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[Woorloog]

A mix between Historical Fiction and Fantasy with a great story. More people should read this.

Oh, that.

It was kind of nice... yet also meh. I can't pinpoint the exact issues but it didn't feel very memorable for sure.

 

[Piecake]

Still listening to The Half has Never Been Told. I think it is brilliant so far. It also got me curious to see what reviews has said about the book, and I found this doozy.

http://www.economist.com/news/books/21615864-how-slaves-built-american-capitalism-blood-cotton

Raw cotton was America’s most valuable export. It was grown and picked by black slaves. So Mr Baptist, an historian at Cornell University, is not being especially contentious when he says that America owed much of its early growth to the foreign exchange, cheaper raw materials and expanding markets provided by a slave-produced commodity. But he overstates his case when he dismisses “the traditional explanations” for America’s success: its individualistic culture, Puritanism, the lure of open land and high wages, Yankee ingenuity and government policies.

Uhh... Those sound like platitudes rather than a counter argument, and the reviewer does not seem to think about or discuss how all of those 'things' interacted with slavery and cotton production.

Take, for example, the astonishing increases he cites in both cotton productivity and cotton production. In 1860 a typical slave picked at least three times as much cotton a day as in 1800. In the 1850s cotton production in the southern states doubled to 4m bales and satisfied two-thirds of world consumption. By 1860 the four wealthiest states in the United States, ranked in terms of wealth per white person, were all southern: South Carolina, Mississippi, Louisiana and Georgia.

Mr Baptist cites the testimony of a few slaves to support his view that these rises in productivity were achieved by pickers being driven to work ever harder by a system of “calibrated pain”. The complication here was noted by Hugh Thomas in 1997 in his definitive history, “The Slave Trade”; an historian cannot know whether these few spokesmen adequately speak for all.

Well, what else could increased efficiency and production per slave be a result of? Magic? Christ...

Another unexamined factor may also have contributed to rises in productivity. Slaves were valuable property, and much harder and, thanks to the decline in supply from Africa, costlier to replace than, say, the Irish peasants that the iron-masters imported into south Wales in the 19th century. Slave owners surely had a vested interest in keeping their “hands” ever fitter and stronger to pick more cotton. Some of the rise in productivity could have come from better treatment. Unlike Mr Thomas, Mr Baptist has not written an objective history of slavery. Almost all the blacks in his book are victims, almost all the whites villains. This is not history; it is advocacy.

Oh god, oh my god.... WTF did I jut read?

Obviously, The Economist soon offered an apology since the uproar over this pathetic review was apparently pretty big.

 

[Stasis]

re: earlier discussions about Mistborn...

I absolutely loved the first novel, barely made it through the second, and then just gave up on the third. I started reading something else and never went back. It's the only series in which I've done this. It makes me feel incomplete in a sense but I have so much to look forward to right now that I just can't see myself going back for a long while, if ever. I've seen quite a few people express similar opinions but I've also seen the complete opposite. It's so divisive. I think maybe it would have been better off as a duology. I'm not sure if that would have made a difference. It wasn't only that it dragged on a bit needlessly, as I can usually handle that.

As to reading in general, just about the only fun part of being sick is that you get to catch up on everything. Reading, TV, etc. I was sick for a little over a week (bedridden with the flu) and burned through every Riyria novel. Now I'm really eager for The First Empire to be published. I loved the series, both the original 6 (or trilogy of omnibus') and the follow-up chronicles duo. I hope he'll write more years from chronicles as well. I don't remember who recommended it but I learned of Michael J. Sullivan and the Riyria series in this thread, so thanks!

I'm currently very early on into the first novel of Daniel Abraham's "The Dagger and the Coin" series. I absolutely love The Expanse series, and since he's half of that I figure I should read his solo stuff even if it isn't sci-fi. After this I'll think I'll read some sci-fi. Maybe Reynolds' Revelations, maybe I'll finish up the Culture novels, or perhaps The Vorkosigan Saga. There are too many options!

 

[Mumei]

justjohn: It's pretty interesting, though I think it's overly breezy and displays too much handwaving when it comes to the issue of race. If you're looking for a feel-good book about America's rise to economic pre-eminence with a healthy dose of free market capitalist ideology, I suppose you'll like it. It's not really my cup of tea, ideologically speaking, but whatever.

Still listening to The Half has Never Been Told. I think it is brilliant so far. It also got me curious to see what reviews has said about the book, and I found this doozy.

http://www.economist.com/news/books/21615864-how-slaves-built-american-capitalism-blood-cotton

Uhh... Those sound like platitudes rather than a counter argument, and the reviewer does not seem to think about or discuss how all of those 'things' interacted with slavery and cotton production.

Well, what else could increased efficiency and production per slave be a result of? Magic? Christ...

Oh god, oh my god.... WTF did I jut read?

Obviously, The Economist soon offered an apology since the uproar over this pathetic review was apparently pretty big.

Yeah, it was a serious embarrassment. We even had a topic on GAF about it, which is how I learned about the book! And then we had another topic about its observations. And the author wrote responses to the review here and here, which are fantastic. I think he nails the ideological concerns underpinning the initial review in the first one especially:

I think you see where I’m going. Had the Economist actually engaged the book’s arguments, the reviewer would have had to confront the scary fact that the unrestrained domination of market forces can sometimes amplify existing forms of oppression into something more horrific. No wonder the Economist abandoned its long-standing intellectual commitments in favor of sloppy old paternalism on Sept. 4, because if it hadn’t, Mr./Ms. Anonymous might have had to admit that market fundamentalism doesn’t always provide the best solution for every economic or social problem.

And Eric Foner wrote a wonderful review for The New York Times.

 

[Piecake]

justjohn: It's pretty interesting, though I think it's overly breezy and displays too much handwaving when it comes to the issue of race. If you're looking for a feel-good book about America's rise to economic pre-eminence with a healthy dose of free market capitalist ideology, I suppose you'll like it. It's not really my cup of tea, ideologically speaking, but whatever.



Yeah, it was a serious embarrassment. We even had a topic on GAF about it, which is how I learned about the book! And then we had another topic about its observations. And the author wrote responses to the review here and here, which are fantastic. I think he nails the ideological concerns underpinning the initial review in the first one especially.

And Eric Foner wrote a wonderful review for The New York Times.

That guardian piece just destroys The Economist. Good Stuff.

 

[Mumei]

That guardian piece just destroys The Economist. Good Stuff.

You might also like this piece in The Nation by the author of The Empire of Necessity: Slavery, Freedom, and Deception in the New World, which notes something interesting:

The Empire of Necessity tries to establish the dependent relationship of slavery to the capitalist revolution of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries in all of the Americas, north and south, and presumes to use Herman Melville as embodying the moral complexities of that relationship. In other words, there’s a lot going on in the book. But the reviewer seemed only excited to find a few instances confirming that the trans-Atlantic slave system was not universally, 100 percent, absolutely, totally, categorically, “a matter of white villains and black victims.” “As is commonly supposed.” “Blacks,” he or she was happy to report, “profited from the Atlantic slave trade.”

The reviewer then complained about the book’s gloominess: “Unfortunately, the horrors in Mr Grandin’s history are unrelenting. His is a book without heroes. The brave battlers against the gruesome slave business hardly get a look in, although it was they who eventually prevailed.” One might think that “brave battlers” would be a good description of the group of West Africans who led the slave-ship revolt that is the book’s set piece. Having endured horrific captivity and transport, forced not just across the Atlantic but the whole American continent into the Pacific, the deception they managed to pull off under extremely hostile conditions was, I’d say, heroic.

Slavery might not be black or white, but bravery and morality apparently are: whites possess those qualities, a possession that merits historical consideration; blacks don’t, at least according to The Economist. The Empire of Necessity didn’t “credit” William Wilberforce, the white reformist MP, or white abolitionist evangelicals and Quakers, for ending slavery. Nor, the reviewer points out, did I make mention of the British Royal Navy freeing “at least 150,000 west Africans from slave ships during the 19th century.” The book isn’t about abolition, or, for that matter, the British Royal Navy. No matter. “The British historians,” wrote the great historian of slavery, Eric Williams, “wrote as if Britain had introduced Negro slavery solely for the satisfaction of abolishing it.” So too, apparently, anonymous Economist reviewers.

[...]

So a pattern is detected, one reaching back much further than the review of my book. In the 1860s,The Economist stood nearly alone among liberal opinion in Britain in supporting the Confederacy against the Union, all in the name of access to cheap Southern “Blood Cotton” (ironically, the title of the Baptist review) and fear of higher tariffs if the North triumphed. “The Economist was unusual,” writes an historian of English public opinion at the time; “Other journals still regarded slavery as a greater evil than restrictive trade practices.”

Since the Baptist review appeared, only to be quickly withdrawn, other historians, such as Mark Healey, have dug up reviews with similar problems. The Economist seems committed to making sure that white people aren’t taken for total villains and darker-skinned folks held accountable for their share of world’s inequities. It also seems dedicated to make sure the economic system created by slavery is denied its parentage, and on insisting that the miseries that continue to be produced by neoliberal capitalism can only be cured by more neoliberal capitalism. A few years ago, for instance, the magazine upbraided the Laurent Dubois, in his book on the history of Haiti, for, you guessed it, dismissing cultural explanations for the country’s poverty and focusing instead on structural issues. Haitians need to be held responsible for “their society’s underdevelopment,” and the best way to end their misery is to stop clinging to substance production and accommodate themselves to “specialised wage labour for a global market.”

Something something leopard something something spots not changing

 

[Piecake]

You might also like this piece in The Nation by the author of The Empire of Necessity: Slavery, Freedom, and Deception in the New World, which notes something interesting:



Something something leopard something something spots not changing

Damn, burn. It must hurt them so much that their beloved free-market, neoliberal capitalism produced such horrific results. Well, maybe it doesnt hurt since they obviously are in denial mode....

I don't want to necro-bump an old thread, but I have to comment on something (so I might as well do it here). On the conversation of whether the Civil War was about slavery, well, the South certainly seceded because they thought that Lincoln was a radical black republican who would have gotten rid of slavery, no matter what he said.

Lincoln, however, was a gradual abolitionist. He believed (erroneously) that if slavery was trapped in the Deep South and not allowed to expand that it would die a slow, natural death and be overtaken by the superior (Lincoln was wrong that it was economically superior) Free Soil Ideology. This is why his tacit approval of the Corwin Amendment and the desire to save the Union first do not conflict with his gradual abolitionist views.

The Corwin amendment simply would have ratified Lincoln's believes. He did not think it necessary to start a possible Civil War over Slavery by federal action because he thought it would die a slow death if he contained it. Something that the Corwin Amendment would do.

Persevering the Union first also does not contradict his abolitionist sentiment because Lincoln thought that preserving the union was essential to abolish slavery. He could not outright call for abolitionism because that woudl have caused him to lose support of the essential border states, which would have resulted in the real possibility of the Union losing the war. That then, would have made the abolition of slavery impossible. Moreover, if the Confederacy was allowed to go free, Lincoln assumed (based on past rhetoric) that they would begin conquering Mexican and Carribean territory and expand slavery, which would have made abolishing slavery impossible.

In Lincoln's view, preserving the Union was essential for the abolition of slavery. Moderate and gradual emancipator Republicans, like Lincoln, soon were won over to the Radical Republican idea of immediate emancipation because they soon realized that their belief of a strong union sentiment in the South was fictitious and that total war was necessary to win and crush the confederacy.

 

[LProtag]

Man, I am way into The Stormlight Archive. Like, ASOIAF amounts of into it. I'm really curious to find out more about the magic system because I'm only halfway through Way of Kings, but I imagine that's something that will get rolled out slowly.

 

[Iztli]

I just finished reading After Dark by Haruki Murakami and I loved it.

Wondering which other books of his to read.

Now its time for some Conan

The Bloody Crown of Conan

 

[zert]

Saw someone in this thread was reading it. Love time travel books and I'm enjoying it so far. I think I'm going to pick up The Martian after I finish this one.

Any other good time travel book I should read?

 

[Rug Monkey]

I've moved on to the Ware Tetrology by Rudy Rucker. It's as amazing and weird as I remember. I'll do a full review when I finish all four, but Rucker -- a mathematician -- is the wild man of science fiction.

They are available for free from Rucker's webpage, under a CC license

 

[Jintor]

Wait didn't that stuff happen in The Name of the Wind?

wow man i really fucked up that

 

[big ander]

this month:

The Bus Driver Who Wanted to be God & Other Stories by Etgar Keret: funny and affecting. Certainly some thematic overlap but that ended up working quite well, creating a universe of stories that blend the surreal and banal.
The Devil Finds Work by James Baldwin: verbose, fiery essay of how being black altered the author's growing up watching movies. Definitely want to read more of Baldwin.
Shotgun Lovesongs by Nickolas Butler: fine. Large parts capture the distinct but equally spiritual ways people approach art, or the tone of midwestern friendship and life. others are kinda stock. funny to see that bon iver really did inspire one of the characters, I went in blind and didn't know that that was such a publicity point for it.
Silver Screen Fiend by Patton Oswalt: [longest graf cause I just finished] expected this to be a real winner for me--alt comedy, cinephilia. Lukewarm on it. Oswalt tells a handful of good stories but I guess I thought there'd be more on what movies inspired him and how. Instead the movies have tangential connections, but I couldn't help but feel like there was more going on in his life that would've been relevant to his "spiral". maybe this is me being self-defensive, but he comes to a weird point of admonishing cinephilia, at the very least writing about it as if it should be solely a phase in anyone's life, as if that's the only healthy way. and it lumps almost all of the blame for the supposed decline in his life on his cinephilia, when reading between the lines makes it seem a lot more like a personality issue--take the fact that his log has him seeing double features on christmas eve, christmas day, new years eve and day. That's never addressed in the book but I felt the fact that he apparently didn't visit his family over the holidays for four years while in his 20s very peculiar and indicative of other problems than cinephilia. he's talked about depression before, why not talk about it here when leaving it out leaves a gaping hole? That plus not talking about the movies at all irked me--as did (and this is a stupid, stupid criticism) the fact that most writing on the book is all "he saw a double feature a night at the new beverly!" when, no, there's a film log in the back and he saw on average probably 3 or 4 films theatrically a week. Only some at the bev. I'd have to hear that he was also watching 4-5 more movies at home to think that was really anything life-alteringly time-consuming

Hoping to finish up Iceberg Slim's Pimp before the month is out. Five books for the month will be well above my average for recent years, where I've normally reached only 10ish in in a year (not counting uni reading). then I just keep that up for...ever.

 

[Piecake]

Still busting my way through this beast. What's interesting is that it takes a completely different take than What Hath God Wrought by Howe. It is very pro Jefferson and Jackson and anti Whig. What Hath God Wrought is the opposite, and I feel that I agree more with Howe than Wilentz. I feel that Wilentz seems to be analyzing everything in terms of democracy and analyzing it, and determining whether it was good or bad, whether it expanded democracy.

This has lead to some interesting situations where Jefferson can do know wrong (apparently he was the first victim of ad hominem attacks) and Jackson's foibles are explained away. I havent gotten to the Jackson presidency so far, but Wilentz condemned John Quincy Adams more for failing to stop Georgia Governor Troup from stealing Native American Land than Jackson massacring the whole lot of them during the 1812 war and forcing them to give away their land, even the Native American Allies who backed him up.

So yea, I am looking forward to Indian removal, the spoils system, the nullifcation crisis and the banking fiasco under Jackson. Not quite sure how you turn those into positives besides the Nullification crisis.

It will be interesting to see how he treats the Jackson presidency, because Howe treated it as a coalition of expansionist Southern and Western whites who wanted to take over Native American land and expand slavery and white supremacy. It is probably a bit more nuanced than that, but Its been a while.

I kinda want to listen to What Hath God Wrought again just to compare the two. This may seem that I am not enjoying Wilentz's book, but I am. Its an interesting perspective and his analysis of how democracy from the bottom up happened and pushed political leaders to incorprate them for political power (basically we shlubs made American Democracy) is fascinating and well researched. I just have a different view than his national interpretation it seems.

https://networks.h-net.org/node/950...ntz-rise-american-democracy-jefferson-lincoln

I have no doubt that he has read most of everything I have. He has, however, a tendency to footnote those things that support his argument and avoid those that do not. Since he ignores others who have views on the subject, Wilentz is, as usual, being selective without defending his choice.

This review is pretty damning, and this is one of the problems that I had with the book. I felt that he was being selective, but I thought it might have been my biases or simply my lack of knowledge of the era. Maybe this is just confirmation bias now, but I have to agree with the reviewer's thoughts about Wilentz's national interpretations. I still like when Wilentz gets down to the local, popular level since I knew little about that.

https://networks.h-net.org/node/950/pages/951/h-shear-forum-howe-what-hath-god-wrought

Now this is What Hath God Wrought's review

Not quite sure Why The Rise of American Democracy won the Bancroft prize after reading these reviews...

 

[Necrovex]

Mumei, the writing style for Habation of the Blessed isnt clicking well for me. I can recognize grest writing, and this is it, but the work isnt resonating with mr. What's wrong with me?!

 

[Haly]

Prose is for nerds.

 

[Necrovex]

Prose is for nerds.

I'll take simple proses, i.e. Sanderson, any day of the week. I'm a simple person when I read those books.

 

[Mumei]

Mumei, the writing style for Habation of the Blessed isnt clicking well for me. I can recognize grest writing, and this is it, but the work isnt resonating with mr. What's wrong with me?!

I'll take simple proses, i.e. Sanderson, any day of the week. I'm a simple person when I read those books.

Oh. Well, that's disappointing to hear! But what do you mean by "those books"?

Anyway, I am thoroughly enjoying My Traitor's Heart. I ought to be done with it by now, but I've been working a lot of overtime these past few nights... and rewatching Disney movies... so it hasn't happened yet. But soon! It's riveting, though. I hadn't really known much about South African apartheid beyond vague "oppressive" and "segregated" and "Nelson Mandela in prison for several decades" and so forth. Basically nothing. I found myself tearing up in places reading it.

 

[420bits]

Seeing how so many ppl talk good or bad about "American Gods" by Neil Gaiman I've decided to give it a go. Not far enough into it to know what I think yet but at least I don't hate it yet.

 

[RepairmanJack]

I remember liking Anansi Boys more than American Gods, but it's been a while so I could be remembering wrong. I thought both were miles better than Good Omens, though. That one just wasn't my cup of tea.

 

[hammertomb]

Reading a dance with dragons again. I need my dark fantasy fix.

 

[Necrovex]

Oh. Well, that's disappointing to hear! But what do you mean by "those books"?

Anyway, I am thoroughly enjoying My Traitor's Heart. I ought to be done with it by now, but I've been working a lot of overtime these past few nights... and rewatching Disney movies... so it hasn't happened yet. But soon! It's riveting, though. I hadn't really known much about South African apartheid beyond vague "oppressive" and "segregated" and "Nelson Mandela in prison for several decades" and so forth. Basically nothing. I found myself tearing up in places reading it.

I was being slightly factitious with the 'those books' comment.

And good! I read some Apartheid novels prior to My Traitor's Heart, but I found this was the best non-fiction involving that era. This book was written prior to Mandela's release and the collapse of Apartheid, like right before De Klerk got into office. Therefore, the novel only gets darker as it proceeds. You think it bad now? Just you wait, Mumei! Also, I teared up a few times as I proceeded through it. Some heart-wrenching stuff happened during that era.

I had the honor of continuing my misery non-fiction reading with the Congo Wars novel. I really need to read something with simple prose, though I'll continue to power through Habitation of the Blessed (I have a sixteen hour flight in two hours, so I'm hopeful to make a solid dent into it); I'm hoping your other novel clicks with me.

 

[Krauser Kat]

Dresden Files Cold Days Done. Harry is back and a faire fucking badass with the winter mantle and soul fire whispering in his ear, will he stay who he was or will he succumb to the power. 4/5

Dresden Files Skin Game Done. Harry has to work with the worst of the worst, nicodickpunch the leader of the denarians, or risk the wrath of mab and the time bomb in his head. Can he and the group complete the heist in time. 4.5/5

Witcher Time of Contempt Done Gerlt finds his love and off spring in the middle of the gigantic shit fest between nilfgard and the northern territories. Can he stay neutral? can he find a way to not lose all that he loves in the face of war.

Witcher Baptism of Fire

 

[Mumei]

I had the honor of continuing my misery non-fiction reading with the Congo Wars novel. I really need to read something with simple prose, though I'll continue to power through Habitation of the Blessed (I have a sixteen hour flight in two hours, so I'm hopeful to make a solid dent into it); I'm hoping your other novel clicks with me.

Well, it is a less florid style!

Are you enjoying it at all? I am sort of disappointed if the prose is preventing you from enjoying it. It might seem odd to go back to reading a pitch about the concept after you've already started it, but this is what introduced me to it. Maybe having it reframed it would help, I don't know.

 

[DistortionOfReality]

In a reading slump at the moment. Did my goal of 50 books last year but now I just cant get back into it, too many good tv shows and games to be getting on with!

But in the last couple of days I did start The Dreaming Void - Peter F. Hamilton. Loved the Reality Dysfunction Trilogy so lets see if that reignites me for the year

 

[hythloday]

I started Warbreaker by Brandon Sanderson. Just the prologue was enough to hook me!

 

[Necrovex]

Well, it is a less florid style!

Are you enjoying it at all? I am sort of disappointed if the prose is preventing you from enjoying it. It might seem odd to go back to reading a pitch about the concept after you've already started it, but this is what introduced me to it. Maybe having it reframed it would help, I don't know.

I don't hate it. I appreciate its ambitions and the elegance in its writing. But I'm a peasant when it comes to prose (sorry Lolita!). The link makes the story more interesting since I didn't know Prester John was actually a person. I will compete it!

 

[Celegus]

Man, I am way into The Stormlight Archive. Like, ASOIAF amounts of into it. I'm really curious to find out more about the magic system because I'm only halfway through Way of Kings, but I imagine that's something that will get rolled out slowly.

Oh lordy, if you're that into it only halfway through the first book... the second half is quite a ride. That's definitely a series I wish I could experience again for the first time.

 

[Necrovex]

Oh lordy, if you're that into it only halfway through the first book... the second half is quite a ride. That's definitely a series I wish I could experience again for the first time.

I still argue the final two hundred pages are some of the finest in the fantasy genre.

 

[Mumei]

I don't hate it. I appreciate its ambitions and the elegance in its writing. But I'm a peasant when it comes to prose (sorry Lolita!). The link makes the story more interesting since I didn't know Prester John was actually a person. I will compete it!

Well, he wasn't real.

 

[mdubs]

So I just read Sputnik Sweetheart and South of the Border West of the Sun by Murakami in the last few days and absolutely adore them, would anyone be able to recommend me something similar in feel to those books? For reference I read Norwegian Wood and Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki in December as well as Elephant Vanishes and Blind Willow Sleeeping Woman and loved those too. I did read Hardboiled Wonderland and didn't like it so much so I'm asking around for suggestions before I get to his other books such as Kafka and Wind Up Bird Chronicle.

I also picked up a copy of the Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay on a whim

 

[Celegus]

I still argue the final two hundred pages are some of the finest in the fantasy genre.

No arguments here!

 

[Mumei]

So I just read Sputnik Sweetheart and South of the Border West of the Sun by Murakami in the last few days and absolutely adore them, would anyone be able to recommend me something similar in feel to those books? For reference I read Norwegian Wood and Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki in December as well as Elephant Vanishes and Blind Willow Sleeeping Woman and loved those too. I did read Hardboiled Wonderland and didn't like it so much so I'm asking around for suggestions before I get to his other books such as Kafka and Wind Up Bird Chronicle.

I also picked up a copy of the Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay on a whim

I had a professor who suggested that I read Italo Calvino because I was into Murakami at the time. You might try reading his books, like If on a winter's night a traveler or Cosmicomics (which was just released in an expanded edition with newly translated stories) or The Baron in the Trees or Invisible Cities.

 

[Necrovex]

Well, he wasn't real.

He might have been real! Believe!

 

[Mumei]

He might have been real! Believe!

I want to believe...

 

[Necrovex]

I want to believe...

/Neogaf.gif

 

[obin_gam]

Finished Asimovs Foundation yesterday. It was a let down. To many "talking heads" all the time and nothing seemed to happen :/

The I started reading the gigantuam:

on audiobook this morning. Am 2 hours into it and all in all it's 20 hours long book. It already feels epic as hell and the characters havent even gotten to Nantucket yet.

 

[Woorloog]

Finished Asimovs Foundation yesterday. It was a let down. To many "talking heads" all the time and nothing seemed to happen :/

Well, it is old "idea scifi", before scifi became more... literate? Uh, something like that.
Old scifi works often just explore concepts, they don't have strong characters or events, or those are very secondary to what the overarching idea behind the work is.

In Foundation's case, it is a story about the the fall of an empire (based on the fall of Rome), and rise of another. It was quite big thing back then.
And no, it hasn't aged that well. I read a couple of the Foundation books some time ago and... yeah.

 

[obin_gam]

Well, it is old "idea scifi", before scifi became more... literate? Uh, something like that.
Old scifi works often just explore concepts, they don't have strong characters or events, or those are very secondary to what the overarching idea behind the work is.

In Foundation's case, it is a story about the the fall of an empire (based on the fall of Rome), and rise of another. It was quite big thing back then.
And no, it hasn't aged that well. I read a couple of the Foundation books some time ago and... yeah.

I'm still sort of interested in the series because I can understand and get the "idea-sci fi thing". Red Mars is somewhat similar in presentation but I guess what made me love that book way more than Foundation is that it had characters you got to follow and know. I've said to myself that if one wants to read sci-fi books one must at least read one from one of the classic authors. Maybe I had too high hopes of Asomiv. I hope I dont get as disappointed later on this spring when I plan to tackle Nivens Ringworld.

 

[bennywhatever]

Still reading Reamde. This is a damn long book.

 

[Woorloog]

I'm still sort of interested in the series because I can understand and get the "idea-sci fi thing". Red Mars is somewhat similar in presentation but I guess what made me love that book way more than Foundation is that it had characters you got to follow and know. I've said to myself that if one wants to read sci-fi books one must at least read one from one of the classic authors. Maybe I had too high hopes of Asomiv. I hope I dont get as disappointed later on this spring when I plan to tackle Nivens Ringworld.

Ringworld is better than Foundations when it comes to characters... a bit. It is still very much idea scifi. Wonderful such tough, so i very much recommend it.

Frank Herbert's Dune is a better mix of great concepts, action, plot and characters, perhaps the very best i know (but then i'm hardcore Dune fan so i'm biased).

 

[PassiveObserver]

Currently reading this coffee table book. I'm impressed at the breadth of games discuss, including relatively obscure gems like Rez and Disgaea, but the copyediting on this is awful. Numerous types, captions that don't relate to the pictures, and some straight up errors (conflating the SuperFX chip for creating Mode 7) but I appreciate that such a book even exist. Video games man.

Still reading Reamde. This is a damn long book.

I can't read this book for too many pages at a time. I've been reading about that one day for over a year now.

 

[RageWaffles]

Recently finished Mr. Penumbra's 24-Hour Bookstore. What a charming and optimistic book. Plus, it has a glow-in-the-dark jacket!

Just started Smoke Gets in Your Eyes for some morbidness.

 

[Jb]

Just finished Do No Harm, the very compelling and (seemingly) honest memoir of a british neurosurgeon. Having never really been in contact with cancer of major illnesses it was very insightful to read about how hard a balance to strike it is for physicians between honesty/detachment vis à vis patients' conditions and empathy and the desire to give them hope that they might beat the odds. I don't think I could live a life where death and suffering are this prevalent, but it made me appreciate all the more their absence from most of mine.

 

[LProtag]

Oh lordy, if you're that into it only halfway through the first book... the second half is quite a ride. That's definitely a series I wish I could experience again for the first time.

I'm around 64% according to my kindle and I already see things are ramping up a lot. Really excited.

 

[A Human Becoming]

Man, as an agnostic Love Does is going to be hard to read. So much God and Jesus...at least it's short and was free.

 

[besada]

Mumei, what did you think of The Safety of Objects?

 

[Tragicomedy]

Man, as an agnostic Love Does is going to be hard to read. So much God and Jesus...at least it's short and was free.

Convert while reading the book, then convert back afterward. Problem solved.

Spoiler

I, too, struggle reading books with overt religious themes. I'm fine if it's a fictional character that believes in religion and God or whatever. I'm less fine when it's the author clearly making a case for their religious beliefs.

 

[Mumei]

Mumei, what did you think of The Safety of Objects?

Loved, loved, loved it.

 

[KmA]

Just finished Wool and onto Shift!