Perdido Street Station

China Miéville

Jul 2003 · Bas-Lag Book 1 · Sold by Del Rey

About this ebook

WINNER OF THE AUGUST DERLETH AND ARTHUR C. CLARKE AWARDS • A masterpiece brimming with scientific splendor, magical intrigue, and fierce characters, from the author who “has reshaped modern fantasy” (The Washington Post)

“[China Miéville’s] fantasy novels, including a trilogy set in and around the magical city-state of New Crobuzon, have the refreshing effect of making Middle-earth seem plodding and flat.”—The New York Times

The metropolis of New Crobuzon sprawls at the center of the world. Humans and mutants and arcane races brood in the gloom beneath its chimneys, where the river is sluggish with unnatural effluent and foundries pound into the night. For a thousand years, the Parliament and its brutal militias have ruled over a vast economy of workers and artists, spies and soldiers, magicians, crooks, and junkies.

Now a stranger has arrived, with a pocketful of gold and an impossible demand. And something unthinkable is released.

The city is gripped by an alien terror. The fate of millions lies with a clutch of renegades. A reckoning is due at the city’s heart, in the vast edifice of brick and wood and steel under the vaults of Perdido Street Station.

It is too late to escape.

Ratings and reviews

For the first few pages, I thought choosing this book was a mistake. It made me squeamish, even disgusted. Uncomfortable. Confused, too, because I'd expected to like it -- I knew Miéville is one of Cory Doctorow's favorite authors, and I sought out his work -- but for the first few pages I was aghast. Then, without warning or fanfare, I was completely sucked in. Like completely overtaken. I read like a woman possessed, reading til the wee hours and waking early to steal another hour of so of reading before I had to return to the real world. I finished the trilogy in a long weekend, absolutely immersed in Miéville's viscerally realized world. These are the kind of books that leave you disoriented and dizzy when you look up from reading and find yourself in your own home instead of the back alleys of New Crobuzon. What can I say, I've been completely won over and filled with the proselytizing zeal of the recent convert 😅

China Mieville is unjustly unknown. So good you will no longer be able to tolerate the trash you used to enjoy. The Bas-Lag books elevated the genre of Fantasy in particular and Fiction in general. Strangely, I read this book last when I discovered the three books set in that universe which left me unsure of what a few of the different creatures and concepts were that are never again definitely described in the later entries. It is wise to read them in the order published for clarity.

i blame the editor. lots of pros: highly imaginative story, carried you thru tons of exposition (main conflict doesn't start til about 40% thru, world is complex and compelling). ultimately i could not KEEP suspending my disbelief that an advanced steampunk society with magic couldn't manage to make a helmet without gaps by the visor... convenience upon convenience keeps plot afloat. all the things i came to care about in the world weren't resolved. female characters guilty about necessity is one of my pet peeves. the book drew me in, enough to be disappointed.

About the author

China Miéville is the author of numerous books, including This Census-Taker, Three Moments of an Explosion, Railsea, Embassytown, Kraken, The City & The City, and Perdido Street Station. His works have won the World Fantasy Award, the Hugo Award, and the Arthur C. Clarke Award (three times). He lives and works in London.