John Birmingham has followed up his highly-successful Axis of Time trilogy of military thrillers with another “ripper yarn” novel, Without Warning: America is Gone. It’s a good read, but not as good as it could be.

Like Axis of Time, which posited a 21st-century naval task force suddenly finding itself at the Battle of Midway and the final volume of which I reviewed earlier, Without Warning is alternative history. One the eve of the 2003 Iraq War, an unexplained energy field obliterates all human life across most of the United States. As the world realises the last remaining superpower is gone, the novel tracks the political and military conflicts which emerge through the eyes of characters ranging from a US general at Guantanamo Bay to a female assassin working undercover in France.

My perceptions of Without Warning are coloured by Katie Harris’ comment that my recent Gonzo Twitter effort was like Hemingway. I still haven’t read any Hemingway, but I’ve been thinking about writing styles. In a previous review I described William Gibson’s noir prose as “a richly textured cabernet merlot” in comparison with the “slab of VB” simplicity of Adrian d’Hagé’s action thriller. Birmingham’s writing is another slab of VB. It’s a fast, easy read without too many difficult words or complex metaphors to slow you down.

Of course there’s plenty of military and other boy’s toys brand names and train-spotter facts.

Lee… opened the throttles on the big boat’s massive Caterpillar engines, unleashing a stampede from the 1492 horsepower contained in each one…

Three identified shooters there. All white males, dressed casually, armed with FAMAS G2 assault rifles…

She opened the oversized hold-all and pulled out the artillery. The pistol-grip Benelli shotgun came first: customised 12-gauge, extended mag with a side-saddle shell carrier. Next was the deal closer, a specially cut-down Heckler & Koch UMP .45, with an extended box mag housing thirty rounds of .40-calibre Smith & Wesson goodness. She slung the HK over her shoulder. It was a large, excessive arsenal for just one young lady to haul around…

Yeah, I know. Chicks with guns are hawt, and there’s plenty to keep the lads moist. Who’ll be cast for the movie, I wonder?

Occasionally I was forced to look up some piece of military jargon or other to grasp the sense of a scene. Irritating to me, but Birmingham’s fans would reckon that just brands me a n00b.

I agree with the estimable Duncan Riley’s review too (interestingly the first Google hit for the book after the Amazon listing):

The French stream, except nearly right at the end of the novel, was perhaps the worst character development ever delivered by Birmingham…

The ending wasn’t great, and set the story up for a sequel which Birmingham is already talking about writing. It’s a BIG book for a Birmingham novel, and an awful lot to cover, and the need to flip ahead into the future is understandable, but it didn’t conclude strongly.

Still, it is what it is. A thrill for the fans. They won’t be disappointed.

Don’t get annoyed by the about-the-author blurb though.

John Birmingham refuses to build a website, but he has three blogs…

Um, and what is a blog if not a website? Fuckwits.

I’ve just had the most amazing conversation about the man in the photograph. C Scott Young was, according to Mark Pesce, “the very, very first VRML designer. What he did — with no tools and for (literally) no money — changed the world.” And Mark should know, because he invented VRML.

Alas, Scott died a few days ago after a long, long battle with diabetes-related illnesses. He doesn’t have his own Wikipedia entry yet, but you can get hints of his life in Mark’s personal blog post and the memorial site.

Tonight’s conversation was remarkable because it led me to re-read a somewhat influential Wired article from 1995, Technopagans: May the astral plane be reborn in cyberspace. When that article hit the streets I’d just moved to Sydney in the first dot.com boom. Mark Pesce was a minor superstar in the Internet firmament for inventing leading-edge virtual reality technology — he was, almost literally, creating the world of William Gibson‘s Neuromancer.

That article combined what I knew of Mark’s technical work with religious and spiritual ideas which were at least somewhat related to my own. I remember thinking, “I’d very much like to meet this man one day.” That’s why I was so well pleased when I finally did meet him last December.

Mark, I am truly sad that you’ve lost a good friend — especially since there was so much complex news for you this week. As you say, “Remembering is the only gift we living can give those gone before us.”

One of my six special vices is reading thrillers, often very trashy ones. So it was an especially wonderful pleasure to read two thrillers in a week — from opposite ends of the trashiness spectrum.

Adrian D’Hagé‘s action thriller The Beijing Conspiracy is like demolishing a slab of VB with mates on a Friday night. It’s loud, fast-paced and perhaps a little clichéd. But it’s great fun and you know you’ll be back for more. I ploughed through it in less than 24 hours.

By comparison, William Gibson‘s Spook Country is like a richly textured cabernet merlot. Take it slowly to appreciate the subtleties, and your time will be generously rewarded.

He was Brigadier Adrian d’Hagé when I first encountered him as Head of Defence Public Relations in Canberra. Him, not me. I was working for ABC Radio in Adelaide. I didn’t realise then that he’s a Genuine War Hero, recipient of the Military Cross for something he did in Vietnam. He subsequently headed up defence planning for the Sydney Olympics, became a research scholar in Arab & Islamic Studies, a wine scientist and a ski instructor. Oh, and a best-selling novelist. A complete failure in life.

His first novel The Omega Scroll wasn’t just a beautifully-timed entry into the market, following Mr Brown’s over-rated thing about secret scrolls, it was a fine read. This second novel is just as good — and just as perfectly timed.

The Beijing Conspiracy concerns a terrorist plot planned for the 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing. It involves Muslims (non-Arab), biological warfare, corrupt politicians (American), an independently-minded scientist (Australian, female), a hunky secret agent (American, FBI, male), a love interest (see preceding) and everything you could pack into a novel like this. I don’t think I’ll be giving away too much if I mention that Sydney is the target of one particularly creative terrorist operation.

I suspect d’Hagé puts his own thoughts into the mouths of his characters — in this book anger with the corruption of of American politicians regarding the Iraq War, in The Omega Scroll anger with Vatican corruption. But I’m sure he’d tell me that this is just a work of fiction. After all, the evil American corporation connected to the Vice-President is a Big Pharma outfit called Halliwell, which is nothing even remotely like Halliburton.

The Beijing Conspiracy Is A Great Read. Yes, structured absolutely according to the genre, but that’s the point. Can’t wait for a movie.

Now William Gibson…

What can you say about the Grand Master of Cyberpunk that hasn’t already been said? Nothing. So I won’t bother trying.

I only need to say that Spook Country is a worthy addition to the Master’s bibliography, and quote a few words from the Wired interview.

Like Pattern Recognition before it, William Gibson’s eighth novel, Spook Country, feels like dictation from the zeitgeist. Its “illegal facilitators,” non-existent magazines, terrorists, pirates, junkies, mad art dealers, and WMD are all woven together into something more unsettling and blackly comic than anything he’s done before.

Buy this book, and then make sure you have plenty of uninterrupted time to read it.

Bonus links:

• William Gibson’s official website, including an interview about Spook Country and blog
• A Tale of Two Thrillers, my previous double review