PositiveLocusAs usual, Kadrey writes strongly from a punk perspective: drugs, sex, and a bleak city in the period between two wars leave the characters low-energy and just this side of clinically depressed. Largo, the protagonist, rises above this a bit: his job as a messenger has taught him all the ways to get around the city, and he actually manages to want several things during the course of the book. Of course, this being a punk novel, he loses each of them, sometimes in spectacular ways but more often through no fault of his own ... The bleakness and despair of the city is not overblown – even at its most gruesome, Largo acts more as a witness than as a participant, so I was never overwhelmed by the gore. And the characters all act believably in their extreme circumstances. This book is being compared in several places to China Miéville’s Perdido Street Station, and it’s an apt comparison. Where Miéville transcends his setting with an amazing Big Bad, however, Kadrey concentrates on the venality of human evil. It’s still a satisfying read.
