Thursday, January 20, 2022

SciFi/Fantasy Book Review: Club Ded by Nikhil Singh

 



Club Ded is the second novel from South African author Nikhil Singh.  The book was a finalist for this year's Nommo Award - an award celebrating the best African work of speculative (science fiction/fantasy) fiction.  It also picked up a nomination for the BSFA Award which is awarded by the British Science Fiction Association.  

And its well.....something for sure, a psychedelic satire (not always in the humorous way) featuring a set of characters coming to or living in South Africa all of whom come into contact with a new psychedelic drug.  The book features a ton of characters, a ton of different plotlines, not all of whom ever connect with each other - and the book jumps back and forth between them and various characters in ways that make this feel as disoriented as the characters on the drug. And the story uses it all to critique colonialism and foreign interference, racist and sexist behavior, as well as to deal with issues of abuse and the struggles to stay on the straight and narrow (ish) towards healthy desires.  This book is so jam packed I definitely missed some of what happened and some themes.  

Trigger Warning:  Rape, Abuse (of Adults and a Teenage Girl), Alcoholism, Racism, Sexism, transphobia, Drug Usage - both voluntary and forced - and Suicide.  These things are not without purpose for the most part, but this may be too much for a lot of readers, even if nothing is heavily descriptive.  

-----------------------------------------------Plot Summary------------------------------------------------------
Brick Bryson, an African American actor whose fame came from a big acclaimed 90s blockbuster he never got proper credit for, comes to South Africa to help save a blockbuster - "Club Ded" - helmed by the director who betrayed him, a man known for preying on underage women.  But when he gets there he finds the movie is a mess, the teenage star actress has been pried with drugs by the director, and almost nothing involved in the production makes any sense.  

Meanwhile, a trio of women working for an information gathering and advice dispensing all-women organization - the Oracle - all get themselves involved with the production - both for their main job, and for various side jobs they each take as they attempt to act out their desires...or to figure out what that is.  And so many others - a white housewife who decides she needs something adventurous; a pickpocket disillusioned with life; a former Nollywood filmmaker turned drug dealer - are hanging around, for one reason or another.  

The one connection between it all is a strange fish-based psychedelic drug, that is being used and spread around the city and the production, and which keeps so many involved in a haze they can't seem to get out of.
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Trying to describe Club Ded's plot is a fool's errand, as this is not a book interested in telling one story, or even two or three, and is certainly not interested in telling the story necessarily in a chronological fashion (one character, Jennifer, has her narrative at times jump forward in time, which confused me a bit near the end).  This is a story where a ton of the characters with plot arcs are constantly high on psychedelics, and the story feels at times like it's on the drug as well, with it jumping between characters seeming at will, sometimes spending a good number of time with various plot arcs so that they get room to develop, and sometimes jumping frequently back and forth between them such that it's unclear what exactly is going on.  

Still, for the most part the book comes together in its final 40%, with the truth of what's going on providing some clarity for many but not all of the major plot arcs.  The result is what is basically a satire of colonial and foreign influences in South Africa (and presumably elsewhere on the continent), whether that be from the racist and abusive director of Club Ded in his approach to his teenage starlet and the people around him, or the leader of the three Oracle women Anita, who is just as racist and abusive as the director even as she seeks to manipulate him and others for her own selfish purposes.  And then there's perhaps the strangest (and often funniest subplot) that of white housewife Sulette, who decides she wants to find something more first by cozying up to the teen actress, gets hooked on the drugs and wants racist sexual adventures, and winds up interacting with a German (Nazi escapee/descendant of one) Volker, who hates her for reminding him of her other and wants to break her....except his actions only thrill her more.  

There's also quite a bit here about individual desires, and about healthy vs unhealthy desires in numerous subplots.  Oracle agent Jennifer finds herself lost in the psychedelics searching for some better way forward, feeling lost in the mud among possible paths (to use sort of a metaphor the Oracle told her) and she winds up with a pickpocket (who also helps peddle the drugs) who has always wondered both outside the country and within if Heaven/Happiness is always going to be beyond his reach in what would be a healthy relationship...except the drugs and her abusive coworker Anita drag her away from that happiness into the abyss.  Brick is supposedly off alcohol and hates himself for his attraction to younger (although legal, unlike the director) women, and yet can't stop himself from diving back into them, even as he tries to put things together.  V, the third Oracle woman, finds herself in so so many pies and plotlines until she all out disappears for the final 40% of the book, turning out instead to have left it all to find a peaceful sane life before it became too much (and even then she expresses a disappointment she took that route).  Club Ded is sometimes funny, but more often tragic as it portrays these things in very very harsh ways.  

For me to say that not all of it works, as I sometimes do when I'm discussing things that don't work for me, would be to imply I understood all of this book, and well I definitely didn't.  Still some weird parts that might be issues for others and didn't work for me include the treatment of two trans characters*, Brick's transitioning child (who Brick struggles with his feelings for) and female presenting Trill, who characters call "it" or "the creature", and who finds themselves raped on one occasion, and just sort of presented as another errant part of the production.  The book also spends some time early on some characters who just then wind up on the side and really didn't need the development, which just makes it harder to figure out who was important.  

*Disclaimer that I'm a Cis Male here, and an interview with the author suggests that he is Queer, even if he doesn't call himself trans.*

But overall, Club Ded is a fascinating novel, and if you can handle the trigger warnings above - and they're a LOT - is well worth your time.  Just uh, don't expect a one track coherent narrative, as this satire is biting but just as all over the place as its characters are on its psychedelic "suicide pills".  

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