A Billion Days of Earth, Doris Piserchia

A Billion Days of Earth, Doris Piserchia (1976)
Review by Joachim Boaz

Doris Piserchia’s A Billion Days of Earth is a whimsical, disturbing, and stunningly inventive science fiction novel. This is the second and by far the best of her novels I’ve read (A Billion Days of Earth surpasses Doomtime (review here) in virtually every regard). Not only are the characters better drawn but the plot isn’t as easily derailed by repetitious actions. That said, she isn’t always the best at plotting but her imaginative worldscapes and bizarre creatures more than compensate. Doris Piserchia’s oeuvre deserves to be read (and reprinted!). Sadly due to deaths in her family she stopped publishing in 1983…

The year is three million A.D. and humans have evolved to the point where they possess immense physical and technological abilities. Humans (Homo Superior), now called Gods, in the past dabbled with genetics and created various creatures including the ferocious zizzy, which is a pouched bee/cat. The Gods refuse to interact with the denizens of the Earth and occupy themselves by engaging in various leisure activities in the clouds.

However the Gods are not the only sentient creature inhabiting this future earth. Rats have evolved and gained sentience without the assistance of the Gods. The rats call themselves humans. These rat/humans have constructed an immense foundry to supply surrogate metal hands… Occasionally pockets of intelligent rats without metal hands are discovered.

The action takes place in Osfar (the location of the hand foundry) a city in the middle of a desert cut off from its water supply by an earthquake. The main characters are Rik, a brilliant and fearless scientist, and his adopted brother Jak (whom Rik discovered and supplied with hands). The humans are ruled by an inbred “caste” called Fillys who are virtual dictators and control vast amounts of money and live in huge estates.

The inhabitants of this future earth, besides the Gods, are engaged in vicious interspecies strife (the zizzies attack the human/rats and vice-versa).

Into this violent and unusual world comes Sheen an amorphous silver being whose purpose and origins are unknown. Sheen seeps out of the volcanic Valley of the Dead and prays on any species it encounters (besides the advanced Gods) by presenting a victim specific telepathic vision of paradise in order to consume the victim’s ego. Sheen multiples and soon huge swaths of land are devoid of life. For a long time no one is concerned despite Rik’s repeated attempts to notify the authorities…

A parallel story emerges as well — Rik spends his time stealing gadgets from the Gods (humans). On one of these treks Rik and Jak encounter a helpless Goddess who momentarily lost her abilities while secretly giving birthabout to be consumed by a moving hill. Yes, a moving semi-sentient hill!

The two narratives — Sheen’s slow engulfing of all human life and Rik’s interactions with the aloof Gods – intertwine in spectacular fashion.

A Billion Days of Earth is a heady brew of fascinating ideas — semi-sentient moving hills, evolved human/gods uninterested in the world below, sentient rats with metal hands, and of course the amorphous/shape-shifting ego consuming Sheen. The snappy dialogue between Rik and Sheen is a delight to read (and the dialogue between Sheen and any of the creatures it attempts to consume).

My critiques are minor. I wish Rik had a larger role to play (especially his interaction with the Goddess after the incident with the moving hill). His role is minimized because of Piserchia’s unfortunate tendency to introduce a horde of characters throughout the novel which don’t add too much to the narrative. Likewise I’m still unsure of the purpose of the tangential Filly machination subplot…

Highly recommended for all sf fans.

The review originally appeared on Science Fiction and Other suspect Ruminations.

Doomtime, Doris Piserchia

Doomtime, Doris Piserchia (1981)
Review by Joachim Boaz

Welcome to the fevered fungal/vegetable nightmares and uncanny vistas of Doris Piserchia. A virtually forgotten science fiction author — her books are all long out of print — who deserves to be read and remembered.

Doomtime is by no means a classic (and not her best work) but should be read for its sheer imaginative and haunting power. Despite the fact that the pacing is poor, the characters undeveloped, and Piserchia’s prose often falters, the world she creates is memorable and disturbing (sadly, the volume is “graced” with some atrocious cover art, well, besides that weird bug thing — a Piserchia stable).

The book opens with Creed surviving an assassination attempt — however, with the assassin (now missing a section of his brain) attached to Creed’s head. How did this happen? Well, Creed’s people produce most of their food from a gigantic brass bowl (a technology developed in the distant past) filled with proto-flesh (which gurgles out into various molds creating chickens, etc). The assassin attempted to push Creed into the pool (which Creed cleans for a living) but bubbles of the proto-flesh melds the two together. Perhaps this gives you an idea of Piserchia’s imagination?

Creed eventually discovers a series of bizarre occurrences, strange molds near the brass bowl produce pinkish creatures which spin like tornadoes and kill people, people disappear into trees only to reappear, and others hunt him with bows and arrows. He realizes that one can meld with the trees which are suddenly growing prolifically near the city. The green ones are called Tendron and the reddish ones Krake. These trees — linked to each other by roots and eventually to gigantic Everest sized trees of each color — are fighting a war between each other. By dipping (melding) into a tree, humans becomes addicted and subtle commands implanted into their minds — the humans become pawns in their war.

Creed sets off to rectify the situation and meets fungus creatures which meld with humans, strange fungus pools which unravel peoples’ psyches, humans sucked dry by Tendron and Krake, humans mutated beyond recognition by the trees, humans turning into trees, fuzzy smallish fungus which grow around peoples’ necks, addicted humans stuck in hibernating trees desperate to meld…. Eventually Creed comes upon the central Tendron and Krake — separated from each other by a mountain range — and an unusual secret in their upper limbs.

The most disturbing element of this novel is how little the humans have control over their situation. Entire groups of humans are transformed by these trees — humans are in no way the superior lifeforms. Piserchia is the master at showing instead of telling — often in an offhand matter of fact way which intensifies the dread and unease. This has to be one of the more unusual and disturbing worlds I’ve ever read about.

Sadly, Doomtime‘s structure is a let-down. The entire middle section drags as characters endlessly explore in groups, get separated, manipulated by the trees, betray their companions, feel sorry for them, escape, get separated, get tree manipulated some more, and go out and explore as if nothing happened. Piserchia clearly did not know how to finish the novel (or perhaps reach her page limit). Also, Piserchia writes using clustered vignettes. Thus, an individual narrative thread rarely goes beyond a page or two. This style is really frustrating.

That said, the world itself with its bizarre technology, creepy female fungus creatures, twirling pink creatures, proto-flesh weapons, tree dipping, fungus melding activities, human transforming, and of course the weather creating world destroying trees, is staggeringly inventive.

This review originally appeared on Science Fiction and Other Suspect Ruminations.