Review: All the Birds in the Sky

All the Birds in the Sky by Charlie Jane Anders
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

This week I discovered a curious, and maybe wonderful, thing my local library does. Newly-acquired books with a large number of advance holds go on a "lucky day" special - on their first day in the library, they are put on a special shelf and anyone can check them out, regardless of their hold status. They can keep the book for the typical three weeks, no renewals. I'm not sure how I feel about this, because I'm fanatical about putting holds on upcoming books I want to read many weeks in advance, so I can read them right when they're released, and this feels a bit unfair. On the other hand, it let me skip the line for "All the Birds in the Sky" and gobble it up in a single day, so maybe things even out. (Plus, it lets people who aren't as plugged-in to book publishing get a chance at the new stuff, and gives people a chance for that wondrous thrill that comes when you find a cool new book at the library.)

I've been burned recently by buzzy new SF releases (I'm lookin at you, Barsk). Charlie Jane Anders is the editor in chief at io9, and writes lovely writing-advice articles, this was published by Tor (one of my favorite publishers) - but then, I'd thought some similar things about Barsk. "All the Birds in the Sky" sounded like it would be either amazing or horrible; a cross between fantasy and sci-fi where the main characters are a witch and a super scientist? It's all of my childhood dreams come true - and if childhood me had written down those dreams I'd probably cringe at the result.

But this was fantastic. Anders wove together magic and sci-fi beautifully, constructed world where somehow a woman with vine-y, whimsical, powerful nature magic can co-exist with a nerd wearing a two-second time machine and trying to build a sentient supercomputer in his closet. The relationship between the magic and the science is like two sets of complex, elaborate scaffolding originally intended to build two different skyscrapers but re-purposed to build each other, instead. It works, unbelievably well.

The story begins with our main characters, Patricia and Laurence, as young nerds who don't fit in at their respective schools (and eventually, at the same school). Patricia has spoken to birds and left her body to fly, but her classmates think she's a Satanic emo cutter. Laurence is the youngest person ever to build a two-second time machine, but he uses it mainly to avoid food (and punches) thrown at his face. The two form an adorable bond when Laurence asks Patricia to lie to his parents and pretend she and Laurence do outdoorsy things together all the time. But middle school isn't easy, and Anders doesn't shy away from how imperfect and selfish people can be; when the whole school is mocking Patricia, Laurence pulls back from her, too. They both make an effort to repair their friendship, but end up going their separate ways. Anders writes the children well, capturing the magic of childhood without writing a dull children's story with a moral at the end.

Many years later, when Patricia has finished magic school and Laurence is a respected scientist, they reconnect. The world is slowly going sideways, with increasingly alarming natural disasters coming out of the background and into the foreground of the novel. Their respective high-powered groups of friends are both working on plans in case of the end of the world, but they are somehow at cross-purposes. Laurence's scientists want to help humanity leave the Earth and settle elsewhere while Patricia wants to save the Earth and all the life on it. And Laurence and Patricia, even after their bittersweet, tender, precarious childhood friendship, are clearly headed to a more intimate and potentially more painful relationship.

There is no single element driving Anders' success here. The story is well-crafted, briskly paced and with dramatic (but believable) stakes. The world is mercurial but consistent, fanciful but serious. The cast is full of vibrant, strange, intriguing supporting characters, and I've rarely enjoyed watching two characters fall in love as much as I enjoyed Patricia and Laurence. Anders knows how to write flawed, vulnerable people who are motivated as much by their faults as by their virtues (and vice versa - these people aren't driven by their flaws alone, either), and it's a joy to read.

There are a few missteps. A few scene changes throw you farther into the future than you expect. Patricia has a tragic backstory from her magic school years that doesn't feel as tragic as it should, because the characters involved and the event itself are not given enough weight or time, and because it's referenced far too often before being explained. There are a few (I counted three) instances of dialogue being introduced by 'like,' as in: 'Laurence was like, "Yeah...".' I don't mind this in theory, in appropriate situations, but 'like' is quotative. Using 'like' like that is a marker of introducing an approximation of something someone else said, and doesn't really work unless your narrator is supposed to be a character directly telling the story (and that's not the case). I'm curious as to how these slipped through; they seem to be a deliberate choice, but I would've thought that Anders (who is very keen in her language choice and knows quite a bit about formal versus informal writing) would understand that distinction.

Overall, though, this is a magnificent story. I have to stop myself from gushing about my favorite parts, because I'll spoil far too much, but I'll give some tidbits: there's a magical character who has to live in a sterile environment because he supercharges all natural life and, left unchecked, will instantly grow fungus all over and around him; there are super-tablets in the future that are creepily all-knowing but unlike in The Circle they aren't a harbinger of evil corporate global takeover, but benignly helpful; and the middle school guidance counselor, as every middle schooler knows in their bones, is actually evil. There's room in this world sequels, prequels, spinoffs, and more, but luckily story itself wraps up nicely - not neatly or perfectly, just satisfyingly right for everyone involved, reader and characters alike.

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