Review: Barsk: The Elephants' Graveyard

Barsk: The Elephants' Graveyard by Lawrence M. Schoen
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

I have been waiting for this book for almost six months. I hopped right on that hype train as the publisher rolled it out of the station back in August or September. It's an SF book written by a cognitive linguist! That's like the majority of my interests all rolled into one book! I even participated in an AMA with the author the day I checked the book out of the library, which was cool

And then I started reading it. I'd been expecting the sentient elephants, since they're the main premise of the story. I didn't expect the rest of the sentient animals, or their ridiculous names, or the many indulgent nods to real-life academia, or the boys-club feel to the story, or... well, a number of things were unexpected. I probably should have expected that this wouldn't be my favorite, given that anthropomorphic animals have never been my thing, even as a kid.

The story begins with Jorl, a Fant who can use koph. Koph is essential to the lives of the Fants. Certain Fants (and, more rarely, creatures from other species) can use koph to communicate with the dead, so long as they know enough about the person they want to talk to that they can summon a good amount of the tiny particles of consciousness/personality that emanate from all living beings. Jorl believes he might be the Fant to fulfill an obscure prophecy made long ago, but he's not even sure what the prophecy means. He spends many of his days using koph to talk to his best friend, who committed suicide several years earlier, leaving behind a son who is a pariah due to his albinism. He is also an academic, and the source of most of the winking complaints about academic life. These come across as inside jokes and for me, broke the fourth wall because the screamed self-insertion of the author; a perfect example of where the author should have 'killed his darlings.'

Jorl's quest begins with a search for the missing dead - Fants who have sailed away from their home to die peacefully, as the Fant do, on an island they will only find once they reach their time to die, but who Jorl can't reach through koph. (Spoiler: Only now do I realize that this seems like a contradiction, as later in the novel it's revealed that you can certainly use koph to speak to people who are alive, and the process is essentially the same as summoning the dead.) His dead friend's son, Pizlo, also begins a journey - the moons of the Fant world have spoken to him, and he knows he must meet Jorl toward the end of his quest. Pizlo's journey throughout the book is the most engaging plot for me; his status an an outcast makes him a great character to explore the Fant society and his strange ability to communicate with non-sentient objects is intriguing (and potentially related to the the secret linguistic premise of the story - perhaps we'll see that in a sequel).

Much of this book is about the politics of this universe populated by sentient animals, but this is the biggest weakness of the novel for me. Nothing about this felt refreshing or imaginative. It feels tired, because nearly every character relies on stereotypical (Western) anthrophomophization; dogs are loyal, cats are feral and individualistic, otters are playful and carefree, elephants have long memories (in the form of koph). Every character has the 'personality' of the species they're from, which grows reductive and repetitive when you see multiple characters from the same species.

The gender dynamics in this book made me a little uncomfortable. It's not that women don't exist in this world, but they're not solid characters, and their stories don't really matter. All of the important relationships are between men, all of the important stories belong to men. Which, I suppose, is fine on its own, but the permeating tone of masculine pretension throughout the story, the almost complete dominance of men in minor and side roles, and the treatment of the few female minor characters (like the young female bookstore clerk who is in love with Jorl, and seemingly only exists to show us how desirable he is, or the otter who is a shallow, vapid party girl who gets absolutely zero character development despite undergoing some traumatic events), all add up to that uncomfortable feeling of 'I suspect this author included women because he knows women should be included, and that he feels proud of himself for inclusion, and gave very little thought beyond that.' Which is a surprisingly common feeling for fiction in general and SF in particular.

Overall, the plot is not hugely compelling. The 'rules' of koph seem to change to be whatever is most convenient for the story to proceed, and any story based in prophecy needs to tread lightly on that ground (especially in science fiction), not trample over it with giant elephant feet. There's a twist toward the end of the book that has very little to do with the actual plot, but seems to be the central point of the book, and maybe the reason why the book was written. Maybe if the story served that reveal, or the reveal served the story, it wouldn't feel so shallow, but shallow it does feel. I'm likely biased because of my distaste for anthropomorphic animals, but I wouldn't recommend this to fans of SF, because it feels much more like fantasy. If it had committed to that fantastical aspect, I suspect I would've liked it a bit more.

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