The Graveyard Game
Kage Baker
Harcourt, 298 pages
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Kage Baker's Company novels (the Company is twenty-fourth century research and development firm Dr. Zeus
Incorporated, inventor of time travel and immortality, whose deathless cyborg operatives travel forward through
time, salvaging the lost treasures of history for the Company's use) are developing into one of the most intelligent
and engaging of recent SF series. So far, though they share characters and themes, they've been unlike more typical
series books in that they don't tell a single long story in multiple volumes--in fact, they more closely resemble
a good mystery series, where each novel works as a self-contained episode while also serving to advance a meta-narrative.
In this case, the meta-narrative is the sum of the questions that over the course of the books have come more and
more to occupy the Company's operatives: what is the Company, really? Why is it plundering history? What will happen
in the year 2355, when something known as the Silence falls?
The Graveyard Game is the least self-contained episode to date, focusing almost entirely on these questions
and the operatives' search for answers. As the story opens, Literature Specialist Owen Lewis witnesses a time anomaly
in which Mendoza, heroine of the first and third volumes of the series, moves briefly forward in time, from 1862
to 1996. This is something that's not supposed to happen: one of the disadvantages of time travel is that you can
only go backward. But Mendoza is a generator of Crome radiation, an indicator of paranormal abilities no cyborg
is supposed to possess, so there's no telling what she might be able to do.
Shaken, Lewis (who has been secretly in love with Mendoza for several centuries) contacts Joseph, who originally
recruited Mendoza for the Company. Joseph, it turns out, doesn't know Mendoza's recent history (she deserted her
last post to run away with her mortal lover, and as punishment was relieved of duty and sent several million years
into the past, to a kind of prison camp for disgraced immortals known as Back Way Back), but he has his own anomalous
bit of information to offer. He saw Mendoza in 1923, well after she was sent Back, accompanied by a man similar
enough to her first and long-dead love, Nicholas Harcourt, to be his twin.
Lewis and Joseph decide they must find Mendoza--who, if she's managed to escape the Company, may be in need of
help. Each also has his own agenda. Lewis is fascinated by the mysterious man for whom Mendoza defected, English
spy Edward Alton Bell-Fairfax, who so much resembles Nicholas Harcourt, and becomes obsessed with the effort to
piece together his history. Joseph is looking for Budu, his own recruiter, who supposedly was sent into happy retirement
centuries earlier, but may in fact have met a much more unpleasant fate. These quests take Lewis and Joseph deep
into the dark history of Company operations, uncovering things about Dr. Zeus's origins and organization no immortal
is supposed to know, and placing them in deadly danger.
Until now, it's been possible to pick up the series with any of the books, but The Graveyard Game is almost
entirely dependent for context on what's gone before, and probably won't make much sense to those who haven't read
the earlier novels. Many questions are answered, but just as many are raised. We acquire a much better picture
of Dr. Zeus's ruthless suppression of opposition and callous treatment of its cyborgs, but are more than ever in
the dark about who is actually in charge and what their motives are. This lack of closure, together with the episodic
nature of the action, which carries Joseph and Lewis across several centuries, might in less skilled hands have
resulted in a confusing mess; but Baker is an accomplished storyteller, and holds it all together with strong themes,
robust characterizations, and well-paced narrative, making The Graveyard Game a satisfying and tantalizing
installment for fans of the series.
Baker continues her thoughtful exploration of the consequences of immortality--something other writers who deal
with this subject matter often only skim. Dr. Zeus's cyborgs have been engineered to love their work, to be contemptuous
of mortals, and to be loyal to the Company; but as they approach the twenty-fourth century and the end of their
service, this sense of mission and superiority is no longer enough. What will they do when their work is done?
What was it all for, anyway? Lewis in particular wrestles with this question. "We don't have families, we
don't have homes, we don't even have nationalities," he says to Joseph. "Nothing remains except us, and
all we have is each other." His obsession with Mendoza and the mystery of Edward Alton Bell-Fairfax isn't
just a way to fill his increasingly burdensome spare time (there's much less for Company operatives to do, post-twentieth
century); he wants to know a happy ending is possible, if only for Mendoza--"That love triumphed, and bravery,
against impossible odds." It's a poignant portrayal of the loneliness of an endless life.
In this, and in its depiction of Dr. Zeus's ruthless amorality, The Graveyard Game is the darkest Company
novel yet. Fortunately, it's not all serious. As always, Baker has a sardonic eye for the ridiculousness of human
behavior; and there's considerable amusement in learning how the world progresses toward the incredibly bland,
boring twenty-fourth century, where exercise and vegetarianism are mandated by law, and sensuous indulgences like
chocolate, cream, and coffee are illegal. All in all, though, it's clear that Baker is heading for a very dark
future--and that it will take her a while to get there. Reportedly, there are to be four more novels. The next,
The Children of the Company is due sometime in 2002.
Copyright © 2000 Victoria Strauss
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