Book Review: Juicy Ghosts by Rudy Rucker

 
 

Juicy Ghosts by Rudy Rucker

333 pages, Paperback

Transreal books, October 2021

There are shades of weird in science fiction.  From the mainstream novels that are almost as milk-toast and boring as a ghost-written James Patterson novel. While Rudy Rucker has written novels like the 1982 classic Software that comes close to recognizable science fiction is a delightfully strange classic now, and the three sequels get weirder and weirder as they go.  Rudy Rucker who is just as well known for being a mathematician as a SF writer is a textbook example of a writer that is totally impossible to compare to anyone else.  

One of the reasons I think Philip K. Dick remains such a landmark is his mind was so out there that his novels and ideas were largely unpredictable, well until you read thirty of them in a row but we are not here to talk about Phil. Rudy Rucker while connected to many of the cyberpunks by way of friendship and a few collaborations write entire unique books that don’t fit easy marketing.
His work is weird as hell and not for everyone.  It is challenging because Rudy is clearly smarter than most if not all the folks who pick up his books. It is clear he is hilarious, and you will laugh as often as you might reading Douglas Adams or Robert Sheckley. If surfer math dude with enormous intelligence and cyberpunk connections writing surrealist gonzo Science fiction sounds like your thing you have many Rudy Rucker books and short stories to look forward to.

Juicy Ghosts is the self-published reaction to the 2020 Trump madness, social mediazation of society, and possible transhuman tech wall coming down. In the afterword, Rucker notes he approached a couple of publishers but I can imagine more than one editor not having a clue what fuck they were looking at.   (That is not a negative)

An editor hired by a publisher might try to retrain Rucker, and in a sense, it doesn’t matter if it all works or not.  One of the values of Juicy Ghosts is how out of control this book is.  Embrace the insanity if you are going to dive into these seas. I would be worried an editor would’ve told Rucker to be more clear, or that he didn’t need a page devoted AI generated donut flavors but the latter cracked me up.

This novel is a story about technology, immortality, and a presidential election similar to the one we all survived in 2020. In this future, your mind can live forever in a device called a life box, you can evenget a new body after you, hence a Juicy Ghost! They can be connected or you can live in simulations.  The wetware tech is zany in all the Rucker-style ways you come to expect. Some of the terms described had me laughing out loud many times. Also scratching my head at times unsure I understood what was happening. Teeps for example like a telepathic tweet, I think. That is what makes sense.

President Tredle is not Trump. He is about to make sure his third term happens. The election drives the narrative through the eyes of several characters. Most of the main characters get their own chapters, towards the end we repeat one of two characters but essentially the chapters somewhat all feel different. It is one story but the shifting POV  makes each chapter have a distinct feel. Some work better than others but if you don’t like a chapter hang around.

 With characters like Gee Willikers and The Mean Carrot (who lives in his life box in an avatar that looks exactly like it sounds. These are self-described high priests of biotech, a useful vocation in a transhuman virtual-ish future. You have to calibrate to Rucker-isms ranging from pets being called Kritters, social media posts are Teeps and stumbles or Psidots which I think is when you connect with another person’s life box.

“Stumble sex is very, very abstract,” I primly tell Anselm. “It’s neurochemicals from gossip molecules.”
“Yes, I know Says Anselm. “I helped Gee Willikers orchestrate the open source release  of the ribbon diagrams for huffy fungus and the gossip molecules.”

So I suggest you use the above quote to figure out if are you able to ride Rudy Rucker's gnarl wave?

For me, I am OK not understanding all of it. Enough of it makes sense and makes me laugh.   
The election fuckery in this novel comes in the form of a virtual disease named after the Trump stand-in President.  This means Rucker is basically commenting on 2020 as a whole.  

“Feel how they’re picking away at us? And that flicker on the screen – that codes for the virus template too. Viewers with insecure stumbles or Psidots are fucked. But most of the infections will be old school. As a Physical virus, Treadle disease can come in directly. And it’s evolving in real-time. Getting snakier. More wiggly. Unbelievably quick to spread. Make sure your mask is on tight.”

Juicy Ghosts is very much a comment on our times.  An absurdist satire of the very sad and serious times. That could get dark really fast in the hands of most cyberpunk but Rucker's gonzo humor and unleashed weirdness make this a hilarious experience.  Sneaky and living at the edges of this book is a commentary on getting older, and the ways our social media and technology is keeping a record of us. The lifebox is a way that characters as persona might live on. I have thought about this with "friends" I have made online that I only know that way.

“Even So, I’ve been working on my lifebox every day. It’s all I’ve got. I talk to Jilljill in my head, she continually updates my lifebox data on Gee’s server in the Santa Cruz mountains. Sensations, ruminations, moods- Jilljill saves them all.”

A Rudy Rucker novel is a surrealist abstract painting ripped from a universe that can only exist in the mind of a genius. A thing of wonder.  I am always game for it.