Bookshelf

The Hammer of God

Clarke is one of the greate of the sci-fi cannon, so it’s a disappointment that this book lands so poorly. The premise of a mission to deflect a world-destroying asteroid is a banger, but it’s told in such broad strokes as to feel more like an outline than a real work of fiction. You just get a series of events with no meaningful characters or sense of personal stakes.

Haiku

Wonderful poetry. Whistful, playful, wabi-sabi. And very interesting to see how the haiku form evolved over centuries through the work of four of the greatest poets.

Wild

It’s really interesting how Jeffs constructs her own short stories out of scraps of Anglo-Saxon poetry and literature. The accompanying woodcut prints are evocative, and the commentary interspersed with personal narrative add some nice flavor. Still, at the end of the day I’d prefer to go straight to the primary sources. Anglo-Saxon poetry is beautiful and moving all on its own.

Ball Lightning

Cixin Liu’s books take a while to get rolling, but they continuously escalate, gradually inventing a whole speculative science until you find yourself far out in the unknown, unsure of how you got there. The way his mind works is a real wonder, throwing out wild hypothoses about how the nature of reality and then using fiction to meticulously explore where they might lead. Science fiction in the truest sense.

In Cold Blood

This isn’t a pleasant read. But it deserves its reputation as a powerful and expertly crafted work of literary non-fiction.

Capote’s skill is in the way he structures the narrative and in his keen observation of the contradictions of the human mind. You’re pulled into the experience of a pair of killers in a way that’s unsettling and intriguing in equal measure.

A Canticle for Leibowitz

This book explores themes that really speak to me. Themes of myth, religion, science, and the relationship between them all. It’s sweeping in scope and really engaging. There are some rough edges in the time jumps and abrupt section endings, but it’s truly a pillar in the edifice of philosophical science fiction.

Is Shakespeare Dead?

I’m disappointed to follow Twain into Baconist conspiracy theories about Shakespeare’s “true” authorship. Still, everything Twain says has so much charm and wit that I almost find myself nodding along — almost.

Humanly Possible

This history of humanist thinkers and philosophy made me feel less alone in the world.

Steppenwolf

Hesse has a way of painting the interior of a mind with life and illumination. While I enjoy the first half — shall we say, the misanthropic half — better than the second, the prose is vibrant and true throughout.

Gulliver's Travels

The purpose of fantasy fiction has always been to shine a mirror on the real world through the example of imaginary others, and that goes all the way back to Gulliver’s Travels. Swift transports the reader to a series of fanciful lands that each have a little (or very big) something to show us about ourselves and our absurdities. And the reader is swept along, engaged and entertained all the way, changed by the end, just as Gulliver himself is by his travels.

Orbital

This is less of a novel and more of a poetic musing about life, the universe, and everything framed by a day in the lives of astronauts aboard the International Space Station. There’s some lovely language and arresting imagery and an overall feeling of the fleeting beauty of life. The one thing that kept tripping me up though is my knowledge that actual astronauts are chosen for their absolute practicality and they are hardly likely to spend their time in space on such bittersweet meditations.

BRave New World Revisited

An interesting appendix to Brave New World. It mostly emphasizes that literary dystopias shouldn’t be confused for accurate prediction of the future. Many of the things Huxley feared most have never come to pass, and in some cases his convictions about ethical dilemmas seem a bit horrifying by today’s standards. But that doesn’t diminish the novel. Rather, it underscores that the value of literature is as much in its interperability as it’s accuracy.

Master of the Revels

Making Shakespeare a character in your time travel novel is gutsy, but that’s not the main reason I was disappointed by this return to the D.O.D.O. series Galland began with Neal Stephenson in the previous installment. Mostly, it’s the sense of wheel spinning. You get the feeling that the first novel was the pilot episode and the rest of the series will be made up of endless adventures that always return to the status quo the first book established. No sense that the stakes are changing or that the story as a whole is inching toward a conclusion.

And while the adventures are still fun (especially as brought to life by a full-cast audiobook), they don’t have that spark of weirdness that was Stephenson’s contribution to the first one. I’m not sure I’ll be returning to this series.

The Rise and Fall of D.O.D.O.

I’ve read a number of Neal Stephenson novels, and I think I know his style pretty well. So looking at this collaboration, I have to guess it’s more Galland’s work than his. That’s not necessarily a bad thing, it’s just a bit more everyday than I’d expect from Stephenson. Less idea density, less eccentricity. It’s there, just not much of it.

That said, it’s a fun magic-scifi-time-travel adventure story that kept me very engaged. Probably not the most memorable or insightful thing on my reading list, but I had fun. It could be a bit shorter, and occasionally the epistilary style wears a bit thin, especially in the really beauracratic middle sections. But I’ll definitely read the sequel (not least because nothing is resolved!).

Practicing History

I was keen to read a book on the practice of historiography, and this book really failed to deliver. The first couple of essays are fine, but after that, most of the essays don’t really concern the practice of history. And, funnily enough, this book about history is quite dated, especially when it comes to Tuckman’s attitudes. She’s curmudgeonly, Eurocentric, and has some politcal stances that just make me cringe.

Narrow Road to the Interior / Hojoki

An interesting look at the Japan of Basho’s time. Though I must say I was hoping for something a bit more poetical, given the author. There is a sense of whistfulness here, but mostly it’s a straightforward account of his travels. More interesting to me as a historian than as a fan of literary form.

The Robots of Dawn

I knew that Asimov had taken nearly thirty years to publish this next entry in his landmark Robots series, so I was pretty curious as to how different it would feel. And in a lot of ways, it doesn’t feel that different at all. The universe is familiar, Elijah Baley and robot partner Daneel Olivaw are the same characters we grew to love, and the mystery is as impossible and surprising as usual.

Where it is different is that this an Asimov ready to talk about sex, and frankly, it feels weird. It’s too much like hearing your grandpa talk about such things, with all the awkwardness and dubious mores that entails. It doesn’t ruin the book by any means, but there are certainly long passages where you find yourself uncomfortably looking around in search of a change in subject.

Still, like all Asimov, the book is fun to read, and I’m still looking forward to continuing the series.