Market Theocracy

Steven Brust has written a novel length Firefly story. A free download under the Creative Commons license.

Brust is a professional writer, very respected in SF/Fantasy circles.

My Own Kind Of Freedom

My review:

Overall, I’d give this (very short) novel an A-. The tone and voice of the characters are very nearly spot on, there are no major lapses in characterization from what we know and love, and the story abounds with the lovely interweaving of comedy, tragedy, action and pathos that made Firefly our favorite show.

Brust’s admitted socialist sympathies don’t really raise their idealogical head. He does what a writer should when tackling characters that have a life outside his own imagination and were created by the group effort of others: he allows them to be their own creations. It’s literally impossible to not imagine the actors in their respective roles. Brust’s style lends itself well to the Firefly ‘Verse — his clean, minimalistic prose and spare imagery complementing the atmosphere and sleek pace we are used to from the show. He intentionally (I assume) sticks to a very cinematic style, not overloading the reader with interior dialogue and thoughts. The story is told mainly in conversation that is light, bantering and entertaining.

Brust’s depiction of River is especially interesting and enjoyable. She is the only character that he truly goes into the head of — and that’s something most fans want, I think. Her prismatic, complex, damaged but brilliant perceptions and observations are a delight to read. He does not dispel the necessary aura of mystery around the character, he deepens and embroiders it with excellent detail.

But it is Mal’s story where the novel truly shines, especially the flashbacks of his time of war. They concern the transformation of the Browncoats from a decentralized, widely dispersed force of small units harassing their larger and richer foe into an attempt to mimic that foe with a centralized army and the bureaucracy that requires. This, the novel suggests, is the main reason the Independants lost.

My only real complaints with the novel is that Brust is a bit repetitious with his humor, and the action scenes are often somewhat muddled.

Some other minor nitpicks:

The Chinese slang is very much overused. In the show it was almost always possible to deduce the meaning from context. It is most of the time in the novel, but not always. Also, reading Chinese is different from hearing Chinese. What added an exotic, intriguing element to the show mostly comes across as a roadblock in prose.

Wash is shown to be a pilot for the Browncoats in the war. I’m pretty sure that the show inferred he had no role on either side.

These are minor complaints (my major minor complaint [ha!] would be a spoiler, so I refrain.) and in no way stop me from recommending My Own Kind Of Freedom to every Firefly fan, either obsessive or casual.