Filaria

Filaria is, in its conciseness and its oddly disturbing grace, one of the finest debuts written in the last decade -- in the sff genre or any other genre. For a fast reader, it could be consumed in nearly a breath, but this would be to miss the point entirely. This is a book meant to be examined, to be known.What strikes me as so unique is how Hayward manages to build such a intensely resonant world in so few words. You will not forget having been in this book. Images, perhaps even whole scenes if you're visually minded, will stick with you for the remainder of your life.Here, because it might illustrate what I'm trying (and probably failing) to say, is something I said about Filaria in an interview:"There is a scene in it where two ancient elevator-repairmen brothers are hanging in a massive (and malfunctioning) elevator shaft--or rather, have been hanging in a massive elevator shaft their entire lives. This may seems a somewhat mundane scenario when compared to interstellar wars and such, but there is for me this moment of consideration: what must life be like, hanging in silence and darkness for most of your life, waiting on... what? An elevator car that will never come? It's frightening to consider, and yet in its way it is also beautiful in an immensely sad way. It's almost like considering death, that great unknown."Anyway, you should buy it, because it's great.

FILARIA will worm its way into every section of your brain like a tiny parasite that sneaks in and slowly awakens and fires up your neurons.The world is a mere shell of what it used to be, littered with remnants, populated by a ragtag bunch existing on multiple levels. Each subset of this fractured world is largely ignorant of the others, with minds full of myths and scuttlebutt.Brent Hayward shines a spotlight on four people, the narrative lens closing in on the minutiae of their lives as if the larger world where they existed was irrelevant to their respective tales. But there are hints that if you pull the lens far enough back, you will see that world and how they each fit in it, that their lives are interrelated and intertwined.Stylistically, I can't recall reading anything written in this manner before. It is superbly novel and fascinating. The structure simultaneously elucidates and mystifies, maintaining a high level of intrigue. Both the microcosmic and macrocosmic views reveal a world that is ultimately foreign-- a desolate, splintered world, de facto functioning separately and independently but simultaneously suffering for the lack of integration. The depth of the characters is matched by the intricacy of the worldbuilding.FILARIA is a masterful blend of simplicity and complexity. There is simplicity and a linear symbolism in the imagery of a man hanging on near the bottom, always looking up at heights he so wishes to reach. There is complexity in the imagery of the same man hanging on-- to existence for its own sake, to a sense of duty, to a hope that he knows is ultimately futile.Hayward prodigiously strings words together. Even when he describes a bleak landscape or a hopeless situation, it is nonetheless exquisite. There are so many tiny, wondrous details in the world he has built. I deliberately slowed down my reading lest I miss any of it. There are strange and fascinating creatures. There is effective symmetry in how mundane objects are deemed talismanic and ultimately crucial ones as decorative and useless.Hayward deliberately weaves every seemingly isolated thread into a beautiful tapestry, going back and forth between the four individuals, slowly revealing bits and pieces of the world by unveiling more details about their lives.This is a story of survival and a story of death. It is a tale of realized culpability and the possibility of redemption. There is love, lust, disdain, indifference. It is where myth encounters reality. It is the bridge between self-image, actuality and potentiality. This is a story about searching for something with no certainty it even exists.I hate this book. I absolutely detest it. Why? For this reason: I can no longer be content and blissful in my ignorance. I am now fully aware of the pitiful limits of my imagination and intelligence, for not in a million years could I have conceived of such a labyrinthine world, populated by such distinct individuals, written in a compulsively readable style and structure. Brent Hayward manages with a few words or lines to express what I would be unable to in ten pages. Heck, I'm bumbling through this review, feeling inadequate to the task of describing how challenging and rewarding reading this book is. I doubt I shall ever be equal to the task.

I received a free copy of this book from the publisher.When I started out with this novel, I thought the description sounded to my liking, but after getting in about 30 pages through, I wasn't so sure. I am one for sci-fi and fantasy, but the world seemed so absurd...almost to the point of ridiculousness. But after I got to about page 50, I realized I was no longer wondering, "Should I continue reading this?" because I was actually getting into it...and liking it!The first thing I noticed was how high the diction was. A lot of the words are archaic, adding to the tone of the book. Some of the words are just weird. And some of the words are made up. Everything you could ask for in a sci-fi novel! The grammar was impeccable, and I absolutely love this writer's style. Even though I'm not typically interested in description pertaining to environment or place, it's almost impossible to understand sci-fi without understanding the world the characters are living in (or in this case, worlds?) A lot of the metaphors also caught me off guard, but in a good way. Most were so original that I literally had to sit there in a silence for a few moments to completely absorb what I had just read.Humor was integrated well into the stories, as well as sadness, and a feeling of nostalgia (at least, for me). My favorite character was "Tran so." Saying that, however, one of the only complaints I had with this novel was the added sexuality. I typically embrace sexuality when sexuality is due, but in this novel it just felt out of place and awkward, especially when I started looking up to Tran so as a sort of father-like figure.The only other complaint I would say I had with this book was that I didn't really like that we had to keep up with four different characters. It would be different if the chapters were shorter, or if the characters had more to do with each other, but it was definitely hard to keep track of what had just elapsed when changing from one character's POV to another.