Perdido Street Station [Paperback]

China Mieville (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0330392891 | ISBN-13: 978-0330392891 | Publication Date: February 23, 2001

The metropolis of New Crobuzon sprawls at the centre of its own bewildering world. Humans and mutants and arcane races throng the gloom beneath its chimneys, where the rivers are sluggish with unnatural effluent, and factories and foundries pound into the night. For more than a thousand years, the parliament and its brutal militia have ruled over a vast array of workers and artists, spies, magicians, junkies and whores. Now a stranger has come, with a pocketful of gold and an impossible demand, and inadvertently something unthinkable is released. Soon the city is gripped by an alien terror - and the fate of millions depends on a clutch of outcasts on the run from lawmakers and crime-lords alike. The urban nightscape becomes a hunting ground as battles rage in the shadows of bizarre buildings. And a reckoning is due at the city's heart, in the vast edifice of Perdido Street Station. It is too late to escape. "A work of exhaustive inventiveness...superlative fantasy." - "Time Out". "A well-written, authentically engrossing adventure story, exuberantly full of hocus-pocus...Mieville does not disappoint." - "Daily Telegraph".

Editorial Reviews

Review

"[A] phantasmagoric masterpiece . . . The book left me breathless with admiration."
--BRIAN STABLEFORD
"China Mieville's cool style has conjured up a triumphantly macabre technoslip metropolis with a unique atmosphere of horror and fascination."
--PETER HAMILTON
"It is the best steampunk novel since Gibson and Sterling's."
--JOHN CLUTE

"From the Trade Paperback edition."

Product Details

• Paperback: 880 pages
• Publisher: Pan Macmillan (February 23, 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0330392891
• ISBN-13: 978-0330392891
• Product Dimensions: 7 x 4.4 x 2.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 14.4 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #569,904 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

China Miéville is the author of King Rat; Perdido Street Station, winner of the Arthur C. Clarke Award and the British Fantasy Award; The Scar, winner of the Locus Award and the British Fantasy Award; Iron Council, winner of the Locus Award and the Arthur C. Clarke Award; Looking for Jake, a collection of short stories; and Un Lun Dun, his New York Times bestselling book for younger readers. He lives and works in London.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Thoughtful and wonderfully strange!, September 27, 2010

By 

Layne C. Harris "hellroy" (Brooklyn, NY) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Perdido Street Station (Paperback)

My first reaction after reading Perdido Street Station is what a shame it would be to try to classify this book as fantasy, science fiction, steam-punk or horror. These categories seem too limiting for a book that breaks the boundaries of each. Mr. Mieville calls it "weird fiction", a throwback term to those pulp novel days when some of the greats like Lovecraft and Howard were penning their strange tales. Meiville fits in well with this crew, only with the modern edge you would expect from a writer in the digital age.

Call it whatever you want, its a ride you won't quickly forget. Mieville creates a world, so detailed from the sewers to tops of the the city government, that you are transported to a place that seems both foreign and familiar at the same time. There is a clear sense of caste, characters whose station in life is as complicated as the problem at hand (I won't spoil it). War, poverty, corruption, racism and all topics thrown into the mix; and while the social commentary is evident, it's easily digestible with the fantastic elements, unusual characters, and face-paced action.

It is the first of three books, but feels solid as a standalone novel, so no fear of falling into a cliffhanger and committing you to the series (although after reading this, you will rush to buy The Scar).

Enjoy!

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Perfect Brew of Fantasy, Steam-Punk, Sci-Fi and Horror, September 21, 2011

By 

Scott L. Moore (Arlington, VA USA) - See all my reviews
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Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Perdido Street Station (Paperback)

I have to say I liked Mieville's writng as much as I liked his story. His writing is rich, detailed and sufficiently poetic. Note his near perfect construction of a 120 word sentence around page 78 concerning Perdido Street station itself. Its interesting to note that despite the many editors injunctions (concerning 'said bookisms') that a writer should never hiss in his dialogue, Mr Mieville goes ahead hisses a trillion times anyway. I guess no fiction writing rule is absolute. The story is first rate, if you like Fantasy, Steam-Punk, Sci-Fi and especially Horror you'll love it. The characters are well developed and the story has plenty of plot twists, rich world-detail, bizarre creatures, politics, criminals, love storiness, evil military intel types, chimera, cool low-tech, drugs, tragedy and dream-killing monsters. Yeah, its kind of dark but not pure dark as it lets the reader, in so far as they can identify with the characters, do a fair bit of soul searching.

3 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Not Free SF Reader, September 2, 2007

By 

Blue Tyson "- Research Finished" (Legion clubhouse) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Perdido Street Station (Paperback)

What a wonderful surprise this book was, seemingly out of nowhere. Take a politically oppressive Victorian type setting. Populate it with multiple races including humans who have to try and get along and work together.

Throw in a steampunk-magic punishment system, for a start.

Then, an adventure and terrifying threat via demons, drugs, and monstrous beasts.

A fabulous world has been built here, with its own mythology.