A hell of a strong setup for this new series. People saying this is connected to The Expanse are grasping at straws. There’s nothing that explicitly sA hell of a strong setup for this new series. People saying this is connected to The Expanse are grasping at straws. There’s nothing that explicitly says it isn’t, but there’s nothing that says it is either, and honestly, I hope it remains that way. It absolutely could be, but if it were that would add nothing of value.
“If we’re part of this grand mechanism of theirs, then maybe we can be the grit in its gears too.”...more
This is one of those books that is truly going to be life changing for me. It's a simple concept that is easy to implement, scales to any scenario, anThis is one of those books that is truly going to be life changing for me. It's a simple concept that is easy to implement, scales to any scenario, and is a radical answer to the ways in which the ever accelerating pace of our world impacts our individual well-being.
Interestingly enough, I've been reading this at the same time as Saving Time, by Jenny Odell and only just realized that they're both talking about the same thing from different angles:
Saving Time, is very interested in how we perceive time, and the ways that capitalism and industry have perverted our experience of time. Do / Pause is less interested in the causes of the issue, but in a practical, individual solution to the problem. Jenny Odell approached this same type of solution in her previous book How to do Nothing a few years back.
I absolutely love when disparate books coalesce into one like this. I feel like I'm adding new information to an existing web of knowledge every time this happens. ...more
Okay, this cements Alasdair Gray as utterly brilliant. The way this story is structured is so incredibly clever: A found book-within-a-book containingOkay, this cements Alasdair Gray as utterly brilliant. The way this story is structured is so incredibly clever: A found book-within-a-book containing dueling unreliable narrators with differing versions of the events of the story. One fantastical, one much more grounded in reality. Both characters within the found novel/possibly historical text could plausibly have perverted their telling of the story from the "reality" of the other's telling.
It's also a very entertaining, enlightening story all on its own. A feminist Frankenstein. One of the most unique and important coming of age stories I've ever read.
Jan 2023 update: The movie is REALLY good y'all. ...more
The title of this book is misrepresentative of its contents, but it was eye-catching enough that it caught my attention at the library. I'm glad that The title of this book is misrepresentative of its contents, but it was eye-catching enough that it caught my attention at the library. I'm glad that it did because I learned some fascinating things reading this. The section on the differences between genealogy and genetics was mind-blowing. Rutherford pretty much demolished 23andme and related tests in the tail end of that section.
There were also a lot of assumptions about race that I've inadvertently made over the years from "common sense" type arguments that were thoroughly debunked here as pseudoscience, which is fantastic. Small things that I've never thought too hard about, or concepts that I've picked up second hand without realizing. When I've been wrong about something, I really want to understand the how and why of it, so I can avoid similar ways of thinking in the future and this book did a great job of illustrating that for me.
I'd highly recommend checking it out, it's short and to the point, but full of interesting information from the intersection of genetics and racism. Just ignore the title, it's not what the book is at all. The subtitle is much better: What Our Genes Do (and Don't) Say About Human Difference....more
I have to admit that I’m blown away. This is how you do a middle book in a series! I had a few misgivings about The Collapsing Empire (and some of ScaI have to admit that I’m blown away. This is how you do a middle book in a series! I had a few misgivings about The Collapsing Empire (and some of Scalzi’s earlier novels), but he has completely outdone himself with this second Interdependency book. It’s fun to see his writing get better and better as he goes. The pacing is tighter, the story flows with more fluidity, the characters are much more distinct from one another now, the prose is drastically improved over the last one, and the payoff is massive. I may have actually thrown the book down and said “Yes! Wow, that was satisfying.” when I finished it.
I’ve mentioned before that, thematically speaking at least, the Interdependency series is Scalzi’s Dune. That still rings true, but The Consuming Fire also feels as dense and conspiratorial as A Song of Ice and Fire, or like a solid espionage thriller. It tells a compelling story while also blowing the worldbuilding wide open and fleshing out some of the concepts that were underdeveloped in The Collapsing Empire. All of this and it does a fantastic job of catching the reader up with effortless exposition, in case it’s been a little while since you read the first in the series. I went back and reread the first book in the series just before starting this one in an effort to refresh my mind on the events thus far, but honestly, I think you could pick up The Consuming Fire as your first read in this series without really missing much. After 20-30 pages you’re all caught up and good to go. It’s impressively handled. ...more
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