Synopsis
The Real Story was just a preview to this action-packed tome... The Gap series steps on the accelerator with Forbidden Knowledge. Beautiful cop Morn Hyland, desperate and in pain aboard Captain's Fancy, controls her body and mind with her illegal zone implant, recreating herself as a super being worthy of holding Captain Nick Succorso's affections. Jealousy among the crew, threats of rape and ship self-destruction, prisoner torture, and government cyborg programs keep things moving along. Alien Amnioni seeking genetic domination over humankind enter the scene with new technologies such as mutagens and force-growing foetuses. Bite your fingernails while you live it all (vicariously!) through brilliant survivor Morn and villain-turned-conspirator Angus Thermopyle.
Review
After a rather stale prelude ("The Real Story"), Donaldson begins to unpack his complex saga. Morn, "rescued" by Nick from the clutches of Angus, soon learns that he is just as bad as her previous captor. Painting a broad brush, one might say that "The Real Story" was about Morn being ravished by Angus, while "Forbidden Knowledge" tells of her violations at the hands of Nick. But this novel (like the three which follow) has all the dimensions of a well-developed epic sorely lacking in the first book. Behind the bombardments of rape, sadism, loathing, and mean-spiritedness we catch hints of a serious and intricate plot. Nick, though a criminal, apparently does occasional jobs for UMCP's Data Acquisitions division (the "CIA" equivalent of the United Mining Companies Police), but he has also had shady dealings with the Amnion, the alien species which has long laboured for humanity's extinction. Nick takes Morn and his crew to the fringes of Amnion territory, where he incurs the wrath of his alien "cohorts" through reckless behaviour. Meanwhile, Angus has been abducted by Data Acquisitions Director Hashi Lebwohl, who begins overseeing his illegal transformation into a cyborg for a special classified mission. As the DA officials construct Angus into a superhuman (but less than human) tool, you can't help but feel sorry as you watch his soul being stripped away.
The one thing that really stands out for me are the elements this book shares with his Covenant books. He seems to be at his best with battered, anguished, mentally unstable characters - though in the first Covenant series his lead was surrounded by much more stable, sane characters. In Gap, Morn Hyland is tossed into the madhouse with the oddest cast of cracked eggs . . . hehe, mixed metaphors. The book is a descent into madness and I loved it. I can't believe how fast I ripped through this novel.
To call this Soap Opera is a stretch for me. Morn is not a damsel in distress - that's a rather insulting label to apply to a lead character, don't you think? She is in distress and she is distressed to the breaking point and beyond and survives and more. Nick is a bad, bad man with few heroic qualities. At one point I was thinking to myself, "If only they could go back and rewrite Star Wars like this!" Nick is a more realistic anti-hero (when he rises to hero status at all). He's absolutely vile. I found myself loathing him. This guys idea of a witty quip is to beat you into a bloody pulp . . . and smile.
There are two things that Stephen R. Donaldson always does remarkably well. The first is character. His people, be they heroes, anti-heroes, villains, winners, losers, manipulators, or manipulated, are boldly drawn and astonishingly real. A Donaldson character does not blend into the background and become indistinguishable from dozens of others you've read. These people stick around inside your head, awing you with their overwhelming personalities long after you've finished the book. His other great talent is for conflict. Having set up two titanic personae, he then sets them against each other. The result is amazing to see.
I'm pleased to report that both of these talents are on full display in "The Gap into vision: Forbidden Knowledge". The personalities this time around are Morn Hyland and Nick Succurso. Morn, seen earlier almost entirely as a victim, comes into her own as a dynamic and strong-willed person. In "Forbidden Knowledge", she draws on a staggering amount of tenacity and courage to continue fighting for what she needs against all odds. Nick, for his part, gives us previously unrealized levels of depth as he struggles to keep control of his ship and his crew. When these two come into conflict, the result is breathtaking to see, one of the best character duels ever written in imaginative fiction.
And that's not all. While those two battle the twists of fate and each other, Angus Thermopylae is caught in a different web of intrigue. Furthermore, the plot and the universe keep expanding. Highly recommended
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