Leviathan by Scott Westerfeld Book Discussion | BioPunk

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I'm on a mission to read a book in every sub-genre of every genre and this is the first episode of SEASON TWO. In this season, I'll be exploring books with the suffix "punk". This time, I will read a book from the biopunk genre and the book representing that is Leviathan by Scott Westerfeld.

Leviathan is not only a biopunk book, but it's also an historical fiction. Set in the throes of WWI, where the British, Darwinists, head into war with fabricated (mutated) animals and the Germans and Central Powers, Clankers, counter with heavy machinery.

When I heard the description of this book, I dropped everything and knew I had to check it out. A blend of fantasy and alternate history was just what I needed. Here's how I felt about the book.

#readingeverygenre

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I love the Leviathan Trilogy. I wish they would make a movie or mini series out of them. Or maybe even an animated series. ❤

TheVeyZ

It's nice to see the Leviathan series getting some well deserved recognition

christosgiannopoulos

"Punk" started as a little short-story, within the New Wave of Science Fiction, called "Cyberpunk" mainly for it's themes of highly advanced techology and focus on youth counter-culture.

Later on a sci-fi noir film that is broadly based on Philip K. Dick's "Do Androids Dream Of Electric Sheep" was released in theatres "Blade Runner" and from that point on a huge zeitgeist of authors, filmmakers, game designers, musicians and the early hacker culture of the mid to late eighties, that was then called "Cyberpunk" and it's head slogan were "High Tech, Low Life".

ALL the "Punk"-genres are off-shoots from Cyberpunk. Steampunk started with "The Difference Engine", a collabrated novel written by the two most well-known cyberpunk authors: Wiliam Gibson and Bruce Sterling.

Biopunk is basically the same as cyberpunk but emphazises advanced technological developments in the field of biology than information technology.

"Punk" is not of the grittyness and dark overtones; it's for the emphazising of alienation, the poor and ordinary working class people. The grittyness comes up naturally.

K_E_Robin

Leviathan was the first true introduction I had to biotechnology in fiction media and as a technology nerd and history nerd it was honestly a perfect presentation of it. The book made me feel so intimately interested and exhilarated the whole way through.

cyansorcerer

You mentioned how they speak in pretty plain, unaccented English... I highly recommend the audio book as a fix to that! Alan Cumming does an amazing job of bringing those accents to life! Giving Deryn her Scottish lit and Alek his Austro-hungary german accent. It makes those scenes where Alek and the other clankers are talking in German and then he "switches" to English for the British crew a little more clear. (I'll admit it caught me off guard the first time I read "spoke in english." Because my brain just didn't comprehend until that point that of course they would've been speaking German the whole time.) You first see that language barrier in the chapter where Alek and Deryn meet for the first time and he says something like, "I can't remember the name for it in english." Before I got the audio book I just thought he was being stuffy about giving away too much information.

Anyway great review!

pennypeach

This novel isn't just Biopunk. Leviathan is a blended combination of Biopunk and Steampunk!
HOO-RAH!

superiorsoldier

I read the leviathan series when i was in middle school. It was a good book!

warfighter

I read this during my HS to early college years! I LOVE THIS SERIES! It's a great YA series and they should definitely make this into an animated series with no substitutions!!!!

Fafnerluver

What a fantastic review! I read it over 10 years ago and I still go back to it! I wish this series were a bit more popular tbh! I wonder if you ever got to read the whole series!

suki

It’s also considered diesel punk and steampunk

norseczar

I have this book!
I literally finished it in 4 days!

emiliamarcellus

Love this series I read it back in high school my favorite thing about it were the illustrations throughout the books, its something I rarely found in novels and enhanced the experience. It'd be cool if it was adapted into a graphic novel or something similar, its been over 10 years since the first one released.

kiptelgat