Subject: DARWINIA by Robert Charles Wilson

From: "Evelyn C Leeper" <[email-masked]>
Date: 27 Jul 1998 15:37:37 -0400

DARWINIA by Robert Charles Wilson
            Tor, ISBN 0-312-86038-2, 1998, 320pp, US$22.95
                   A book review by Evelyn C. Leeper
		    Copyright 1998 Evelyn C. Leeper

     In S.M. Stirling's ISLAND IN THE SEA OF TIME, the island of Nantucket
is hurled back to the Bronze Age via a mysterious "Event."  In Greg Bear's
DINOSAUR SUMMER, the lost plateau of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's LOST WORLD
is real.  In Robert Charles Wilson's previous book, MYSTERIUM, our history
took a different course and Gnosticism prevailed.  DARWINIA seems to be a
combination of parts of all four, but ends up very different from all of
them.

     In 1912, the "Miracle" happens, and Europe as we know (knew) it
vanishes, replaced by a primeval continent with virtually identical
geography and geology, but different plant and animal life.  Apparently it
is from a timeline where evolution took a different path.  As a result,
the history of the world is very different from that point on.  For
starters, it's hard to have a World War based in Europe when all the
inhabitants of Europe no longer exist.

     Guilford Law signs up with the Finch Expedition to explore
neo-Europe, or Darwinia, as it is called. This leads to some confusion, as
the term "Darwinian evolution" refers specifically to the evolution of the
life-forms on Darwinia, not evolution as described by Charles Darwin.  Not
only does the expedition run into various natural and man-made dangers,
but several members are haunted by strange dreams that we recognize as
being related to their possible lives in our timeline, and Law gradually
becomes aware that the struggle is not merely global, but cosmic.

     However, this is not so much an alternate history as an analysis of
what might cause an alternate history, because in addition to everything
else, this is connected somehow with the Archive, a record of all history
created by the far future.  Wilson uses interludes to try to explain this,
but it is such a departure from the main action, at least at the
beginning, that it feels very jarring--which is probably the idea.  Even
though the basic situation is mysterious, the reader *thinks* she
understands somewhat what is going on and then Wilson pulls the rug out.

     John Clute seems to feel that DARWINIA, along with Wilson's other
work, expresses a feeling of "apartness" that comes from Wilson's being
Canadian.  While there is a sense of apartness and isolation, I think it
is more universal than Clute perceives it as being.  There is also a
thread reminiscent of Harry Turtledove's BETWEEN THE RIVERS and its echoes
of Jaynes's bicameral mind.  I realize at this point that it sounds as
though DARWINIA is a real hodge-podge, but it isn't.  Wilson has taken
several themes that have appeared elsewhere recently, but woven them into
a tapestry all his own.  I definitely recommend DARWINIA.

%T      Darwinia
%A      Robert Charles Wilson
%C      New York
%D      June 1998
%I      Tor
%O      hardback, US$22.95
%G      ISBN 0-312-86038-2
%P      320pp

Evelyn C. Leeper    |  [email-masked]
+1 732 957 2070     |  http://www.geocities.com/Athens/4824
"That's how things are--you open the door to a possibility and the next
thing you know, an actuality has you by the throat."  --Russell Hoban