Tentacular, spectacular

Kraken; China Mieville
Macmillan Rs461 pp 481 

There’s a ‘weird’ charm to China Mieville’s writings. Like an untimely burp reminiscent of a hearty meal, his flavoursome pennings stomp the mind at moments unexpected. It’s partly due to the beauty of Mieville’s shape-shifting monsters and partly because you realise that he has read his Herman Melville (an ancestor), read through his H.P. Lovecraft and enough of Charles Dickens to be able to subvert the latter’s London to build his fantastical world — his London.

But above all, it is because of the reassurance Mieville provides that New Weird fiction in the 21st century is alive and well in his hands. In Kraken, Mieville comes firing all guns with his ‘architeuthis’ saga. London’s Darwin Centre’s prized possession, the giant squid, has gone missing.

Full review here Hindustan Times