A Son of the Rock

Angry Robot, 2021, 267 p. Reviewed for ParSec 1.

Science Fiction is a broad church, which is arguably at its best when it examines the impact of technology on humans and their relationships. Composite Creatures is such a novel with its speculative background sketched out early on. Among other creatures, birds have vanished – in her youth our narrator’s mother made a collection of feathers in memento. Pollution is rife, even garden soil and plants are contaminated. The NHS is more or less gone, signed up with a private institute to make up for lack of funding; apparently in response to an endemic disease known as the greying. (Reviewer’s note: that institute at present would have to have enormous pockets; but this NHS appears much reduced in scale and ambition.) Technology is being used to synthesise or simulate versions of natural organisms. There are also hints that human fertility has been compromised.

The story is narrated by Norah, a woman in her thirties. She has entered a relationship with Art, a somewhat older writer of forgettable crime novels, who has emigrated from the US to live with her. Theirs is a curiously distanced liaison, little or no passion is displayed, even after Art proposes to her; it is certainly not a conventional romantic relationship. Norah has been in love before, though. There are frequent mentions of Luke, an ex-boyfriend. Her friendships with Aubrey, Eleanor and Rosa are also often in her thoughts. In her office job at Stokers, Norah tells us she is efficient but keeps her head down. (This aspect of the novel was a touch unconvincing. The interpersonal dynamics shown seemed odd.)

Norah and Art have signed up to a mysterious clinic called Easton Grove for which they were subject to a thorough vetting process. Hardaker leaves the terms of their contract vague while implying they can be over-intrusive, but this may be a reflection of Norah’s hypersensitivity. However, the Grove seems to have wider influence in society, as an exchange with Norah’s boss indicates.

The couple’s reward arrives in a cardboard box; a creature like a baby but clearly not one. A “faceless bundle of grey fluff” which is fed on what Norah calls “tinned slush”. This is the Grove’s product, an ovum organi (whose exact function Hardaker leaves unconfirmed until late in the book, leaving the reviewer with a dilemma.) Their interactions with the new arrival, a female, rapidly take on the aspects of parenthood, though the creature is kept in their loft, and later given the run of the house.

Despite cautions against, Art and Norah name their charge Nut, and Norah in particular becomes very attached to her in a series of scenes which could almost have been a depiction of the feelings of a new mother towards her child.

Ova organi are an option available only to the wealthy – or to those who can just afford it, a category Norah and Art fall into but her friends do not. The ova are not entirely acceptable to wider society as a group of protesters against the Grove illustrates on one of the couple’s visits there. This, along with Norah’s increasing fixation with Nut and failure to keep up with the problems in her friends’ lives are two of the contributors which lead to the disintegration of Norah’s friendships and to her descent into self-centredness. Her focus on Nut is entirely comprehensible. Nut is flesh of Norah’s flesh after all – and of Art’s. That self-centredness is the driving force throughout. The ova are a technological solution to both the greying and to an aspect of the human condition to which the society depicted in Larry Niven’s stories of Gil the ARM Hamilton adopted a very different approach.

Novels which hitch themselves to the literary end of the SF genre, which focus on small stories as this one does, sometimes find themselves overlooked in favour of more glittering vistas. Composite Creatures is, though, very well written,* and psychologically believable. It also manages to avoid the pitfalls of excessive information dumping (until it gets a bit more open towards the end.) It’s certainly one for those who prefer SF driven by its characters.

*At one point the text mentions Science Fiction, not generally regarded as a good idea in an SF novel as it tends to break suspension of disbelief.

Pedant’s corner:- innumerable instances of ‘to not’ followed by the required verb rather than ‘not to’, also many uses of focussed or focussing rather then focused or focusing, “Mom or Luke say something new” (the ‘or’ makes it singular; ‘says’.) “The final piece of …. were a pair of socks” (the final piece … was a pair,) bannister (banister,) “along endless roads that lead to” (context and previous tense implies ‘led to’,) sprung (sprang,) sat (sitting,) a semi-colon where a comma would have sufficed (and even that wasn’t necessary,) echo-y (echoey?) gamble (gambol – an odd error, Hardaker had gambolling later in the book,) “the tickling of his fingers on the nape of my neck were far more vivid” (was far more vivid,) “a larger crowd … were crowded around” (was crowded around.) “one of the woman” (women.) “I pressed it back together and returned to the grave before carrying on walking” (no grave had been mentioned, ‘returned it to the ground’ makes more sense,) sneakers (trainers, please,) a missing comma before a piece of direct speech (more than once,) snuck (sneaked,) “the men’s room” (this is set in Britain, it’s ‘The Gent’s’,) outside of (outside, no ‘of’,) inside of (ditto, just ‘inside’,) fit (fitted,) Markus’ (Markus’s,) “estate agents’ office” (estate agent’s office,) “to diffuse the situation” (x2, defuse,) “his trousers hug loosely” (hung loosely.) “Either me or Eleanor was” (Either Eleanor or I was,) stood (standing,) “that I’d already drank too much” (drunk,) “‘It’s New Year’s’” (New Year; no apostrophe,) piece de resistance (pièce de resistance.) In the Acknowledgements; beˋing (being.)