→ October 2, 2020
→ By

Enola Holmes.

Enola Holmes is utter dreck, a mediocre mystery wrapped in the cloak of a superior writer’s creation and some quality set design, wasting two solid actresses on a script desperate to tell you how clever it is. There have been worthwhile adaptations and continuations of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s work and iconic character, but this is just plain boring.

Enola Holmes, you see, is Sherlock and Mycroft’s younger sister, a fabrication by the author Nancy Springer for a series of books that posit that this 14-year-old girl, unmentioned by Doyle, was as quick-witted as her older brothers, with a special talent for cryptography. When her brothers try to send her off to finishing school, she absconds to London and starts a detective agency of her own, specializing in missing persons cases (as, I presume, murder was a bit much for the young adult literature market).

This Netflix adaptation of the series’ first book, The Case of the Missing Marquess, starts with Enola (Millie Bobby Brown, so critical as El on Stranger Things) at home with her mother (Helena Bonham Carter), but when the latter vanishes, Enola’s brothers show up to decide her fate. Mycroft is especially disdainful of her most unladylike ways and thus the stronger advocate of sending her off to a finishing school run by a Miss Harrison (Fiona Shaw, also wasted in a minor role), while Sherlock (Henry Cavill, decidedly un-super here) equivocates and shows a soft spot for his younger sister. Enola takes off and encounters another fugitive, Lord Tewksbury, and the two pair up while on the run, separating in London before circumstances throw them together again – while both are pursued by a mysterious, creepy man named Linthorn who looks too much like a young Willem Dafoe. Enola tries to secure her freedom while figuring out the mystery around Tewksbury’s flight and avoiding her brothers and the interference of Inspector Lestrade.

The story is a convoluted mess, overly reliant on coincidence and failing to give Enola enough of a reason to solve the Tewksbury tangle. Enola’s character is just Sherlock as a teenaged girl, transmuting his disregard for rules and cold manner into a mischievous pixie who breaks the fourth wall with irritating frequency. (And of course she has to say “the game is afoot,” a hackneyedphrase Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes said exactly one time in all of the stories.) She takes off for London with a pile of money her mother presciently left hidden for her in a location she’s disguised with a cipher that Enola cracks, and has little trouble tracking her mother’s movements through the London underground – that’s another preposterous subplot that I won’t spoil because it’s just so stupid. While there, she just bumps into Tewksbury again, because the story needs them to run into each other.

The Sherlock character is a softer and kinder version of the one present in most of the stories and in film versions, which has made the film the subject of a peculiar lawsuit by the Doyle estate. (The character of Sherlock is in the public domain because most of the works that include him have lost their copyright protection; the estate claims that this film uses a later version of Sherlock where he shows emotion, and thus isn’t in the public domain.) This poses two problems: It’s not the Sherlock most of us know from canon or from depictions like Benedict Cumberbatch’s, and it also makes Sherlock really, really boring. There are no pithy observations, no witty ripostes, and none of the charm of watching his brain at work, which is a huge part of the appeal of Doyle’s writing – the same as it is for Agatha Christie’s Poirot or Dorothy Sayers’ Lord Wimsey.

This feels more than anything like an attempt to profit from someone else’s creation, because it’s devoid of anything original or interesting. Brown might play the single most important character in Stranger Things‘ ever-growing ensemble, although I think there are times the script pushes her to overact. She never inhabits this character, however, and the reason is probably that the character itself is two-dimensional and cartoonish. For a movie that’s been heavily hyped and received positive reviews, Enola Holmes is a shocking dud. If you’re a fan of the original Sherlock Holmes stories, you’d do well to stay away.

Filed Under: Uncategorized Tagged With: , , ,
→ October 1, 2020
→ By

Atlantis Rising.

The second edition of the cooperative game Atlantis Rising came out last September from Elf Creek Games, bringing updated graphics and much-improved components while simplifying some of the mechanics. It’s flown a bit under the radar but is one of the better cooperative titles I’ve played, a step up in complexity from Pandemic but not as difficult to learn as Spirit Island.

In Atlantis Rising, one to seven players try to save Atlantis before the island floods by gathering resources to build eleven ‘components,’ each of which helps the players continue to advance towards the ultimate goal with one-time or ongoing benefits. Each player gets a specific role with a special ability and a set of meeples they can place around the island’s many spaces. The island board has six peninsulas on it, each containing six tiles on which players can place their meeples. Three of those allow you to gain resources – gold, crystals, and ore – by rolling a die, while the other three allow you to convert ore to steel, to pick up Library cards that give you extra benefits, or to recruit more meeples. You can also place up to two or three meeples (based on player count) on the components board to allow you to build them on that turn.

The order of operations here is a bit different than that in Pandemic and the many games that have borrowed its mechanics. In Atlantis Rising, players all place their meeples at the same time, coordinating their efforts, and then players draw one card apiece from the Misfortune Deck, which mostly comprises cards showing the name of one of the six peninsulas. When you draw one of those, you flip over the tile closest to the end of the peninsula that isn’t already on its flooded side. Those tiles furthest from the center either have the best rewards or require the lowest value on your die roll to gain a resource, so the island gets harder to use as it shrinks. If any peninsula has all six tiles flooded and you draw another card for it, you have to flip the middle tile and you lose the game. Some cards in the Misfortune deck are even worse, while others are Calm cards where nothing flips, so it’s possible your card draw won’t be entirely disastrous.

Only after you’ve drawn and resolved your Misfortune cards do you execute the actions for the meeples you’ve placed, assuming that they weren’t booted from the board when their tiles flooded. (You don’t lose the meeples forever, just for the round.) You roll dice to see if you get any of the three resources, convert ore to steel, roll for recruits (which requires two meeples to activate, as in the “love shack” of Stone Age), and draw Library cards. You can also build components if you have a meeple there and have acquired the two to four resources required. Once you’ve built the ten components, you can build the final piece, requiring eight resources, to win the game. At the end of each round, you flip a number of tiles equal to the value on the Wrath of the Gods round tracker, starting at 0 and going up to 3, where it remains for the rest of the game. The players choose which tiles to flip this time, so you have some discretion here, but you’ll probably get seven rounds in before you run out of tiles.

The Library card deck includes mostly single-use cards, but has about a dozen Artifact cards that you keep for the rest of the game, gaining benefits on every turn. There’s also a sort of internal currency in the game called mystic energy, which you can always gain for free by placing meeples on the center tile, and which you can use to increase the result of a die roll by one, or collect to spend four to place a barrier tile on a peninsula that you discard rather than flooding a tile, or to spend five to un-flood a tile. You need two mystic energy in addition to six other resources to build the final piece on the components board to win the game, but one of the components lets you get two mystic energy per meeple placed there, so if you get to that point acquiring more mystic energy is less of an obstacle.

The game is highly customizable by difficulty, with multiple suggested configurations of components to use in each game and the ability to make the Misfortune deck more punitive. With two or three players, you draw four Misfortune cards as a group; with just two players, you also get a Hologram meeple that takes on an additional role and may take one action like any other meeple. There’s also a solo mode that really works, letting you play one main role, one secondary role with the Hologram, and use a robot meeple to boost one or two of your own meeples by adding 2 to their die rolls. In solo mode, you get a free mystic energy token at the start of every round, and then draw four Misfortune cards in that phase.

What really works about Atlantis Rising, which I’ve read is a change from the first edition, is that the mechanics of the challenge are simple to understand and implement. The complexity is all on the players’ side – how best to deploy your meeples, which components to build, even which tiles to use on each round because of the risk that they’ll be flooded before you get to take your actions, which amounts to a lost turn for those meeples. It’s also quite solid as a solo game.

The game is out of stock in most places right now – it’s on amazon but for a gouging price – and Elf Creek has indicated there will be a new print run available in Q1 of next year. If you enjoy cooperative games, and want something a bit more difficult than Pandemic, I’d check it out.

Filed Under: Uncategorized Tagged With: , ,
→ September 30, 2020
→ By

Fight Club (novel).

The first rule of Fight Club is … oh, enough already, you know the joke.

I saw David Fincher’s acclaimed film adaptation of Fight Club back in 2011, and nine years on it hasn’t left me, even though I have yet to rewatch it. The three leads are all so good, and as disturbing as the film is, I think I needed some time to process what Fincher and the book’s author, Chuck Palahniuk, were trying to say.

Since I hosted a livestreamed event with Palahniuk earlier in September, I decided to read Fight Club, Palahniuk’s first novel and I think still his most popular. The film’s script adheres reasonably closely to the story in the book, but the novel has fewer clues to its ultimate twist, and the ending differs substantially, with the written one far creepier and paranoid.

The novel is narrated by the main character, never named, who has already met Tyler Durden, the primary antagonist who exerts a Svengali-like influence over the protagonist. We jump back in time to where the narrator spends most of his time attending self-help groups for people suffering from or dying of rare diseases that he doesn’t actually have. He meets Marla, who’s doing the same thing, and ends up in a battle of wills with her that ends with them splitting the groups they attend and, somehow, also leads to her meeting Tyler and sleeping with him. The narrator and Tyler go on, of course, to create a fight club that attracts other disaffected young men and eventually becomes a social movement focused on self-reliance and the overthrow of the modern state.

The violence inherent to the story plays out less shockingly on the page than on film; Palahniuk is very comfortable delving into the darker side of humanity, and doesn’t shy away from the physical damage of the fights, but it’s less lurid here than in Fincher’s version – without being less visceral. You are drawn into the page by that violence but kept there primarily by the narration itself. The protagonist isn’t quite right, obviously, and Palahniuk’s best trick in the novel, even aside from the ultimate twist, is how he voices the narrator’s inner monologue so that we get the sense of his mental descent without him making it explicit.

The twist, if you don’t know it, is the same here as it is in the film, but the two diverge after that point when the narrator tries to stop what he’s set in motion with the cult he and Tyler have created. The movie ends on a more hopeful note, if you can believe it, while the book emphasizes how the narrator has been trapped by his own creations, without the way out he gets in the film. The book also spends less time on Tyler’s character, and he’s more three-dimensional in the film, not least because of how Pitt portrays him.

There’s a whole body of literature on the meaning and themes of Fight Club the book and the film, which I won’t even try to rehash here, not least because they aren’t my own thoughts. Reading the novel now, in 2020, well after seeing the film, I couldn’t avoid seeing it as a prescient depiction of incel culture before that word even existed. Young men, feeling emasculated by society, oppressed by late-stage capitalism, and rejected by women, turn to violence and a movement that purports to restore them to power. These same young men would be wearing MAGA hats fifteen years later, or carrying tiki torches in Charlottesville. Palahniuk doesn’t so much blame society for their existence as observe them as a consequence and follow one of them in particular to the bottom of his slippery slope. There’s an anti-consumerist message here but it was much weaker than it is in the film, replaced in part by mockery of upwardly mobile consumers who will pay more for a product that they see as “natural” or that carries other socially desirable traits.

Marla isn’t much of a character in the novel Fight Club, which is disappointing given how much more real she is in Helena Bonham-Carter’s portrayal. Palahniuk has faced criticism for his views on gender, and Marla is enough of a stock character here, despite a very promising introduction, that it becomes a weakness in the novel – never mind the Bechdel Test, which this novel fails immediately, but this is a novel about dudes who just want to be dudes. It’s a Real Men™ thing, and you ladies wouldn’t get it. Palahniuk is a satirist on some level, but there isn’t a strong sense of condemnation of Tyler Durden’s acolytes here, and Marla was his best chance to provide that within the novel if she’d been a stronger character.

When I’ve read a book and seen the movie adaptation, nine times out of ten I come down in favor of the book. Fight Club is in the latter category. Jim Uhls’ screenplay smooths out some of the rough edges in Palahniuk’s novel, while Pitt and Bonham-Carter bring their respective characters to life with far greater detail and texture. The tradeoffs are an ending that might be too positive, and more overt clues as to the coming twist. There are huge tells in the movie that aren’t there in the book, and it’s at least a fair debate whether that’s to the film’s detriment. I figured it out while watching the film, but I don’t think I would have figured it out if I’d read the book first. In some ways, that’s a recommendation for the book, but on balance, I think the film is just better.

Next up: I’m reading Upton Sinclair’s The Jungle, probably 35 years after I first heard about the book in social studies class.

Filed Under: Uncategorized Tagged With: ,
→ September 26, 2020
→ By

Stick to baseball, 9/26/20.

Nothing new this week at the Athletic, but I’m hoping to write two pieces this upcoming week to make up for it.

I reviewed the light resource-management and tile-placement game Cosmic Colonies for Paste this week; it’s a fine enough game, but I was left a little underwhelmed because it didn’t offer anything I hadn’t seen before in other games.

My guest on The Keith Law Show this week was my colleague at the Athletic Kaitlyn McGrath, talking about what it’s been like covering a team (the Blue Jays) she can’t see in person because they’re playing in the U.S. You can also subscribe to my podcast on Amazon,  iTunes, and Spotify.

I’ve been keeping up with my free email newsletter better recently; my thanks to those of you who’ve signed up and who’ve sent kind notes in response to some recent editions. That said, I didn’t send one this week since … well, I haven’t had the muse much at all lately.

The holidays approach! My books The Inside Game and Smart Baseball make excellent gifts, or so I’m told by my editor and publicists.

And now, the links…

Filed Under: Uncategorized Tagged With: , , , , , , , ,
→ September 19, 2020
→ By

Stick to baseball, 9/19/20.

I had one post of my own this week for subscribers to The Athletic, on my disdain for MLB’s proposal to keep expanded playoffs beyond 2020. I also did a Q&A with our Royals writer Alec Lewis and answered some questions for our Nats writer Britt Ghiroli on each of those teams’ farm systems.

My guest on The Keith Law Show this week was my friend and former colleague Adnan Virk, talking about the season to date and some upcoming movies of interest to him (he hosts his own movie podcast called Cinephile). My own podcast is now available on Amazon podcasts as well as iTunes and Spotify.

Over at Paste, I ranked the five best board game reboots I’ve played, as a companion to last week’s review of Nova Luna, itself a reboot of an earlier game called Habitats.

I’ve been keeping up with my free email newsletter better recently; my thanks to those of you who’ve signed up and who’ve sent kind notes in response to some recent editions.

The holidays approach! My books The Inside Game and Smart Baseball make excellent gifts, or so I’m told by my editor and publicists.

And now, the links…

Filed Under: Uncategorized Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , ,
→ September 18, 2020
→ By

The Invention of Sound.

I was the host for Chuck Palahniuk’s live-streamed Q&A event through Midtown Scholar, an independent bookstore in Harrisburg, PA, last Friday night, discussing Chuck’s new book The Invention of Sound. I’ve just gotten into Chuck’s oeuvre, having read that and Adjustment Day and just starting Fight Club, so I was simultaneously shocked and entertained by his newest novel, which is violent, dark, often funny, and extremely thought-provoking.

The Invention of Sound pairs two narratives that we learn early in the novel are going to intersect. One is that of Gates Foster, a father whose daughter, Lucinda, vanished from his office building about ten years earlier, leading to the demise of his marriage and his own downward spiral into obsessively hunting for her image in online pedophilia and child-porn communities. The other is that of Mitzi, a sound engineer who crafts and sells blood-curdling, realistic screams to movie and television producers, a business she inherited from her father and that she has built further with the help of Schlo, a successful producer who buys some of her best screams. We’ll also meet the wonderfully-named Blush Gentry, an actress on the downside of her character who sees a chance to boost her profile with Gates’ help – and who was the actor on screen when one of Mitzki’s most potent screams was used in a B-movie many years earlier.

Palahniuk was a great interview, and one of the best answers he gave me, which I think is instructive for all readers of fiction and for would-be writers as well, was that he uses violence as a way to bring the reader into the text and make the events on the page more visceral. (He said that drugs and sex also work in the same way.) The violence here is mostly implied, at least, rather than described graphically, as it was in Adjustment Day, but it’s there, and the specter of this violence lurks on every page – it raises the tension, but I read this with a good amount of fear that I was going to turn the page and find something that would turn my stomach.

Under the veneer of violence and depravity, however, are deeper explorations of questions like grief, especially when you’re grieving without closure; and of the power of fiction to move us, for better or for worse. Gates’ methods of dealing with his grief are not exactly evidence-based, but they do tell us something about the kind of open-ended horror of losing a child without knowing what happened to them – a rare occurrence, but among the most horrifying things any parent can conceive – and serve as an explanation for some of Gates’ more irrational or just plain dangerous choices.

Mitzi’s story is less successful than Gates’, although it’s just as compelling to read; it’s just hard to understand why she carries on with this business, knowing its personal toll on her, even when Palahniuk offers us a trauma in her past that might explain some of her risk-seeking behavior. She’s on her own death spiral, almost literally, but the more we learn about her character the harder it is to fathom why, more so because she goes so far out of her way to try to save her friend Schlo from almost certain death closer to the end of the book. She’s a villain, but also a victim, which makes her complex but ultimately inscrutable.

This might be too much of my own interpretation, but if I didn’t know Palahniuk’s work or reputation, I might have thought The Invention of Sound offered a sort of condemnation of horror films and other works of art that aim to please an audience by distilling and serving up the pain of others. There’s a whole genre of horror film that I won’t watch, where the violence is itself the point and the audience is supposed to root for the killer(s); Mitzi’s screams, and the industry she serves, feel like a satirical rendering of that kind of exploitative, misanthropic cinema. Why exactly do so many people enjoy watching the suffering of others, fictional or real? Would there really be a market for screams as realistic as those Mitzi sells, where no one asks how she manages to produce them? And is there tragedy at the end of this pursuit of greater horrors?

I’ll spoil one thing that probably should be obvious from the start of The Invention of Sound – Gates isn’t getting a happy resolution to his story, although he gets … something, certainly. The pleasure of reading his narrative is the multiple surprises that Palahniuk springs on us in the last few pages, twists for which he laid clues but that I at least missed while reading. It’s brilliant in several ways, and incredibly disturbing, but I can’t quite put my finger on what Palahniuk might be trying to say.

Next up: I’m reading his Fight Club, although of course I’ve seen the movie already.

Filed Under: Uncategorized Tagged With: , , , , ,
→ September 16, 2020
→ By

The Personal History of David Copperfield.

When word came out in mid-2019 that Armando Iannucci (The Death of Stalin, VEEP) was filming an adaptation of Charles Dickens’ David Copperfield, I read the book in anticipation of its release, also rectifying a rather large gap in my own reading history. (I’d read five Dickens novels, two in high school and three by choice, but not this one, which Dickens himself called his favourite, and which the Guardian called the third “most Dickensian” of his novels.) The movie came out in the UK last year, but its arrival in the U.S. was delayed by COVID-19, and it just hit theaters earlier this month. It is marvelous, the best 2020 release I’ve seen so far this year, with a mostly faithful script, wonderful casting, and excellent use of the humor in Dickens’ rags-to-riches novel.

If you haven’t read the book, which I had not other than one of those Moby Books’ abridged, illustrated versions back in 1981 or so, it is the life story of its title character, from birth into straitened circumstances, through his widowed mother’s unfortunate choice of a misanthropic, controlling husband, to his indenture at his stepfather’s wine-selling business, and on and on in somewhat picaresque fashion. He encounters a host of eccentric characters, a few of whom, notably the venal Uriah Heep, have gained lasting reputation among the pantheon of literary creations, with several others providing comic relief among David’s series of misfortunes before he finally turns to writing as a vocation and finds success and financial security for the first time.

The first theatrical film version of Dickens’ classic novel in a half-century, The Personal History of David Copperfield might be most notable for the color-blind casting, although I’d argue that this choice is notable for how quickly you’ll stop noticing it. The casting itself is so perfect top to bottom that casting all-white actors couldn’t have produced a comparable result, notably Dev Patel as David himself, handling the pivotal role with aplomb, adapting to David’s changing views of the world and greater understanding of the people around him over the course of the story. Characters who are related by blood don’t share skin tone, and it couldn’t matter any less.

Many of the side characters are superbly cast as well, but none more so than Hugh Laurie as the befuddled Mr. Dick, which sees Laurie at his Woosterian best, and also gives that character a bit more to do than just to serve as comic relief. Mr. Dick’s host, David’s aunt Betsy Trotwood, is played by Tilda Swinton, who can certainly dominate a film in the wrong way when she gets to play a severe character; here, she gives Aunt Betsy more depth than the character has in the novel, making her more sympathetic and thus making it easier to understand why David is so generous to her as her own circumstances decline and he finds their relations reversed. Ben Whishaw delivers an unctuous, loathsome performance as Uriah Heep, complete with bowl-cut and affected speech that Patel later mimics to great comic effect. Peter Capaldi, the Twelfth Doctor, has a lot of fun with the shifty but good-hearted Mr. Micawber, making him a little less exasperating on the screen than he is on the page.

The movie is brisk at two hours, and spends far more time on the first half of the novel than on the second, with great length given to David’s childhood and early adulthood, including his relationship with Mr. Micawber and time in a boarding school where he meets James Steerforth (Aneurin Barnard). That choice gives us rather more prologue than David requires and rushes some of the resolutions, so that David’s marriage to Agnes is treated almost as an afterthought, and the unmasking of Uriah Heep plays out in a far less satisfying manner, because the audience has so much less time and reason to despise him, and also has less time to appreciate Whishaw’s deft portrayal of Heep’s scheming nature. The first half of the novel is important, but the second half is the payoff. The film gives you all of that payoff in the last thirty minutes, and it’s still fun, just condensed.

Iannucci and his co-writer Simon Blackwell play the story extremely straight until close to the very end. The compression of the last half of the book requires a large change to the arc with Dora, which the screenwriters handle in a way that also comments on Dickens’ original story, where David marries Dora, realizes it’s unsuitable because she’s dull and needy, so Dickens has her conveniently die after suffering a miscarriage so that David can marry Agnes. Dora here is even sillier than she is in the book, making her a great comic presence, but rather than kill her off, the writers give her the perspicacity to find her own way off the stage. The Ham/Emily/Steerforth subplot, itself rather tangential to David’s own narrative, also has a rather significant change that I would argue is less successful even though Dickens’ own handling of that arc relied too much on coincidence.

I had no trouble following the plot, because I’d read the novel recently, but I do wonder how well viewers could follow the plot, especially the last half hour or so, if they had no exposure to the book or previous adaptations. It’s the Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy problem – a novel of 500+ pages is hard to condense into a two-hour film without losing something, and you’d rather lose details or exposition than plot or character development. Perhaps the Emily subplot could have gone instead, as essential as it is on the page, because so much time is spent on David’s childhood visit to the seaside hovel where she lives, to give us more time with Heep and David at the law firm so we better understand their rivalry and why Heep is so odious. (We do see plenty of Mr. Wickfield, played by Benedict Wong, in various stages of inebriation.) Yet The Personal History of David Copperfield is joyous because of what Iannucci and Blackwell retained – Mr. Dick, Dumb Dora, the Micawbers – and how well Dev Patel brings that title character to life.

Filed Under: Uncategorized Tagged With: , , , ,
→ September 12, 2020
→ By

Stick to baseball, 9/12/20.

I had several posts for subscribers to the Athletic this week. One was another scouting notebook looking at several top 100 prospects who debuted recently, including Ian Anderson, Ke’Bryan Hayes, and Deivi Garcia. Another looked at what the planned changes to the 2021 draft might mean in practice. The third was a Q&A with our Red Sox beat writer Jen McCaffrey, discussing the state of Boston’s farm system. I held a Klawchat on Thursday.

Over at Paste, I reviewed Nova Luna, one of the nominees for this year’s Spiel des Jahres award. It’s a reboot of an earlier game called Habitats, rethemed and redesigned by Uwe Rosenberg (Patchwork, Agricola). It’s very good, and definitely good for family play with kids 8 and up.

I’ve resumed writing my email newsletter more regularly recently, helped by the resumption of the baseball season and a few other things that have made life a bit more normal. Also, here’s your reminder that my second book, The Inside Game: Bad Calls, Strange Moves, and What Baseball Behavior Teaches Us About Ourselves, is available on bookshop.org and anywhere you buy books.

Charles Peterson, the Cardinals’ area scout in South Carolina and Georgia, has COVID-19 and is on a ventilator. You can join me in donating to his GoFundMe here … and maybe consider what it would be like to live in a country where we didn’t have to do this to pay our medical bills.

And now, the links…

Filed Under: Uncategorized Tagged With: , , , , , , , ,
→ September 10, 2020
→ By

Klawchat 9/10/20.

I have three new posts up for subscribers to The Athletic: a breakdown of the planned changes to the 2021 draft, a Q&A with Jen McCaffrey on the Red Sox’ farm system, and a scouting notebook (from Tuesday) on several top 100 prospects who debuted recently. I also have a new game review at Paste, looking at the Spiel-nominated Nova Luna, Uwe Rosenberg’s reboot of an earlier game called Habitats.

Keith Law: In the shuffling madness … Klawchat.

Ben (MN): How useful is this year’s data for evaluators like yourself? For example, Austin Meadows had an early case of covid and has been awful. Is that evidence that he was never as good as his numbers from last year, or can we just not tell at this point due to the small sample and the unknown impact of covid, lack of reps, etc.? For someone like Javy Baez, has his approach finally caught up with him and exposed him as a solid but not great player, or is it just a small sample and he may be a superstar again next year? Do you have any idea how to gauge this season for situations like this, where the data doesn’t confirm what we thought about the player before the year?
Keith Law: This entire season is a small, skewed sample. Not only is 60 games less than half a regular season, but schedules are far less balanced than they usually are, and we’re clearly working with less major-league caliber pitching than usual. If a player continues what he showed us in 2019, then great, it’s probably further evidence in that direction. If a player is having an outlier season in 2020, though, I’m not going to draw any conclusions either way.

Sedona: Gut feeling…Luciano take the Vlad/Soto early path to MLB?  If not, who?
Keith Law: No. Don’t think he has their idea of the strike zone.

2020 Voter: I read nearly all of your chats and in each one this year there’s a comment from someone that essentially says “how could anyone vote for Trump?” and I’d like to share my perspective.  Biden has proposed revisions to 401Ks that replaces the current taxable income reduction with flat credits.  This would greatly increase my taxes per year — despiate pledges to not raise taxes on households making <400K — and leaves our family with little extra.  Trump is a horrible embarassment, but that is a huge financial hit.  Democrats will likely control Congress, so the chances of this passing are high.  You’ll probably call this selfish, but I’m not especially political and I have young kids.
Keith Law: Yeah, that’s pretty selfish – and also extremely narrow. If the economy is worse off as a whole, what does that mean for your income, or the long-term value of your 401K? Trade wars and tariffs are terrible for the economy. So is a pandemic without a sufficient government response. Also, I’d wager a good amount of money that you’re a straight, white man, whose status isn’t particularly threatened by a Trump administration that is rolling back anti-discrimination protections for anybody who isn’t that.

Todd Boss: Given the 29-9 beatdown last night, would you support a little-league style “slaughter rule” in baseball games at some point?  We’re already experimenting with “weirder” rules (extra innings runner, 7-inning double headers, no-pitch IBB) that have existed in non-MLB leagues for a time … why not have a rolling slaughter rule; game’s over if losing by 10 or more runs 7th inning or later?
Keith Law: This year I would have.

Jason: Should Bob Woodward have released those taped conversations much earlier, is criticism of him fair?
Keith Law: Yes.

Adam: I admit to being very confused that The Burnt Orange Heresy wasn’t a documentary on the current administration.
Keith Law: It’s a great title for a good novel (I read it, it’s solid) and a bad film.

Jason: Is corbin burnes a GUY?
Keith Law: I think so. I was a year early on his breakout, as usual.

Matt: Do you believe in Austin Nola being a 120 wRC+ type bat in next couple of years or no?
Keith Law: I’d bet the under on that.

Ryan: Hey Keith love your work. What do you think an extension for Tatis looks like. Would 8 250 get it close. He could get another bite of the apple at age 29.
Keith Law: With four years of team control now, one of them essentially at the minimum salary, you’re still giving him $40 million or more for his free agent years. He should definitely take that offer.

Jon: Don’t look now but Michael Conforto is turning into a superstar.  (In my best John Malkovich voice – “Pay that man his money”)
Keith Law: Again, I don’t want to read much into the short season, but the OBP has always been there, and this is power he’s shown before when healthy. Funny how the Cubs fans who were mad I ranked him over Schwarber have gone silent.

Chuck: Any idea why Davidson or Muller don’t get at least a spot start for Atlanta?
Keith Law: I don’t know how prepared they are for that … we don’t know how much they’ve pitched, or if they’ve dealt with any minor injuries, anything like that. On the face of it I’d assume Davidson was in line, but I have no inside info here.

Mac: Have you heard how the fall league will be structured?
Keith Law: Nothing. Many ideas, no specifics.

Ken: Comparing the two who had more upside as a starter at age 22 for the yanks severing or Garcia?  Why?
Keith Law: Severino had the better arm, but I always had concerns about his delivery that unfortunately came to pass. Garcia has his own concerns but I think he’s a bit more likely to hold up as a starter.

Michael: Yesterday more than 1,200 Americans died. In Spain, Germany, Canada, Japan, Italy and the UK they lost a combined 75 even though they have 100 million more people than us.  #AmericanExceptionialism
Keith Law: Yeah, but Biden might raise my taxes a tiny bit.

Deke: Anything dumber (non-actually-important department) this year than Hosmer’s bunt and the aftermath?
Keith Law: Bunting with two strikes, even against the shift, is such a bad idea … if you are that unlikely to get a hit in that situation, you shouldn’t be in the lineup.

Jake: Keith—I’m a first time voter (just turned 18). I’m extremely progressive. As such, I obviously am not voting for trump. But I don’t know if i can betray my heart and vote joe. He has a brutal history, and won’t bring about meaningful change. How do i vote?
Keith Law: You vote for Biden. You have two choices here that matter. One might not bring about meaningful change from our history, but he will bring about meaningful change from the last four years. The other will get to keep appointing conservative judges, gutting environmental laws, killing LGBTQ+ protections, muzzling scientists, and mishandling crises. This isn’t hard. And it’s not only about you.

BirdlandBro: Hey Keith, your thoughts on the Orioles?  Do you see real positive strides being made and potentially an accelerated rebuild?  Or just small sample size?
Keith Law: Just a small sample size.

Bryan (Montclair): What do you think the impact will be on pitchers in 2021 based on this truncated season? Anecdotally, I would think that starters will have a longer time getting stretched out/pitching through a long 2021 season, at the very least. Not to mention an uptick in injuries.
Keith Law: I share your concern – and I think it’s the main reason we will see some sort of fall league, so minor leaguers who didn’t see the majors aren’t left with virtually no innings this year.

Cory: What’s the deal with Mize’s lack of command; wasn’t that supposed to be his biggest strength? Cause for concern?
Keith Law: Again, tiny samples.

Jordan: Do you see the Padres talent ever stacking up enough to overtake the dodgers for a division title? Or does LAs combination of cash and organizational acumen make SD a groomsmen for the next decade?
Keith Law: Some of it is just luck – you stay healthier one year, or you have a guy have an outlier year like Cronenworth – but I will say no large-market team would scare me more as a competitor than the Dodgers. They’re extremely strong at the major-league and minor-league levels, they keep finding high-end talent in the draft even when they draft low, and they’re exceptionally well-run.

BJ: Are you coming around on Mountcastle? All the guy does is hit. Even if the BB% boost is just a small sample, who cares? Why walk when you can rake?
Keith Law: Because when you don’t walk, pitchers tailor their approach and you don’t rake so much.

Larry: Whats your level of concern for Soroka’s future while coming back from the Achilles tear?
Keith Law: None.

Greg: Fried, Soroka, Anderson seem like logical pieces in the future Atlanta rotations. Any other internal guys who you think could figure it out and join them?
Keith Law: I would bet that one of that group of Wright, Wilson, Toussaint, Davidson would figure it out … but I am not really sure which one I’d bet on. Touki has the best arsenal, and all the athleticism in the world, and when he’s on – repeating his delivery especially – he’s the best of the quartet.
Keith Law: If he doesn’t figure it out in Atlanta, he’ll spend the next ten years going from team to team because every pitching coach will want to work with him. He could be the new Edwin Jackson.

Matt: 200K dead Americans but 2020 Voter is concerned about his 401. That’s nice.
Keith Law: I wonder if questions like that are just bait.

Adam: Is it odd that the Padres, for all their drafting and IFA prowess, have a roster comprised of only maybe 2 “homegrown” players, depending on your definition of the term?
Keith Law: They’ve used a lot of homegrown players to acquire guys on the roster. Also, you’re probably not counting Tatis Jr. as homegrown, since he originally signed with another club, but he never played an official game with any other org but the Padres.

James: Do you agree with Kershaw that the extra-inning rule is “not real baseball”?
Keith Law: It’s not my kind of baseball.

Steven: If Bart can hit .250+, is he an all star?
Keith Law: What’s his OBP in that scenario?

Matthew: All the beat writers seem to think Cleveland will decline Hand and Santana’s options and trade Lindor in a massive salary clearance this offseason. With Carrasco set to achieve 10-and-5 next May or so, I’d imagine they’ll also be eager to move his salary while they still can, without his approval. What do you think his trade value is like? Definitely a unique case.
Keith Law: I would bet it’s high. People seem to love Carrasco the person, and obviously he’s a top-end pitcher. I think they’d do very well if they trade him – multiple real prospects in return.

Guest: Would you bring up brailen marquez for the last bit of this year if you were jed/theo?
Keith Law: Assuming he’s ready & healthy, he’d be a hell of a weapon in relief.

Jon: It looks like Andres Gimenez has overtaken Rosario at SS, at least for the rest of the season.  If you’re the Mets, what do you do with Rosario next year?  Try him in CF, trade him or see if he can still become what a lot of people thought he could be?
Keith Law: My guess is they’ll end up trading him. I wouldn’t be shocked to see him succeed somewhere else.

zeke: Do you think the anti-Military comments and COVID disclosures re “Clown Hitler” move the needle at all?
Keith Law: You would think so … how any veteran or military family could hand-wave this away is beyond me.

Brian: Do you think some players perform better because of not having fans? Thinking specifically of Darvish.
Keith Law: No.

Appa Yip Yip: Are you buying Teoscar Hernandez? His good run started last year.
Keith Law: Another 2019 breakout candidate. More buying than selling, I would say, but again, 2020 is a tiny sample and I would not extrapolate any player having a strong but outlier six weeks into him doing it for a whole year.

Brian: Ian Happ is another breakout you jumped the gun on. Great power and OBP mix. Think he can be a regular All-Star?
Keith Law: I do – he was one of my bigger breakout disappointments because I was always pretty confident he’d be a strong OBP/doubles guy at the worst while playing a few positions.

Johnny Tuttle: Why did Libertarianism take such virulent root in the US?
Keith Law: Isn’t it innate? One of the original 13 states has “Live Free or Die” as its motto.

Greg P: Isn’t it scary to think 45% of Americans will vote for Trump?
Keith Law: 45% of voters will. Not the same thing. The problem is all the people who don’t vote, many of whom will see their quality of life affected quite directly by the outcome.

Adam Trask: You still think Hinch gets hired again but not Luhnow? Hinch knew about it and couldn’t control his team. Luhnow may not have known and got screwed. And he seems to have interest from the A-Rod group at least.
Keith Law: Luhnow knew. Let’s not revise history here.

Guest: Awesome to hear you’re running. Interesting to know you can do something you never thought possible. In that sense, do you have any hope that we’ll see substantial progress in climate change in our lifetime?
Keith Law: I think we will in my daughter’s lifetime, but by then it may be far too late.

Tracy: If this current administration is defeated this fall, should the Biden admin go after any of the obvious lawbreakers who’ve run amok the last four years? I’d hate to see them literally get away with murder because the new administration would deem it “ not worth it.” Sends a bad message that there are indeed two separate sets of laws that are enforced.

Keith Law: Yes. Lock them up.

Mike Trout: Another Mets SSS but gosh Dom Smith. I know you were always high on him – how good can he be?
Keith Law: He started this last year in limited time, so I’m more inclined to believe it – but I’ve also always been a believer. Funny how much grief he got after 1 HR in his first season in full-season ball. Since the start of 2019, he’s played 125 games and hit 18 homers with a .301/.371/.572 line, and he’s hitting lefties too. That’ll play.

OZ: For the guy who is going to vote Trump because of Biden’s 401K plan:  the 401K tax deduction is highly regressive, it gives a larger tax break to those with higher incomes (higher tax brackets) while providing a limited benefit to low and middle class savers.  Moving to a flat credit will provide a larger break and more incentive for middle class families.  If your taxes are raised by this plan its because you have a large income and can afford it.  However its unlikely to make much of a difference since Roth IRAs are taxed differently than 401Ks so savers can easily switch to contributing to a Roth IRA instead.
Keith Law: Well, there you go. I have voted for years in direct opposition to my own interests when it comes to tax rates, because 1) there is no reason on earth I need a tax break and 2) I am at least vaguely aware that there are other people on this planet besides me.

John: Do you think Derek fisher will have a teoscar style breakout? They share some (possibly superficial) similarities. Also, do you believe in teoscar’s breakout?
Keith Law: Fisher’s really interesting because his tools – plus power, 70 run – have long outstripped his production, and there hasn’t been a great reason why. It’s been true in the field and at the plate since he was at UVA. His 34 PA this year don’t tell us anything at all, but he’d at least be someone to watch if you are looking on the Jays roster for a player with the physical tools to be the sort of found money that Teoscar has been.

Kevin: Is trent grisham a center fielder now? A lot of people felt he couldn’t succeed there before this season.
Keith Law: I’d be shocked if he was able to play above-average defense in CF for a whole year.

Nolan: have any of these “I’m a leftist how could I possibly vote for Biden?” people ever heard of the Supreme Court? Noticed how many times RBG has been hospitalized recently?
Keith Law: The Supreme Court is where they play tennis at their local country clubs.

Ron: What would you say to disaffected leftists who see both Biden and Trump as horrendous candidates whose parties both actively stifle progressive policies? How long do we have to keep voting for the lesser of two-evils while deluding ourselves that next election will be different?
Keith Law: See all the answers above, and maybe consider the privilege in your self-definition as a “disaffected leftist” instead of someone whose livelihood or even existence is threatened by four more years of this shit.

Sedona: Is Domingo German a lock for the rotation next year?  Tanaka, Paxton, Happ should be FA’s.  Do you think Schmidt, Devei and Severino say otherwise?
Keith Law: I don’t think German or Severino are rotation locks for 2021.

Steven: I would say Bart’s OBP would have to be .340
Keith Law: If he does that, with his power and defense, he’s a star. But I’m not sure he gets there unless he continues to be a HBP magnet.

Dave: Whether or not it’s actually indicative, it’s clearly a small (and unreliable) sample size. That being said, does Bobby Dalbec have the  potential to be a big league regular?
Keith Law: I think he has a fringe regular ceiling but will likely be a good bench player.

Chamaco: The Athletic is running a special – $1 a month for 6 months.  Will that allow me to read everything you have written since starting there?
Keith Law: Yes. I don’t think it’s limited in any way.

Jason: Do you think josh lindblom could be good in relief? he clearly isnt cut for starting in MLB
Keith Law: Yes.

Luis Robert: Luis Robert is walking almost twice as often as he did in AAA. Is this SSS noise, or a positive step?
Keith Law: Everything. In. 2020. Is. A. Small. Sample.
Keith Law: If this were a regular season we wouldn’t even be at Memorial Day.

Chamaco: Any good reason why scouts can’t attend MLB games or alt. sites? Seems like there is enough room to socially distance even with players in the stands.
Keith Law: Certain owners didn’t want to spend the money to send scouts out to games, so they pushed for MLB to just ban them all.

Mike: Klaw, if Steve Cohen hired you to run the Mets, what are the top things you would tell him that needs to be done? Would you even have interest in a front office position?
Keith Law: I would actually leave a lot of people in place. They’ve drafted really well, and you’re seeing more of that this year and last year with Smith’s emergence, Conforto, Alonso, and perhaps Peterson (he should be better than this, the BB% is surprising). Their development on the pitching side has improved. Their two biggest problems have been injuries and major-league transactions.

Nelson: It’s a small sample obviously, but Braves fans have been cautiously optimistic about Austin Riley’s approach at the plate improving. Have you seen much of him this year? Quality of ABs seems vastly improved to my eyes, especially on the last month.
Keith Law: Tiny sample. And they’ve faced a lot of bad pitching in that span.

Tim KC: Hey Keith…I am afraid that all the rule changes for this experimental year is going convince Manfred to negotiate to keep changes and push for further (bad) changes next CBA negotiations (and greater possibility of strike/lock out).  (Only pro-universal DH.). Can you talk me off the ledge or is it legit concerns?
Keith Law: The union has to agree to all of it. Universal DH is a lock. Don’t see the union agreeing to many other things like 7-inning games, which would reduce the need for so many relievers.

Appa Yip Yip: Libertarianism in America also has to be put into the context of having one political party that does everything it can to make the state inept. Freedom from government interference makes a lot more sense when your government is constantly being kneecapped by the people responsible for running it.
Keith Law: Not unreasonable. Although I think there’s such a strong cultural “don’t tell me what to do” mentality here that overruns any sense of “I should care about others” that you might expect from a nation that so often likes to refer to itself as a Christian one.

Maddy: Looking at 2021 Prospect Rankings, how are you going to go about not getting a traditional season-long look at prospects? How many changes are we realistically going to see?
Keith Law: We’ll have a lot of graduations, the addition of this year’s draft, and possibly some stuff from fall baseball. That’ll make for fewer changes than in a normal year, and I’m assuming my team by team writeups will be shorter as a result of guys not playing, but there will at least be sufficient changes to make the top 100 pretty fresh.

Brent: Dylan Cease has been productive getting guys out without a high K-rate. Do you see that continuing or will he have to miss more bats to continue the success?
Keith Law: I think he needs a higher K rate, but I also think his K rate will improve.
Keith Law: Secondary stuff has shown at least flashes of being good enough to miss more bats.

Greg: Obviously small sample, but is Plesac a mid rotation guy long term?
Keith Law: Yeah, I’m buying that.

Mike Trout: I read “you’re running” as in running for office. Law 2024!
Keith Law: I don’t need to run – we’ve got progressive candidates running all over the place here in Delaware. I voted in our primary for Kyle Evans Gay, a progressive running to flip our State Senate seat (it’s been red for over 20 years); and Jess Scarane, the progressive candidate running against incumbent Senator Chris Coons. I also donated to help other progressive candidates for our state legislature, including Sarah McBride, Debbie Harrington, and Stephanie Barry.

Jason: Would the US Postal Service be in better shape if it wasn’t forced to prefund its retirees’ health benefits 75 years into the future or do they need to radically change the organization?
Keith Law: Pretty sure it’s the former.

Johnny Tuttle: I was exhilarated when players walked off the fields/courts/rinks. We need more of this leadership.

PS: Why do white people revere Jackie and MLK decades afterwards but hate LeBron now? Hang on, I think I’ve figured it out on my own.
Keith Law: Yep. Much easier to laud these guys well after the fact.

Kevin: Will the Mariners call up Taylor Trammell for some time this year? Would you? A Trammell/Kelenic/J-Rod outfield looks mightyyyyy nice in theory.
Keith Law: I would call Trammell and Kelenic up now, since it’s not like they’d be taking time away from anyone important for their futures.

Joe: What are your thoughts about contracting MILB teams? As a fan and taxpayer that built a new stadium for a team being eliminated, I’m irritated that rich MLB can’t afford to support these teams.
Keith Law: I have mixed feelings on this. Some markets just didn’t support their teams, and were more headaches for their parent clubs (due to travel, facilities, etc.) than anything else. The Appalachian League will barely be missed – nobody went to most of those games. And MLB should have more say in where MiLB franchises are located, for the convenience of moving players around, and to manage the reach of the game into better or larger markets. That said, eliminating all of short-season baseball is a terrible player development move, a penny wise and pound foolish decision that reduces jobs in baseball for players and staff alike.

Tracy: All this talk of uniting this country might backfire on the next administration. There will still be a large faction who will oppose any attempts that may help “them” (non-white people). Same reasons Biden should forget about “bi-partisanship.” It’s not going to happen. Do not waste time like Obama did. You get screwed in the end.
Keith Law: I read Ben Rhodes’ book The World As It Is, about his time in the Obama White House, and while I don’t think this was his intended message, it was the one I took away. You can’t work with people who don’t intend to work with you. Negotiating with someone who consistently acts in bad faith is far different from negotiating with someone who acts in good faith. You need a different strategy and different tactics.

Chaz: Have seen a few ups and many downs from Evan White this season. Obviously didn’t have the most experience heading into the season, but will he figure it out? Seems like a velocity problem ie: he can’t hit the hard stuff.
Keith Law: That was my take too. If you can’t hit velocity, this is not the sport for you.

The Ghost in Texas: What kind of prospect was kiner-falefa. SSS but the guy looks like he belongs has he changed anything to allow himself to be more productive than expected? And is he a starter on a winning club? (Not currently of course bc Tex is awful)
Keith Law: He didn’t start catching until he was 21, in his fourth season in pro ball, and without that he wasn’t really a prospect at all. Less than two years later, he was in the majors, so his window to appear on anyone’s lists was very short. This year is the first time (so far) he’s slugged .400+ at any stop at all, and it’s just because his BABIP has jumped 57 points. So, he wasn’t a prospect until he could catch, and his 2020 line looks like a pretty serious outlier at the plate. However, a C-IF like him has value if he can just get on base like IKF has, so I think he’s a useful player on a winning club, but not a starter.

kc: although it’s a weird season, pretty excited for the future of baseball with some of these young players
Keith Law: I am too.

Matthew: I’ve been reading these chats for too long because I remember when all the Cubs fans would come and disparage you for saying Junior Lake wasn’t a star when he was good for like 3 weeks one time.
Keith Law: Never forget. Junior Lake and Brett Jackson belong on some sort of All-Star Klaw Hates My Team’s Prospects roster.

Leftist: Your responses to leftists are emblematic of the Democratic Party’s inevitable downfall. Instead of attempting to reach out and expand the net of potential voters, you mock, ridicule, and use inconsistent logic (such as implying that Biden, who was instrumental in appointing Scalia and Thomas, has a clean record with SCOTUS). Instead of dismissing an entire movement as “privileged”, maybe consider that some of us are actually marginalized BIPOC and just don’t trust someone with as horrible a record as Biden.
Keith Law: I never implied Biden has a clean record with SCOTUS; that’s your inference, and a bad-faith one at that. I implied that I’d prefer Biden’s choice for SCOTUS, especially if it comes with a Democrat-controlled Senate, to Trump’s choice. We have clear data on the type of justice Trump would nominate, but those examples you give for Biden came 20+ years ago and were not his nominees. If you think that, as President, Biden is going to nominate the next Antonin Scalia, I’m not sure we can have a rational discussion on the subject.

JJ: Watched the Red Sox game with my dad the other night, and after a Bobby Dalbec strkeout, I casually mentioned to Dad that the Sox picked Dalbec one pick before Shane Bieber was chosen.  My dad went nuts, saying that Dave Dombrowski was an idiot who ruined the Red Sox.  My question:  at that point in the draft (4th round) do GMs have any idea of who they’re picking, or is it a 100% scouting director decision?
Keith Law: Scouting director decision – but also, Bieber wasn’t throwing anywhere near this hard when in college.

2022: Do you foresee a work stoppage in 2022? Starting to think the 2021 season might be the only full year we get until 2023 (and even 2021 could be impacted by COVID).
Keith Law: It’s a real concern, although I wonder if players would approach the talks differently after losing more than half of this season, and look for more guaranteed money even if it cuts off long-term upside. (Not saying that should be their strategy, just that it might be.)

Lyle: SSS and all but have you seen enough from Kyle Lewis to believe that he’s an everyday OF going forward?
Keith Law: SSS – and Lewis hasn’t had a huge run of health since college, either. I’m not rooting against him, but if you’re DiPoto, you have to consider that when planning the future of your roster. (Maybe that means Lewis ends up taking DH time to keep him playing, eventually.)

The Ghost in Texas: In normal times Spring Training would be going strong 6 months from now. What do u think the chances are ST 2021 will look anything similar to previous seasons. As someone that travels to Phoenix each year for a great weekend I beg u to not make me cry.
Keith Law: I would guess we get spring training but if we don’t have a vaccine it might be without fans, or with very few fans.

Nate: Hearing of any prospects at satellite sites that have made big jumps this year?
Keith Law: Yes, but I don’t take any of it seriously until they show it in games. Any team can claim their prospects look great when nobody else can watch them.

Jason: Is devin williams a future closer?
Keith Law: Yes.

Jason: As an author, where do you want to see most of your readers get your book: Amazon vs. supporting a local bookstore, ebook vs print vs audiobook or you don’t have a preference?
Keith Law: My incentives are all over the place. The more you pay for the book, the more I get in royalties against my advance, although it’s a small amount on any one book. But I also want more people to read my books, since it was so much work to write them. And I also want to be sure independent bookstores continue to exist, as I enjoy them so much as a consumer, and I believe they contribute to diversity in what gets published. So … buy my books wherever you want, in whatever format you want, and I will be grateful.
Keith Law: That’s all for this week. Thanks for reading and for all of your questions, as always. Stay safe, wear your masks, and make sure you’re registered to vote!

Filed Under: Uncategorized Tagged With:
→ September 9, 2020
→ By

A Memory Called Empire.

Arkady Martine, the pen name of Canadian historian AnnaLinden Weller, won the Hugo Award for Best Novel this year for her debut work A Memory Called Empire, a pretentious anachronism of a book that spends far too much time and energy on arcana like its invented language or obscure terms from poetry and semiotics, and too little on matters like plot or character development.

A Memory Called Empire takes us to the Teixcalaanli Empire, an interstellar domain at some unspecified date in the future, where we meet Mahit Dzmare, the brand-new ambassador from a remote outpost called Lsel. Lsel is independent, although its status is precarious, located in a gravity well near a significant jumpgate used for interstellar travel, and Mahit’s predecessor died under mysterious circumstances. Mahit has a neurological implant called an imago machine that contains the memories and at least some of the personality of her predecessor, although it’s from fifteen years earlier, before he left Lsel for Teixcalaan. The Empire is in the midst of several political crises – an incipient revolution, a possible invasion by an alien race, and a question around who will succeed the aging Emperor. When someone also tries to assassinate Mahit, it becomes clear that her predecessor’s death was no accident, and leads her into an intrigue that will ultimately go all the way up to the throne.

The political story here isn’t actually that compelling because Martine doesn’t earn it with the setup. There’s no reason for the reader to care about who is going to succeed the emperor, or whether the possible civil war will come to pass, because we have no idea what the current regime’s policies are, or whether the people are satisfied or even prospering. The individual personalities involved in the intrigue aren’t well-developed and there’s zero sense of whether we should root for any person or faction other than the obvious question of who killed Mahit’s predecessor and appears to now want her dead as well.

Martine commits a pair of cardinal sins common to bad science fiction or fantasy: She obsesses over fake vocabulary, making it look alien with unusual or unpronounceable letter combinations; and she wastes a ton of time on specifics about the culture or science being depicted. You can see the former in the names I listed above; most constructed words in this book have at least one x or z, often several, and have a general lack of vowels in places where they’d be welcome. The latter problem pops up all over the place in discussions of linguistics, orthography, and especially in the Teixcalaanli method of communicating through poetry or verse, much of which people in the Empire memorize as did so many educated Britons a few hundred years ago. This presents myriad problems, not the least of which is that nobody gives a shit about this stuff and it has less than nothing to do with the plot. It’s abysmal, punctuated by Martine’s use of obscure terms from poetry analysis (ekphrasis, phatic, encomiastic, and scansion among them). It’s also hard to believe that an advanced civilization would be this hung up on traditions that, in our history, fell out of fashion several centuries ago. There’s probably some sort of correlation between the development of faster-than-light travel and declining usage of anapests, although I haven’t seen hard evidence on that. The result is a book that feels pretentious from its title on through the resolution.

The imago-machines are the one truly novel element in A Memory Called Empire, but Mahit’s malfunctions early in the book and we go a few hundred pages before she gets it back again, so the exploration of what that merging of memories and personalities might mean is limited. It’s a clever idea, and the absence of the machine that Mahit expects to be there, and to help guide her through difficult situations in her new role as ambassador, is a significant plot point for much of the novel – but to us, it simply reduces Mahit to our level. The chance of real insight into what makes us us, and how the experiences and thoughts of others help change and define who we are, is largely lost by the malfunction of Mahit’s imago-machine, reducing the novel to a somewhat slow-paced spy story, and one where even Mahit is so two-dimensional that I couldn’t get concerned whether she figured out who killed her predecessor or even whether she survived.

Next up: I’m hosting a livestreamed event with Chuck Palahniuk on Friday, so after finishing his new book, The Invention of Sound, I’ve started his previous one, Adjustment Day.

Filed Under: Uncategorized Tagged With: , , ,