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kcaryths
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Comments
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Never played any Cosmic Horror themed games. Not really a "type" I've ever been too interested in exploring.
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Was there anything more to the village people at the start of the book. I kept waiting for the shoe to drop and for them to have some sort of connection to something else in the book. Or maybe break out some sort of Deliverance style menacing of the…
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Maybe this would be a nice Rorschach test for someone to sift through the book and pull out what they think things mean. I have no idea if he wanted things to mean more than just the up front weirdness, or if he was digging for something deeper.
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(Quote) This is about where I landed as well. Most of the book felt like some weird hallucinatory dream where I wondered if the guy who wrote the book was just having a breakdown of some sort, but the second half cranked that up to 11. I also didn'…
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I have not read any Stapledon so can't compare to him. I was trying to think if I had ever really read anything that has traditionally been labelled as "Cosmic Horror" and I really don't know. Certainly no Lovecraft. Would Stranger Things…
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All finished!
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They are kind of like dog ants.
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I thought the ants as this unknowable force that just grows and marches on and slowly consumes everything were interesting. We have a book exploring what it is to be human and then what it is to be mutant, and robotic, and an intelligent dog ( so al…
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(Quote) I definitely thought of Martian Chronicles when reading this book. Gave me similar vibes, but you do make a good point that City seems to be more on the descriptive side.
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At dinner I asked my kids (adult age now) what animal they would like to see rule the world if they could become intelligent and both of them immediately said dogs! I don't know what to make of that but thought it was an interesting data point. My …
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Ok, the dogs were cute and fun and loyal and all that, but I thought the idea that they would create some sort of pacifist society to be funny. One of the aspects of post-apocalyptic books that seems to be consistent is when society fails and the an…
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Have not read Cities in Flight. Might need to give it a go. I don't recall if I see it kicking around. I thought the agoraphobic angle was an interesting one. When I see the anxiety that younger generations appear (I say appear because I can't clai…
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(Quote) I landed around there as well. I felt like people would move to the country to get away, but then if they moved in such mass numbers then wouldn't the country just become urbanized anyways? It didn't quite compute for me. Also, it seems to s…
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I also really liked it. Something about the tone and the melancholy nature of it appealed to me. I actually did not remember about the Huddling Place being in SF Hall of Fame until I was a couple pages into reading it again and wondering why it soun…
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Alright, questions for City are up!
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Questions for City will be up after October 5 as I am out of town for vacation.
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Still need to get around to Riddley Walker.
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I have been reading Dark Eden, which also features a group of people completely isolated from anyone else (on another planet) and it shows a very different take on how the group of people have developed over time (I think better) - though in this ca…
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(Quote) Fair - but would that look the same in a situation like this where these new people are borderline alien?
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(Quote) I don't know Dr Who at all, but communication barriers can be really interesting parts of some stories. Darmok was already mentioned as a Star Trek episode. the communication issues in Project Hail Mary are another example.
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(Quote) Neal Stephenson. It's the only one of his tomes that I have read. I really liked it, but it's not without its flaws (and some people hate it)
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(Quote) They just needed a babelfish
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(Quote) I'll have to find the time to read this when I can give it the right attention - thanks!
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Wasn't sure where else to put this, but one of the other parts I liked about this book is that it was a pseudo first-contact story. It's been SO long since the settlement had seen any humans and they believed they were gone. There was so much fear b…
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This entire book could have been written without the Exiles. No idea why they were added to be honest. I guess since it adds to the "hidden information" theme, but then they were such an add on that I wondered why she bothered. I was hopi…
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Definitely one of the weaker points of the book in my view. The characters were distinct but generally sort of iterative of the others in their respective groups as well.
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I am with you there @Apocryphal I feel like my expectations for worldbuilding in SF to be pretty low so this was not too bad relatively speaking. 400 years is a LONG time though and it was hard to tell how much change there was. But then, with a sma…
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I don't really have a level of expertise or understanding to comment much on the accuracy of the "Russianness" of the cultures. They did seem a little bit forced, but then, I wasn't expecting Tolstoy either. I thought that the behaviour o…
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I loved that it was left somewhat abiguous. Very refreshing actually. I am unsure if the characters themselves knew exactly what was going on between them.
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I liked the setting quite a bit. Enjoyed the constant battle against an enemy that will never give up (radiation or time). It reminded me a little bit of Seveneves in that sense, in that things just keep getting worse, but Seveneves I enjoyed a lot …