{"id":3645,"date":"2022-05-02T10:41:54","date_gmt":"2022-05-02T10:41:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/courses.bowdoin.edu\/world-science-fiction\/?p=3645"},"modified":"2022-05-02T10:41:54","modified_gmt":"2022-05-02T10:41:54","slug":"somtow-sucharitkul-starship-haiku-1981","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/courses.bowdoin.edu\/world-science-fiction\/wsf\/somtow-sucharitkul-starship-haiku-1981\/","title":{"rendered":"Somtow Sucharitkul, <em>Starship &amp; Haiku<\/em> (1981)"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"x_p1 x_elementToProof\"><span class=\"x_s1 x_elementToProof\"><strong><br \/>\n<img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-3647 aligncenter\" src=\"https:\/\/courses.bowdoin.edu\/world-science-fiction\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/312\/2022\/05\/strshphkjj1981.jpeg\" alt=\"\" width=\"379\" height=\"640\" srcset=\"https:\/\/courses.bowdoin.edu\/world-science-fiction\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/312\/2022\/05\/strshphkjj1981.jpeg 379w, https:\/\/courses.bowdoin.edu\/world-science-fiction\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/312\/2022\/05\/strshphkjj1981-178x300.jpeg 178w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 379px) 100vw, 379px\" \/><br \/>\n(Post by River Patterson)<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Why did I choose this book?<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"x_p1\"><span class=\"x_s1\">I wasn\u2019t sure what I wanted to read about before entering the bookstore. I asked the store owner for a recommendation of a book that corresponded with some of my personal interests and was given: Starship &amp; Haiku. I decided to stick with it partly because the cover was purple and featured a grey whale.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"x_p1\"><span class=\"x_s1\">What\u2019s it about?<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"x_p1\"><span class=\"x_s1\">After global strife causes the moon to shatters into pieces, America falls into civil war.<span class=\"x_Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0\u00a0<\/span>Hawaii is ruled by three kings who command \u201cgangs of wild people\u201d (45) to kill the island\u2019s inhabitants. The Japanese government, with polluted waters and no fish, enables mass suicide. The world is falling apart. Ryoko Ishida, the daughter of a Japanese government official, travels to Hawaii with her father and discovers she can speak to whales. On her trip, Ryoko meets Josh Nakamura, a Japanese-American boy who cares for \u201cstranges\u201d (36), mutants stricken by plague. Ryoko\u2019s visit prompts Josh to leave war-torn Hawaii for Japan. Contemporaneously, Ryoko\u2019s father works on a spaceships meant to rescue humans from the dying earth. On her voyage home, human Ryoko is impregnated by a whale. (70) Her offspring may have the potential to save the world\u2026<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"x_p1\"><span class=\"x_s1\">What kind of SF?<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"x_p1\"><span class=\"x_s1\">The story is somewhere between apocalyptic and post-apocalyptic. Could fall into underwater SF category, or whale SF. Additionally, pre-cogs.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"x_p1\"><span class=\"x_s1\">What\u2019s good?<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"x_p1\"><span class=\"x_s1\">There are a lot of cryptic haikus. In part set in 2022, is serendipitously and scarily<span class=\"x_Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0\u00a0<\/span>pertinent. The writing ambience is beautiful, dark and poetic.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"x_p1\"><span class=\"x_s1\">Do I recommend it?<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"x_p1\"><span class=\"x_s1\">If you like 80s trippy whale melodrama, but not really. While I have developed a small love for this book, it is pretty intense and complicated. The plot line is too layered. The main characters are not that interesting and their relationship is a little awkward. The whale pregnancy thing is also odd.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"x_p1\"><span class=\"x_s1\">Sucharitkul, Somtow. <em>Starship &amp; Haiku<\/em>. Timescape Books, 1981.<span class=\"x_Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>(RIver Patterson)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>(Post by River Patterson) Why did I choose this book? I wasn\u2019t sure what I wanted to read about before entering the bookstore. I asked the store owner for a recommendation of a book that corresponded with some of my personal interests and was given: Starship &amp; Haiku. I decided to stick with it partly [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":134,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3645","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-wsf"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.bowdoin.edu\/world-science-fiction\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3645","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.bowdoin.edu\/world-science-fiction\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.bowdoin.edu\/world-science-fiction\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/courses.bowdoin.edu\/world-science-fiction\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/134"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/courses.bowdoin.edu\/world-science-fiction\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3645"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/courses.bowdoin.edu\/world-science-fiction\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3645\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.bowdoin.edu\/world-science-fiction\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3645"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/courses.bowdoin.edu\/world-science-fiction\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3645"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/courses.bowdoin.edu\/world-science-fiction\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3645"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}