An entertaining first novel that pulled me in after a few pages and made me want to know the outcome. The rock musician characters make a nice change from the usual cyber-punk heroes, and the music lore feels credible. There are some minor characters too obviously parachuted in for the sole purpose of giving background explanation. Unobtrusively revealing the background has always been a difficult writing problem in SF. The setting is in the near future, with a technology and social history that seems unlikely in so short a time-span, but that’s a quibble. It’s a good, solid SF read, and I’ll seek out the author’s next work.
Category Archives: BM - Reading 2009 - Page 2
READING — AUGUST 2009
17961. (David G. Mandelbaum) The Plains Cree ― An Ethnographic, Historical, and
. . . . . Comparative Study
17962. (Jane Jacobs) The Nature of Economies
17963. (John S. Milloy) The Plains Cree: Trade, Diplomacy and War, 1790 to 1870
17964. (Josiah Gregg) Commerce of the Prairies
17965. (Geoffrey Ashe) Camelot and the Vision of Albion
Read more »
17962. (Jane Jacobs) The Nature of Economies
This, the second-last of Jane Jacobs books, continues the “dialogue” initiated in Systems of Survival. The starting point of the conversation is this proffered axiom: “human beings exist wholly within nature as part of the natural order in every respect”. From here, Jacobs argues that ecosystems and economies should be conceptualized in roughly the same way, and that the same principles of co-ordination, interdependence, combination, and re-combination underlie them. It is good, solid stuff — vintage Jacobs. Plenty of concrete examples are used to bring the abstract arguments down to earth.
I recommend that anyone engaged in any of the disciplines of the humanities — history, economics, politics, archaeology, urbanology, anthropology, sociology, philosophy — should familiarize themself with this remarkable woman’s work. She made major contributions to all of these fields, and created a body of thought that transcends their boundaries.
READING — JULY 2009
(Fritz Leiber) The Ghost Light ― Masterworks of Science Fiction and Fantasy [Byron Preiss Visual Book,
. designed by Alex Jay; ill. John Jude Palencar, Brian Humphrey, JoEllen Trilling, Pat Ortega, Thomas
. Canty, David Wisner, Robert Gould, Steve Leialoha, Paul Rivoche, Ben Asen]:
. . . . 17775. (Fritz Leiber) Introduction [preface]
. . . . 17776. (Fritz Leiber) The Ghost Light [story]
. . . . 17777. [5] (Fritz Leiber) Coming Attractions [story]
. . . . 17778. [3] (Fritz Leiber) A Deskful of Girls [story]
. . . . 17779. [3] (Fritz Leiber) Space-Time for Springers [story]
. . . . 17780. (Fritz Leiber) Four Ghosts in Hamlet [story]
. . . . 17781. [4] (Fritz Leiber) Gonna Roll the Bones [story]
. . . . 17782. (Fritz Leiber) Bazaar of the Bizarre [story]
. . . . 17783. (Fritz Leiber) Midnight by the Morphy Watch [story]
. . . . 17784. (Fritz Leiber) Black Glass [story]
. . . . 17785. (Fritz Leiber) Not Much Disorder and Not So Early Sex: An Autobiographic
. . . . . . . . Essay [article]
17775. (Steve Muhlberger) [in blog Muhlberger’s Early History] Review of A History of Modern Iran
. . . . . by Arvand Abrahamian [review]
Read more »
(Fritz Leiber) The Ghost Light ― Masterworks of Science Fiction and Fantasy
Fritz Leiber, over the years, wrote some of the finest fantasy fiction there is, and some pretty decent science fiction, as well. This collection, enlivened by illustrations by several artists, is a good introduction. It contains some of his most famous stories — “Coming Attractions”, “Gonna Roll the Bones” and the delightul “Space-Time for Springers”, but it also has the unusual semi-autobiographical “Four Ghosts in Hamlet”, based on his experiences in his father’s Shakespearean company. One well-known story that I’d missed until now is “Midnight by the Morphy Watch”, which involves the missing pocket watch of the 19th century chess master, Paul Morphy. Stories like this make you want to buy an overstuffed armchair and take up pipe smoking. Read more »
READING — JUNE 2009
17694. (Stephen Fry) The Stars’ Tennis Balls
17695. (Thomas W. Best) Macropedius
17696. (Steve Muhlberger) [in blog Muhlberger’s Early History] review of Joan of Arc: La Pucelle
. . . . . by Craig Taylor [review]
17697. (Jeffrey Toobin) Diverse Opinions [article]
17698. (Richard Scott Nokes) Beowulf: Prince of the Geats, Nazis, and Odinists [article]
17699. (Sharon Moalem) How Sex Works
17700. [2] (Damon Knight) Beyond the Barrier Read more »
17743. (Samuel P. Huntington) The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order
This is a stupid book. Unfortunately, it’s also been a very influential one.
Huntington starts out by playing the old “civilizations” game, popular from the late 19th century onward. Nobody any longer takes you seriously if you talk about nationalities in a silly, anthropomorphic way (“The Dutch are cheese-eating, practical people, but they are doomed to failure as nation because they smoke too much marijuana and their feet must hurt from wearing wooden shoes”). But if you shift the discussion to “civilizations”, big segments of the globe defined by arbitrary criteria, you can get away with it. Read more »
17742. (Edward L. Ochsenschlager) Iraq’s Marsh Arabs in the Garden of Eden
This is a brilliant book. Ochsenschlager was engaged in an important archaeological project in Iraq, starting in 1968. The site was the Sumerian city of Lagash. Puzzled by some unglamorous, but intriguing artifacts, he started looking for analogies among the local people to interpret them. The local people included Bedouin tribes, the agricultural Beni Hasan, and the famous Mi’dan [Marsh Arabs] who lived in the reed-filled swamps at the conjunction of the Tigris and Euphrates. Read more »
17700. [2] (Damon Knight) Beyond the Barrier
I’m revisiting this little-known novel, which I read as a kid. I didn’t remember much detail, only a few of the odder incidents in the story, and its creepy atmosphere. Damon Knight first made a reputation as an acerbic critic, and was extremely critical of A. E. van Vogt’s work. So it’s ironic that this novel struck me as distinctly “van Vogtian”. It certainly has that author’s tendency to jerk you from one plot development to another, and to constantly shift its frame of reference. There’s also a bit of a Philip K. Dick feel to it. The story starts with a protagonist with memory loss, a dubious identity, enigmatic events, murder, aliens masquerading as humans, and soon drifts into time-travel, wandering about an empty space ship after the human race is extinct, and even has the main character fall through the earth like a yo-yo. The stuff is just piled on. And yet, it’s readable. Read more »
Tuesday, June 2, 2009 — On Holy Books
There should be no Holy Books. Our species would make a significant step forward if it forsook the habit of declaring books to be sacred scriptures. The belief that certain books aren’t just the writings of human beings, but direct revelations from a divinity, or that they are “sacred” has caused no end of mischief. But I plead my case precisely because I love and respect books. There is some profound wisdom to be found, if one cares to look, in certain books. But there seems, in my view, to be no greater insult to a wise person than to turn their work into a silly magical talisman, to be mindlessly chanted and ranted, rather than read and judged with reason.
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