Science Fiction & Fantasy Award Winning Book Group discussion

Welcome to the discussion for April 2023 - Only Forward by Michael Marshall Smith. We are reading it because it won the Philip K. Dick Award in 2000.

I chose it (as my first pick) because I have never heard of it, and none of my friends have read it. It sounds quirky. It also won the August Derlith Award in 1995. The Hugo Award in 2000 went to A Deepness in the Sky by Vernor Vinge.

Enjoy! As always, beware that there might be spoilers in the thread discussing the book.

I've never heard of it either. I read the synopsis and immediately thought of Synners which makes sense since I guess they're both considered cyberpunk. I'm interested to see if this one is as weird/crazy.

Looks like we're all going into this one blind - I've never heard of it either!

This is certainly a departure from the serious reads we've been doing. It reminds me of Douglas Adams with Alan Dean Foster? Not completely goofy, but definitely out there.

Well, this is different.

I haven't started yet, but finding your comments intriguing.... :D

Starts out as Douglas Adams and transitions into noir and - as another reader put it - a "hallucinatory nightmare". I really liked it. Fast paced. Great world-building.

I've started and I'm really enjoying it!

Is "absudist noir" a category? That's how this book feels to me!

Is "absudist noir" a category?

LOL. I don't know. But it fits. Very unexpected.

I've got as far as 'Diligenz'. And it made met think: (view spoiler)[isn't everyone in tech dosed to the eyeballs on adderall so they can work harder? And it isn't viewed as much of a scandal by anyone?
I suddenly felt like this book was actually very innocent and sweet. :D (hide spoiler)]

Edited to add: (view spoiler)[OK, now I've got to the bit where it's made of human brains and I can see why that would be more disturbing! :D (hide spoiler)]

Really liked the first two thirds to three quarters of this one but I thought it tailed off at the end.
When I was reading the beginning I thought it felt like a cross between Terry Pratchett and Kurt Vonnegut. Douglas Adams might be a better fit but I haven't read his stuff yet.
Like I said I didn't like the end as much as the rest of the book. It felt too disjointed and almost like I was reading a different book. Overall it was a good read and it took me by surprise.

I agree about the end - in murder mysteries there's always a denouement at the end where the detective explains everything to the cast. It felt a bit like that, as if the final act was just explaining everything behind the rest of the book, instead of making it part of the story.

I agree with both of you - the end of the book was not my favorite part of the book. I actually went back a bit at the 90% mark to see if I missed something. It was just so dark and abrupt. But the revelations about the creation of Jeamland, and Alkland's story were interesting. Nick, you're right - that it was just explaining everything.

On the other hand, the more I think about it, the more I enjoyed it. Some of the parts in Jeamland were a bit of a drag. At that point everything was too "lol, so random", if you know what I mean.

But I thought the first half in The City was interesting and funny, and I thought the last act where we learn everything was actually very moving.

I don't think it counts as science fiction at all though. This is definitely fantasy to me.