Oryx And Crake
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Seconded! Thatās what Iām slowly reading now.
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I finished Al Frankenās Giant of the Senate a week or so ago. It was quite an entertaining read, but felt kindaā¦ I dunno, sorta toothless at the end. He keeps himself on a very short leash, except when it comes to Ted Cruz and Trump. That might keep him in good standing in the institution so he can continue to do good work on behalf of his Minnesotan electorate, but jeezā¦ if it werenāt for the book itself (and his promotional tour of the talk shows), one could be forgiven for forgetting he even exists on the political stage.
Now Iām reading City of Devils by Justin Robinson. Postwar noir in L.A. except the nation has been conquered by Universal-type monsters (werewolves, mummies, ghosts, Frankensteinesque āmeat golems,ā killer robots, even Joe Danteās Gremlins) who then assimilate into our culture. All cops are werewolves, City Hall is staffed by mummies and zombies, and regular humans are definitely 2nd class citizens. By law, humans are protected from being eaten or āturnedā during daylight hours, but after sunsetā¦ the monsters can get ya, with no recourse. Our hero is L.A.'s only human private eye, hired to find a missing city councilman (mummy) by the guyās wife, a shapeshifting actress who spends most days at a movie studio acting in a flick called Love is a Many-Splendored Thing From Another World, directed by a robot named Gortran. The studio head (and mayor of Hollywood) is a tentacled Crawling Eye named Oculon.
By now you already know if youāre gonna like it or hate it.
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Yep. I like Al Franken whenever he speaks up, but he never speaks up often enough. We need a lot more Al Franken!
Gortran 77 or Gortran 90?
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I saw part of his appearance on Colbert the other day, and he seemedā¦ broken. I mean, heās always been on the dry and low-key side, but all I could see in his face was all the great, pointed, hilarious stuff he wouldnāt allow himself to say. I mean, itās Al Freaking Franken sitting there next to Stephen Colbert, and there was no spark at all of the Franken wit. McCain would have been funnier. Barney Frank would have been feistier. Franken looked like he was operating under a heavy dose of cold medicine. It made me sad. All that wit is still in the book (albeit somewhat more defanged than I like), but on Colbert he seemed barely present.
Just Gortran.
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i donāt know ā he got in some good lines. he was quick on the quiz part, and he played the answers very well. i think heās being low key until after 2018, and then heās going to decide if heās going to run or not. he SAYS heās not running, but you just know heās gotta be thinking about it.
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I never knew they made Gortran Fortran after Fortran 90.
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A minor exchange in a different place has caused me to tell those of you who donāt already know that you possibly should read Tove Janssonās Moomin books. To your children, if you have any.
There are few reasonably educated children in Europe who donāt know about them, but they seem to have struggled with the Atlantic.
Google is your friend here.
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Remember watching the cartoon as a kid.
Donāt know why it didnāt get to america.
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The books are not the cartoons.
I suspect I know why it didnāt go down too well in the US. As I recall, at the time lesbian feminists promoting multiculturalism werenāt exactly flavour of the month there.
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I just finished Dark Orbit by Caroline Ives Gilman last night. It was kind of an interesting spin on first contact situations, but was tonally all over the place. It didnāt flow right, or couldnāt decide what it wanted to be or something. But enjoyable if youāre looking for something to pass some time.
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The last couple of books I finished were Twelve Kings in Sharakhai and the sequel With Blood on the Sand. Really good fantasy, with a little bit of the flavor of the Black Company and a tiny bit of Fallen London without really being that much like either. Iām eagerly awaiting the next book, or more likely, books.
Then I started in on āThe Sarah Zettel Collectionā (Playing God, Reclamation, The Quiet Invasion, Foolās War). Iāve read the latter probably three times and wonāt hesitate to read it again once I get through the other three. Iām enjoying Playing God so far.
Also have read most of Star Wars: Guardians of the Whills while waiting for friends to show up to an eclipse party. Itās not exactly sophisticated stuff but Iām entertained by some of the Chirrut/Baze banter.
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I prefer Borgesā concepts in his fiction and essays, but still a good read.
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Currently:
Another pass through Gibsonās Bigend trilogy
Snow Crash
Crichtonās Micro (even though itās not entirely written by him)
Crichtonās *Dragon Teeth" (because summer time is Crichton time, apparentlyā¦)
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This is my desert island book, if I only get to have one book forever, itās this in hardback:
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Iāve got the set of three. I still havenāt gotten used to some of the newer translations, though.
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Oh yeah, this place exists.
Iām reading:
Little known fact, Frederick Forsyth, who wrote Day of the Jackal and Dogs of War (both of which became movies), probably tried to finance a coup in Equatorial Guinea in 1973, which was caught by European Authorities before it started. A year later, he published Dogs of War which bears an amazing similarity to this coup attempt and even the people apprehended. That book, in turn, was much loved and used by mercenaries in Africa as inspirationā¦
Also reading:
Iād meant to get around to it. Now that a sequel is out, people have been raving, again, about just how good these books are.
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Jumping in here ā a bit late ā I read the Three Body Problem and mostly enjoyed it except for a few things, which I will spoilerize:
First, thereās a huge chunk of exposition at the end explaining a big part of the novel. Donāt know if thatās a cultural difference or what, but Iāve always been told in writing class that exposition in sf is not good. Second, I thought some of the science was completely unbelievable.
Iāve just finished reading The Riddle of Foxwood Grange by Denis O. Smith, a well-done Sherlock Holmes mystery novel. Smithās earlier shorter stories Iāve read were collected in The Chronicles of Sherlock Holmes, Volumes 1-3 and are really good; as if Conan Doyle Dr. Watson had come to life and was writing them again. Much better than any other pastiches Iāve read. Thereās a Volume 4 too, but the best price Iāve seen on Amazon and eBay is $100. Eek.
Thereās also a Mammoth Book of the Chronicles of SH which I have on order. Drooling in anticipation.
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Wow, read that long ago. I liked the first one a lot (and the movie), but not the other two so much. Itās really interesting to think back about it, and how computery things are today.
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Now Iām reading āPlain Speaking An Oral Biography of Harry S. Trumanā, by Merle Miller.
Iām one of those folks who believe that if something happens and/or someone is born that has a positive effect on a greater part of, if not the whole of, the world, well, maybe lightning can strike twice. Or even thrice, or more than that, maybe.
History kind of shows that, doesnāt it?
(I also believe one canāt fully appreciate the positive without having experienced at least a little negative, ya know what I mean?)
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