When Gravity Fails (The Budayeen Cycle Book 1)

I liked the rich Budayeen environment. It was interesting to imagine this seedy cross between the French Quarter from New Orleans and say a lively Muslim city with a mix of religious observance and entertainment. For me Casablanca comes to mind.I read the paperback in ‘87. Just reread on Kindle. I remember being drawn in to the thrilling life of the protagonist. He definitely has faults. But that makes him more interesting.Some say that it gets too ‘sciencesy.’ But I wanted to learn more of the workings of the Moddies and Daddies. As well as the drug actions of the Sunnys and Triphets.I imagine with the opioid epidemic the prominence of the drug culture included within the Budayeen might be off-putting. Also its treatment of trans characters is pretty dated.But like any literature it has to be judged by the lens of the era it was written. And with that in mind I found it an exciting page turner. It’s a dark and complex murder mystery.

George Alec Effinger's science-fiction whodunit "When Gravity Fails" (1987), transports us to the year 2172, dropping us into the Budayeen, a walled in, rough-and-tumble tourist trap near the forbidding Sahara Desert, featuring bars, clubs, street thieves, prostitutes, and predators, all rather casually policed, with a well-populated cemetery.In this future world, medical procedures and pharmacology exist for physical re-engineering and sexual transformation. Men can readily become women and vice versa. Direct modifications of the human brain are now commonplace through surgical implants that permit those suitably "wired" to become anyone or anything commercially available in "moddies". By "chipping in" a small circuit board, one can become any character from literature or history from James Bond to Genghis Khan, with true identity submerged. "Daddies" are also on hand - temporary data transfer chips that lend instant knowledge of any language, skill, or corpus of facts, however esoteric, for as long as the chip is in place.To navigate this world with integrity intact, one must be "the best man in his world and a good enough man for any world." Our narrator, Marid Audran, is such a man. He is an easy-going hustler from the Mahgreb, an impoverished region of Algeria. He has found a home in the Budayeen, pulling himself up by his bootstraps from nothing to next-to-nothing. He has an uneasy relationship with the police, welcome acceptance by nightclub proprietors, a trio of friends, and the love of Yasmin, born a boy, now a voluptuous club dancer with the knockout looks that only surgery could provide.A Muslim by birth, Marid is well versed in his creed, but knows how to take it or leave it. He refuses to have his brain wired, preferring to find pleasure and solace in pharmaceutical products. As he puts it:"Drugs are your friends, treat them with respect. You wouldn't throw your friends in the garbage. You wouldn't flush your friends down the toilet. If that's the way you treat your friends or your drugs, you don't deserve to have either. Give them to me."Even the Budayeen is subject to influences agitating the world beyond its walls. Marid accepts an assignment from a foreign diplomat to locate a missing person. His client is murdered before his eyes. Soon others in his social circle fall victim to grisly homicides. He is recruited by Friedlander Bey, the Budayeen's wealthy godfather, whose interests are threatened by the murders, to track down the killer. To prepare Marid for his dangerous mission, Friedlander Bey intimidates Marid into the brain wiring he has always avoided, adding an extra implant and a rack of special "daddies" that sharpen Marid's senses and suppress fear, anger, hunger, thirst, and lust. His investigation confronts mystery and mayhem with street smarts and hard-boiled banter.In the book's prefatory page, Effinger (1947 - 2002) acknowledges his debt to Raymond Chandler and his source for the title in a quote from Bob Dylan's "Just Like Tom Thumb's Blues". In two sequels, "A Fire in the Sun" (1989) and "The Exile Kiss" (1991), he returns to the Budayeen with Marid, Friedlander Bey, and others of the original characters, including Bill, the transplanted American taxi driver, who has had one of his lungs removed and replaced with a sac that drips a continuous psychotropic fluid into his bloodstream - a deliciously sardonic invention, considering that the author suffered from childhood ailments that rendered him unable to pilot an automobile.Effinger's employment of courteous Arabic verbal genuflections and Muslim pieties add spice, and flavor his trilogy with cultural insight.

I found When Gravity Fails on my Kindle with no memory of buying it and no notion of the book's history. I have a feeling that I heard about it at Continuum, Melbourne's science fiction and fantasy convention. Certainly, I wasn't aware that it is part of the Gollancz SF and Fantasy Masterworks series. I probably wouldn't have read it if I'd realised it was. Masterworks so often feel dated. In any event, When Gravity Fails was on my Kindle and my Kindle, being a Kindle, jumped me over all of the fore matter and I hit chapter one under my very own veil of ignorance.When Gravity Fails is a delight. It's rich, curious and full of all the wonder that a good SF crime crossover should offer.The Budayeen is the seedy side of an unnamed Arabic city and Algerian-born Marîd Audran is the unarmed, pill-popping, unwired, unbelieving Muslim guide to the Budayeen's glorious mashup culture. Marîd does a bit of this and that for money, including the odd investigation that falls into his lap when nudged off Lieutenant Okking's desk.At the beginning of the novel, Marîd meets a new client, a Reconstructed Russian named Bogatyrev, who has a missing person problem. Things go violently wrong and Marîd begins a world-weary and paradoxically idealistic investigation aimed at returning the Budayeen to its everyday exploitative, drug-taking, haggling, peddling, violent existence. But not back to chaos because the Budayeen is supremely orderly as it veers from old to new vices and back again.One of the most delicious aspects of When Gravity Fails is the contrast between the sin and violence of the Budayeen and the courtly interactions between the Muslim characters: faithful and faithless alike. When Marîd sits before Abdoulaye and Abdoulaye's boss Hassan who are overtly violent and dangerous, Marîd is offered coffee spiced with cardamom. Marîd says, `May your table last forever' and Hassan returns, `May Allah lengthen your life' and this is just the beginning of the invocations that last through several cups, all aimed at protecting everyone's health, welfare, family and people. Underneath the extravagant, flowery, prayerful well-wishing that continues throughout the book, Marîd walks on a knife edge.It is the infidels who enter the city as marks, sex workers and corrupt businessmen who seem brash, mannerless - even childlike in their lack of culture.If you enjoy the feeling of being in a different but familiar world and you like your SF and hardboiled crime with a twist, this is a fabulous read. I highly recommend it. When Gravity Fails was a Hugo and Nebular shortlisted novel and US-born George Effinger is said to have helped found Cyberpunk as a genre.

Don’t understand why this is regarded as a classic of cyberpunk, since the only ‘cyber’ elements are the ‘modies’ and they are a bit flat, undeveloped as an idea. For the rest, this is mostly a Chandler-style detective story – not particularly well written, frankly, with a not especially interesting story and too-thin characterisation. Where the book scores is in its world. This is partly because it is set in something like a middle-eastern souk, certainly, but more importantly because most of its denizens sport various kinds of physical modifications, from full sex changes to facial augmentations. That does give some fizz to the thing. You do get a sense of a different society operating.Is that enough? I was happy for the book to be over, so probably not, for me at least. If I could give it two and a half stars, I probably would – but erring on the side of generosity, I’ll stump for three.

This story was well written and had a great original plot. It was endearing to have a Muslim character or close to a Muslim character as the lead character. His actual deeds and devotion as a pious Muslim would by some afficionados be debatable. The story was reminiscent of Neuromancer by William Gibson and even that of Philip K Dick as well. The book was so interesting to read and came to a good climax. There were good dramatic moments. I can' t wait to read the next book in the series.

Charming story, a nice view (if it's real!) of middle east culture, and a very likeable protagonist. Not "hard sci fi" or anything like that, but great storytelling.

Trying hard to be Lester del Rey but failing to achieve decent characterisation, plot, tension or charm. Shame. It started well.

Part of Effinger's cult classic Marid series; distinctive, elegantly written, atmospheric, first rate as both SF and crime fiction.