Book Review: TRIGGERS by Robert J. Sawyer

Robert J. Sawyer is a hell of an idea man. Every time he puts a book out, without fail, it quickly makes it way to the top of my ‘to read’ pile. Because, hell, who doesn’t want to read about the Internet gaining sentience, or first contact with an extra-terrestrial civilization or a parallel world where Neanderthal man survived to become the dominant life form? Those are all really interesting premises on which to base a story.

In TRIGGERS the United States is under assault by a terrorist organization that has successfully carried out a number of attacks on American soil. When President Seth Jerrison is shot delivering a speech in front of the Lincoln memorial it seems as if there is nothing that can be done to stem the tide of destruction and misery.

Led by Secret Service agent Sue Dawson, Jerrison is rushed to a nearby hospital for treatment. As a team of surgeons struggles to save his life a powerful bomb destroys the White House and releases an EMP which scrabbles the machinery of Dr. Ranjip Singh, who is attempting to provide relief to patients suffering from traumatic memories.

But there is an unexpected side effect. Singh’s equipment has linked 24 minds within the hospital to one another, including Jerrison’s. These 24 people can now read the memories of one other person caught in the blast radius.

Now, with time running out, Dawson must figure who has access to the President’s memories and how she can stop them from revealing American’s deadly planned response to the terrorist threat.

Looking back over his bibliography Sawyer pushes out nearly a book a year. That’s a pretty impressive output when you consider that it takes GRRM the better part of a decade to cough up a single novel. But as we all learnt in primary school quantity doesn’t always add to quality and even the most prodigious idea-generating machine will sometimes trip up on the execution of it.

Unfortunately TRIGGERS is one of those times.

The big problem underlying TRIGGERS is that it doesn’t really know what it’s supposed to be about. The book’s lack of identifiable personality drags it down as it lurches unsteadily between genre. Is it about the sci-fi hook or the political intrigue? Are we supposed to be paying attention to the social commentary or the mystery/whodunnit angle that plays such a visible part in the first half of the book?  It feels like Sawyer took a mixed bag of literary tropes and just threw them up on the page in whatever order he felt was most appropriate. Rather than create a single cohesive storyline that blends and mixes the motifs of the various genre it feels more like a Frankensteinian monster, with the central narrative marred by the strange limbs that have been awkwardly grafted onto its body.  

This genre excess contributes to the feeling that the book could have used a serious rethink on its structure. With so many distinct story hooks bubbling up and demanding the reader’s attention every plot development feels truncated as Sawyer trundles along to the get to the next beat.

I feel that so much of what bothers me about the nature of the story could have been solved if the story had been stretched out for a couple novels. For example the subplot where Dawson has to figure out who’s reading the President’s memories is the dominant story of the first half of the book, more so than any other plot point. When that storyline comes to a screeching halt halfway I had to flail around for a bit until I figured out where Sawyer was going to take the story now.

In fact, at times it feels like even Sawyer isn’t sure where the narrative is going as he seemingly abandons telling a story to just check in on how his characters’ are coping with the memory linkages. The discovery of who is reading the president’s mind feels like it would have been a natural ending point for the book. I think if Sawyer had made the decision to wrap the story there it would have given him the opportunity to flesh out other subplots, like the simmering geo-political tension and possible traitor within the Secret Service, that are currently given short shift.

Another failing of TRIGGERS is that it feels like a very dry, emotionally reserved story. Despite the rich subject matter Sawyer maintains a scientist’s detachment throughout the book, delving into a number of complex and diverse characters but somehow imbuing them all with the same objective authorial voice. I don’t get a sense of distinct characters or personalities, but instead I’m treated to a series of interchangeable ciphers who’s only distinguishing features is the amount of knowledge they have at their fingertips.

A hallmark of Sawyer’s writing is his willingness to editorialize and educate throughout. Like any good scientist he knows the importance of peppering the lecture with a couple interesting facts to keep the audience paying attention. As an author Sawyer has always worked to make sure his subjects are impeccably researched and chronicled as faithfully as possible. But there’s an incongruity within TRIGGERS, a feeling that despite all the historical accuracy he may have stuttered on some of the practical aspects of his story.

I never really feel like Sawyer has a grasp on how the world would react to the possible assassination of an American President and the destruction of the White House. Once Jerrison is taken to the hospital the Secret Service seems awfully laissez-faire about security measures. Despite a series of incidents that, in the real world, would result in a security shit storm that sees Secret Service agents placed around the President a hundred feet deep, people in TRIGGERS seem to come and go as they please. Hell, hospital security guards even get to keep their sidearms, despite the fact that there’s clearly an ongoing conspiracy to destabilize the American government.  The gravity of the situation, the fundamental change of the American status quo is glossed over or completely overshadowed by smaller events. Key characters behave in a manner that is at odds with the events that are taking place around them. Their priorities never match up with their personalities.

I always enjoy reading Robert J. Sawyer. Yes, his books are more intellectual exercise than gripping sci-fi drama, but he has struck a balance that works for him and most times works for me as well. Unfortunately this time around I feel the normally rock steady author has delivered an unfocused and uneven final product. I look forward to his next book and hope that he can recommandeer the style and presence that has served him so well in the past.  

Book Review - WONDER by Robert J. Sawyer

Webmind, the world’s first naturally occurring artificial intelligence has just survived an assassination attempt on his life by WATCH, the US agency responsible for overseeing the nation’s Internet security. Now, wary of the tenuous nature of his own existence, Webmind must convince the people of the world of the purity of his intentions and stave off another attempt at his life.

Of course none of this would be possible without Caitlin Decter, a 15 year old formerly sightless teenager, who’s experimental vision is directly responsible for helping Webmind come into being. Caitlin is Webmind’s human face to the world, appearing on television and helping the A.I. plead his case in front of the United Nations.

But the world is still afraid of what Webmind can do. Despite his attempts at increasing the net happiness of humanity there are forces at work within the government that won’t rest until Webmind is destroyed. It’s a race against time, man versus machine in struggle that could determine the fate of humanity.

I can’t review WONDER, by Robert J. Sawyer, the third instalment of his WWW trilogy, without first talking about THE WEALTHY BARBER. WB was a Canadian financial self help book from the mid 90s that attempted to teach money sense to readers through a novel length allegory. Roy, a well to do barber, would have friendly chats with his customers and in doing so would reveal essential truths about the nature of finance to them over the course of his tales. High art it wasn’t, but it got the job done.

WONDER is the WEALTHY BARBER of artificial intelligence. Sawyer does a great job at advancing genuinely interesting theories and chatting knowledgably about what the emergence of A.I. could look like, but the plot of his book is paper thin (yukyuk) and its only purpose is to serve as backdrop for his ideas. I want to be really clear about this. WONDER is a captivating read, but for all the wrong reasons.

Its more education than entertainment, and for a novel that purports to be a work of fiction, that’s a problem for me.

The plot is lacking. There’s never any real sense of the story’s stakes, no escalating conflicts to provide grist for the reader’s mill. Instead the audience is treated to a series of moderately threatening obstacles which Webmind hurdles with ease every time. The story’s prime antagonist, Peyton Hume, is a paranoid military scientist who never manages to present a credible threat to the worldwide A.I. Instead he’s reduced to skulking in corners, making dire prognostications and wholly unable to meaningfully follow through on any of his plans.

This is a trait of many of Sawyer’s characters. Aside from Caitlin most of the characters in the novel are completely two dimensional. They are, for all intents and purposes, straw men, being of no real substance, no goals and objectives of their own and who’s only function is to parrot the opinions and theories of the author.

How else do you explain the wildly unnecessary chapter about the validity of atheism, a recurring hobby horse of Sawyer’s, but one that has no real bearing on the subject matter at hand.

The best character seem to have a life and essence all their own, but Sawyer treats his characters like chess pieces, moving them casually from point a to b, in order to ensure they complete their given tasks and are in place for the novel's climax. And once these characters do fulfill their roles they are simply plucked from the board, never to be heard from again and their plot lines never satisfactorily resolved.

In fact WONDER reads a lot like an essay at times. At the beginning of a chapter Sawyer advances a hypothesis on a subject that is important to him and then spends subsequent paragraphs proving his thesis. It’s an interesting approach for students of the subject, but not one that lends itself well crafting a suspenseful story.

And that’s the problem with WONDER in a nutshell. It’s not a story, it’s a thought exercise masquerading as fiction and should be treated as such.

I’m not doubting Sawyer’s bonafides and extensive knowledge of his subject matter. But he’s trying to have his cake and eat it too. He spends too much time serving the rational, dispassionate scientist and not enough catering to the needs of the wild and unpredictable prose writer.

Character development, escalating tension and conflict are all essential elements of nearly any work of fiction and sadly they just aren’t present here.

I have a soft spot for Sawyer, I enjoy reading about the bits of Canadiana he sprinkles into his work and his books are always interesting and well thought out. I always take something away from them.

But just because THE WEALTHY BARBER taught me about the value of putting 10 per cent of my paycheque into an RRSP doesn’t mean it’s a good book, just an informative one.