28 June, 2002
Roadmarks
Roger Zelazny
1979
185 pp (MMPB)
Like Chad, I'm a tad dismayed that my booklog lacks representation of my favorite authors, so I decided to reread some Zelazny in an effort to start remedying the situation.
I love the whole idea of this novel: Time is a highway, with exits and side-roads leading not only to the past, present, and future, but to many variations thereon: "The Road... traverses Time-- Time past, time to come, Time that could have been and Time that might yet be." Some people have the ability to access the Road and travel it from Time to Time and world to world. It's just such a fabulous concept-- the ultimate road trip. If I could do that, I'd ditch this physics business in an instant. (Or, at least, right after I defend my thesis. No point in ditching 6 years of work, at this late date.)
Anyway, the main character of Roadmarks is Red (or Reyd) Dorakeen, who has been travelling the Road for as long as he can remember. He knows he's looking for a time or a place from his past, the exit to which has been lost. However, somebody has decided to kill him, and has set a number of elite assassins on Red's trail. Meanwhile, Red's son Randy has come onto the Road, in search of the father he never met. Red's also got an incredibly cool sidekick: a sentient book. Acutally, it's an artificial intelligence built in the shape of a paperback copy of Baudelaire's Flowers of Evil. "Flowers" is a well-drawn character in her own right, with a wicked sarcastic streak.
Additionally, there's lots of Zelazny-type goodness in the novel. There's some experimentation in the time flow of the narrative, which is only to be expected in a Zelazny novel about time travel. Like A Night in the Lonesome October, Roadmarks features cameo appearances by various fictional and historical characters, such as Doc Savage and Adolf Hitler. There are also some gratuitous wacky episodes of mayhem which don't exactly serve to forward the plot, but which are nevertheless good fun. Especially the bit with the Marquis de Sade and the T. Rex.
I've always rather liked the cover art for this book, with the battered blue pickup truck driving along the Road towards the last exit to Babylon, and the dragon flying overhead. It conveys the feel of the novel perfectly-- driving down the open road towards the past, surrounded by fantastic impossibilities.
