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RichardAbbott
About
- Username
- RichardAbbott
- Joined
- Visits
- 6,071
- Last Active
- Roles
- Member, Administrator, Moderator
- Games I like
- Sundry, mostly board
- Books I like
- Science fiction, fantasy, some historical fiction
Comments
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I thought this was a strong element of the book. I wasn't always sure that I understood where everything fitted, and wouldn't be able to draw an airship plan from memory, but I certainly got the impression that the captain and crew knew what was wha…
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It worked for the kind of book and what I think is the intended audience. So good for that, and I enjoyed the book on that level. But as mentioned before, I'd like to see a Steampunk book with a bit more depth to the writing, but haven't yet come ac…
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The two main characters, and the crew of the airship, seemed well defined and credible. I guess most of the others seemed a bit 2d, like the wicked and prejudiced general for example. The mum could have been an interesting person to develop more, bu…
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I'd expected it to be YA and so it was, so no surprises there. (For some reason that I cannot fathom, almost all Steampunk seems to fit here, although I'm sure the genre could lend itself to regular adult fiction) I had expected that the fussy nobl…
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All: I have added three monthly categories for Frankenstein in Baghdad, A Hero Born, and Ancestral Night, and set up the cover blurb for each. Now's the time to set up notifications for those who like to do such things...
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Here's another article talking about English translations of several of the books, and generally building a Big Picture of Jin Yong eg "in the Chinese-speaking world, has a cultural currency roughly equal to that of Harry Potter and Star Wars c…
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> @Apocryphal said: > Which month is Elizabeth Bear? July. Currently we have: April @clash_bowley The Guns Above May @Apocryphal Frankenstein in Baghdad June @NeilNjae A Hero Born July @RichardAbbott Ancestral Night
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I'm thinking Ancestral Night by Elizabeth Bear for my choice (https://www.amazon.co.uk/Ancestral-Night-Elizabeth-Bear-ebook/dp/B07H8GCC4T/ref=sr_1_1). It's far-future space opera but largely an exploration of character and culture rather than Big Ba…
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I had to look wuxia up but now understand it :) sounds good to me
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> @clash_bowley said > I wonder if an alternate take where the book is about the the super powered humans beating on the poor innocent mind parasites might have been fun... Yes... A cool plot twist would have been where the supposed parasi…
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Something that occurred to me in this connection was that Wilson apparently was not willing to put his cards on the table as to exactly what the parasites were. There were several theories that the characters suggested - their initial idea that they…
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Sounds good to me
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So... @Apocryphal May, @NeilNjae June, me July and @clash_bowley August... With @WildCard and @BarnerCobblewood free to step in with a month anytime they choose.
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> @BarnerCobblewood said: > @RichardAbbott about the book - I think not. Trying to read. I'm overloaded at the moment to lead a discussion though. Not giving up, and I'll let you know when I've cleared my plate a bit. No problem @BarnerCob…
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> @WildCard said: > I appreciate it, but I’m just not able. My pleasure reading is almost nil. :( No pressure! Just so's you know you're not forgotten :)
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(Quote) I haven't read Nopagarth - in fact, there's a lot of Vance I have never explored
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(Quote) You could probably argue that Wilson was so intent on setting out a prospective inner landscape that the external one was a) neglected and b) irrelevant anyway
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(Quote) :)
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(Quote) I think you could probably have guessed the outcome - the (rather minor) mystery at the end doesn't substantially change anything!
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OK! Looks like discussion on The Mind Parasites has died down so let's look ahead. This month as previously mentioned, @clash_bowley is leading a discussion on The Guns Above, steampunk novel by Robyn Bennis. What happens net depends on what people …
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(Quote) Yes, good points - I suppose I tend to think in terms of particular kinds of simple plots or characters
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(Quote) That's a neat summary
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An interesting thing happened today on the subject of genres (or more specifically, sub-genres, as in pulp here). I read a review of Consider Phlebas - I don't think we've read this as a group, though we did read the later (and IMHO better) Player o…
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That's a very provocative idea, and suggests to me that (just maybe) Wilson is trying to push the analogy on a kind of meta-level. Who are the mind parasites in our own world? Within the confines of the book the most obvious human bad guys are the m…
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(Quote) No, I tend to agree with you, and with those others who reckoned it started well but could not sustain it. I was curious to see if I still enjoyed it, seeing as how when I first came across it (probably 40 years ago :) ) I thought it was bot…
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There was, I think, very little character change in Austin - he just got better / more powerful at the Jedi mind tricks (to shamelessly borrow)! Maybe as @Apocryphal has suggested elsewhere this is just part of the pulp magazine trope - EE (Doc) Smi…
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I tend to agree with laziness, and all the more surprising as in subsequent writing he became interested in much more overt occult and mystical practice, which (one would have thought) would have exposed him to much more diversity than just a Euro-U…
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(Quote) This reminded me of something that (I think) @NeilNjae said a while ago about Ursula Vernon / T. Kingfisher's writing (Paladin's Grace etc) - that it was fine if you took it on the level intended, and didn't try to look for more depth and so…
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Industrialisation, and the (probably) consequent growth of both leisure time and the middle classes, I guess.
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(Quote) Agreed. Things like the ready availability of rocket transport from place to place, and the intrusiveness of the media, all make good sense. But even in the early 60s it should surely have been possible to predict the rise in importance of o…