Which book are you reading now? Volume XIII

[Synobun]

Three months! Gah, I was impatient about waiting a week...

It wasn't even the longest wait. I had to wait 5 months for Vicious by V.E. Schwab.

 

[hobbsyoyo]

I impulsively bought the first four books at once (they were discounted) so I didn't have to wait so much as a day.

I'd love to read more of your thoughts on them!

 

[rah]

I coming up to the end of book 2. While I intend to read more because they're ok space opera, the plot for the second book was really pretty bad.
The only thing it had going for it was the introduction of our resident kick butt marine. Holden is a tiresome mess.

 

[hobbsyoyo]

I finished Nemesis Games just in time to pick up the next one from the library. This one had a lot more character development than probably all the other books and that was a great thing. The plot was exciting but as with the other books, you can't really look at it to critically before picking up lots and lots of plotholes and flaws. I'm content with the ride and enjoying the forest in entirety rather than trying to pick out all the trees, if that makes sense.

 

[rah]

That's still a few more ahead of me. I'll let you know later this month if I agree with your assessment. (I assume my feelings will be close)
And yeah, that makes sense.

 

[JohannaK]

I finished The Unbearable Lightness of Being after a one-year delay. It is a good read. Kundera manages to pull the pedantic ass act a few times, but it works well enough in its context, so I wont hold it against him.

 

[Takhisis]

Back to Vassilis Vassilikós after a long spell of reading the entire Discworld and Harry Potter series.
Hors les murs (1970)

At the same shop I found several translated copies of Lieutenant General Aleksandar Vukotić's Theory of Yugoslavian Total National/Popular Defence. I almost bought it just for the value of having large samples of non-Soviet Marxist speech, including tireless referencing of the Fascist and imperialist enemies and ‘the people’.

 

[Synobun]

I finished reading Magic Breaks by Ilona Andrews. It is the 7th book of the Kate Daniels series, although I skipped a couple books. It was recommended by a friend as being one of their most formative/favourite series, and I felt I should give it a go. I was deeply unimpressed with the characters in the books I had read, but she insisted that the 7th book is where it has a significant shift.

This... ended up being true. The former books could not do better than a 6/10, and I found myself constantly annoyed with the main characters. Characterization completely changed in this book and I found it far more enjoyable. It was a 9/10 for me.

 

[Kyriakos]

Hm, I started reading Foucault's "Discipline and Punish", cause I am in hipster mood.
I didn't expect even the first chapter to be so extensive, though... It seems to be endless
And up to this point it is pretty dry, so Foucault may well have been german.

 

[AmazonQueen]

Almost finished The Brothers of Gwynedd trilogy by Edith Pargeter aka as Ellis Peter and responsible for Brother Cadfael and various other novels.
A very good series although she is inclined to hero worship of Simon de Montfort and Llewellyn Ap Gruffydd.

 

[hobbsyoyo]

I'm not enjoying Babylon's Ashes as much as Nemesis Games (books 6 and 5 of The Expanse, respectively) due to the plot and lack of characterization in the latter book. Nemesis Games spent a lot of time with Amos and Bobbie and in particular for Amos, really gave a window on his mentality that I enjoyed. Previous books had portrayed him as a bit of a sociopath but Nemesis Games really put that front and center as it constantly showed him navigating the world by essentially faking normal human emotions and trying to emulate what he thought Holden would do in certain situations as he lacks an independent moral compass. I know it's weird but I really like his character, he's very interesting.

These books don't have particularly strong or coherent plots and whenever the action slows down, these problems become much more noticeable. Nemesis Games was almost relentless in how fast the plot pushed forward whereas Babylon's Ashes has slowed things down quite a bit (at least to the 2/5 point where I'm at in it currently), allowing the reader to take stock and ask why things are happening which doesn't do the book any favors.

Spoiler Spoilers :

I'm bothered by the way the people of Mars just 'gave up' on their planet as soon as the gates were opened. The book says that basically once there were found other worlds that didn't need to be terraformed, people just up and left Mars. I find that hard to believe - especially to the extent it happens in the book - given I don't think people just give up that easily on major goals they've been dedicated to like terraforming, while leaving their families and friends behind in the process. Yes, I know mass emigration is a thing in the real world but Mars is not depicted as a starving, poverty-stricken hell hole as many real life locales where mass emigration has taken place on Earth. If anything, the standard of living on Mars is depicted as possibly even better than on Earth due to the high level of economic engagement of its people relative to Earth where most people subsist on poverty-level universal basic income. And they have a sense of purpose (terraforming) that no one else has and years and years of cultural indoctrination/propaganda that I don't think would be overcome in the blink of an eye as it is shown in the books.

The Belters are also depicted as being faced with near-immediate extinction due to their physiology (low-g adapted) being effectively made 'obsolete' by the discovery of so many worlds. And this touches on another problem with the series - consistency. The books variably depict Belters as universally unable to land on planets, then shows some Belters (Naomi) being able to do it with ease. Then the series goes back and shows that it takes a lot of drugs and exercise to make that possible (even though Naomi did not have to in Cibola Burn) and now it's settling on the notion that about 10% of Belters are unable to use the drugs or exercise enough to be able to make the transition. This means they'll be made extinct as the other 90% will inevitably go off to colonize planets- which again begs the question of why they'd do that although unlike on Mars, life in the Belt is consistently depicted as pretty crappy. Basically, it's sort of all over the place on this front which is a central theme of the book and that makes for a less pleasing reading experience.

The inconsistency shows up in other ways as well. As I talked about when the Season 3 TV trailer dropped, by that point in the books the crew of the Rocinante had been depicted of being rich enough that they purged all equipment branded with the name Tachi over the previous few years. Yet here in Babylon's Ashes, they're depicted as once again having lots of items with that old branding. Similarly, the fleets of Earth and Mars are depicted at being completely exhausted by their previous wars, with ships and ammunition having run perilously thin as so much carnage had been inflicted on the fleets with a corresponding reduction of industrial and food production across the system caused by the same conflicts. Yet in Babylon's Ashes, the fleets are more or less at full strength with no mention of rearmament programs which would have surely drained all sides. I get there is a lot of years-long gaps between books but they could have at least given some mention to how the fleets and industrial capacity was rebuilt given how frequently they talk about massive disruption and destruction previously.

Finally, the notion that most of the Martian fleet and material would up and disappear, completely unnoticed is just dumb on the face of it, especially so with much of it winding up in the hands of a genocidal adversary (the Free Navy). I mean I get that there is some secret third Martian faction that has ulterior motives and they are using the Free Navy to meet their own ends which explains some of it but to the extent this fleet handover happened in the books it just doesn't make a lot of sense. I have not yet read on the parts where the mysterious Martian faction is or what their motives are so there may be some plausible explanation but I'm sort of doubtful.

 

[Birdjaguar]

I think that all the Martian emigration stuff makes perfect sense. Living outside and having a real, more earth-like environment would be a powerful attraction, especially if there was the potential for economic gain. The small inconsistencies about Belters going into gravity situations didn't bother me at all. meh. And yes, the gates would be a huge threat to the Belter way of life. Maybe not immediately, but in the long run everything the Belters produced would be found in quantity and cheaper among the new systems (or so they would think). The whole idea of Belter independence and being a system power would go up in smoke. They would have competition from the new colonies/independent systems. All those radicals in the belt would feel threatened and vulnerable enough to act to defend their cause. [Palestinians throwing rocks at Israeli soldiers]

The time jumps do allow things to go unexplained. And, Amos is very cool. My favorite character.

 

[Dachs]

Explicitly related how?

I mean, I vaguely remember Anansi showing up in AG, but I don't remember him playing a really significant role in the story. And his manifestation there didn't seem very similar to his manifestation here either, with AB feeling less epic than AG, and more cosily domestic (kinda sorta). Also funnier, though: Gaiman seemed to be really going for an Adams/Pratchett vibe, and it worked.

Gaiman first developed the character of Mr. Nancy for Anansi Boys, then borrowed him for American Gods, which happened to be published first. The books aren't connected in terms of story, tone, mood, or style, but they do share that character.

Far from the first https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feminist_science_fiction

kinda says something about a guy that he holds up Honor Harrington as iconic feminist sf

The Hunt for Red October was the novel that established the techno-thriller genre in general and the Tom Clancy franchise in particular. It charts the search for the titular Russian submarine as it goes rogue on an exercise and heads for the Eastern Seaboard. The main players and supporting characters of the Ryanverse are introduced here. The writing shows off the author's strengths in technical detail and high-stakes action. It also shows his weaknesses such as a tendency to infodump (e.g. Captain Ramius' backstory could have been integrated into chapters showing off his interactions with the other officers of Red October, who are rather undeveloped), certain political grandstanding (oh hey, the congressman's aide is a KGB informer, congressional oversight of intelligence agencies bad), and portraying the REDFOR side as incompetent (e.g. poorly trained men, dirty streets in Russian cities, etc.) unless the plot needs them to be otherwise. The book's biggest failing seems to be that the suspense is concentrated in only a few areas. It's mostly showing the hypercompetent Americans executing their brilliant plans while the Russians flounder and occasionally wise up for the few showdowns. Yeah, don't know why this is considered Clancy's best book.

I did not get quite the same impression as you about just how competent the Americans appear in most of the story. For the overwhelming majority of it, the NATO fleets don't really know what's going on. They are repeatedly described as getting lucky when they achieve successes; USS Dallas' intermittent acquisition of Red October is explicitly down to Jones' unique skill, for example. Much of what the Americans and British do doesn't constitute a brilliant plan, although it all does come together at the end, as such stories do. Still: the Americans help out a bit during the final confrontation with the V. K. Konovalov, but Dallas is mostly useless and Ramius makes the crucial calculations. While Clancy does take the opportunity to indulge in some reassurances about the quality of American equipment and highlights deficiencies about the same with the Soviet side, he tended to stay within the bounds of, y'know, truth, at least for that novel.

I would say that there is a larger group of people that think The Cardinal of the Kremlin is a better Clancy novel than The Hunt for Red October. It appears to give something of a greater balance of competence to the Soviet side, especially Vatutin, Bondarenko, and Golovko. It suffers from similar problems of pacing and information and political grandstanding (although Clancy, in what passes for slyness among American conservatives, does use the grandstanding to play a little bit of a trick near the end of the book), but those things were kind of Clancy trademarks, and were much less severe problems than they would become in his 1990s books.

As a side note, I find it interesting that bargains had to be struck between the Americans and the British for the exchange of intelligence. I suppose the Five Eyes agreement wasn't really public knowledge in the late 80s?

I don't believe it was, no.

^_^
"Philogelos" is such an elegant name for this as well. The friend of laughter.

Sadly there is only philomizeros now.

Also a place where Kaldellis likes to stretch his periodization (although his own take on the Byzantines is to emphasize the continuities of Roman culture); the Philogelos was probably written in something like the fourth century.

 

[SS-18 ICBM]

The Americans were quite lucky, and it's just so jarring when compared with the bad luck the Soviets have (apparently they lost another sub in the same course of events, among other humiliating circumstances they suffered). Speaking of Jones' skill, there were quite a few other Americans portrayed as particularly skilled in their specialties (Tyler, Mancuso, etc.). Compare that to the Russians who seem to only have the Konovalov's skipper as being in the same upper class. As for accuracy, apparently this was only for the American subs and not the Soviet ones (the aforementioned lost sub suffered an accident in a pressurized-water reactor, not possible for the real-life Alfa's metal-cooled reactor).


Still enjoyed it, but I'm kinda suffering a bit of Broken Pedestal for this novel.

 

[Kyriakos]

Back to Vassilis Vassilikós

Why?

Also, you have an SS not needed there.

Btw, you should read this, cause it is by the (imo) only first (global) tier Greek novelist in the last couple of centuries:

Read Cavafy too, another first tier writer & in his case you can find his entire work online, translated to English.

 

[Synobun]

Finished Night Broken by Patricia Briggs, book #8 of the Mercy Thompson series. Fairly generic book that didn't move things along too much. Still enjoyable and didn't make confusing choices, but the stakes were pretty low. I think it was intended to just introduce new characters for future books and imply future events.

 

[Takhisis]

Why?

Also, you have an SS not needed there.

Because I like how he writes.

Also, I know how his name is written in Greek, but in the Western world (I think the French might be to blame) it's spelled with double s's.

Btw, you should read this, cause it is by the (imo) only first (global) tier Greek novelist in the last couple of centuries:

Read Cavafy too, another first tier writer & in his case you can find his entire work online, translated to English.

Actually I was going to go for Petros Markaris. I think I can find Kavafis though.

 

[Kyriakos]

Because I like how he writes.

Also, I know how his name is written in Greek, but in the Western world (I think the French might be to blame) it's spelled with double s's.

Actually I was going to go for Petros Markaris. I think I can find Kavafis though.

Maybe it is what Borges said: "This book does its translation no justice"
Ie in Greek it isn't worth much - he is massively interconnected, though.

 

[dusters]

Any Norwegian CFC posters read anything from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hanne_Ørstavik ?

I read one book and I'm in awe.

 

[Takhisis]

Maybe it is what Borges said: "This book does its translation no justice"

To which I answer:

«Ningún problema tan consustancial con las letras y con su modesto misterio como el que propone una traducción».​

‘No problem [is] as consubstantial with letters and their modest mystery as that proposed by a translation’.