Michael Barnes
I read, enjoyed and noted Hiron Ennes debut Leech and looked forward to reading their next work. The Works of Vermin is even more impressive than Leech. It’s a Weird City novel and as such as much a character as our protagonists and antagonists Niall Harrison at Locus puts it better than I could… "Tiliard, “a grand bridge of a city,” well-built across a gorge through which flows an acid and strange river that is referred to as a “liquid mind.” Tiliard is many-levelled, filled with factories and canals and fields of carnivorous tulips; its original architecture was concentric, but it has been etched by history. “When it cannot grow out, it settles for down, when it cannot crawl skyward, it turns inward.” It has a Sommelier Laureate and a Seamstress Laureate and a Dramaturge Laureate. It is a place where the high arts – ballet and poetry and portraiture and most of all opera – are not only revered but are actually part of the political infrastructure. Dances are also duels, or executions. It is a melange of Old Europe at its most decadent, architecture with a touch of Gaudi, court intrigue perhaps by Venice, performing arts by Germany. It has Rues as well as Streets. It is also a place infested with giant and/or mutated insects and other creatures, a place “warped” by “bioalchemic” incidents, and where weaponised perfumery is sufficiently advanced as to be indistinguishable from magic. It is an old city, in an old world, but given to frequent revolutions. It is ruled by a Chancellor and his Marshal, tyrants who fancy themselves patrons, perhaps philosophers; it is serviced by exterminators and sex workers and labourers. It is an intoxicating place to spend time, but its streets ring with echoes".
But its characters are no less complex and fascinating. Guy Moulène works as pest exterminator, hunting a giant bug that secretes ecdytoxin, which warps (horrifyingly, exquisitely) everything it comes into contact with, organic or non-organic – and there are far too many people who see the potential in that. Guy also does sex work on the side all this hustle to keep his feral younger sister Tyro from sign work contracts which for the underclass, the exploited are terrible. Another character Asteritha Vost (Aster), to call her a perfumer is to undersell think alchemist, wizard, and personal stylist. Her past saw her lungs were badly damaged by a chemical weapon when she was a child, in the city’s last civil war. Aster is sent to ‘acquire’ a dancer for her employer and patron, the Marshal (think head of the military under a dictator; he’s not the dictator, but he is not someone you want to fuck with). By the end, the city is on fire, and neither Guy nor Aster’s stories are anything like what you thought they’d be at the beginning.
Throw in toxins of the bizarre insects produced by the river are turned into perfumes that give gifts to the wearer: the ability to control people’s actions, or maybe just a more attractive smile. The devastating building-deforming toxins used in previous intra-regime battles have changed entire areas of the city, and led to artistic movements. Then there’s the opera, where the killings on stage are very real, with those who displease the ruling chancellor being put to death to serve the cause of theatre.
Around these wild concepts, Ennes builds a story of deep satire, constantly hilariously yet deeply disturbing and utterly ruthless about what it says about the ruling classes. This is a city whose constant changes of authoritarian regime are named as art movements: from neo-revivalism to extemporism. The centrepiece for this art-obsessed city is the opera, where as I noted above revolutions are powered by stage performances that portray real killings. It’s this mix of the utterly pretentious with the shockingly brutal that powers some of the outrageous wit and whimsical grotesqueness of the satire, sort of if Waugh’s Vile Bodies was crossed with 1984.
I realise this is too long and few if any will read it but sufficient to say when I read, about three quarters through the book, Ennes provides an astonishing pulls off one of the greatest structural narrative twists, which made me immediately lock myself into to re-read the book to pick up on those parts I had red and overlook pointing to this change. On tip from Sia at Every Book A doorway suggest "you should pay attention to character names, to people’s titles, and that this is a story that lavishes rewards on those who take heed of every detail"
Summing up I agree with Neil Harrison at Locus "Filled with some of the most twisted, inventive worldbuilding you’ll ever see and a perfectly poised balance of ruthless mockery of the decadent and corrupt with a well of deep humanity for those beneath them, The Works of Vermin is not just a landmark novel of dystopian satire but one of the great speculative works of the twenty-first century".
I read, enjoyed and noted Hiron Ennes debut Leech and looked forward to reading their next work. The Works of Vermin is even more impressive than Leech. It’s a Weird City novel and as such as much a character as our protagonists and antagonists Niall Harrison at Locus puts it better than I could… "Tiliard, “a grand bridge of a city,” well-built across a gorge through which flows an acid and strange river that is referred to as a “liquid mind.” Tiliard is many-levelled, filled with factories and canals and fields of carnivorous tulips; its original architecture was concentric, but it has been etched by history. “When it cannot grow out, it settles for down, when it cannot crawl skyward, it turns inward.” It has a Sommelier Laureate and a Seamstress Laureate and a Dramaturge Laureate. It is a place where the high arts – ballet and poetry and portraiture and most of all opera – are not only revered but are actually part of the political infrastructure. Dances are also duels, or executions. It is a melange of Old Europe at its most decadent, architecture with a touch of Gaudi, court intrigue perhaps by Venice, performing arts by Germany. It has Rues as well as Streets. It is also a place infested with giant and/or mutated insects and other creatures, a place “warped” by “bioalchemic” incidents, and where weaponised perfumery is sufficiently advanced as to be indistinguishable from magic. It is an old city, in an old world, but given to frequent revolutions. It is ruled by a Chancellor and his Marshal, tyrants who fancy themselves patrons, perhaps philosophers; it is serviced by exterminators and sex workers and labourers. It is an intoxicating place to spend time, but its streets ring with echoes".
But its characters are no less complex and fascinating. Guy Moulène works as pest exterminator, hunting a giant bug that secretes ecdytoxin, which warps (horrifyingly, exquisitely) everything it comes into contact with, organic or non-organic – and there are far too many people who see the potential in that. Guy also does sex work on the side all this hustle to keep his feral younger sister Tyro from sign work contracts which for the underclass, the exploited are terrible. Another character Asteritha Vost (Aster), to call her a perfumer is to undersell think alchemist, wizard, and personal stylist. Her past saw her lungs were badly damaged by a chemical weapon when she was a child, in the city’s last civil war. Aster is sent to ‘acquire’ a dancer for her employer and patron, the Marshal (think head of the military under a dictator; he’s not the dictator, but he is not someone you want to fuck with). By the end, the city is on fire, and neither Guy nor Aster’s stories are anything like what you thought they’d be at the beginning.
Throw in toxins of the bizarre insects produced by the river are turned into perfumes that give gifts to the wearer: the ability to control people’s actions, or maybe just a more attractive smile. The devastating building-deforming toxins used in previous intra-regime battles have changed entire areas of the city, and led to artistic movements. Then there’s the opera, where the killings on stage are very real, with those who displease the ruling chancellor being put to death to serve the cause of theatre.
Around these wild concepts, Ennes builds a story of deep satire, constantly hilariously yet deeply disturbing and utterly ruthless about what it says about the ruling classes. This is a city whose constant changes of authoritarian regime are named as art movements: from neo-revivalism to extemporism. The centrepiece for this art-obsessed city is the opera, where as I noted above revolutions are powered by stage performances that portray real killings. It’s this mix of the utterly pretentious with the shockingly brutal that powers some of the outrageous wit and whimsical grotesqueness of the satire, sort of if Waugh’s Vile Bodies was crossed with 1984.
I realise this is too long and few if any will read it but sufficient to say when I read, about three quarters through the book, Ennes provides an astonishing pulls off one of the greatest structural narrative twists, which made me immediately lock myself into to re-read the book to pick up on those parts I had red and overlook pointing to this change. On tip from Sia at Every Book A doorway suggest "you should pay attention to character names, to people’s titles, and that this is a story that lavishes rewards on those who take heed of every detail"
Summing up I agree with Neil Harrison at Locus "Filled with some of the most twisted, inventive worldbuilding you’ll ever see and a perfectly poised balance of ruthless mockery of the decadent and corrupt with a well of deep humanity for those beneath them, The Works of Vermin is not just a landmark novel of dystopian satire but one of the great speculative works of the twenty-first century".