Among Others ~Jo Walton
–copyright 2010
–Publication Date: January 18, 2011
–Tor Books
–302 pages
–10/10 Brill!
Once in a while I sit down to write a book review and I struggle with how to begin. Such is the case with Jo Walton’s latest novel, Among Others. As I sit here at the keyboard I agonize over the right combination of words that will give you the correct impression of all that this book is and the potential it has for providing you with a personally enriching and rewarding reading experience. Among Others is a brilliantly conceived and brilliantly executed story that attempts to be so many things at once and succeeds masterfully in each facet. And within that enigmatic statement lies the crux of my difficulty. What is exactly is Among Others?
One one level, Among Others is the semi-autobiographical tale of a young girl named Morwenna “Mori” Phelps. When Mori is not lost in a science fiction or fantasy novel, she is traipsing around the countryside with her twin sister Morganna, playing with the spirits that inhabit the woods, and occasionally doing their bidding. When their evil, mad mother begins to use magic for dark ends, Morwenna and Morganna team up to stop her in a battle that results in Morganna’s death and leaves Morwenna crippled in one leg. Jo Walton’s outstanding novel presents Mori’s story, in the form of diary entries from September 1979 through February 1980, when Mori is placed in an English boarding school by her formerly estranged father, Daniel.
That, in so many words, is what the book jacket will tell you. And it may or may not be enough to convince you that this is the very next book you should read. It wasn’t enough to convince me. It was the combination of editors Jonathan Strahan and Gary K. Wolfe raving about this book on their latest podcast and the quote on the book’s cover that sold me:
“If you love science fiction and fantasy, if reading it formed your teen years, if you remember the magic you used to do, if you remember the absolute joy of first discovering those books, then read this.” ~Robin Hobb
One of my first reactions upon reading what the story was ostensibly about was a temptation to write it off as another Harry Potter book and move on. For all the wonderful things that J.K. Rowling did for literature, her boy-wizard has flooded the market with magical English boarding school novels and there was a risk of Among Others being white noise. But let me assure you right here (with no malice towards magical English boarding school novels intended) that this is not the kind of novel that Among Others is.
Among Others is a coming of age tale, to be sure, with a 15 year old protagonist who has the same struggles to fit in and find acceptance that we all can remember from our adolescent years. Where it succeeds so powerfully is that author Jo Walton has stated that this was an attempt to “mythologize” various real events from her own childhood. That foundation of truth explored through fiction gives Among Others surprising depth as well as providing a thread of mystery and intrigue that is woven through the story. You cannot help but wonder which parts of the story are inspired by truth.
Among Others is a fantasy story with fairies and magic and an exploration of the consequences inherit in practicing magic, particularly the ethical dilemmas of potentially manipulating others to one’s own end. And yet I must stress that the stereotype that this description may conjure up is not an accurate one. One of the beautiful enigmas present in Mori’s daily chronicling of her life is that you find yourself wondering if the magic is real or is just in her imagination. And there is plenty of evidence to support either argument when all is said and done.
But for me where Among Others stands out is as a love letter to reading, primarily the love of reading science fiction and fantasy. Mori is an avid reader, a fact that is evident in each and every diary entry. In that manner she is a character that any adult who was a voracious reader as a child can relate to, so much more so those of us who embraced science fiction and fantasy and were enraptured with the wonder of it all. Mori repeatedly discusses the books that she is reading, and does so with a voice so convincing that you would swear Jo Walton actually wrote this when she was 15. Despite the authenticity of this adolescent voice, it would be a misrepresentation to consider this a Young Adult novel. As Jo Walton said in a recent interview* with John Scalzi, “There are a lot of things in the book. There’s a lot of landscape, and a lot of magic, and a lot of books. It’s a story about a fifteen year old, but it’s more of a story for people who used to be fifteen than one for people who are fifteen now.”
I connected with it deeply in that regard. I was 11 years old during the time period in which this story was set, just beginning to discover the wonders of science fiction and fantasy within the pages of books by Harry Harrison, Brian Daley, Larry Niven and Patricia A. McKillip. I was not nearly the well-read reader in the genre that Mori was, although I certainly could relate to her passion for the act of reading. The joy of being a reader, the comfort that books give, and also the magic of the library system are embedded in the fabric of this story from the first to the last page. As strong as my reaction was in finding a kindred spirit in Jo Walton’s protagonist, I also found myself feeling envious of her. The unparalleled satisfaction of discussing books with others who have the same interests is another aspect of Among Others and this was not something I had growing up, a fact that I only recently began thinking about in light of the rewarding friendships I have formed here locally and online. But this is a topic for another post. I will say this before moving on: there is enough discussion about what are now considered classic works of science fiction, and to a lesser extent fantasy, that even hard-core genre readers who generally do not go in for this kind of book would find hours of interesting debate material within the pages of Walton’s book.
Among Others is a truly beautiful, poetic book that is wholly unlike any book I have ever read. It is one of those books that you will read and find yourself wanting to underline passage after passage because of the way they speak to you. Several times I found myself wondering if Jo Walton had been eavesdropping, because a statement or two would echo conversations that I have had with my friends. An example being a discussion about how authors sometimes peak with a specific book and nothing they write is ever quite the same. Mori makes this observation regarding Stand on Zanzibar by John Brunner:
“I wonder what it’s like to have written your own masterpiece, and to know that you’ll never do it again.”
In the six years that I have been blogging I have never felt so inadequate in my ability to make a case for why you, dear reader, should read a book as soon as you possibly can. As you can see, I have been verbose, but I have not, at the risk of sounding hackneyed, adequately conveyed the “magic” contained within these 302 pages. As I read the final words of Among Others shortly after midnight, a big satisfied grin spread across my face and I could not wait to get up this morning to tell you all about what Jo Walton has done. Morwenna perhaps says it best:
“There are some awful things in the world, it’s true, but there are also some great books. When I grow up I would like to write something that someone could read sitting on a bench on a day that isn’t all that warm and they could sit reading it and totally forget where they were or what time it was so that they were more inside the book than inside their own head.”
Congratulations Mori, you did it!
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Before I let you go I want to do something that I don’t often do, which is point you to a couple of reviews that I think you must read.
One is Gary K. Wolfe’s review of Among Others in Locus Magazine (click here)
The other is by the editor of this book, Patrick Neilsen Hayden (found here). He closes his blog post by saying, “If any of the above sounds interesting to you, I ask you most humbly: Please buy this book and make it a success. The book deserves it. The world deserves it. But most of all because you will love this brilliant, perceptive, utterly transformational book.” Having experienced exactly what he describes I can see the genuine sincerity in his words. He isn’t just trying to sell a book. And I know his plea won’t fall on deaf ears. With the praise of so many top-notch, award-winning authors and editors racing around the internet, I suspect Among Others will sell very well indeed.
*Finally, I referenced an interview by John Scalzi in the body of my review and I wanted to give proper credit and provide you with a link to that interview. I did not do so above because I wanted to warn you not to read this interview until after you’ve read Among Others. In it Jo Walton reveals some of the real details that she changed to fantastical elements for the sake of the story. While I loved finding out about those after I read the book, it would have taken away some of the intrigue had I known those details beforehand. The interview can be found here.
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Why are you still here? Go buy this book!
Or, if you want a chance to win a free copy for yourself:
Tor Books graciously sent me a copy of this book to review. Not an ARC, the actual book. I did not anticipate this and had purchased my own copy and was almost done with it when the package arrived from Tor in yesteday’s mail. If you would like to be included in a random drawing for your very own copy of Among Others, simply say so at some point in the body of your comment. If you do not say anything about it I will assume that you want to be left out of the drawing. I will draw a winner randomly on Wednesday, January 26th at 11:59 p.m. CST.
Ooo, I’d love to be entered! I didn’t know Jo Walton had written a new book — I loved the Still Life with Fascists trilogy last year, so yay!
Please enter me into the drawing. It sounds like a really good read — and will be vaulting to the top of my Goodreads queue. Thanks!
The more I hear about this book, the more I want it. I’d love a chance to win a copy–thanks for offering the giveaway!
Well if that didn’t convince me this was a book I needed to read, I don’t know what will!
Oh, and please enter me in the giveaway, if it’s international. 🙂
This book sounds wonderful. I’d love to be entered in the giveaway!
Dude! I just started reading Ship Breaker and just days after posting that review you’re telling me I have to go out buy another book, like RIGHT NOW! You’re killing me smalls, you’re killing me! 🙂
In all honesty it sounds wonderful and please enter me in the drawing.
Hi Carl,
I came over here to thank you for the comments on my blog and to look up one of the books you mentioned and I was stopped dead in my tracks by this review. I was just lusting after this book the other day and so curious about it. Glad to see it’s as good as I’ hoped. Please enter me!!
Cheers!
Rebekah
Rebekah: It was fun to find your blog the other day, I believe I came over there from Little Red Reviewer’s site. As silly as it may sound I was thrilled with how wonderful this book looks “in the flesh”. Orange (and its variations) is one of my favorite colors and book covers like this always leap out to me. I had decided I wanted to read the book based on Jonathan Strahan and Gary Wolfe’s podcast before ever seeing it, and once I looked it up I too was lusting after it.
Jeff S: Ah, a Sandlot reference! Perfect! I know what you mean. I felt a little bit of the “you’re killing me Smalls” feeling when I was done and knew that I would be posting back to back 10 reviews. Couldn’t be helped. I actually considered whether there was any reason to tone this review down and I just couldn’t do it. I even slept on it and literally dreamed about the book.
Shivam Bhatt: You are entered!
Darren: Definitely one that I think you would like. There were a handful of bloggers that popped into my head right away when I started reading this and you were one of them.
Memory: I suspect that praise for this book is just going to keep building and building…which will then hit that unfortunate point where it will be too hyped and people will wonder what the fuss was all about. So read it now! 🙂
Sprite: Great to hear from you. You are entered!
Jenny: This is my first experience with the work of Jo Walton, but won’t be my last.
I haven’t had the chance to read a Walton novel but I would like too. Please include me in your drawing.
I ordered the book after reading your review. You really sold it. Amazon has it for on $13.79
Please please please include me in your drawing! You are the third person in the past week to say that this is a great book. Now I know I need to read this soon.
Vasilly: I will indeed, and I hope either way that you take all three of our advice and read it. 🙂
Jim: When I commented to Darren above about people I was thinking about while reading this, you were one of them. I have barely scratched the surface of the books Mori mentions in the story but I have a feeling you’ve read many of them. It will be so interesting to talk to you about this once you’ve read it. I wish the book club was reading it.
JK: This would be a good place to start.
Well… you may think that you have not adequately expressed why you love this book and why one should go out and read it, but let me fully assure you…not only did you fabulously express your thoughts (no surprise there..to me) you also made me want to read this book, and to own it. I am thinking that if I like it anywhere near as much as you do then it will be great for my shelves. On that note…please put me in the drawing. Crossing my fingers that I win, and if not, it is on my list of books to purchase.
Ibeeg: Thanks, I appreciate it. I tried, which is, in the end, all I can do. I did spend a lot of time agonizing over this one. Not sure why as it usually isn’t like this. I enjoyed the book so much that I wanted to turn around and start reading it all over again, so I started reading it aloud to my wife tonight.
let’s see ..do i need to make my tbr list one book longer? Hell, why not? You can enter my name Carl lol.. you are such a bad influence!!!! I love when a book just explodes and makes you feel as this one did for you…those treasures are rare but ohhhhh sooooo gooood!
You added another one to my bookshelf. This sounds like one I will enjoy. Books like this only appear once in a “blue moon”. This is one of the benefits of following a great blog like this one. I probably would have passes on this one if I had not read your review.
A comic book you might enjoy, in the same vein, is The Unwritten by Mike Carey and Peter Gross. It deals with literature in general. Reality and literature effortlessly weave together. Definitely recommended.
Jim: Thanks for the recommendation. I’m sure I’ve seen that comic before, didn’t realize that was what it was about. It would surprise me if this book isn’t up on the awards list next year (which I assume is when it will be slated despite its 2010 copyright date since it wasn’t released until last week).
Deslily: I’m glad you came to your senses and said “yes” Deslily. 😉 There are several mentions of the Pern books in here, so I know for a fact that you’ll enjoy it.
I’d love to have a copy!
Thanks for the convincing and passionate review. Either way, I’ll be reading it but thanks for the chance to have a copy sooner rather than later!
I recently read a review about this book, liked what I read and stuck it on my potential to be read sometime later list. After reading this review I’m sure I’ll love it. So yes, enter me in the drawing to win my own copy. Thanks!
I just read Gary’s review in Locus on Friday and put this book on my to-get list! So I’d love to win a free copy! I am becoming such a big fan of Jo’s, and this book seems like a perfect one for all of us who love books, never mind were 15 once. Oh lucky you that you have read this already!! 😀
PS in my enthusiasm I forgot to say please enter me in the draw….
Ye gods, your review is amazing so I can only imagine the goodness of the book–enter me please!!
No need to enter me in the giveaway as I just got the book but I just wanted to say how much I enjoyed your review. When I looked at the book it sounded good to me and the way you’ve reviewed it just makes me want to pick it up right now!
Please enter me in the drawing. You’ve written a very enticing review.
Ohhh drawing entry please! I’ll admit you made me curious if not excited
Jesse: Well, that is something anyway. 🙂
Catherine: Will do!
Iliana: Please make sure you come back and let me know when you’ve read it, I’d like to know what you think.
Tatiana: Thanks! will do!
Susan: Thank you. It is a really special book and I hope you enjoy it whenever you get a chance to read it.
Leslie: Glad you are planning on reading it either way. I’ll put you on the list.
Sharon: You are welcome. The passion was easy, glad to hear I did an okay job with the convincing.
You have convinced me–I must read this! (If you have a drawing, I’d like to be included.)
I’m glad Tor’s facebook directed me over here. I used to read your blog some years back, when I had a different book review blog. Am glad to have found this one again. 🙂
I love it when a reader has found something that connects so fully with their experience. It’s infectious. It makes me want to read everything I can until I, too, can have this feeling.
I’m sold on Among Others. Not sure I would notice this book without your review, so I’m glad to have it brought to my attention.
Please, include me in the drawing.
Boden: I wouldn’t have picked it up without someone else’s praise of it either, so I’m happy to have done something to put it on your radar. You will be included.
Gypsi: I will definitely be including you in the drawing. I’m glad you found me again, and yay for Tor Books.
Nice review. Intrigued me enough to want to read the novel. Please include me in the drawing. I’ll purchase it if I don’t win.
I had wanted to read this before, but now it’s a must and soon! I would love to be entered.
Thanks Don and Chelle, you are both entered and I hope one way or the other you get a chance to read this soon.
Holy crap this sounds amazing!!! I’ve been looking for something like this…something to just wow me. It sounds like everything I love really combined into one story. Needless to say, I’d love to be entered into the drawing 😉
Chris: LOL! I was thinking that if you didn’t see this before the weekend was out that I was going to have to email and tell you about it, as you (along with a handful of others) were one of the people I thought about frequently while reading it. Now I just got to track Debi down and make sure she reads this book too! 🙂
You said, “I enjoyed the book so much that I wanted to turn around and start reading it all over again, so I started reading it aloud to my wife tonight” I think it is great that you are reading it aloud to your wife. I wonder how you will like it with the re-read…as much? more? not as much?
I understand your desire to re-read the book….normally I do not like to re-read a book right away if I want to at all but with the book Pegasus by Robin McKinley that I read in November…I could not wait to read it again. Currently I am reading it aloud to Elliana and I am greatly enjoying my return to the story…with El…seeing her reaction.
Have fun reading the book aloud.
I just finished this book as well, and I loved every minute of reading it. I want to reread it as well, because the wonderful parts about life with books probably made me miss a lot of the rest; I want to reread it concentrating on the magic and then again watching her learn to talk to people outside her family, and then again… (you get the idea).
Beth: Great! I hope you do a review as I’d love to read it. I feel like I need to reread it once more for pleasure and then a third time as a reference book where I simply right down titles and authors! Ha!
Ibeeg: It isn’t often that I turn right around and reread a book again, either aloud to Mary or just to myself, but whenever I do I usually have a positive reaction to it the second time around. Enchanted Night by Steven Millhauser is one that I did this with last year and I recall doing the same thing with Susanna Clarke’s short story collection, The Ladies of Grace Adieu.
oh that’s just great Carl (said sarcastically).. I never win these things so now I have yet another book to put on my wish list!!! argh!!!!!
This sounds like EXACTLY the kind of book I love and am drawn to. Would really like to be included in your actual drawing for the book. ^_^
Sgist: It is! I’ll certainly include you.
Deslily: I know, I’m a jerk that way. 😉
I’ve been reading about the book on Jo Walton’s LJ and other places and am looking forward to reading it. As an ex-young book lover I feel I will totally identify with the heroine even though 15 years old was decades ago.
Please include me in the drawing.
Shakatany: It was decades ago for me as well, and I’m not a female, but I too really identified with the character as far as reading goes. I will indeed enter you.
I’ve heard so much good stuff about this book, so of course I want in on the chance to win a copy 🙂
I did try to buy a copy for my kindle but they wouldn’t sell it to me outside of the US. Evil rights and regulations!
Fence: That is lame! You think they would want to make as much money as they could, especially striking while the iron is hot, when a book is getting all its buzz. Ah well, I’ll definitely put you in the drawing.
Great review. Please enter me in your drawing,
I would love to win Amount Others! I have been reading the buzz around the blogs, but I believe you have finally convinced me that I do need to read this book. I, too, lost myself in books growing up. Walked to the library just to be able to do so. Yep, this book is now on my TBR list.
I’d love to be entered in the drawing, too. Every single review I’ve read of this book is so overwhelmingly positive and enthusiastic, that I can’t wait to read it.
Bravo, Jo!
Anarra: I have yet to see a negative one myself, although they no doubt exist.
Lingeorge: I’m jealous, I wish I had been in walking distance of a library growing up.
Don: Thanks, I will.
enter me please! i am so absolutely intrigued… a wonderful review Carl…sometimes just knowing that the experience was so marvelous to move you to speechless is enough.
~L
L: Done! I’m about 50 pages in to my second read through, this time aloud to my wife. She is enjoying it very much and I have to admit that it is holding up fantastically to a second read through. Always a good sign.
Ok, I just love that you read aloud to your wife!
Rebekah: It is something we started doing early on in our marriage. I wanted my wife to read Dracula, as it is one of my favorite novels, and so I read it to her. That started a long tradition where I read her three or four books a year. Sometimes they are books she might normally not pick up but that I know she’ll enjoy, other times it is situations like this, where I enjoyed the story so much that I want to read it again and it is just more fun to read it aloud to her the second time through.
I would love to be included in the giveaway! I read my first Jo Walton book, Tooth and Claw, last year, and it was among the top books I read all year. I also love coming-of-age books, boarding school books, and books about books, so I’ve been eagerly wanting to read this one since I first heard about it!
Firefly: Whether you win or not I hope you can read this one soon, as it is a special one. Unlike you, this is my first experience with Jo Walton, which means now she has some big shoes to fill as far as my expectations for her other books. 🙂
I just tried to interlibrary loan this book, and NO ONE has it. How dare they not have a book that just came out last week? I shall try again next week.
Among Others sounds like the cure for much of the mediocre I’ve been reading lately. I’m desperate for something that is going to blow my mind, and it sounds like this is it.
and please enter me for the drawing. 🙂
The price you pay for free books, I guess, is that they aren’t always available when you want them. 🙂 I suspect any libraries that do have this would have a long wait list for it. I’m still a ways out on All Clear, and its been out for a while now.
I do not think I have *ever* been so happy to still have gift card money left!!! 😀 Not that not having any would have stopped me! Seriously, no one’s made me want a book quite this badly in forever. Sounds like it will be perfect for OUaT…though waiting until then to read it might not be possible.
And thanks for the giveaway opportunity, Carl…in a way I almost hope I don’t win because I *know* I’ll pick this book up anyway…and it sounds like just as many people as possible need to have this book.
Better late than never! I was looking for some good titles for this years Once Upon a Time challenge!
JenClair: This would be a good one for the challenge, a really good one!
Debi: Either way I’m excited you are going to read it because it is a special book.
I like that the cover doesn’t look like a traditional fantasy or sci-fi oriented book. A nice change, both in the fiction genre and in the wide worlds of sci-fi and fantasy.
Regarding your point on British boarding school fantasy books, you have a point. It’s a phenomenon that seems to follow any big success. Still, there are some wonderfully original finds out there that follow this theme that do so without seeming like Harry Potter rip-offs. Not many, but a few gems. I’ll read this one for myself and find out if it falls into that category. Seems like it just might.
Biblio: Oh, I agree there are some wonderful books and I have no doubt Harry Potter inspired some imitators that, despite that, are still very good books. I just wanted to try to address that out of the gate so that people would not dismiss this wonderful book just because it sounded like a ‘been there, done that’ storyline. I haven’t read the Harry Potter books myself, yet I can still say with confidence that this is not anything at all like those books.
Great review, Carl! As a book lover all my life (though I wasn’t lucky enough to discover science fiction when I was still a child), this sounds like the kind of book I’d love.
WCG: I think you would indeed. I’m enjoying my second read through of it (aloud to my wife) and am finding it every bit as engaging despite knowing what will happen. I am in awe of all the books her protagonist reads and discusses, albeit briefly, in her diary entries.
I LOVED THIS!!!! thanks so so much for reviewing it. I wouldn’t have gotten to it for a while, if at all, if you hadn’t.
You’re welcome Melanie, I’m so happy that you enjoyed it. I often worry when I gush about a book that people are going to be coming after me with pitchforks because they followed my recommendation and were disappointed.
I just completed the book over the weekend. I liked it a lot, but I would have loved it more had I read the books Morwenna talks about. I’m new to the science fiction genre and am trying to read more of it, so I felt a bit left out with all of the books she referenced 🙁 However, the one thing that it did motivate me to do is read more sci-fi from the 1970s. I picked up The Lathe of Heaven</i. by Ursula le Guin this weekend and finished it in a day – I loved it! So, in that, Among Others was extremely successful!
I’m so sorry I missed this back in Feb, Natalie. I agree that a knowledge of the books would have opened up this story even more. I haven’t read much of what she referenced but I’ve read enough SF and Fantasy that I didn’t quite feel like I was missing out. Among Others has so many books that are now on my tbr list.
Carl, I have finally gotten around to reading this book, and it is wonderful. Thank you so much for your review. I don’t know if I would have remembered to get to it without this post.
That is so awesome to hear, Fence! I’m glad you enjoyed it. I really hope it wins some of the awards it is up for because it is such a worthy book.