Which book are you reading now? Volume XIII
- Thread starter Takhisis
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SS-18 ICBM
Oscillator
They need to get a move on with answering fundamental questions like what dark energy is.
It's a place holder.
Blue Emu
GroFAZ
Currently (re-)reading The Invincible by Stanislaw Lem. One of my favorite authors, despite the fact that I can only read his (Polish) works in translation.
EnglishEdward
Deity
I have just finished reading a Sci-Fi space opera:
Embers of War
by
Gareth L Powell
The first 95% is great, but then a happy ever after ending.
Embers of War
by
Gareth L Powell
The first 95% is great, but then a happy ever after ending.
I read michael kolhaas (by kleist) tonight.
All in all imo it is a pretty dumb story. Kleist was never a favorite of mine; still, the shorter stories of his i had read werent so bland.
After kolhaas burns the young lord's castle the tale is little more than a low melodrama...
All in all imo it is a pretty dumb story. Kleist was never a favorite of mine; still, the shorter stories of his i had read werent so bland.
After kolhaas burns the young lord's castle the tale is little more than a low melodrama...
SS-18 ICBM
Oscillator
Philip K. Dick's The Man in the High Castle is a well-known alt-history novel about a post-war United States divided between the victorious Nazi German Reich and Imperial Japan's Pacific empire. It follows a number of characters in the areas of California and Colorado as they go about their daily life and participate in the larger political struggles of the day. Eastern philosophy themes underlie the text, with the I Ching in particular used to examine various issues such as fate and historicity. This is used to examine the construction of the alternate history in the book, contrasted with the in-universe novel The Grasshopper Lies Heavy in which the Allies win, though with different results from our timeline.
To be honest, somewhat underwhelmed by the novel. The examination of themes as a whole is rather shallow, and leads to characters acting very unusually and uttering conversations that don't really happen in real life. It's as if Mr. Dick can't decide whether to tell us this is a viable alternative timeline or a mere work of fiction. The world-building leaves much to be desired. The Reich is this hyper-efficient, ultra-advanced world superpower that's exploring the inner solar system in the freaking 1960s, something which is probably mocked on places like /r/[Swill]WehraboosSay. At least Wolfenstein: the New Order had the excuse of ancient Jewish caches of high technology. The Japanese empire is portrayed as a pan-Asian culture for some reason, promoting the literature of the slaves of the Ming. There's a hint of an excuse with a portrayal of a younger Japanese couple with a more tolerant outlook. The novel crams most of the action near the end, and ends without any decisive change in the main plot and several subplots left hanging. I suppose I shouldn't have been surprised, since all I've heard of Castle is its alt-history premise and little else.
Worth reading once, I suppose. Now I know where the Soviet Cold War campaign of Rise of Nations: Thrones and Patriots got the name Operation Lowenzahn from.
To be honest, somewhat underwhelmed by the novel. The examination of themes as a whole is rather shallow, and leads to characters acting very unusually and uttering conversations that don't really happen in real life. It's as if Mr. Dick can't decide whether to tell us this is a viable alternative timeline or a mere work of fiction. The world-building leaves much to be desired. The Reich is this hyper-efficient, ultra-advanced world superpower that's exploring the inner solar system in the freaking 1960s, something which is probably mocked on places like /r/[Swill]WehraboosSay. At least Wolfenstein: the New Order had the excuse of ancient Jewish caches of high technology. The Japanese empire is portrayed as a pan-Asian culture for some reason, promoting the literature of the slaves of the Ming. There's a hint of an excuse with a portrayal of a younger Japanese couple with a more tolerant outlook. The novel crams most of the action near the end, and ends without any decisive change in the main plot and several subplots left hanging. I suppose I shouldn't have been surprised, since all I've heard of Castle is its alt-history premise and little else.
Worth reading once, I suppose. Now I know where the Soviet Cold War campaign of Rise of Nations: Thrones and Patriots got the name Operation Lowenzahn from.
Lexicus
Deity
It makes vague sense given how far ahead of us they were at rocket engineering in 1945.
JohannaK
Heroically Clueless
Well when I read it I thought it was an utterly idiotic alt-history, but it was a fascinating world nevertheless, out if sheer alien-ness. It always seemed to me like both the Nazis and the allies were propaganda-like caricatures. I am not sure it is good at anything, but there is no doubt in my mind thst it is a masterpiece.
Catwoman: Soulsealer. By Sarah J Maas.
This is part of an official novel series by DC. It's not the Catwoman story I'd like to write. It isn't really consistent with any of the Catwoman mythos I've read in the past. But, then again, this is DC. So there is no canon. It's OK. Not great. Oddly, the cover art is Anne Hathaway, barely disguised as not. While the other books in the series aren't recognizably an actor I know. Even though the cover art doesn't match the story. But, then again, no cover art ever matches the story.
This is part of an official novel series by DC. It's not the Catwoman story I'd like to write. It isn't really consistent with any of the Catwoman mythos I've read in the past. But, then again, this is DC. So there is no canon. It's OK. Not great. Oddly, the cover art is Anne Hathaway, barely disguised as not. While the other books in the series aren't recognizably an actor I know. Even though the cover art doesn't match the story. But, then again, no cover art ever matches the story.
hobbsyoyo
Deity
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This is overblown and due more to differences in strategy than technological disadvantage. The Germans learned how to build rockets by cribbing off Goddard, though the point is taken that the US did not emphasize strategic rocket weapons the way Germany did because they didn't see the sense in it at the time.
You're right that it does make vague sense - especially thematically. But the Germans weren't doing anything the US or Britain couldn't do themselves at the time - they just chose not too. And the German rockets were pretty crap themselves, they just built a lot of them and terrorized the hell out of Western Europe with them.
-obligatory 'but American rocket scientists were German rocket scientists!' joke
But hell no, it makes zero sense that the Germans would be mounting manned planetary expeditions in the 60's.
SS-18 ICBM
Oscillator
Not to mention that there's more to a space program than just rocket technology. And technology alone isn't enough to occupy vast areas of a former enemy.
As an addendum I find it weird Shokaku still gets sunk in a 1944 battle in the Philippine Sea despite all the changes to the timeline that materialized.
As an addendum I find it weird Shokaku still gets sunk in a 1944 battle in the Philippine Sea despite all the changes to the timeline that materialized.
Phrossack
Armored Fish and Armored Men
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You of course know more about rockets than I do, but I'll add that German technological superiority in the war is really overblown. For just about every German advantage you could point to something similar the Allies had, a good reason not to develop that thing, or something superior in a different field. The Germans had nothing quite like the Manhattan Project, proximity-fuzed shells, or Allied fire control computers. And their army was largely horse-drawn!
Thorgalaeg
Deity
Yeah, and Operation Paperclip never happened, nor the race beetween USA, Britan and Soviet Union to retrieve as many V2s as possible. And the Mercury-Redstone rocket was not a descendant of the crappy V2s at all, designed by the same guys: von Braun and Arthur Rudolf, who also designed the Saturn V... Come on, nobody like nazis, but give credit where credit is due.
OTOH while the soviets also drank from the nazi fountain, they already had one of the greatest rocket scientists ever: Serguei Koroliov.
"Rejoice: a Knife to the Heart" by Steven Erikson. Superb Sci Fi about first contact in our time. Touches lots of bases we talk about here and even has a president who looks a lot like Trump. A great read.
Phrossack
Armored Fish and Armored Men
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Finished Native North American Armor, Shields, and Fortifications by David E. Jones. Not very scholarly, and he's full of it whenever he goes on a tangent about Japanese or European armor, but it's the only compilation I know of on the topic and it's pretty useful in that regard.
Traitorfish
The Tighnahulish Kid
It's a graphic novel, so it counts.
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