Recent reading
Mar. 7th, 2005 08:27 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
drscottThe mashup I'm listening to makes me remember how good the original You Only Live Twice (sung by Nancy Sinatra) was:
...which seems adequately Japanese in its illogic.
I've been neglecting my usual book plugging. Here's some of the better stuff I've read so far this year:
Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed by Jared Diamond. This was not up to the standard of his last book, Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies, but it was a nice tour of sustainability concerns with a lot of colorful detail about the Viking colony in Greenland, Easter Island's catastrophic decline, and other past examples of societal failure.
Old Man's War by John Scalzi. This is a simple story of an Earth where old people sign up for the defense forces at the age of 75 or so because it is the only way to get antiaging treatment, kind of Starship Troopers with oldsters (but nowhere near as didactic as either Heinlein or The Forever War.) Not very challenging but fun reading.
Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell by Susanna Clarke. A long, long novel about an alternate England where magic was real but fading, and the two magicians who bring it back. Often said to be "an adult Harry Potter book," but more like Neal Stephenson's Baroque Cycle in that it is only subtly anachronistic and uses a realistic historical framework (England during the Napoleonic Wars) and real historical characters in service of its fantasy element.
Singularity Sky and Iron Sunrise by Charles Stross. The backstory has a near-transcendent being from the far future, the Eschaton, supervising a humanity scattered through the galaxy. Agents of a much more businesslike future UN and the Eschaton itself contend with culture clashes between offshoots of humanity that have diverged widely enough to seem alien. Good characterizations and interesting ideas make these well worth your time.
Trading in Danger by Elizabeth Moon. This series-beginner reminds me of David Weber's Honor Harrington series, but with less pseudo-Royal Navy atmosphere and more complex characters. Loads of fun, and notable for borrowing the culture of an Indian merchant family as background, which allows for a lot of family-based humor.
Warchild and Burndive by Karin Lowachee. These two novels are set in typical space-as-18th-Century-naval milieu and remind me of Citizen of the Galaxy in their portrayal of very young men (8-16) as independent moral actors making their way in a dangerous world of slavers and spies. The first is one of the best first novels of recent years, and has a particularly interesting homoerotic flavor as the hero comes to love the leader of a band of alien sympathizers known as Warboy. The homoerotic element is just there, not portrayed as unusual or demeaning, which is great to see in a book likely to appeal to adolescents.
Metaplanetary and Superluminal by Tony Daniel. Two of the best hard SF books of recent years. Here's the entirely accurate publisher's description:
You only live twice or so it seems,
One life for yourself and one for your dreams
You drift through the years and life seems tame,
Till one dream appears and love is its name.
And love is a stranger who'll beckon you on,
Don't think of the danger or the stranger is gone.
This dream is for you, so pay the price.
Make one dream come true, you only live twice.
...which seems adequately Japanese in its illogic.
I've been neglecting my usual book plugging. Here's some of the better stuff I've read so far this year:
Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed by Jared Diamond. This was not up to the standard of his last book, Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies, but it was a nice tour of sustainability concerns with a lot of colorful detail about the Viking colony in Greenland, Easter Island's catastrophic decline, and other past examples of societal failure.
Old Man's War by John Scalzi. This is a simple story of an Earth where old people sign up for the defense forces at the age of 75 or so because it is the only way to get antiaging treatment, kind of Starship Troopers with oldsters (but nowhere near as didactic as either Heinlein or The Forever War.) Not very challenging but fun reading.
Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell by Susanna Clarke. A long, long novel about an alternate England where magic was real but fading, and the two magicians who bring it back. Often said to be "an adult Harry Potter book," but more like Neal Stephenson's Baroque Cycle in that it is only subtly anachronistic and uses a realistic historical framework (England during the Napoleonic Wars) and real historical characters in service of its fantasy element.
Singularity Sky and Iron Sunrise by Charles Stross. The backstory has a near-transcendent being from the far future, the Eschaton, supervising a humanity scattered through the galaxy. Agents of a much more businesslike future UN and the Eschaton itself contend with culture clashes between offshoots of humanity that have diverged widely enough to seem alien. Good characterizations and interesting ideas make these well worth your time.
Trading in Danger by Elizabeth Moon. This series-beginner reminds me of David Weber's Honor Harrington series, but with less pseudo-Royal Navy atmosphere and more complex characters. Loads of fun, and notable for borrowing the culture of an Indian merchant family as background, which allows for a lot of family-based humor.
Warchild and Burndive by Karin Lowachee. These two novels are set in typical space-as-18th-Century-naval milieu and remind me of Citizen of the Galaxy in their portrayal of very young men (8-16) as independent moral actors making their way in a dangerous world of slavers and spies. The first is one of the best first novels of recent years, and has a particularly interesting homoerotic flavor as the hero comes to love the leader of a band of alien sympathizers known as Warboy. The homoerotic element is just there, not portrayed as unusual or demeaning, which is great to see in a book likely to appeal to adolescents.
Metaplanetary and Superluminal by Tony Daniel. Two of the best hard SF books of recent years. Here's the entirely accurate publisher's description:
The human race has extended itself into the far reaches of our solar system -- and, in doing so, has developed into something remarkable. The inner system of the Met -- with its worlds connected by a vast living network of cables -- is supported by the repression and enslavement of humanity's progeny, nanotechnological artificial intelligences whom the tyrant Amés has declared non-human. But the longing for freedom cannot be denied.
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Date: 2005-03-08 12:17 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-03-08 10:24 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-03-08 10:45 pm (UTC)Now excuse me while I go watch Ricardo Montalan try to sell me something in rrrrich, Corrrrinthian leather.
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Date: 2005-03-08 10:46 pm (UTC)