I am absolutely delighted to be leading off the blog tour for this fabulous novel on its UK publication day. I do love SF, although I read little of it these days. However, waft a spec fiction novel under my nose and I will grab it. I love the familiarity of a world I know, but the strangeness of the direction it\u2019s taken. This is the case with Korean author Park\u2019s debut, Luminous<\/strong><\/em>, which is set in a recently reunified Korea where robots are now part of everyday life. You may argue that not having been there, I can\u2019t be familiar with it, however, I have read enough novels set in this part of the world now to have a bit of a feel for that society (well maybe not the North!).<\/p>\n At its heart, Luminous<\/em> is a story of two families: one broken, and one made through friendship. <\/p>\n Ruijie is eleven, as the novel begins, she is exploring the robot salvage yard close by her school. She is clad in her robowear, \u2018battery-powered titanium leg braces, the latest model, customized circuitry to aid her ability to walk.; Ruijie has a rare life-limiting genetic disease. It\u2019s there that she meets Yoyo, a robot boy who is unlike any other robot she\u2019s met, hiding in the rubble\u2026<\/p>\n In one movement, he pulled himself out of the robot\u2019s belly and lanedd on the dirt with a clunk. He was her height but felt smaller, listing to the right where his leg ended at the ankle. The shine was covered in shredded skyn, like the hem of his pants had gotten caught in an angry chewy machine, exposing a calf full of wires in red and blue. His stump was so white it felt fragile, more ceramic than bone. Ruijie will come to meet Yoyo every day after school, and introduce her friends Mars and Amelia to him, and later Taewon from the North, the nephew of the scrapyard\u2019s manager. Together they will form a family of close friends, all fiercely protective of Yoyo, who seems to no longer have a family affiliation of his own. However, they must keep him safe from those who would take him to fight in bot demolition derbys. <\/p>\n Next we meet Detective Cho Jun of the Robot Crimes squad. Jun is a fascinating character \u2013 a trans man who had been a soldier, but got blown up by an IED. <\/p>\n The IED damaged 78 percent of his body beyond recovery. It was a miracle he was alive. No, it was Science. They repaired him by attaching not the bionic to his body but his body to the bionic.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n Jun is investigating the case of a missing old model Sakura robot called Eli, who belonged to an elderly artist, to whom she was like a daughter. And the quest to find Eli runs through the backbone of the story. Jun knows what it is like to lose a robot who has become a family member. His younger \u2018brother\u2019 had be introduced to Jun and his younger sister Morgan by their father, who was then one of the foremost robot designers. There\u2019s not a day when Jun doesn\u2019t miss Yoyo, or wonder what happened to him. Yoyo was unique, one of a kind, a prototype designed by her father.<\/p>\n None of Jun\u2019s family really speak to each other now. Their father has retired to creat zoobots instead, preserving animals facing extinction as machines. Morgan has become a robot engineer, one of the foremost like her father, at Imagine Friends, the company behind the best robots on the market. They are planning to introduce a new range including a boy and girl robot. The \u2018Boy-X\u2019 model is Morgan\u2019s project and she is building it in Yoyo\u2019s image. At home, Morgan has Stephen, a robot she had created to look like her favourite film star, and devoid as her life is of romance, she\u2019s considering Stephen as a lover instead.<\/p>\n So you can see that Yoyo will link both stories in a way, although he has changed since parted from his family. Everything will build up to a climax at Imagine Friends\u2019 launch of the new Yoyo-X and Sakura-X models, and along the way will be trials for all the characters, for instance: robot fights, bot brothels, and an awful toxic macho chat-up school, will be part of Jun\u2019s investigations in his search for Eli.<\/p>\n We discover a little about the mythology that has sprung up around the killer HALO robots at Gaechon (a city in the former North) during the war that led to reunification \u2013 it is said that if you said you survived Gaechon, you weren\u2019t really there! It\u2019s clear that those from the north who have moved south are often treated as second-class citizens, only one step above the bots, so there is a layer of social comment running through the novel too. We get to see all sides of life in the city, the seedy bits in particular as Jun\u2019s investigations continue.<\/p>\n Yun and Morgan\u2019s lives will reintersect as their father comes back into their lives to give a keynote speech at the launch, and eventually they\u2019ll discover the dark secrets he harboured and how they related to Yoyo. Somewhat surprisingly, Jun\u2019s father seems more accepting of his trans status than his sister too.<\/p>\n Park\u2019s world-building in this novel is second to none. She\u2019s taken the Seoul that she knows into the near future and imagined a world where humanoid robots are part of daily life for all. It all works seamlessly and I was completely involved in it. Her characters are all so well drawn and totally engaging, and the relationships are all believable. Add in the drama of the main plot strands, linked with \u2018luminous\u2019 prose and the combination is unputdownable. Although the novels cover different eras, I was reminded of Sadie and Sam in Gabrielle Zevin\u2019s wonderful Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow<\/a><\/em> and their story of a gaming start-up in the 1990s \u2013 both novels have a similar sense of technological wonder, so if you enjoyed Zevin, you\u2019ll doubtless like Luminous <\/strong><\/em>too. It\u2019s not going too far to say that this novel will be in my year-end best of list \u2013 it\u2019s certainly the best thing I\u2019ve read so far this year. What a fantastic debut!<\/p>\n Source: Review copy \u2013 thank you! <\/strong> Oneworld \/ Magpie hardback, 388 pages. BUY at Blackwell\u2019s<\/a><\/strong> via my affiliate link.<\/p>\n\n
She was staring until he took her hand, Pressing his index on her lifeline, he wrote out his name. Sort circle, then two little strokes, a cut long and swift. Repeat. In hangul, then English.
\u201cDoes it hurt?\u201d
\u201cMy leg?\u201d He glanced at it. \u201cNot very.\u201d
She peeked at his write, his skinny elbow. \u201cHow bionic are you?\u201d
\u201cThat\u2019s impossible,\u201d she said, and h laughed.
He slipped past her. A leg like his should wring his muscles, each thump sending shocks up the spine. Yet Yoyo moved like he was bree.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n
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<\/figure>\n<\/div>\nLike this:<\/h3>\n