Yaleen: The Book of the River, The Book of the Stars, The Book of Being [Paperback]

Ian Watson (Author), Steven Baxter (Introduction)

Book Description

Publication Date: March 11, 2004

Yaleen, the river-woman, has always been involved with “the black current,” a strip of black running along the center of the river that separates the eastern bank from the mysterious western side. No one is really sure what the black current is, but the people sense that it is alive and powerful, as it allows only women into the river and brings madness and death to men who enter more than once. Longing to experience that freedom, Yaleen drinks of the black current and joins the River Guild. But when her brother Capsi discovers a way to cross to the forbidden western side, Yaleen is caught in the middle of a battle that could end the world.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"A joy to read, full of incident, humanity, and humour." -- Vector magazine

"If you think that all utopias are necessarily dull ... read this tale ... and be pleasantly surprised." -- The New York Times Book Review

"One of the most satisfyingly accessible of all Mr. Watson’s novels." -- The Times, London

About the Author

Ian Watson is one of Britain’s greatest science fiction writers. His books include Chaos Child, Deathhunter, The Embedding, The Great Escape, Miracle Visitors, and Mockymen.

Product Details

• Paperback: 736 pages
• Publisher: BenBella Books; 1st BenBella Books Ed edition (March 11, 2004)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1932100245
• ISBN-13: 978-1932100242
• Product Dimensions: 8.2 x 5.5 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #3,507,948 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Garrison Keiller is an Ian Watson fan and so am I!, April 23, 2004

By 

Glenn Yeffeth (Dallas, TX USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Yaleen: The Book of the River, The Book of the Stars, The Book of Being (Paperback)

Here's what Keiller had to say about Watson on April 20, 2004:

"It's the birthday of science fiction writer Ian Watson, born in St. Albans, England (1943). He grew up in England in the 1950s, at a time when realistic fiction about working-class British was becoming all the rage. Watson read novels by writers like Kingsley Amis, Alan Sillitoe, and Colin Wilson, but he grew tired of reading about depressed people living in
bleak towns. He started reading science fiction novels, and a few years later he started writing them.

His novel God's World (1979) is about a group of astronauts who set out to find heaven in a distant solar system. In The Jonah Kit (1975), the universe is discovered to be just a few microseconds old, and a whale is given the soul of a human. Watson's most popular books are those that comprise the Black River/Yaleen trilogy: The Book of the River (1984), The
Book of the Stars (1985) and The Book of Being (1985). In these books, a river divides two societies, one female-dominated and one male-dominated. Men from the male-dominated society who try to cross the river are driven insane."

You can find this at http://writersalmanac.publicradio.org/docs/04_04_19.htm and scroll down to April 20th, and get the audio.

I'll add my two cents:

Yaleen is a brilliant work that shouldn't be possible because it succeeds on so many levels at once - it's deeply thoughtful while being filled with action, it's profoundly feminist while deeply honest and fair, it's a true classic while being enormously fun to read.

1 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars first half pretty good, but then..., November 18, 2005

By 

Jim Molnar (Chicago, IL USA) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Yaleen: The Book of the River, The Book of the Stars, The Book of Being (Paperback)

This book really started out pretty good, nicely paced to our dawning understanding of an extraterrestrial colony and how their society developed, but then devolves into a shuddering mass of pseudo-cosmic poop at the end (actually, like the whole final third). It's very unsatisfying when an author schemes up a story that culminates in situations-that-cannot-be-described, and we the readers are left holding the bag of whatever-it-is. Fortunately Watson's "Mockymen" is much more even.