Years ago, I started the first book in this series, Quicksilver, but only got about 1/4 through it and gave up. But I love Neal Stephenson's other, moYears ago, I started the first book in this series, Quicksilver, but only got about 1/4 through it and gave up. But I love Neal Stephenson's other, more sci-fi, books, and having read just about all of them except the Baroque Cycle and The Mongoliad, I decided to try again. I enjoyed it more this time, and had the patience to let it go, waiting to understand "what it was about." I thought it was about the conflict between Isaac Newton and Gottfried Liebnitz (re which invented calculus first) as seen by the fictional character Daniel Waterhouse, but the author also spent a lot of time on other characters, particularly Jack Shaftoe, ancestor of a main character in Cryptonomicon (which I loved). I finished that book, and while I still didn't know "what it was about," I enjoyed it enough to start the second book, The Confusion. I now believe these books are less about "something" (meaning a plot point or conflict), than about exposing the reader to what life was like in the last 1600's for various types of people, by telling their stories. Sailors, pirates, vagabonds, minor players in the community of "People of Quality", and others. It also delves into the concepts of currency and finance, and how it evolved. A couple things I learned about early currency: pieces of eight were literally coins that could be broken into eight pieces to allow for smaller amounts (sort of like exchanging a quarter for five nickels, except you'd snap the quarter into five pieces), and that Isaac Newton was in charge of England's mint in his later years. So to summarize, these books give a great insight into actual life in the 1600's, while telling intriguing stories. This book in particular has a number of hair-raising stories of Jack Shaftoe's adventures, gaining (as the author puts it) all the money in the world twice and losing it twice. His Trial by Ordeal as ordered by a pirate queen is particularly good!...more
"The Way" is a great classic SF series, that I'm disappointed I haven't read before.
Eon is about a massive asteroid that enters the solar system. I"The Way" is a great classic SF series, that I'm disappointed I haven't read before.
Eon is about a massive asteroid that enters the solar system. It turns out to be hollow, containing several abandoned cities. It's a mystery where it came from, who built it, and why it's showing up now, just as the Earth is balanced on the edge of global thermonuclear war. That's just the setup; there are a lot of mind-bending discoveries as the plot unfolds.
It reminded me, of course, of Clarke's Rendezvous with Rama, but it goes off in a completely different direction. It also reminded me of Niven's Ringworld (one of my all-time favorites), but again, totally different. It's actually nice to see familiar jaw-dropping concepts, used in divergent ways by masters of the art.
One of the very interesting ideas were that future humans would communicate primarily through "picts," projected icons and images. They had some kind of device around their necks which projected these things to those in conversation, and were able to more quickly communicate with greater shades of meaning through pictures. For instance, a yellow half-circle would indicate interest and full attention, and the "speaker" could emphasize or de-emphasize the degree of interest in the tint of yellow. This concept made me think of emoticons and memes in our current electronic communications....more
Artemis is a fun sci-fi story featuring an honorable bottom-feeder in the first colony city on the Moon who gets entangled further and further in TrouArtemis is a fun sci-fi story featuring an honorable bottom-feeder in the first colony city on the Moon who gets entangled further and further in Trouble with a capital “T”. The hero/narrator is Jazz Bashara, a young woman who has (by her own admission) made a lot of mistakes and is on the bottom rung of Moon society, scraping out a life as a porter and small-time smuggler.
The story is engaging and hard to put down, as I kept asking myself “what is she going to do now?” As you would expect from the author of “The Martian,” it’s well-thought-out technically as to how a Moon colony works, including the economy and other non-technical topics. Weir goes a good job of including technical detail without drowning the reader in it, or distracting from the story. He also paints a convincing and intriguing set of characters to populate his story....more
This sequel to The Rise and Fall of D.O.D.O by Neal Stephenson and Nicole Galland continues their first book's unique time travel concept: time travelThis sequel to The Rise and Fall of D.O.D.O by Neal Stephenson and Nicole Galland continues their first book's unique time travel concept: time travel by witches, albeit scientifically enabled. Magic was once possible, and practiced only by women with the correct genetic abilities, until the advent of technology pushed it aside. This had to do with wave functions which allowed for quantum variations (see, I told you it was scientific!), and things like photography collapsed those wave functions into only one accepted reality.
So naturally, the way to build a time machine is to simply find a genius physicist to build a chamber where you un-collapse those wave functions, and then find a descendent of pre-tech witches to go inside the chamber with you (where magic is now possible) and send you to the past. And since the government is doing all this, we need to create a whole bureaucracy called the Department of Diachronic Operations (D.O.D.O.). And thus the hijinks commence, leading to a very satisfying finale set at a Wal-Mart.
The sequel is Master of the Revels, a solo effort by Nicole Galland. It picks up where the first book leaves off, but I won't explain that since it would be a big spoiler. Like the first one, the narrative style is a collection of personal notes, formal reports, online chats and other transcripts. It also feels less Neal Stephenson than the first one (naturally).
Much of the main action is split between two agents, one sent back for a mission in 1397 Sicily to subtly move the location of an observatory that will be built many years later, and the other to 1606 London to protect the words of Shakespeare's Macbeth when it was first performed. This is where the title comes from. The Master of the Revels was an officer appointed by the king to ensure that plays didn't include ideas or language that would be offensive to the throne, a 15th-century censor (or Ministry of Truth, if you will).
Anyway, it's a good book, but you do have to give it a little grace, as you do with most time travel stories. There are a few plot holes, particularly to do with "strands," or multiple versions of reality in which you have to change the past in several strands to get it to "take" on the whole of reality (?). It's a good idea, but several plot points are inconsistent with it. Easy enough to overlook, though, as it is a fun and engaging story. And the ending is somewhat weak, which is typical for Mr. Stephenson but I was hoping Ms. Galland would be different in that respect. It's clear to me she plans to return to D.O.D.O. for at least one more book....more
I occasionally listen to Mark Dawson’s podcast, The Self-Publishing Show, which is a nice resource for independent authors like me. Recently, he interI occasionally listen to Mark Dawson’s podcast, The Self-Publishing Show, which is a nice resource for independent authors like me. Recently, he interviewed Anton Eine, an independent Sci-Fi author from Ukraine, who has published a couple books on Amazon (translated into English).
Anton, of course, isn’t really thinking much about writing at the moment, since he’s involved in the defense of his country, but he was interesting to hear. It’s good to get perspectives from people who live in different cultures. Sometimes that’s what Sci-Fi offers us: the chance to see how life would be different in a different world, but how that also relates to the lives we live.
I bought his book, Human Kind, which is a collection of short stories. They're certainly different from stories you would find from American authors, and I recommend it to any of you seeking a different perspective. Even if you just want to support an author in a difficult situation, buying his book (it’s only $2.99) would help him out a little and, I'm sure, be a great encouragement....more
I read the original Revelation Space trilogy of books when they came out a couple decades ago, and I fell in love with this author. I think I've read I read the original Revelation Space trilogy of books when they came out a couple decades ago, and I fell in love with this author. I think I've read every one of his novels and many of his short stories. The Revelation Space series (which he expanded beyond the original trilogy). I see several other reviewers complain that the later books didn't measure up to the first three, but I don't know if I agree. Such comparisons are often hard to make. It's sort of like people arguing about which Star Wars movie was the best, or if the new ones measure up to the originals. To properly compare, you'd almost have to reset your brain to the expectations you had at the time. For example, the first Star Wars movie blew our minds in 1977, because we hadn't seen anything like it. If it had never happened, but the rest of the industry moved forward as it has, would that movie be huge if it came out today? I doubt it, but I've gotten off on a tangent.
Back to Mr. Reynold's book. He set a high bar with the original trilogy, and I think he's met it here. The characters have mystery (where we're not sure for a while what their real story it), the settings provoke a sense of wonder and scale, and the events have galaxy-spanning consequences while also drilling into the characters' personal impact.
The one thing I wished as I read this was that I had a better memory. There are many callbacks to the previous books in the series, and I just plain don't remember a lot of specifics from books I read twenty years ago. On the plus side, that's motivated me to go back and re-read the originals, which I plan to start soon....more
As I drive along the interstates and other highways, I often wonder about what it must have been like to build these roads. Not just the actual constrAs I drive along the interstates and other highways, I often wonder about what it must have been like to build these roads. Not just the actual construction (although some mountain roads do make me wonder about that), but things like obtaining the land, whether it replaced a lesser road or cut a fresh path. and how it affected the people who lived there (e.g., if it split a farm in half and the farmer had to drive his plow five miles to an overpass to get from one side of his field to another).
This book answers most of those questions, and more besides. The only thing it lacked was more details on how they cut roads out of difficult terrain, but I won't quibble. The rest of it is fascinating if you're into how such an enormous project developed. It starts at the very beginning (a very good place to start), with bicycles, which I knew were the initial impetus to build good roads, although they were quickly overtaken by the upstart horseless carriages. The demand for better local roads grew into a desire for roads to allow cross-country travel, and eventually the network of highways we have today.
Another interesting theme is how the development of highways impacted people's lives. Not just the people displaced by the construction and the arguments about whose neighborhood would get split (although he does describe that), but also the enormous change that meant to how we all live our lives. We once stayed near the services we needed, since there wasn't much ability to go further out. But the car changed all that, and resulted in retail districts bunched around interstate exits, particularly those near bypass highway exits, drawing retail out of downtown districts and driving the suburban sprawl.
All in all, if these are topics you are interested in, then you will find Earl Swift's book fascinating....more
I've read most of Neal Stephenson's works, starting with Snow Crash, all the way up to Fall or Dodge in Hell. So I decided to go back and read one of I've read most of Neal Stephenson's works, starting with Snow Crash, all the way up to Fall or Dodge in Hell. So I decided to go back and read one of his first books (The Big U came before this one) and see how he's evolved. And it turns out while he's certainly improved as a writer since then, many of the distinguishing characteristics of his books were there: a technically proficient protagonist, a TON of interesting detail, and fascinating side trips that break out of the usual novel structure. I wholeheartedly recommend this to any Neal Stephenson fans who, like me, missed this early novel....more
I'm a fan of Neal Stephenson, and this book certainly fits his style. It starts oddly enough, with a diverse cast of characters (including the Queen oI'm a fan of Neal Stephenson, and this book certainly fits his style. It starts oddly enough, with a diverse cast of characters (including the Queen of the Netherlands, a Texas hog-hunter and a Canadian Sikh teen). He weaves their separate storylines, and you wonder how they will ever come together, and in fact, what is this book all about? Normally that is bad for a book, but Mr. Stephenson's intriguing writing keeps you going, and as always, learning a lot along the way. The Science here is mostly about a practical way to fight climate change, not by reducing our impact but trying to reverse it. Certainly something to think about, particularly how that may affect global politics. As with most of Mr. Stephenson's books, the ending is a little weak, but it's nevertheless and engaging and rewarding read....more
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