This is book 11 in the Hugo project.
After reading Nova Swing, I'm wondering if SF/noir crossovers are particularly common this year, or if I just coincidentally happen to be picking all of them up? I'm getting fairly tired of them.
Nova Swing is set about 400 years in the future, apparently on another planet. It is set in a city where a disaster took place some time earlier--something came crashing down on the city, creating an area they call the Aureole, a contaminated place where reality is distorted. The city officials try to contain the area and prevent anyone from going in, or anything from coming out. I admit I never really felt like I had a good feel for the setting, and Harrison doesn't explain it in any depth.
The story has a fairly large cast of characters, but centers mostly on two: Vic Serotonin and Lens Ascheman. Vic leads tourists into the Aureole for a living, and considers himself rather an expert on it. He's a flawed character, dead on the inside. He treats other people badly, and when his friends need help, his instinct is to shrug and walk away. Until he meets Mrs. Kielar, a woman who is missing part of her soul, and wants to search for the missing piece in the Aureole--and have lots of sex with Vic in the meantime. Lens Ascheman is a detective with the local police. He is a thoughtful man, one who observes and calculates before acting. He has recently been hanging out at a bar where more people come out of the bathroom than enter it. He doesn't know why, but he's certain that Vic is somehow responsible. He is also still working on an old case--a serial killer who leaves cryptic messages tattooed on the bodies of his victims. One of those victims was Ascheman's estranged wife.
Nova Swing is my third attempt at Harrison (the others being Things That Never Happen and Light) and the first I've managed to finish. Overall, I liked it pretty well, even though I'm fairly sure I didn't understand it all. There were a few places it dragged for me, but mostly I found it an absorbing, if rather depressing, story. This is the sort of book where the setting is fairly strange, but he doesn't hold your hand and explain it all to you. It's just all taken for granted, and you slowly pick it up on your own. And I like that approach, if it's done well.
I didn't love Nova Swing, but I liked it. And it has a fairly good shot at making my Hugo nominating ballot, because it's one of the best I've read so far this year.
Monday, October 29, 2007
Wednesday, October 24, 2007
More socks
I have finally finished the orange socks. I bought this yarn in December of 2005, then looked at the pattern and decided that it was above my skill level at the time. I set it aside to do later, and recently decided to give it a try.
This was the most time-consuming pair of socks I've ever knit. They had a 16-row repeating pattern, so I spent the whole time with the chart in my lap, moving a sticky note up and down it as I tried to keep track of where I was.
The pattern is Embossed Leaves Socks from the Winter 2005 issue of Interweave Knits. The yarn is Schoeller Stahl Fortissima Socka (75% wool, 25% polyester) in color 1008. And for anyone who knows me well, it can be no surprise that the first sock yarn I ever bought was orange. Lovely, lovely orange. That color just makes me happy.
Sunday, October 21, 2007
Radio Freefall by Matthew Jarpe
This is book 10 in the Hugo project.
Radio Freefall is a science fiction novel set in the near future--perhaps 30 years from now. It has a couple of different story lines. The first is about an aging rocker who calls himself Aqualung at the beginning. He is a man with a past, and during the novel goes on the run and changes identities a couple of times. The second storyline is about Quin Taber, a very bright geek who has two obsessions: catching an intelligent computer virus and bringing down his old boss, Walter Cheeseman. Walter Cheeseman is the head of a very powerful corporation who is aiming for world domination. By the end, naturally, their storylines converge.
I found the book alternately interesting and annoying. When Aqualung is on the run, and takes and sheds personas, it was quite interesting. (However I found his final identity, known as Riff, a bit risible. Every time I see that name I think of Riff Randell, the protagonist of Rock n Roll High School, possibly the stupidest movie I've ever had the misfortune to see.) Some of the stuff about Freefall, the space station where he spends part of the book, was interesting. When Quin and his AI assistant are tracking down leads, it was interesting. Every time the story got back to rock music, rock concerts, and various bandmates, I was bored silly. Some people think rock and rockers are essentially cool. Some people do not. I am in the latter camp.
There are also some not very interesting themes that keep popping up. Big corporations and globalization are Bad. This is a fairly common element of near-future fiction, so nothing new there. Also, Drugs are bad, mmkay? Let me repeat that: Drugs are bad, mmkay? Aqualung certainly keeps repeating it over and over. I don't wish to hammer the book for not coming up with entirely original ideas--it isn't necessary. But they just weren't very interesting. Perhaps the evil overlord--oh, sorry, head of the big evil corporation--was supposed to be a humorous caricature and I'm failing to see the irony. If so, it didn't really work for me.
I don't want to entirely slam the book, however. Parts of it were interesting and fun. For a first novel, it's pretty good. I would read another by him, provided that it contains no rockers. I liked it, but I didn't love it.
Radio Freefall is a science fiction novel set in the near future--perhaps 30 years from now. It has a couple of different story lines. The first is about an aging rocker who calls himself Aqualung at the beginning. He is a man with a past, and during the novel goes on the run and changes identities a couple of times. The second storyline is about Quin Taber, a very bright geek who has two obsessions: catching an intelligent computer virus and bringing down his old boss, Walter Cheeseman. Walter Cheeseman is the head of a very powerful corporation who is aiming for world domination. By the end, naturally, their storylines converge.
I found the book alternately interesting and annoying. When Aqualung is on the run, and takes and sheds personas, it was quite interesting. (However I found his final identity, known as Riff, a bit risible. Every time I see that name I think of Riff Randell, the protagonist of Rock n Roll High School, possibly the stupidest movie I've ever had the misfortune to see.) Some of the stuff about Freefall, the space station where he spends part of the book, was interesting. When Quin and his AI assistant are tracking down leads, it was interesting. Every time the story got back to rock music, rock concerts, and various bandmates, I was bored silly. Some people think rock and rockers are essentially cool. Some people do not. I am in the latter camp.
There are also some not very interesting themes that keep popping up. Big corporations and globalization are Bad. This is a fairly common element of near-future fiction, so nothing new there. Also, Drugs are bad, mmkay? Let me repeat that: Drugs are bad, mmkay? Aqualung certainly keeps repeating it over and over. I don't wish to hammer the book for not coming up with entirely original ideas--it isn't necessary. But they just weren't very interesting. Perhaps the evil overlord--oh, sorry, head of the big evil corporation--was supposed to be a humorous caricature and I'm failing to see the irony. If so, it didn't really work for me.
I don't want to entirely slam the book, however. Parts of it were interesting and fun. For a first novel, it's pretty good. I would read another by him, provided that it contains no rockers. I liked it, but I didn't love it.
Tuesday, October 16, 2007
Bright of the Sky by Kay Kenyon
Book #9 in the Hugo project.
Eh.
Interesting premise, competently written, unlikeable characters, all a bit overwrought. I can't bring myself to care enough to read any further. Abandoned on page 68. Just not fun.
Eh.
Interesting premise, competently written, unlikeable characters, all a bit overwrought. I can't bring myself to care enough to read any further. Abandoned on page 68. Just not fun.
Saturday, October 13, 2007
The Yiddish Policeman's Union by Michael Chabon
This is book #8 in the Hugo project.
It is an alternate history mystery, set in a world where Israel was not succesfully established as a state. A couple of million Jews were allowed to settle in Alaska, and have formed their own little Yiddish-speaking territory. However, after 60 years the territory is going to revert back to Alaska, and no one knows if they will be alowed to stay or forced to emigrate somewhere else. The novel is set a few weeks before the reversion, and the city is turning into a ghost town as a lot of people pack up and leave.
Our protagonist (definitely NOT a hero), Meyer Landsman, is a homicide detective who has fallen on hard times. One of his neighbors in a shabby residence hotel has been shot, and his new boss (who happens to be his ex-wife) declares the case closed, as she is anxious to get through all of their case load before Alaskan authorities take over the region. Meyer, of course, decides to investigate anyway.
The novel is written entirely in present tense, though it took me over a hundred pages to notice it. Everyone is ostensibly speaking Yiddish, so their dialogue has a grammatical structure I associate with New York: "A curse on your head, Meyer." "Thirty below they had today. That was the high." In my mind, they all sounded like New Yorkers. (OK, specifically Jewish New Yorkers.)
The style is deliberately old-fashioned, rather noir. I don't doubt that Chabon is mimicking an established style of storytelling. Nevertheless, I read this one too soon after 9Tail Fox. Please, can't we read an SF/mystery crossover about a detective who isn't a depressed, aloholic asshole? Please? Is that really too much to ask? Because I can't take it any more. Abandoned on page 170.
It is an alternate history mystery, set in a world where Israel was not succesfully established as a state. A couple of million Jews were allowed to settle in Alaska, and have formed their own little Yiddish-speaking territory. However, after 60 years the territory is going to revert back to Alaska, and no one knows if they will be alowed to stay or forced to emigrate somewhere else. The novel is set a few weeks before the reversion, and the city is turning into a ghost town as a lot of people pack up and leave.
Our protagonist (definitely NOT a hero), Meyer Landsman, is a homicide detective who has fallen on hard times. One of his neighbors in a shabby residence hotel has been shot, and his new boss (who happens to be his ex-wife) declares the case closed, as she is anxious to get through all of their case load before Alaskan authorities take over the region. Meyer, of course, decides to investigate anyway.
The novel is written entirely in present tense, though it took me over a hundred pages to notice it. Everyone is ostensibly speaking Yiddish, so their dialogue has a grammatical structure I associate with New York: "A curse on your head, Meyer." "Thirty below they had today. That was the high." In my mind, they all sounded like New Yorkers. (OK, specifically Jewish New Yorkers.)
The style is deliberately old-fashioned, rather noir. I don't doubt that Chabon is mimicking an established style of storytelling. Nevertheless, I read this one too soon after 9Tail Fox. Please, can't we read an SF/mystery crossover about a detective who isn't a depressed, aloholic asshole? Please? Is that really too much to ask? Because I can't take it any more. Abandoned on page 170.
Friday, October 12, 2007
Ooh, cool, I want to go
The Royal Scots Guards and Coldstream Guards
This is why surfing the internet is a dangerous thing. I could have lived in happy ignorance, but now I have to figure out if I can make it to this.
This is why surfing the internet is a dangerous thing. I could have lived in happy ignorance, but now I have to figure out if I can make it to this.
Thursday, October 11, 2007
Sunday, October 7, 2007
Spook Country by William Gibson
This is book #7 in the Hugo project.
Hollis Henry, retired rock singer turned reporter, has been hired by a new European technology magazine to write an article on digital artists in Los Angeles. She interviews artists, then tracks down an eccentric computer guy at her editor's request. She quickly realizes that things are not as they seem, and soon she's been offered a position by an eccentric Belgian billionaire.
In an alternate story line, Tito, a Russian-speaking, Cuban-born operative for a small crime family, is sent to deliver an iPod to an eccentric old man, and then things get complicated. There is a third story line about Milgram, a Russian-speaking drug addict, who is being held against his will by a man named Brown, so that he may translate messages to Tito that have been intercepted.
Spook Country is a fairly standard Gibson novel, and especially felt a lot like his last, Pattern Recognition. We have three alternating story lines that will eventually converge at the end. We have lots of wonderfully colorful eccentric characters. We have Gibson's unique style of description, which particularly seems to be fixated on brand names (For instance, Milgram's overcoat is always referred to as the Paul Stuart coat; and Tito's feet are not clad in shoes but in Adidas GSG9s. Gibson does that a lot). And, most importantly, we have a MacGuffin: a shipping container that everyone is trying to find or trying to conceal, but which is itself not really that important to the story. (It was actually a retired English professor who pointed out to me that Gibson writes MacGuffin stories, and he's right)
Spook Country is an absorbing novel. I gulped it down in about a day and enjoyed it very much. I didn't entirely understand the more convoluted details of some of the plans, but you don't really need to understand. Just hop on an enjoy the ride.
Ultimately, I don't think that Spook Country is a science fiction novel, and so I probably won't nominate it for a Hugo. But Gibson writes it like a science fiction story, describing everything as if it were a strange and alien landscape; and technology is always an important part of the story line. And so this is a good read for an SF reader, even if it's more precisely a technothriller.
Hollis Henry, retired rock singer turned reporter, has been hired by a new European technology magazine to write an article on digital artists in Los Angeles. She interviews artists, then tracks down an eccentric computer guy at her editor's request. She quickly realizes that things are not as they seem, and soon she's been offered a position by an eccentric Belgian billionaire.
In an alternate story line, Tito, a Russian-speaking, Cuban-born operative for a small crime family, is sent to deliver an iPod to an eccentric old man, and then things get complicated. There is a third story line about Milgram, a Russian-speaking drug addict, who is being held against his will by a man named Brown, so that he may translate messages to Tito that have been intercepted.
Spook Country is a fairly standard Gibson novel, and especially felt a lot like his last, Pattern Recognition. We have three alternating story lines that will eventually converge at the end. We have lots of wonderfully colorful eccentric characters. We have Gibson's unique style of description, which particularly seems to be fixated on brand names (For instance, Milgram's overcoat is always referred to as the Paul Stuart coat; and Tito's feet are not clad in shoes but in Adidas GSG9s. Gibson does that a lot). And, most importantly, we have a MacGuffin: a shipping container that everyone is trying to find or trying to conceal, but which is itself not really that important to the story. (It was actually a retired English professor who pointed out to me that Gibson writes MacGuffin stories, and he's right)
Spook Country is an absorbing novel. I gulped it down in about a day and enjoyed it very much. I didn't entirely understand the more convoluted details of some of the plans, but you don't really need to understand. Just hop on an enjoy the ride.
Ultimately, I don't think that Spook Country is a science fiction novel, and so I probably won't nominate it for a Hugo. But Gibson writes it like a science fiction story, describing everything as if it were a strange and alien landscape; and technology is always an important part of the story line. And so this is a good read for an SF reader, even if it's more precisely a technothriller.
Monday, October 1, 2007
9Tail Fox by Jon Courtenay Grimwood
This is book #6 in the Hugo project.
9Tail Fox is the story of Bobby Zha, a burnt out San Francisco cop, estranged from his wife and daughter, who is nearing the end of his career. Shortly after the novel begins, he is murdered. Though circumstances which I won't spoil, he comes back to investigate his own murder. I don't have a lot to say about it, so this review is going to be pretty short.
Bobby is an asshole. That was a real barrier to me in reading this book. It took me about 70 pages to get sufficiently interested, but up until that point I could easily have dropped the book without regret, and nearly did.
He goes back to San Francisco to investigate his own death, but as he digs into it, things get deeper and more complex. This being a work of fiction, everything turns out to be related. It turns into a big, frantic action scene at the end, and a lot of the plot just didn't make a lot of sense to me. Parts of it are told from the perspective of a mentally unstable homeless person, which always earns negative points in my book.
Like Keeping it Real, the text flows pretty smoothly and drags you along. It jumps around too much, with flashbacks and changes of point of view. A good deal of the plot he uncovers didn't make much sense to me. Then there are the crazy homeless narrator demerits, and the wild, frantic action at the end, which I don't care for. Overall, I was rather disappointed. I tend to like mystery/SF crossovers, but I really wasn't wild about this one.
9Tail Fox is the story of Bobby Zha, a burnt out San Francisco cop, estranged from his wife and daughter, who is nearing the end of his career. Shortly after the novel begins, he is murdered. Though circumstances which I won't spoil, he comes back to investigate his own murder. I don't have a lot to say about it, so this review is going to be pretty short.
Bobby is an asshole. That was a real barrier to me in reading this book. It took me about 70 pages to get sufficiently interested, but up until that point I could easily have dropped the book without regret, and nearly did.
He goes back to San Francisco to investigate his own death, but as he digs into it, things get deeper and more complex. This being a work of fiction, everything turns out to be related. It turns into a big, frantic action scene at the end, and a lot of the plot just didn't make a lot of sense to me. Parts of it are told from the perspective of a mentally unstable homeless person, which always earns negative points in my book.
Like Keeping it Real, the text flows pretty smoothly and drags you along. It jumps around too much, with flashbacks and changes of point of view. A good deal of the plot he uncovers didn't make much sense to me. Then there are the crazy homeless narrator demerits, and the wild, frantic action at the end, which I don't care for. Overall, I was rather disappointed. I tend to like mystery/SF crossovers, but I really wasn't wild about this one.
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