Eifelheim
Eifelheim
By Michael Flynn
Tor Books, 2006
320 pages
Eifelheim by Michael Flynn was an unusual science fiction book as it created a depth of character that is rare in science fiction which is often long on ideas but deeply lacking in depth of character, depending on stick figures to convey its ideas.
The novel is set in medieval Germany in a small hill village not far from the Black Forest.
For over 300 pages I was transported back and forth between a medieval German world that felt as real as an created by more conventional historical novels and a rather pedestrian present that felt disemplaced in contrast to the richness of Dasein communicated by a parish priest on the run, the lord of the castle, the folk who lived in the village and the aliens who crash-landed onto the wrong planet.
The gradual integration of the aliens into a medieval village, the conveyance of Christianity as a lived presence and the ability to depict alien personalities without destroying their diffence (they were in essence large grasshoppers with advanced technology) was a continual pleasure to read, irrespective of the feeling that the plot machinery, that took us from time to time back to some now wherein what we were reading was being researched and a new physics was being developed, just didn’t work well.
In spite of those interruptions, and a new physics that can be thrown on a pile with all the rest that can’t quite produce a new cosmos, I read every page with great avidity.
Eifelheim is a book that is suffused with humanity and a spirit of rare openness.
It is a delight to read.
I will read more of Michael Flynn and respond when the response is apt.
Days after I closed the book, I could still feel the village and its inhabitants under total siege from the plague.
I also felt strongly that the author is a fine novelist and should perhaps have a go at a conventional novel as his gift for conveyance of character and place is rare.
