Wow - that's a lot of 1632verse! Any stand out as particularly good/bad?
April 2019: Reading Thread
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sure. the ones with the main characters are normally fine. the ones in russia also. i'm just sorry i didn't get the barbie consortium. i think that one might be the funniest of them all.
Pedro Del Mar
I am content
Having mentioned a book myself in another thread, something I read as a teenager and then found and read again a couple of decades later (though I remember much about the first reading, I don't remember the second, just that I had my hands on a book I'd been looking for a long time but hadn't been able to remember the title or the author) I was accordingly seized by a desire to read it again. So I ordered it, and it came yesterday, and I spent much of the day reading it.
You Shall Know Them, by Vercors (pseudonym of Jean Bruller), translated from the French by Rita Barisse. It was published in 1953. It's a novel that revolves around serious questions about what it means to be human. A tribe of "missing links" is discovered in New Guinea, and greedy industrialists want to enslave them as cheap labor because they consider them to be just animals. But it's worse than that, because other people exploit the questions already raised by the existence of the "tropis" to extend to questions about whether the dark-skinned races are fully human and ought to be treated as such, or whether it's just sentimental drivel to accord them equal rights under the law. So the scientists who have been studying the tropis, and don't want them to be mistreated, much less a return to the "racialism" that brought about the horrors of the last World War, still fresh in their minds (the Nuremberg trials are mentioned a few times), decide that they can perhaps prove that humans and tropis are of the same species by artificially inseminating some of the females with human sperm. The hero, a journalist, ends up being the donor. And in order to decide the question of whether they are human or not in a British court of law (because the cross-breeding does work, but it also works inseminating them with sperm from the great apes so isn't decisive), he decides to martyr himself on their behalf by being tried for murder: he kills (humanely) one of the experimental children, his own son, and then turns himself into the police to stand trial. If he gets off, he will have killed the baby for nothing, which is horrifying, and if he is convicted, which is what he wants, then he expects to hang. (He admits to killing the baby partway down the second page, so that's not a spoiler.)
And yet with all this—and something I didn't remember from previous reading—is that there is also a lot of dry humor in this book, mostly at the expense of the British—the main characters are all very British and all very much of the 1950s—and though the author is French, they all seem very much to me like people in books written at that period by actual Brits. His treatment of their foibles seems quite affectionate, too, even while he mocks them.
Also, though the book is quite obviously meant to be anti-racism, it is itself extremely racist in many respects. I'd say unconsciously so. For instance all the characters, and some of them are very good, very humane, very earnest in their repugnance for racism, come out with some shockingly racist statements and expect the people they are talking to to agree, as indeed they do. It's just taken for granted by all of them that the white race is clearly superior to any other, and that there is a large leap in intelligence between a white man and a black man, and sometimes they express this in language that is rather ugly. And yet all the time they are exuding the milk of human kindness. It is just possible that he is doing this ironically, with the purpose of pointing out their unconscious biases, but I don't think so, because they are contrasted with all sorts of people who are far less humane, far more prejudiced, not so ethical. They appear to be there, not only to move the plot, but to demonstrate what thinking, questioning, compassionate people struggling to understand are like. There is no reason to suppose that the author does not share the exact same prejudices. But I may be wrong, because there is only the dialogue of the characters to suggest that he does. He may be more subtle than I think he is.
You Shall Know Them, by Vercors (pseudonym of Jean Bruller), translated from the French by Rita Barisse. It was published in 1953. It's a novel that revolves around serious questions about what it means to be human. A tribe of "missing links" is discovered in New Guinea, and greedy industrialists want to enslave them as cheap labor because they consider them to be just animals. But it's worse than that, because other people exploit the questions already raised by the existence of the "tropis" to extend to questions about whether the dark-skinned races are fully human and ought to be treated as such, or whether it's just sentimental drivel to accord them equal rights under the law. So the scientists who have been studying the tropis, and don't want them to be mistreated, much less a return to the "racialism" that brought about the horrors of the last World War, still fresh in their minds (the Nuremberg trials are mentioned a few times), decide that they can perhaps prove that humans and tropis are of the same species by artificially inseminating some of the females with human sperm. The hero, a journalist, ends up being the donor. And in order to decide the question of whether they are human or not in a British court of law (because the cross-breeding does work, but it also works inseminating them with sperm from the great apes so isn't decisive), he decides to martyr himself on their behalf by being tried for murder: he kills (humanely) one of the experimental children, his own son, and then turns himself into the police to stand trial. If he gets off, he will have killed the baby for nothing, which is horrifying, and if he is convicted, which is what he wants, then he expects to hang. (He admits to killing the baby partway down the second page, so that's not a spoiler.)
And yet with all this—and something I didn't remember from previous reading—is that there is also a lot of dry humor in this book, mostly at the expense of the British—the main characters are all very British and all very much of the 1950s—and though the author is French, they all seem very much to me like people in books written at that period by actual Brits. His treatment of their foibles seems quite affectionate, too, even while he mocks them.
Also, though the book is quite obviously meant to be anti-racism, it is itself extremely racist in many respects. I'd say unconsciously so. For instance all the characters, and some of them are very good, very humane, very earnest in their repugnance for racism, come out with some shockingly racist statements and expect the people they are talking to to agree, as indeed they do. It's just taken for granted by all of them that the white race is clearly superior to any other, and that there is a large leap in intelligence between a white man and a black man, and sometimes they express this in language that is rather ugly. And yet all the time they are exuding the milk of human kindness. It is just possible that he is doing this ironically, with the purpose of pointing out their unconscious biases, but I don't think so, because they are contrasted with all sorts of people who are far less humane, far more prejudiced, not so ethical. They appear to be there, not only to move the plot, but to demonstrate what thinking, questioning, compassionate people struggling to understand are like. There is no reason to suppose that the author does not share the exact same prejudices. But I may be wrong, because there is only the dialogue of the characters to suggest that he does. He may be more subtle than I think he is.
Ian Fortytwo
A Poet, Writer and eclectic Reader.
I'm about to venture into new ground with my next read, The Mammoth Book of Steampunk, edited by Sean Wallace. As I have never read steampunk before this will be very different.
In between stories in my reading of Heinlein’s The Past Through Tomorrow (which I’m enjoying), I’m reading through some other SF novels.
I just finished Weber’s Field of Dishonor, which I like a lot better than the first time I gave it a go. On my first attempted reading I really didn’t get on with it ( I only got a third of the way through), as it wasn’t the kind of book I was expecting. This time, after recalibrating my expectations, it was good enough. It’s really a drama, and it would be stretch to call it Mil SF. It’s set in a fictional future but there’s precious little SF in it. It’s perhaps for that reason that I don’t like it as much as the preceding 3 Honor books, but will probably read the next as they are decent light relief tales (and there’s nothing wrong with that).
I’m now going to read Big Planet, by Jack Vance. I picked this up this week in a used bookstore.
I just finished Weber’s Field of Dishonor, which I like a lot better than the first time I gave it a go. On my first attempted reading I really didn’t get on with it ( I only got a third of the way through), as it wasn’t the kind of book I was expecting. This time, after recalibrating my expectations, it was good enough. It’s really a drama, and it would be stretch to call it Mil SF. It’s set in a fictional future but there’s precious little SF in it. It’s perhaps for that reason that I don’t like it as much as the preceding 3 Honor books, but will probably read the next as they are decent light relief tales (and there’s nothing wrong with that).
I’m now going to read Big Planet, by Jack Vance. I picked this up this week in a used bookstore.
Victoria Silverwolf
Vegetarian Werewolf
I have started The Secret Ascension or Philip K. Dick Is Dead, Alas (1987) by Michael Bishop. (The "or" part of the title is the author's preference, and the book was later published without the first part.) Starts with the death and semi-resurrection of a parallel universe version of PKD, and how he functions in a world where Richard Nixon is serving his fourth term in office, having set up a repressive government and won the Vietnam War. Quite compelling so far, and captures the flavor of a PKD novel without being blatantly imitative.
Danny McG
Lid closed, monkey dead.
Cheers tobl, I might well try the first couple of them.
trust me. it's a riot. lycans, tantric witchs, gnomes, mages, etc... lol
Simbelmynë
Well-Known Member
Finished The Dancers at the End of Time by Michael Moorcock. Excellent stuff, if a bit rushed in places. But this is true of other stories by MM. Didn’t detract too much from my enjoyment and put me in mind to re-read some Elric.
A friend lent me Brave New World by Huxley. I found this a bit dry in places, but I expected this, as I didn’t really treat it as a piece of entertainment. Very thought provoking and a little unsettling, been meaning to read it for a while and I’m glad I got round to it.
I’m now into Sapiens: a brief history of humanity by Yuval Noah Harari. Another one I’ve been wanting to get to for a while, since the buzz it got a few years back. It gripped me from the start, and I’m not always that successful at keeping my concentration with non-fiction so I’m pleased about that. It’s very accessible, which is great for a drop out like me. Riveting stuff.
A friend lent me Brave New World by Huxley. I found this a bit dry in places, but I expected this, as I didn’t really treat it as a piece of entertainment. Very thought provoking and a little unsettling, been meaning to read it for a while and I’m glad I got round to it.
I’m now into Sapiens: a brief history of humanity by Yuval Noah Harari. Another one I’ve been wanting to get to for a while, since the buzz it got a few years back. It gripped me from the start, and I’m not always that successful at keeping my concentration with non-fiction so I’m pleased about that. It’s very accessible, which is great for a drop out like me. Riveting stuff.
The Big Peat
Darth Buddha
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I was lying.
The series as a whole is one of the more subtly ambitious I've seen in a while because a number of years elapse between each one and they change the characters, with the result that each has a tone.
Age of Assassins is a super fun book because its a coming of age book and those tend to be filled with a lot of wonder and a lot of fun.
Blood of Assassins is... trying at the times. Its Girton as a surly, traumatised young man. It's a decent book to be sure, but nowhere near as good as the first.
King of Assassins has more mature, more stressed characters, and it hits like a hammer. Its like a million elephants proceeding over you in a good way. The tone is a bit more like the first but the heft of the themes and the weight of the decisions is so much more. Age of Assassins is something I'd compare to Raymond E Feist; King of Assassins is something I'd compare to Guy Gavriel Kay. Its a different kind of fun, but still extremely entertaining.
Thanks. So I‘ll have to give it some thought. Will probably read the other two, anyway, if just to quell that pesky curiosity.
The Big Peat
Darth Buddha
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I thoroughly recommend you do.
Simbelmynë, it's been a while but I found Brave New World a bit dry too (1984 was as well). The worlds are well-realised, though, and alarmingly prescient in certain ways.
Danny McG
Lid closed, monkey dead.
Rereading today, Fritz Leiber's Changewar books, starting with The Big Time
i remember seeing a tv show where a guy famous in russia was discussing literature, years after the wall fell and before putin. he said he never believed the hype about 1984. According to him, how could a writer living in a opne society reallyunderstand what was like living in a controlled society? he said he got the choc of his life reading the book because it was a photgrafy of the soviet society
Simbelmynë
Well-Known Member
I enjoyed parts of it quite a lot, the story of the savage especially. And it’s left me with a lot of reflections which I guess is what this kind of novel is supposed to do. And yes, strangely prescient, I thought this particularly about the sensory entertainment. Brings to mind the proliferation of video games, and the advances in vr.
I much preferred it to 1984, but perhaps because so many references to 1984 are deep within pop culture now, Brave New World felt more fresh to me.
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Andrew Collins: “The Seventh Sword”. True life “psychic questing” adventures @1980s in which the protagonists follow psychic clues/guidance, retrieving power objects from remote sites and restoring "positive energies" in the face of stern resistance from the forces of darkness, and at times scaring themselves silly.
Thank you @HareBrain for this recommendation. I seem to have, as far as I can tell, survived psychically intact.
I definitely preferred the first half (the re-cap of “The Green Stone” from a different pov) to the second which pretty much concentrates on linking secret societies/ individuals/cultures through the ages for long interminable passages. The parts I particularly liked (if liked is the right word) are those describing the immediacy of the protagonists' psychic experiences and their various associated terrors, much like a “Most Haunted” for real. As I remember them (not necessarily accurately), both “The Green Stone” (which I found most unnerving when I read it back in the 80s) and “The Eye of Fire” (also seriously scary at times, but sadly almost totally left out in this book) had rather more of these terrifying thrills and spills, which, perhaps naively, as a reader I tend to take at face value. However, there are enough of these in the “Seventh Sword” to still be worrying. I have enjoyed revisiting these adventures and,have also enjoyed, even more, going off on various tangential musings about them. I remain very glad indeed that I have never been remotely drawn into getting mixed up in any of this good vs evil psychic questing: for example, p353 of this edition “Despite the happy ending of ‘The Eye of Fire, a series of frighteningly real psychic attacks had befallen T.S – keeper of the Eye of Fire – and his family from 1983 onwards. According to G these had originated from an awesome demonic force…..So despairing had TS become after these almost daily attacks on his family and home that...”. Doesn’t sound pleasant. Can still give me goosebumps.
Thank you @HareBrain for this recommendation. I seem to have, as far as I can tell, survived psychically intact.
I definitely preferred the first half (the re-cap of “The Green Stone” from a different pov) to the second which pretty much concentrates on linking secret societies/ individuals/cultures through the ages for long interminable passages. The parts I particularly liked (if liked is the right word) are those describing the immediacy of the protagonists' psychic experiences and their various associated terrors, much like a “Most Haunted” for real. As I remember them (not necessarily accurately), both “The Green Stone” (which I found most unnerving when I read it back in the 80s) and “The Eye of Fire” (also seriously scary at times, but sadly almost totally left out in this book) had rather more of these terrifying thrills and spills, which, perhaps naively, as a reader I tend to take at face value. However, there are enough of these in the “Seventh Sword” to still be worrying. I have enjoyed revisiting these adventures and,have also enjoyed, even more, going off on various tangential musings about them. I remain very glad indeed that I have never been remotely drawn into getting mixed up in any of this good vs evil psychic questing: for example, p353 of this edition “Despite the happy ending of ‘The Eye of Fire, a series of frighteningly real psychic attacks had befallen T.S – keeper of the Eye of Fire – and his family from 1983 onwards. According to G these had originated from an awesome demonic force…..So despairing had TS become after these almost daily attacks on his family and home that...”. Doesn’t sound pleasant. Can still give me goosebumps.
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