Antimimetics - Reading the book
This section is for our responses to the book as a book.
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I enjoyed the book. I read it first on the web-pages, and then later read the book, so I'm not sure that it is a book, but of not, what is it?
The writing kept me interested in the story-line, and the characters were developed just enough to make their motivations believable. However after a few weeks what I remembered of it was that I liked it, but not that much about what was in it, which was tasty I suppose.
Anyway this led me to wonder about books becoming things of the past, kind of like vaudeville after Keaton and Chaplin. Theatre continues, and so does vaudeville in some small way, but its glory is definitely past. I wondered if this might be a precursor of the book already being abandoned as the main source of evidentiary authority. I came to ttrpgs through reading, but I don't think that's where the scene is now at. I've re-entered public play of rpgs a bit over the last 6 months, and have seen a lot of self-identified "grognards" talking about OSR and Appendix N etc., but to be honest I'm finding the landscape a bit daunting. More about that in the topic of play and praxis.
Anyway, lookiong forward to hearing what you guys think. BC
TINAML seems very much a thing of the present, but when Trump’s post-truth era ends, it’ll probably feel like a thing of the past. Curious to hear a comparison between this and the Gospodinov book, if you remember that one. Both are about memory (or lack of).
Two separate thoughts here, the first about the book itself. I thought that it was a potentially interesting idea, spoiled by the implementation. I didn't get on with the writing style at all, I'm afraid - I like writing to have more depth and style than this does, unless I go in consciously knowing that it's just the equivalent of pulp stuff for quick entertainment. I felt that this was trying to say some serous and potentially important things, and deserved to have more effort and creative flourish put into the vehicle. It didn't really feel like a story as such, more like a collection of disparate musings on a theme, each going off at a different angle with very little connection from one to the next. I wouldn't be tempted to read any more of the material, I'm afraid.
The second bit concerns the possible demise of the book, which I'll tackle later this evening!
@RichardAbbott Yeah, it's a starnge publication. It felt like it should have been short stories, which were ruined by going for a longer form. I would really like to know what motivated the "publication" of a "book." I see it as part of an process of authorisation, which is odd because it's creative commons. I guess people are trying to stake IP.
I read the book after I had read the webpages, which meant that the book was not doing any of the introduction business. Also, I don't explect much from the WWW so it had to clear a lower bar to impress me. It's pulp fiction, and pulp is only slightly thicker than slop. However I am pretty sure it was not AI generated, but have no idea why I am so sure. I am fascinated by the amount of monied interest the SCP it has generated - see the worldbuilding thread, and the wikipedia page.
@Apocryphal I'll think about comparisons with other books and get back to you.
Second part... I don't think there's any substantive evidence that books are in long-term decline? There certainly was a short-term blip during and immediately after covid, but the regular emails I get from Nielsen Bookdata indicate that 2025 saw a return almost to pre-pandemic levels. There's no shortage of indie books, frequently focusing on genre fiction (Queer, HF, SFF, Horror etc) quite apart from trad-publishing material which frequently focuses more on literary fiction. Books and reading are enjoying a resurgence amongst young people - boys as well as girls. You might liken it to the situation where a few years ago someone might have predicted that gaming would be exclusively electronic and online, whereas in fact physical gaming (board games and in-person role-playing) has made something of a come-back.
I got a bit confused by your statement regarding "the book already being abandoned as the main source of evidentiary authority". We're talking fiction here, surely, not educative material? I can see books being challenged as "evidentiary authority" in specific subject learning - suppose I wanted to learn about non-Abelian group theory, or how to build a Bussard ramjet, or gene splicing (or whatever) then maybe I'd go to a book, or maybe I'd find someone who has real cred in that area and watch some online material. In that case I really am wanting to secure actual tangible knowledge.
But do people read fiction as "evidentiary authority"? Surely not? We all read fiction for several reasons - relaxation, entertainment, appreciation of writing talent and originality, exploration of a different universe (historical, social, futuristic, fantasy etc) and no doubt lots I have forgotten. But ultimately it's fiction, and is intended to take liberties with things that "we know" or "are true", in order to get us to question something about ourselves, the world, society etc. How could such a thing be "evidentiary authority"? Now, I totally agree that a work of fiction might well take - frequently does take - some important real issue as a focal point, but it will approach it - maybe challenge or subvert or reinforce it - by way of indirection and imagination, rather than debating the relative merits of each side of the matter.
@RichardAbbott I'm talking about books, print on paper, not fiction. We're reading this because it is a book, but how many of us read the book? Some of us seem to do most things on audiobook, I use an eBook for well over 80% of my reading, we all communicate here on our computers, but if our text this month was just a series of webpages there would be no evidence that it was worthy of attention. The book is the evidence.
Consider the discussion about dating over on the Discord - if that other theory was a only on a web page it would be considered crank science. But it is taken seriously because it was published in book form. It's even got another author on teh cover to provide the evidence that books are. That's the kind of authority I'm challenging - the Wikipedia page suggests that a lot of people were taking the SCP seriously long before it was in print, if money risked can be used to measure severity.
To be provocative, I'll half agree with you - nobody uses books anymore for anything other than fiction. University students preparing papers don't use them; just like ordinary folks who want to know something they go to Google (AI), or Wikipedia; but OTOH the President of the USA holds up a Bible indicating he can't read to grasp at authority, so I guess a book is evidence of something there - is it a fiction? I think most people would be hard pressed to say that most of it wasn't.
Sorry, a bit of a rant. My apologies.
I agree with the the comment that this is a couple of short stories that got over-expanded into a full novel. There's nothing wrong with fixup novels, but there wasn't enough here, I think, to keep things coherent. I think most of that was because of the desire to escalate stakes at every turn. If the book had been the more traditional fixup style, as a collection of standalone short stories, I think it would have stayed more interesting.
And the notion of "book" as a stand-alone piece of art that's worthy of attention: yes, that's still a thing with cultural importance.
@Apocryphal About the Gospodinov book: Yes I vaguely remember it, and based on my memory there's no comparison. That was good, healthy food, this is junk food - not even dessert. It's like comparing my grandmother's apple pie with a pop tart. Sure they're both pastry, sugar, and apples, but really they're not the same thing.
Say, that book isn't on the list - when did we read it?
For me thing about this book is that it is an example of a fortunate beginning fallen onto the wrong ground, as Brian Eno talks about on Daniel Lanois album Here Is What Is, you can listen to the discussion here:
There are two videos because the discussion extends into the very beginning of the second track. Interesting edit point. It's a very Christian idea, Matthew 13th chapter:
That whole chapter is worth reading. Anyway, to my mind it really leads into what I'm trying to talk about in the topic "Gaming in practice," being the place where the seed's fate is developed. That said, I'm very happy to talk about the book as being what it is, but if we want to talk about what it leads to, we need to think about what it becomes, and when, where, how etc. The play of the world, I guess.
But I do think the stories have merit. They are interesting objects of speculative fiction, a genre that asks one or more questions and makes some attempts to answer them. They prompt us to think about memory and what it’s loss means. They also prompt us to think about why memory loss is scary. And to think about our fears. They invoke a sense of wonder as well. There’s value in all that, I think.
It’s probably too easy to devolve these books into ‘monster of the week’. For one thing, the monsters are not very real. They’re more like nightmares. Some a giraffe-like Rorschach’s, some are spider like. Some are more like humans. Some are humans. Some are not alive. Some are alive. Like dreams, we only barely remember them, if at all. That wasn’t one of the questions, but it might be - how are these antimemes like dreams?
Is it really the monsters that are scary? Or is it their effect that’s scary? Like Alzheimers.
Interesting thoughts. I never read anything on the website at all. I read a digital copy of the book and really really liked it. It instantly drew me in and had me wondering how it was going to wrap up and how it would get there. A really cool idea that I thought was extremely well done at the start, but kind of meandered as it went on which kept it from being a top tier book for me. I am not sure if that is because of how it was written or not, but that would be my one main criticism of it. Otherwise I thought it did so many of the things I liked - creepy monsters, twists and turns, a big idea that was just outside of my understanding, but not too far that I thought I couldn't really understand what was going on (until the end as I mentioned). Yeah, it wasn't super deep or anything, but compared to Sphere, which was also sugar cube pop-sci entertainment reading, it kicked the crap out that. I'll definitely give it another go in the future.
I have a 20 year old daughter and her room is almost taken over by physical books at the moment. Sure, that's an N of 1, but book sales seems to be steady at the very least - though I believe a lot of that is romantasy etc, but hey why not. I certainly don't see them as a thing of the past either.
I do a lot of audiobook listening for sure, but that's just a time issue. The physical book reigns supreme for me whenever I have time.
I'll have to give more thought to your comments on Matthew 13 @BarnerCobblewood after I have read the other threads. Often that passage is used to imbue some pretty heavy guilt on people but I think I need to understand more of the context of what is being discussed elsewhere.
> @RichardAbbott I'm talking about books, print on paper, not fiction. We're reading this because it is a book, but how many of us read the book? Some of us seem to do most things on audiobook, I use an eBook for well over 80% of my reading, we all communicate here on our computers, but if our text this month was just a series of webpages there would be no evidence that it was worthy of attention. The book is the evidence.
>
I remain unconvinced! Our grandchildren - two of whom are well into consuming digital material for both education and entertainment - have wanted physical books for presents at Christmas and birthdays. One prefers graphic novels, the other regular young persons' novels, but both wanted the physical medium. The indie bookshop in the village here is one of the busiest retailers, and there are thriving indie bookshops across the north of England and lowland Scotland. I can't convince myself that physical books are in decline!
Now for sure there are reasons if convenience... I usually read ebooks because we majorly downsized our living space a few years back, and wouldn't have room for all our books in physical form. And I listen to audio books in environments where reading is otherwise impossible, eg in a car or while cooking or washing up!
But those are reasons of convenience rather than principle, and the overall picture... at least here in the north of England... is that physical books aren't about to disappear.
More later on the other points, just off out for a walk!
> Consider the discussion about dating over on the Discord - if that other theory was a only on a web page it would be considered crank science. But it is taken seriously because it was published in book form. It's even got another author on teh cover to provide the evidence that books are. That's the kind of authority I'm challenging - the Wikipedia page suggests that a lot of people were taking the SCP seriously long before it was in print, if money risked can be used to measure severity.
>
Actually with Rohl's chronology it wasn't quite like that. He first tried building the model as part of an archaeology PhD and had a lot of push-back, so abandoned that and wrote a book focused on a popular audience. That didn't do much until it was picked up by a TV channel as a documentary short series, which basically presented him as a bold and innovative thinker squashed by an uncaring reactionary status quo. So the few "establishment" speakers, esp Kenneth Kitchen, were portrayed as curt and dismissive in contrast to Rohl's charisma and creativity.
Now, I've dealt with both - Kitchen reviewed an academic paper of mine, and at one stage I comoderated an online discussion group exploring Rohl's ideas. Kitchen in real life was sharply incisive, but kind and courteous, and the paper was the better for his comments, whereas Rohl was rude and abrasive, using as hominem arguments on those who disagreed with him. I often thought that if he was any other group member he'd be under moderation or barred. The TV series was, as often happens, highly selective in its presentation.
So Rohl's chronology gained traction _not_ because it was a book (there are several other competing models with books behind them, which are relatively unknown) but because he was able to mobilise a visual medium and came over as charismatic and bold. All of which is a bit off topic to the original discussion, but it is relevant to the suggestion that being in book form automatically confers authority.
I do think it's indicative that most indie authors prefer to have a physical book version alongside digital (kindle or epub) ones, and our experience is that they appeal to slightly different audiences. Print in demand has opened out or, if you like, democratised, physical books in ways that were not possible when printing was controlled by a small number of large trad publishing firms.
I have no objection at all to people using online media to create content - Wattpad has done this for some time, for example - and again it democratises the process of sharing creative content from author(s) to readers, more even than ebook production. That, surely, is a good thing! I just don't think this particular attempt ended up with a good final production.
But it made me wonder... are there similar differences between reading on a screen and a physical page? I've not come across such a study, and my current prejudice claims that there is no difference... but it's a possibility I don't want to just ignore.
>I have no objection at all to people using online media to create content - Wattpad has done this for some time, for example - and again it democratises the process of sharing creative content from author(s) to readers, more even than ebook production. That, surely, is a good thing!
I’m not so sure it’s a good thing. In a democracy (at least a modern one) everybody gets a vote. The most votes decide what happens. In a way, that’s anathema to creativity, as minority voices can be squashed. Furthermore, the electorate is by an large pretty stupid on any given subject - sure, we’re all experts in some narrow interests, but should we really be casting votes on things we don’t know much about? I feel like this is how we get people voting in favour of ‘alternate fact merchants’.
@BarnerCobblewood Freeform discussion here we go!
At its best, democracy doesn't mean tyranny of the majority. There can be diversity and tolerance for it.
I recently saw a short video by a university economist about why there are so many sequels in films, just a few music superstars, etc. His conclusion is that it's a two-tier market. One is the "superstar" part, where people gravitate to the one or two absolute best products; the need for high production values makes this part have high barriers to entry and conservative producers. The other part is the thriving "long tail", where lots of people make all sorts of "independent" media that have small but thriving audiences.