Zoe and Villy are two kids at the end of high school, plotting to drop out and drive across America in the way I'm not sure young people really do anymore. She laments the fact that her peers aren't into Miles Davis, and the two of them embody a sort of timeless teenage identity in a way which I find a bit embarrassing despite being a middle-aged white man, and which I imagine will be even more so for readers who are not. In short, there is no getting away from the fact that one is reading a 2019 novel written by an old hippy*. And yet, there are enough flashes of something, enough moments when it feels more Pynchon than Kerouac, that one keeps reading – for instance, the description of one of Zoe's fashion concepts as 'Goth Coma'. And Rucker might be a hippy, and I never finished White Light, and I suspect the two 'ware novels of his I read might not read as well now as they did in the nineties, but he was also the hippy who blew my tiny schoolboy mind with The Fourth Dimension And How To Get There. So I persevered through the somewhat cheeseball alien contact, and the aliens pimping their ride, but eventually a line had to be drawn when Villy's annoying kid brother gets an invite to come along for the fabulous journey across the universe. Yes, no doubt there'll be some heartwarming hugging and learning and discovering they're not so very different really, but if there's one thing I expect in exchange for putting up with hippy tropes, it's that I'll at least get a decent escape fantasy out of the experience, rather than a wagging parental finger.

*Albeit an old hippy whose full name – Rudolf von Bitter Rucker – sounds more fitted to a camp commandant in a war film than expanded consciousness.

(Netgalley ARC)

Million Mile Road Trip is unlike any journey you’ve ever been on. Rucker takes the wheel and slams through barriers into a world that bursts with originality and inventiveness. I’m new to Rucker’s work and this surreal experience makes me want to stop what I’m doing and read everything he’s written in a feverish marathon. It’s invigorating to read something so unhinged from the norm, a feeling that stayed with me long after I left the book.

Rucker’s narrative style is almost beyond description. It starts as a typical conversation between two teenagers, both in love with the other but unable to fully realize that connection. With the snap of a finger, the story makes a screeching u-turn into a zany, hilarious and extremely surreal interaction with two aliens who appear from the sky. Technically, they crawl down a ladder extended from a floating pearl through a portal that was summoned playing a song on a trumpet. But who’s counting? Their ensuing road trip is filled with ups and downs and an endless stream of interactions that will fry your imagination.

The characters are an interesting bunch. The two young teenagers, Zoe and Villy, are both struggling to figure out what their futures could hold. It’s this uncertainty that leads them to blindly accept the offer to take a road trip to this alien world. They’re joined by Villy’s strange brother, Scud, who seems to fit in just fine with the upside down reality they find themselves in. The two aliens are truly out of this world, filling the novel with their hyped-up form of English and their infectious personalities. Throw all of these characters into a souped up station wagon and it’s impossible not to have a good time ripping through the wilds of this alien frontier.

Overall, it’s impossible not to love Million Mile Road Trip. With a wild cast of characters, an alien world that boggles the mind, and extremely spot-on writing, Ruckus has created a masterpiece that must be experienced.

To be published on 5/13: https://reviewsandrobots.com/2019/05/13/million-mile-road-trip-book-review

Million Mile Road Trip, Rudy Rucker’s latest, is a gnarly road trip romp across the universe to save the Earth from flying saucers. The aliens are nicely alien, and there’s lots of different kinds. There’s love, a little bit of sex. It’s an alternate dimension 4D-mathematical hippie alien drug-fuelled epic quest road trip between friends who learn a little about life and themselves.

I’m going to have a hard time describing the plot of this one, but I’ll give it a try.

Just before her high school graduation, a high school girl, Zoe, her boyfriend, Villy, and her boyfriend’s little brother, Scud, go on a road trip with a few aliens. The aliens soup up her boyfriend’s car, and they take a portal to another … dimension? Another view of the universe? We live in “ballyworld”, where we have planet balls that are separated by light-years of space. They jump to “mappyworld”, which is a giant plane, with valleys that correspond to our planets, and mountain ranges that separate the valleys that correspond to our deep space. They quickly learn that Earth has been under attack by flying saucers, who are actually biological entities. Some of the flying saucers are evil, and take over people’s brains. Zoe and Villy are destined to make their way to Szep City, return to help Earth, and they undergo their epic quest to save the world.

Each chapter is told from a rotating viewpoint, and every character has their own voice. The young characters are awesome and really believable. Rucker does a good job filling every page with ideas and with the distinctness of each section of his fun setting.

This was super fun. I thought it was pretty grand, as an adult, but I bet there are teenagers that would love it as well. I’ve read a fair number of Rucker’s previous novels, and this is my favorite.

I received this book at no cost from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

If science fiction were the Catholic church, Rudy Rucker would be the patron saint of quantum cupcakes. Saint, indeed yes, such is the regard with which the community should hold Rucker. Trouble is, his area is of so little common interest (the majority of candles seem to be lit for the saints of commerce, i.e. space opera and heroic adventure) that it leaves a small but devoted cult chanting Rucker’s name and spouting his many mercies and blessings in tiny alcoves and reliquaries (ergo this blog). 2019’s The Million Mile Roadtrip marks Rucker’s return after an eight year pilgrimage to the Plains of Crystal Sprinkles. Hands folded together in supplication, the man has still got everything worth lighting a candle for.

Telling the tale of high school surfer Villy, his trumpet playing girlfriend Zoe, and Villy’s annoying younger brother Scud, The Million Mile Roadtrip is classic Rucker madcap genius. Going on a trans-galactic journey in a purple station wagon souped up with space magic, the trio, along with a revolving cast of wacky aliens, explores the ideas of parallel worlds, flatworlds, and of course, Rucker’s transreal special: ‘human development’. Quotation marks required, I don’t think there is anybody quite like the author to put characters through a grinder of alternate physical realities and have them come out changed people on the other side but still wholly and recognizably human.

Which gets us into why Rucker is a saint. While at some level of philosophy all imagination is unique, it is of course relative, practically speaking. Author A’s space ship may have a curved hull and author B’s an angular, but both are blasting the f-u-c-k out of alien bugs in cheap entertainment. Rucker’s space ship is a purple 70s surfer wagon… with monster truck tires… and the alien bugs don’t’ require blasting. They require magic mushroom navigation. Like Rucker’s other books, The Million Mile Roadtrip walks its own path, taking its three protagonists on a perilous journey through mappyworld (a flat world with some analog to Earth). The peril more often mental than physical, the three have to choose their own ways of dealing with the huge variety of slang and wackiness mappyworld/Ruckers spills their way.

If there are any discrepancies about the novel, one would have to be length. A sci-fi salad of constantly changing ingredients, the book reaches a point at about the three-quarters mark where the barrage of originality begins to become a wash. Novelty still sets the story hurtling onward, but in a fashion that has the reader occasionally questioning ‘What was that veep thing, again?’ I suppose after eight years, however, Rucker probably had trouble quelling the dearth of imagination built up.

Jack Kerouac may have his name in the canons of literature as ‘that guy who wrote the ultimate roadtrip book’, but I daresay that for as dynamic and shifting as On the Road is, The Million Mile Roadtrip runs through the cosmos and back in the same time without losing any of its humanity. Featuring teenage characters as its protagonists, and their ordeal superficially simple, it would be easy to characterize the book as YA. But that would be doing it a disservice considering people of all ages could just as readily enjoy the trio’s zany adventures in a parallel world.

Do yourself a favor if you haven’t read Rucker, light a candle for the saint and buy The Million Mile Roadtrip. It will wash away the sins of the mediocre, derivative material flooding the market today and cleanse your science fiction soul. Me, I’ve said my prayers for today. The quantum cupcake tasted good, and my world has a more colorful perspective for it. I wish you the same.

Million Mile Road Trip by Rudy Rucker
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I've read and enjoyed a number of Rudy Rucker novels and I can practically taste the surf on this one. They all have very distinctive flavors, but in all cases, they're wildly imaginative.

I admit I have a soft spot in my heart for easygoing kids more interested in being practical about relaxing, getting some surfing done, and playing their instruments, jamming out and taking it slow. This may have the hallmarks of a YA but it isn't, really. It's a road trip novel.

Here's where it really stands out: It's like reading Cat Valente's Space-Opera or Douglas Adams with a very surfer ethos, where the MCs take in the introduction of tiny aliens and a Dark Matter conversion kit for his bus with absolute aplomb.

What? Road trip with more peeps? Okie-dokey! With the kid brother? eehhhh.... okay... and we're doing a million miles and doing it powered by the strength of our music? ALL RIGHT! :)

If it sounds fun, you haven't gotten to know all the freaking aliens yet. :)

There's a ton and they're fun and of course, the journey ends with saving the universe and all, but the point is THE JOURNEY, man. :) And kisses that spawn a room full of babies. Or a whole WORLD of surfing! That bus goes through A LOT. :)

Very funny novel and delightful characters. I am reminded that I REALLY have to get back into reading Rudy's whole catalog. :) Well worth the time!

I received a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

I have to say that I have never read anything by this author before, but it definitely had a Kurt Vonnegut feel to it. Without reading the biographical information, it was clear that this book was written by a mathematician or physicist who had perhaps experimented too much with LSD in the past.

I give the book high marks for creativity, with the very interesting cosmology and presentation of the aliens. Each of the aliens were portrayed in an interesting way, to the point where it seemed to get in the way of the story. The road trip itself was pretty weak as a plot device and the main character's interactions were those of someone so stoned that they had no awareness of anything but the now. Someone's wife is brutally murdered? No problem, just go on and sing with the group, even to the point of starting to date someone else three days later. Someone acts treacherously to you? Ask them to leave politely, then attack and kill them the next day when they show back up.

In short, the book starts out great, drags pretty badly for the middle half and then picks back up and does a pretty good job at the end. I had trouble getting through the middle of the book, but at the end I was enjoying it again.