Ship Breaker by Paolo Bacigalupi

Book Review – Ship Breaker by Paolo Bacigalupi

By Ben Kuhlman

Since 1980, when the science fiction community went through relative upheaval with novels like Ender’s Game and Neuromancer, it is rare for the Hugo and Nebula Award voters to agree on a single title.  (If you think about this, it makes sense – one group, the Science Fiction/Fantasy Writers of America, gives its award to the best sci-fi/fantasy novel published in the United States, while the other gives the award to the best sci-fi/fantasy novel published in English.  Unless the author is an American, it is difficult to win both.)  When they do, it is usually for monumental achievements that these disparate voting blocs can agree on, such as The Yiddish Policeman’s Union, Michael Chabon’s foray into alternate history, or American Gods, Neil Gaiman’s brilliant fantasy about faded deities skulking around the corners of the United States, reminiscing about past glories.  Paolo Bacigalupi recently joined this club with The Windup Girl, a complex and convincing sci-fi imagining of the world after catastrophic climate change, out-of-control genetically-engineered plants and animals, and corporate colonialism. 

Bacigalupi’s recent YA venture, Ship Breaker, echoes some of the structures of his earlier, larger, grown-up work.  Both are “post-apocalyptic.”  Both also seem to agree on the nature of the apocalypse – global warming, rising sea levels, increased scarcity of resources, much more pronounced separation among socioeconomic classes.  (A key difference between the two is that Ship Breaker is much less stuffed with scientific speculation about causes and effects.  Readers of The Windup Girl want to understand the main character’s personality, but they also want to understand why her skin has no pores, and why she moves in a telltale, jerky manner.)  Yet both books also call into question the permanence of social class, while simultaneously reiterating how strongly determined most characters’ (and most peoples’) lives really are.  This is a complex project for any novel, let alone a YA novel with an audience famous for its low tolerance of BS. 

At this point, I think I should take a step back, smile, and admit that I loved the book.  It was a gut-wrenching, thrilling, sometimes painful ride through a difficult and completely convincing world, with people who seemed to forget that they weren’t real.  I loved almost every inch of it, with the possible exception of the moment when Richard Lopez and his crew catch them with Nita the first time, and it sees like there is no escape.  I almost gave up on the book, because I was worried that something bad was going to happen to Nita, Pima, or Nailer.  That alone says something.

In the beginning of the book, fate – especially luck – seems all-powerful.  There are dozens of references: Lucky Strike, an important minor character, who is famous in the area for finding a hidden pocket of oil during a salvage job, and managing to sell it and pocket the money; Nailer’s unlucky slip through an air duct into a similar pocket of oil, and his lucky escape; all of the gifts Nailer receives from people hoping to share his good luck; the luck of finding Nita’s ship; her bad luck in wrecking in the storm; even the nicknames that Nailer (Lucky Boy) and Nita (Lucky Girl) get.  The importance that the culture of the ship-breakers places on luck stems from their sense of powerlessness.  Nailer constantly struggles with the injustice of Pima’s, and even Sedna’s, likely future, knowing that they have little hope of escaping early death and abuse.  Luck is the only way out.

Over the course of the book, Nailer begins to change this perception.  By the end of the book, his choices become more important than his fate or his “luck.”  His first choice – preserving Nita’s life – changes his life in complex ways, and the decisions he makes as the story unfolds become more and more important in determining his future.  He decides to use the train to flee the beach, and his decision proves wise; he decides to seek the help of the captain of the Dauntless, and it works in his favor.  The end of the book (which I will not ruin) comes about because of Nailer’s choices. 

Apart from this intriguing shift in Nailer’s perceptions about his fate, Ship Breaker is crowded with strange and interesting characters.  Nita doesn’t readily fall into the role of “love-interest,” nor does she immediately become bosom buddies with Pima and Nailer.    Richard Lopez is a frightening villain who seems ready to explode at any moment, but his connection to his son seems to restrain him in unpredictable ways.  Nailer sings Pima’s praises, and Pima saves his job (and his life) many times, but she is ready to kill Nita without really thinking about it.  Perhaps most interesting – more interesting even than Nailer, the conflicted hero – is Tool, the intelligent and coldly rational genetically-engineered “half-man” or “dog face.”  Other half-men (like Knot, a crewmember from the Dauntless, who ironically teaches Nailer to read) are designed to be unquestioningly loyal.  Tool seems to lack this genetic mandate – to the confusion of almost everyone.  Yet he also possesses the super-human strength, senses, and reflexes of the half-man.  Tool surprised me when he decided to join Nailer and Nita on the trip north; he surprised me again a few more times before the book ended.  Bacigalupi has managed to create characters that can surprise you, but whose choices still seem in harmony with what you are told. 

As I have already said, I enjoyed the book a great deal.  Bacigalupi is a gifted writer, with uncommon talent for character and vision.  Ship Breaker is a complex image of a bleak future, and it should be read for the almost enveloping completeness of its imaginary world.  More important, Bacigalupi tells a good story.  Either way, you should read it.