I am recommending this book to a lot of people; The Great Glass Sea, by Josh Weil. It came out earlier this month, and it’s published by Grove Atlantic; available on Kindle as well as in paper.
My experience with Weil was as an instructor at the Mendocino Coast Writers Conference first and as a writer second. As a teacher, Weil has the vital and unusual ability to make a workshop space feel safe and encouraging, and still point out places in people’s work where there are deficiencies. He was accessible, responsible, and funny.
I also knew I liked his prose, though, because I picked up a copy of The New Valley before the workshop. At the time, I thought it was a little odd that the person teaching the novel workshop hadn’t exactly published a novel (The New Valley is three linked novellas). Still, his prose, his observation of small details, and the way he lets his characters mourn a style of life that is changing, or vanishing, around them, wowed me. At the conference, I had a conversation with Weil and he told me about the book he had coming out; The Great Glass Sea.
The book is set in present-day Russia; not quite our present-day, but close. A consortium of oligarchs has built and launched a set of reflective satellites; space mirrors, turning an agricultural section of the country into endless daylight. This is still Russia, though, and even though it is light, food crops have to be protected from the elements, so the town is also building hectares of glass greenhouses; a vast sea of glass. Two brothers — identical twins — work in the greenhouses. Yarik, the elder twin, comes to the attention of one of the oligarchs, and is soon promoted to foreman. Yarik has a wife and children, and looks ahead to the future. Dima, the younger twin, cares for their aging mother who suffers from dementia. Dima has no interest in the shining future of the greenhouses. He yearns to buy back the little farm (once part of a collective) that their uncle owned, and go back to simpler times. Each twin, in his own way, becomes a symbol or spokesperson for various political groups who have opinions about the greenhouses.
The book is not just about changing societies, although that is a big part of it. It is about a disappearing way of life; about family; about folklore; about the unintended consequences of technology; about everyday life in Russia (which Weil knows about; he spent time as an exchange student, and went back as an adult when he was researching the book); about politics, economics and peer pressure; about mental illness, about love and regrets.
This is a long and densely written work, with a tone that ranges from folkloric, to elegiac, to humorous, to tragic. It’s filled with powerful imagery and gestures gone wrong. It’s dreamlike in spots, and hyper-realistic in others.
I reviewed the book for Fantasy Literature because of the science fiction premise, but the book is not about satellites and greenhouses. It is about how people react to the changes brought by satellites and greenhouses. It’s also, basically, a book about brothers.
I recommend The Great Glass Sea highly. It is dense and you will have to make a commitment to it. If you do, you won’t be disappointed.