I have mixed feelings about Jeffrey Ford’s science fantasy novel The Physiognomy. While I rank it above the average, it’s still frustrating to read a book with so much potential so needlessly wasted. Jeffrey Ford had great ideas for it but I didn’t like the way he handled many of them. I’ll let you know about my biggest gripes in a minute, so keep reading.
For this review, I split the novel into three parts. Act one is, in my humble opinion, the best chunk of the book. Here we witness as Cley, renowned physiognomist of the Well-Built City — the urban brainchild of overlord genius Drachton Below —, is sent to the rural landscapes at the edge of the known world on a trifling mission he’s not very pleased to carry out. Cley is a cruel and conceited individual, intelligent but at the same time blinded by his own knowledge and an addiction to a drug known as Sheer Beauty. He isn’t loathe to vent his frustrations on the hapless peasants, whom he rates pathetic creatures after only a quick glance at their physiognomic traits. Jeffrey Ford shows great talent for dark humour in his portrayal of Cley, and it’s a pity it only lasts for the first part of the novel. Granted, Cley isn’t a character you could easily identify yourself with, but I still liked him a lot at this stage. So shoot me.
Cley is also perhaps the only truly well-developed character in The Physiognomy, while all the others seem flat in comparison. Unfortunately for him, though, things are about to change.
The story goes a bit downhill from here. Luckily not into the Forbidden Zone of Badness, but downhill nevertheless. For starters, things happen too damn fast at times, especially from the second act on. Jeffrey Ford seems in a hurry to finish the book, and its 244 pages add to that impression.
During the second part of the book, Cley endures a set of conditions that gradually change him into a man of healthier disposition. Possibly because the narrative seems so rushed, his moral metamorphosis felt awkward to me. Not unlikely, but still awkward. Or perhaps the surrealism of the world around Cley did it, I don’t know. What I find is a pity is that the protagonist begins to flatten and lose complexity as a result. Too bad. On the other hand, Jeffrey Ford writes up some more cool concepts, fewer than in the first part, but fortunately not as squandered.
The third act gives us Cley’s return to Below’s Well-Built City. Without going into particulars for the sake of spoilers, I’ll just say I didn’t appreciate the novel’s kind-of vacuous antiscientific message, nor did I like to see Cley made into a wimp at the end. The rating goes down a notch for me, though I understand other people's views on the subject might vary.
Like I mentioned at the start of the review, The Physiognomy boasts quite a few first-class concepts — I’ll tell you of Drachton Below’s pet, a clockwork-animated werewolf, just to tease your appetite. Sadly, Ford leaves behind a trail of undeveloped ideas, and explores those which I wouldn’t like him to go into, such as describing an expedition to Paradise in needless detail — he ended up murdering the whole thing’s ‘sense-of-wonder’ for nothing. Any author who pulls one of those without a pretty damned good reason gives me cause to lop a couple of points off the book’s rating.
So, is it worth picking up? I’d say so. The Physiognomy is an original and rather interesting read, and it wouldn’t take you more than an idle weekend afternoon to finish it. Personally, I’d encourage you to give it a try. You might even like it better than I did.
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