian, Silk, and Horn, but no less than the Mahabarata or Faust celebrates the beauty of the universe, human frailty, and the elusiveness of the divine. These themes and others meet and diverge throughout the great work, playing themselves out with complexity and profundity. Yet at no time does Wolfe lose momentum, cohesion, or dramatic force: the varying strains combine in a symphony of metaphysics and human character, and a passionate and beautiful symphony it is.

In Green's Jungles encompasses a continuation of the travel journals of Horn as he wanders through war torn settlements on the hostile worlds of Blue and Green, upon which are scattered the last shipwrecked remnants of human civilization. Horn pursues a forlorn quest: to find Patera Silk, the priest, teacher and revolutionary whom many believe may be the only person capable of saving mankind from self-destruction or destruction at the hands (and teeth) of Green's vampire race of Inhumu.

In Green's Jungles is rich in plot, language, and surprises for the reader; any attempt to summarize the plot would do the work material violence. If you have been keeping up with the series right along, you won't need me to urge you buy this book. If you have not, do NOT buy it, yet. Rather, start at the beginning with the Shadow of the Torturer and delve into one of the most unusual and majestic stories ever put to paper. I envy you: you have ahead of you all of the joys of reading Wolfe for the first time.

Rating:
Summary: Better than the first book!
Review: Gene Wolfe can be a frustrating writer: his prose is often elliptical, his plots and characters unusual, his text obscure and dense. He's a master of indirectness: he'll leave out what for other writers would be "important plot points".

In this second volumn of Book of the Short Sun, we spend most of our time *not* in Green's jungles, but the intersecting plots and deft, subtle interplay of the different characters leave us with both a clear picture of the main character's (Horn/Silk) time there. We get crumbling cities, in-human (and human) monsters and other trappings of, say, a good Burrough's Barsoom tale presented entirely as backstory to the current events in which the lead character has become embroiled.

On Blue's Waters (the first volume) was a beautiful work, marred (I thought at the time) by the overly obscure ending. But this novel (a lot clearer to follow, with a more conventional linear story) actually improves the first book. I can't wait to read the final volume now...

Rating:
Summary: The Girls' Book
Review: Gene Wolfe has occasionally been accused of misogyny in his writing, or of stereotyping his female characters to the point where they rarely achieve more than two dimensions. I'm happy to report that in this new book (dedicated to his daughters, as its prequel, ON BLUE'S WATERS, was dedicated to his sons) he proves that he is indeed capable of creating female characters--not just one but three of them--with rich inner lives and distinct, appealing (not altogether appealing--this is Wolfe, after all) personalities. All three are young, apparently between 13 and 19, and all three become in some sense Horn's daughters. This is the same--well, not quite the same--Horn who raped Seawrack, to whom he also stood in loco parentis, in the last book; he is still atoning for that act. As well he might, says this reader--but his compassionate and heroic actions in this book have led me to forgive him and then some.

Horn is the first of Wolfe's series heroes ever to change and mature within the series; this makes him the most interesting and human of them. I disagree with the reviewer here who found IN GREEN'S JUNGLES to be a "link" book. To me it seems much richer, both in imagery and emotion, than the first one, and it opens up the series to such a degree that I find myself regretting, well in advance, that there will be only one more book to explore these worlds. Wolfe changed his mind once before, adding a fifth book to the original New Sun quartet. Maybe he will do it again!

Rating:
Summary: The best Wolfe in a while (and thats saying a lot).
Review: Gene Wolfe is my favorite writer. The best thing for me about his work is that his books can be read many times. There is a always a lot to think about and often the story is told in such a subtle way it is almost a puzzle. I usually enjoy a Wolfe book even more on the second reading than on the first. I haven't reread green yet so I don't know how high it will reach but the first reading ranks with Peace, Shadow of the Torturer and Soldier of the Mist and that is the highest praise I can give.

Rating:
Summary: The best Wolfe in a while (and thats saying a lot).
Review: Gene Wolfe is my favorite writer. The best thing for me about his work is that his books can be read many times. There is a always a lot to think about and often the story is told in such a subtle way it is almost a puzzle. I usually enjoy a Wolfe book even more on the second reading than on the first. I haven't reread green yet so I don't know how high it will reach but the first reading ranks with Peace, Shadow of the Torturer and Soldier of the Mist and that is the highest praise I can give.

Rating:
Summary: A Strange and Wonderfully Complex Story Continues
Review: General for all books in "The Book of the Short Sun" ("On Blue's Waters", "In Green's Jungles", "Return to the Whorl"): This third series of books, which are a direct continuation of the books in "The Book of the Long Sun" and a semi-direct continuation of the books of "The Book of the New Sun", is similar in its writing style and tone. When you start to read "On Blue's Waters" you feel like you've been thrown into an alien world inhabited by non-alien people with an alien culture. That's what Gene Wolfe has created in these books. He has gone where few authors have dared to go: into the very distant future of Mankind; not a few decades or a few hundred years, but many thousands of years. Frank Herbert, in the "Dune" books, started nine thousand years or so into our future. In Gene Wolfe's books, we don't know how far into the future we've gone, but it's well beyond what Herbert did, as the sun is cooling. The characters in these books are highly developed, three-dimensional, and realistic. The story-line is extremely non-linear, with abrupt shifts in time and setting, along with dream sequences loaded with meaning. It takes a while to get accustomed to that style, and some readers might not like it, but it was worth it for me. The writing is highly descriptive, and one comes away with a feeling of having visited the places described and having known the characters. One strange note about the series as a whole is that its central character, Horn, gets semi-transformed into Patera Silk, the central character of "The Book of the Long Sun", as the story progresses (or does he?). This series of books also resurrects from "The Book of the Long Sun" one of the most entertaining supporting characters I've ever encountered, Oreb, the semi-intelligent, wise, and highly vocal bird who was the constant companion of Patera Silk and is now the companion of Horn, the new central character.

For "In Green's Jungles": This continues the story of Horn and his search for Patera Silk. The ship that was supposed to take him to the Long Sun Whorl, instead takes him to Green, the home of the inhumi. He has to lead his fellow shanghaied shipmates against the inhumi, who want to enslave them and drink their blood, and Horn gets some help from the enigmatic Neighbors or Vanished People. Horn is killed along the way (or is he?) and reincarnated, thanks to the Neighbors, in the body of the dying Patera Silk (or is he?). The reader is never certain of exactly what happened to the central character, which reflects the character's confusion about himself (he is never certain again if he is Horn, Silk, or some combination of both). The writing is somewhat more linear here, and there are increasing hints that this series connects not only with "The Book of the Long Sun" but also with "The Book of the New Sun". A wonderful continuation of a complex, enchanting story.

Rating:
Summary: A Strange and Wonderfully Complex Story Continues
Review: General for all books in "The Book of the Short Sun" ("On Blue's Waters", "In Green's Jungles", "Return to the Whorl"): This third series of books, which are a direct continuation of the books in "The Book of the Long Sun" and a semi-direct continuation of the books of "The Book of the New Sun", is similar in its writing style and tone. When you start to read "On Blue's Waters" you feel like you've been thrown into an alien world inhabited by non-alien people with an alien culture. That's what Gene Wolfe has created in these books. He has gone where few authors have dared to go: into the very distant future of Mankind; not a few decades or a few hundred years, but many thousands of years. Frank Herbert, in the "Dune" books, started nine thousand years or so into our future. In Gene Wolfe's books, we don't know how far into the future we've gone, but it's well beyond what Herbert did, as the sun is cooling. The characters in these books are highly developed, three-dimensional, and realistic. The story-line is extremely non-linear, with abrupt shifts in time and setting, along with dream sequences loaded with meaning. It takes a while to get accustomed to that style, and some readers might not like it, but it was worth it for me. The writing is highly descriptive, and one comes away with a feeling of having visited the places described and having known the characters. One strange note about the series as a whole is that its central character, Horn, gets semi-transformed into Patera Silk, the central character of "The Book of the Long Sun", as the story progresses (or does he?). This series of books also resurrects from "The Book of the Long Sun" one of the most entertaining supporting characters I've ever encountered, Oreb, the semi-intelligent, wise, and highly vocal bird who was the constant companion of Patera Silk and is now the companion of Horn, the new central character.

For "In Green's Jungles": This continues the story of Horn and his search for Patera Silk. The ship that was supposed to take him to the Long Sun Whorl, instead takes him to Green, the home of the inhumi. He has to lead his fellow shanghaied shipmates against the inhumi, who want to enslave them and drink their blood, and Horn gets some help from the enigmatic Neighbors or Vanished People. Horn is killed along the way (or is he?) and reincarnated, thanks to the Neighbors, in the body of the dying Patera Silk (or is he?). The reader is never certain of exactly what happened to the central character, which reflects the character's confusion about himself (he is never certain again if he is Horn, Silk, or some combination of both). The writing is somewhat more linear here, and there are increasing hints that this series connects not only with "The Book of the Long Sun" but also with "The Book of the New Sun". A wonderful continuation of a complex, enchanting story.

Rating:
Summary: Excellent sf
Review: Horn feels obsessed with the need to find Silk, the missing hero of his people. Silk led his followers to the planets Blue and Green, but vanished not long afterward. Now Horn believes it is his lot in life to search the vast universe in order to locate the lost legend and savior of his people.

As Horn battles with monsters and visits strange societies on weird planets including that, which might be Urth of the dying red sun, he discovers an interesting power that he possesses. In a nanosecond or less, Horn can travel between his home planet of Blue and another world Green that Silk safely led his people to settle on. As Horn moves back and forth between the two planets, his body changes with each transport until his own family fails to identify him as Horn because he now looks more like Silk.

Anyone who has followed science fiction over the past two decades will probably agree that Gene Wolfe belongs on the short list of the top three genre writers. His second novel in "The Book of the Short Sun" is a brilliant tale that although a transition book pays homage to the diversity of the universe. Using eloquent and intelligent prose, Mr. Wolfe states nothing is new under the solar umbrella. Anyone who has not read Mr. Wolfe before will want to read the first book ON BLUE'S WATERS while impatiently waiting for the next novel RETURN TO THE WHORL. Newcomers and some of us old-timers will also return to the related "Book of the New Sun" and "Book of the Long Sun" series that prove Mr. Wolfe deserved his Life Achievement and other awards.

Harriet Klausner

Rating:
Summary: Will Patera Silk please stand up?
Review: In Green's Jungles (Book of the Short Sun, Book2) By Gene Wolfe, is the 2nd volume in the short sun series. All the books are tied together (see the books of the Long Sun) in many ways. One excellent reviewer said this book is for the SF thinker rather than the SF reader and I agree. You have to THINK HARD about what is being said and done. Getting past the omni-linear track of the plot (for me) was the hard part, but becomes very clear at the end and holds your interest.

Here is a good Editorial Review that helped me understand the plot better: 'In Green's Jungles follows narrator Horn as he voyages to the planet Green (Blue's companion) and to the abandoned generational starship known as the Whorl in search of the godlike Patera Silk. As Horn recounts his adventures, his own identity becomes muddled (very), and we find out his interactions with the vampiric inhumi of Green and the strange alien Neighbors were deeper than we knew (and how). In fact, Horn may not be himself at all anymore. Tantalizing story details drip slowly from Wolfe's pen:

Through the ring a Neighbor saw him, and she came to him in his agony.... she said, "I cannot make you well again, and if I could you would still be in this place. I can do this for you, however, if you desire it. I can send your spirit into someone else, into someone whose own spirit is dying."

So who is Horn? Has he become Patera Silk--it seems so, for people begin mistaking him for the heroic leader. Is he the warrior king Rajan, or is he something entirely new, formed by the strange places and people around him into a savior of worlds? Identity, love, and faith weave through the themes of In Green's Jungles, and Wolfe has added another masterpiece to a shelf full of them.' --Therese Littleton --This text refers to the Hardcover edition...

During the story's narration, we notice a marked change in Horn as his search for Patera Silk continues. The change, gradual at first. Starts little by little, but as each of Horn's recollections become known, we are spotting inconsistencies, and his voice is becoming that of Patera Silk, Horn, Lord Rajan and Master Incanto all in one. The confusion is known by us (the reader), but only sensed or felt by Horn et al. Mr. Wolfe's mastery, becomes abundantly clear as you get towards the end of the book.

As I mentioned in my earlier reviews, these works bear repeated reading to fully comprehend. The prose and style are 1st rate. One amusing reviewer wrote "Horn would greatly appreciate the quality of the paper in the Hardcover edition."
Enjoy and grow!