The Spire #1

[laughing_tree]

'I’m weary of genre stories that are contrived purely to enable the story taking place inside them. There’s this really tiresome conventional wisdom that “if you’re creating a new world, the stakes of the story should be world-shaking.” Tell that to Rick Deckard, Roy Batty and co, y’know? I wanted the world we built to feel like it continues to exist when you look away from it, even though the readers—much like its inhabitants—can’t possibly understand everything about it. Hence the world of The Spire is rich with history and strangeness, but rather than slavishly presenting maps and chronologies readers are left to speculate and surmise about a lot of it.

'(After all, nobody ever gives those of us living in the real world explanatory notes on the mysteries we encounter every day. How can it possibly enhance the wonder of fiction, let alone the relatability of its characters, to constantly explain everything?)' -- Si Spurrier

Comments

[doodleboy]

Looks pretty China Mieville so far.

[alschroeder3]

Ah. Good comparison. Yes, it does.

[lieut_kettch]

Yup. Like you could plop New Crobuzon right in the middle of this city and you wouldn't notice. I don't mean that in a bad way, mind you.

Medusae... I assume that refers to the Linnaean rather than the mythical medusae. Because her tentacles do look a little like a jellyfish's, and the line about regenerating body parts.

[nyadnar17]

This! So much this! One of the reasons I can't stand Bioware games of late is because everystory is about ripping apart the world I found interesting enough to explore in the first place.

[quatoria]

Okay. Well. I'm obviously buying this! Thanks for posting it, wow.

[glprime]

Oh, well, that new Baroness is just a peach. (Bloody aristos... gimme a Patrician any day.)

The other two comments I was going to make related to 1) pulling arrows straight out and 2) how bad navigating a vertical city must be with monovision. But given the Captain is implied to have regenerative powers, prolly not a big deal.