Stephanie Johnson

The Whistler
ISBN: 1869413466
EAN/ISBN-9781869413460
Imprint: Random House NZ Vintage
Release: 01-05-1998

Smooch is a 'Whistler', a genetically altered lapdog with special talents, including the ability to remember his previous incarnations and the ability to communicate rather directly form his brain by electronically downloading his thoughts onto disc. Smooch has been reincarnated many times, and has lived on many of the great laps of history, past and future. He can recall many of history's key moments, such as the birth of Jesus and the imprisonment of Mary Queen of Scots.

The Whistler is a virtuous feat - wise, fun and intelligent. Smooch's current reincarnation is in Sydney in the year 2318. The world has gone to hell: democratic government worldwide has given way to a society run by corporations, pollution is everywhere, and society is heavily stratified between haves and have nots.

Reviews of The Whistler

The result is one of the most inventive novels to be published in Australia this year. It is part science fiction, part short story, part feminist narrative, even part metafiction; all of which makes the book wholly original. It is an ambitious project that reads on several occasions as if it is going to spin out of control, but Johnson demonstrates considerable skill to integrate it into a single novel…. I wonder what it says about Australian culture (although New Zealand has perhaps a greater claim on Johnson) that yet again we have a novel which celebrates the imagination through the e character of a crippled boy. Johnson joins Peter Carey and Tim Winton, among others, in using the Damaged Boy motif, which is now an enduring presence in the contemporary Australian novel.
(Neil James, Sydney Morning Herald, 11 July 1998)

The Whistler is a good read – an Orwellian nightmare come true in The Brave New Word, even as it looks on with pathos at the spiritual wasteland that surrounds us and in which we continue to live out our lives. … Highly recommended.
(Ira Raja, Thinking Business (NSW), July 1998)

Her novel is as imaginatively intricate as computer circuitry: echoes of Joan Makes History, with a twist of Brautigan impish ess, Pychonesque significance, black humour and Gothic tones, plus a dash of conspiracy theory, adventure action, idealism and humanity.
(Murray Waldren, The Weekend Australian, May 16-17, 1998)

The value of history for a society that is fast losing its sense of history is a central motif. One protagonist asks another how might one regain one’s Voice in order for a “pioneer instinct” to return? The reply is “… By remembering, by knowing what has gone before, by knowing what is possible, by history” (p. 153, my emphasis). Evolution, and by this is meant both that of body and mind, is hinted at throughout the novel and revealed in the final pages… It comes at a time of our growing appreciation of animal intelligence, and readers should enjoy teasing out these stories and themes for themselves.”
(Bruce Shaw, Science Fiction: A Review of Speculative Literature, Australia, November 2001)