John's recent posts

Recent public posts (showing 61-80 of 186).

Robin, it's Hollywood, so chances are that we'll get a scene at the end showing the boy's future and how he goes on to save the world, or maybe the people who save him will take him to this verdant Eden where food grows in abundance and good guys are living a utopia. It wouldn't be the first time the ending of a book has been changed to make sure the ending is sufficiently happy...

Pete, the Piers Anthony series (Incarnations of Immortality) wasn't specifically about the four horsemen of the apocalypse. It starts with Death, and does include War later in the series, but the other books focus on Time, Fate, Nature, Good, and Evil as sort of supernatural jobs that humans end up holding for a certain amount of time.

Terri, I think you hit the nail on the head there: the father's great love for his son has blinded him in such a way that there doesn't seem to be much point to his living. He has no goals beyond seemingly arbitrary, ill-considered ones. They go to the house he grew up in, they go to the sea. Maybe it will be better somewhere. But there's no sense that the man really believes that it will be better anywhere: he's just trying to keep his son alive (as he thinks, by keeping on the move, on the road) and innocent.

He never really teaches his son anything, except by vague example (look at some of his last advice, to "Do everything the way we did it" (278)). But, for instance, when he reasons out the existence of the cistern or finds the bunker or finds the emergency kit on the boat... he doesn't talk his son through any of those things. He seems determined to keep his son innocent, and thereby ensures that his son won't survive any longer than he does (or would have, if not for the convenient arrival of the man who represents this group).

Maybe it's impossible given what's happened to the world (whatever it was), but it seems like there's no one who's building anything, who's doing anything that's sustainable--they're all just fighting over the scraps of industrial society, looking for lost pockets of canned goods or whatever. Will the land not support food beyond things like the mushrooms we see? Or not yet, anyway?

On one level, I think the trout ending is there because McCarthy styles himself a "literary" author, and so needs to fulfill his quota of words spent being obscure and poetic, especially at a crucial point like the end of the novel.

That's no reason to dismiss it out of hand, however. I'd like to take it seriously, but at the same time I recognize that I haven't been able to come to any hard and fast conclusions for myself, so I have little thought of convincing anyone else. What follows is offered in the spirit of inquiry.

In some ways, the passage actually seems *not* hopeful. "Once there were brook trout," but no more. The patterns on their back tell "Of a thing which could not be put back. Not be made right again." Not exactly hopeful stuff, is it? Yet it ends with "In the deep glens where they lived all things were older than man and they hummed of mystery." Is this a suggestion that man is not the measure of all things? That there's some deeper principle of life acting beyond what is obvious? I don't know.

I skipped over something else that interested me, this phrase "Maps and mazes." We see so many times the man and boy looking over the map, trying to figure out where they are and how to get to the ocean, yet by doing so they're losing themselves in the arbitrary maze made by the roads, and as the man who takes the boy at the end suggests, that's about the last place they should be. The father is so focused on his love for his son and his basic principle of keeping to the road and keeping moving that he seems never to have adequately considered where they should go and WHY. Perhaps I'm veering from where the author intended me to go, but he's vague enough that I feel pretty well justified in going just about anywhere. :)

Hannah,

Since I've read almost all of Brust's novels, I'll chime in on this one... I'm assuming that you're thinking primarily of his Vlad Taltos series and the related Khaavren Romances. These seem on the surface to be firmly in the fantasy camp, with magic, witchcraft, swordplay and the like, but peppered throughout the series are suggestions that there *might* be sci-fi justifications haunting this world. Right from the first book we get a discussion of genetics and some kind of genetic engineering by an advanced race sometime far in the past. There seems to be an awareness that they live on a planet, and although no one living on the planet seems to have any inkling of being able to get off the planet, there's a knowledge by some characters that humans aren't native to this planet, that another race of beings who also weren't native did some genetic manipulation on native species and on human beings, and pretty much ran things to their liking until a successful rebellion forced them out.

The thing is, even with this science-fictiony backdrop, I think most readers would still be strongly inclined to call these works fantasy novels because, well, they read like fantasy and there's enough that seems unexplained and magical that it feels like fantasy. But still, there's just enough there to make you question it, and even the magic is very consistent and systematic, suggesting that it just *might* have some justification.

I think Brust just does it to thumb his nose at easy classification, not because it's "really" sci-fi. As opposed to Carolyn's examples of Pern and Darkover, where the authors really want to make it absolutely clear that they're not writing fantasy, even if it feels like it sometimes.

Kristjan, I think you have a lot of good ideas. I can understand how some people just don't want to be discussion leaders, and that doesn't mean they can't suggest a good title. I should think that a nomination with an explanation should be sufficient to show one's seriousness.

I also like the idea of have a run-off to narrow down the field to 10 books before a final selection--I think it's a great idea.

Jeffrey, I really like your idea about including an argument for the book. It (theoretically) forces the person nominating it to put more thought into it and it also potentially gives us something more to go on than just name recognition, which often seems to carry the day.

Yes, that is the rub--if people throw out as many nominations as they want and leave it to the mods to fix it ("kill 'em all and let God sort 'em out"?), that's asking an awful lot of the mods. On the other hand, if, as Angie suggested, we only allow one nomination per person, then we accomplish two things: 1) fewer total books for the mods to sort through and 2) more thoughtful nominations.

Hi, I'm John. I teach high school English and music in Pennsylvania, grew up in Ohio, lived for a time in Rhode Island, want to move to New York, to the Finger Lakes region. I'm married, with just one child of the small, furry, tail-wagging variety.

When it comes to games, my first love are the euro-style board games: as a general rule, the less the game comes down to luck, the more I like it. Some of my favorites are Power Grid and Puerto Rico. For Christmas, I got the Battlestar Galactica board game, though the jury's still out on that one. Carcassonne, Condotierre, A Game of Thrones, the occasional game of Blokus or Rumis. Thurn und Taxis. Those are the games that come to mind off the top of my head.

I also enjoy playing D&D with a good group, but I've never gotten into the MMORPGs.

The need for limitation, though, isn't strictly--or even primarily?--a numbers issue, at least not in my mind. The issue as much as anything is that too many suggestions are given that don't seem to show enough forethought--they don't fit the theme, either because the person nominating it hasn't considered the theme carefully enough or hasn't considered the book carefully enough. More than a random culling of the flock to make a smaller list to vote on, what's needed is a careful selection that brings the unruly flock of suggestions in line with the theme that was selected in the first place.

I need more time! My wife and I along with another couple and another friend of ours have been trying to go through all the back episodes (for my part, I didn't start watching until late in season 2 or early in season 3, though I watched a half-hour catch-up show and my wife explained some things to get me up to speed, and my friend's wife was in about the same position). We're only in the first half of season 2 though--unless we all call in sick to work (tough since we all work at the same school!), we're never going to get caught up before Friday. And we've got webisodes to watch too?! ::sigh:: Frak me.

(But I'm still very excited for the new episodes!)

Thomas-- The fine boxed wines have made their way to America... I had one at a party about a year ago and it wasn't half bad, but I couldn't tell you what the name of it was, but all the wine snobs I know were oohing and ahhing about it.

Jerrod-- While it's certainly possible to have a poor experience with an RPG IRL, I suspect Christopher's point is that RPGs with other people DMing and playing has a higher ceiling... as you noted, console RPGs tend to get repetitive and pretty well remove the role playing aspects. Real DMs and players sometimes do that as well (more *roll* playing than *role* playing), but when you've got a good DM and you've got a party of characters who are into bringing a character to life more than just getting all sorts of cool powers and inflicting maximum damage each round of combat... well, then you've got something that a computer RPG can't compete with.

MMORPG like WoW go some distance above and beyond just a PC RPG, but still seem to have a tendency toward combat over character.

I'll be interested to hear what you think of this. I haven't read it, but when I was teaching in Rhode Island Tim Wise came to speak at our school.

Good recommendation. I first read this as part of the Sci Fi book club's 2-volume Amber Chronicles, taken out from the library. I owned the second series as individual books, and eventually bought The Great Book of Amber. I only read this one as an individual book because I found it on a friend's book shelf.

This is in part a post about an idea I wanted to bring up anyway, and it's partially a response to Jackie's post (as such, first, thank you for the kind remarks about my review).

Oh, and by way of warning, this could be considered to have spoilers, though they're largely of a thematic nature.

I was thinking about the parallels to the Roman empire, especially perhaps the parallelism between Tay-Aien and Christianity, each a monotheistic religion moving into a polytheistic one.

What was most interesting to me, though, was not any parallels that it might be possible to draw between them, but a different connection between the Empire of the Sacred Union and "the real world."

In order to get into this, let me back out a little to discuss history, with full knowledge that "history" in not "what happened" but is something more like "interpretations of what might have happened." This is probably nowhere more true than in the period I want to look at: pre-history. In the time before history (which is to say, civilization) began, human being seem to have been organized into tribes. A tribe may be relatively large or relatively small, but at its heart a tribe is profoundly egalitarian, in part because there's very little to fight over: food is freely available to be hunted or gathered, possessions are at a minimum. Chiefs tend to be people who lead because they are respected, whether that's for their hunting prowess or fighting ability, their wisdom, or simply their personal charm and charisma. Even these leaders have virtually no coercive power: if a majority of the tribe disagrees, there's very little even the greatest warrior can do to force people to do something. These leaders tend to share in the work similarly to the other members of the tribe and to reap the benefits at a similar level.

Then came agriculture, the basis for civilization. In a simplification, the ability to make more food led to more people, but it also led to locking up the food and specializing. With civilization, you rapidly develop firm hierarchies: kings and priests on top, all sorts of middle managers following them, on down to the peasants. Now, there *is* a very real difference between leaders and the led. In these hierarchies, the people at the top have control of the food supplies and the military, and now have power to impose their will upon everyone else. They also have significant material benefits.

All of civilization is the heir to this sort of thing, and we see the image stamped on most of our social institutions, from businesses to schools to government. True, in the past few hundred years, we've created ideals of "freedom" and "equality," but we still perpetuate social structures that inhibit both in ways both big and small.

I bring all this up because it was the lens through which I read the conflict between the empire and Shehaios. Very early, when looking at Orlii's mind and those of other Caiivorians, Kierce notes the fundamental difference in the way they think compared to the way Shaihen people think, and relates it to an internalization of hierarchy at all levels. Shehaios, at least as an ideal, is egalitarian. "King" Rainur needs the approval of his Holders (sort of), and it's a culture where anyone can speak his or her mind. Of course, *some* hierarchy seems to have crept in before the story starts... the common people may be able to speak their minds, but only Holders have the right to issue a challenge. Even the challenge itself is interesting in this context, though, because the first thing it seems to lead to is discussion--often extended discussion. And with the coming of the Caiivorians, Shehaios seems to be moving more and more toward stratification. I believe there was a comment to the effect that the heir to a Holder or even the King did not necessarily need to be a family member, but that with the marriage to Cathva, Rainur pretty much *will* have to name his son his heir.

But of course that kind of thing was already going on, and even justifying it by saying that the children of people who rule tend to learn about how to rule and thus be the best choice doesn't change the fact that it's a de facto hereditary system. Even though the servants may have it better in Shehaios than in the Empire, there still seems to be a somewhat strict class system, or at least an emerging one.

Nonetheless, these are the ideals that compete in the novel, hierarchy vs. equality. As an interesting aside, it was interesting to see the emperor styling himself "Zelt the Fair, Champion of the Free, Emperor of the Whole World," but then he decides that doesn't sound quite right, so he changes it to "Zelt the Fair, Holy Emperor of the Free World." Now, in his own mind, it might be that it sounds too wordy or awkward, but we readers see clearly enough that he's nothing like "Champion of the Free," but "Free World" is--as in our own world--just words (on which Zelt himself has just been meditating), nice-sounding but essentially meaningless.

Anyway, it's interesting to me to see how Shehaios tries to negotiate this change, how it seeks to hold onto its essential character. How *can* a land of pacifists deal with violence--especially the organized violence of a disciplined army? How can Shehaios become part of the empire without becoming more hierarchical... especially as its young men go off to serve in the army for five years, internalizing Caiivorian values? We've only just begun to see this conflict play out, but I'd have to say at this point it isn't going so well for Shehaios....

I look forward to seeing what others thing. And if you made it this far, thanks for reading. And reading, and reading... :)

I just finished Cloak of Magic today (I did little else Saturday)--S.A., thank you so much for giving away copies (yeah, I know you had ulterior motives, but I'm still excited not only to get a book free, but to enjoy it). I've posted my review on my blog and here on Goodreads and now I'm looking forward to discussing it with any of you who are interested.

Nick, I appreciate the info on the collection and, in fact, I'd like to ask if anyone has recommendations of specific post-apocalyptic short stories, either from that collection or from elsewhere.

I'm teaching a course called "The Literature of Survival," and though the focus isn't sci-fi at all and my core texts are already set, I'd be interested in slipping a sci-fi short story or two into the class. Not all post-apocalyptic stories, of course, are survival stories, and I'm more interested at this point in those which are. Thoughts?

The Prince of Nothing series by R. Scott Baker, which starts with The Darkness That Comes Before. People often compare it to Martin's and Erikson's works.

I'm in the same boat Jim is, struggling to find the time, except that I'm over 100 pages behind him. I think I can find some time today though, and probably over the weekend, so I hope to finish and join in the discussion... but don't wait on me.

Damnit Terence, I don't have enough time to read all the books I want to read as it is--why do you have to keep reviewing such interesting books? ;) I'm going to have to quit my job if I want to have any hope at all....

Thanks for another great review.