Tassie Dave’s Comments (group member since Mar 27, 2011)

Tassie Dave’s comments from the The Sword and Laser group.

First House - Veronica (The Emperor)

Second House - The Roberator
The Second House is the militant strength of the Emperor. Deeply interwoven with the Cohort, they comport themselves with military rigour in all situations. Their fervent devotion to rank and order makes them prone to taking charge, often over the protestations of other houses.

Third House - Me :-)
The Third House is the vanguard of trend in the Empire, setting fashion and sparking gossip with their every move. Not only do they spark rumours, they also diligently collect intelligence, both personal and political.

Fourth House- Tom
The Fourth House is the vanguard of the Empire, first over the line on every battlefield as the Emperor wages war across the galaxy.

Sixth House- The rest of you ;-)

Most of us would be Sixth House ;-)

In their orbital Library, the Sixth House preserves and investigates the collective knowledge of the Empire. Masters of a thousand esoteric fields of study, they are often considered bookish, but are never to be underestimated.

Strengths: The Sixth have read the book on most subjects, and wrote the book on the rest. They are flexible and adaptive, always ready to change their approach.

Weaknesses: A sprawling organization of erratic loners, the Sixth are chaotic by nature and terrible at collective action.

Mark wrote: "Tor.com is hosting a Gideon the Ninth reread...

https://www.tor.com/2020/01/21/the-gi..."

Re-read :-? The book is only 4 months old

Our first ever New Zealand author as a main pick.
2nd including alternates (Adam Christopher)

2nd Author from Oceania/Antipedes/Australasia (Daniel O'Malley)
3rd including alternates (Daniel O'Malley & Adam Christopher)

She's the first female author from the Southern Hemisphere.
2nd author from the Southern Hemisphere (Daniel O'Malley)
3rd author born in Southern Hemisphere (J.R.R. Tolkien and Daniel O'Malley)
4th author born in Southern Hemisphere including alternates (J.R.R. Tolkien, Daniel O'Malley & Adam Christopher)

John (Taloni) wrote: "Will it recognize on your device once you change back? I have been (im)patiently waiting for an ebook copy of "Wizard of the Pigeons." My paperback copy from decades back is in much too small a print to read now, even if the spine would hold up. It seems to be available in the UK but not US."

Yes, I have many books on my iPad (Kindle app) from various international Kindle stores.

Log in to your Amazon account.
-> Manage your content and devices
-> Preferences
-> Country/Region settings
Change to US store (or whatever store has the ebook)
Buy book and download.
Change back to your country's store.

It is, technically, against Amazon's Terms of Service. But they only have that ToS there to placate the publishers. Both Amazon and the Author are quite happy to take your money :-)

RJ wrote: "Trike wrote: "Comedian and historian Terry Jones, member of Monty Python, has died.

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/01/22/ar..."

Better get a bucket. I'm going to throw up."

As long as you don't explode ;-)

Richard wrote: "I put covers in, but let me know if we should not do that, as I don't see anyone else did yet."

Covers are fine. I, personally, would use a larger image, as the thumbnails look too small on a big screen.

TRP wrote: "In my defence (not that I need to defend myself of course) some of the picks are not (or have not been) easily available on eBook or Audiobook format here in the UK.
Not mentioning any names but I'm mostly missing "Sword" books"

I have the same problem in Oz. Some books are just not available in any digital format.

Luckily I can usually get in on Amazon or iBooks by changing to a foreign store (usually US or UK) and buying it there.

TRP wrote: "My S&L total is currently 101 main picks (out of 128) and 8 alternates (out of 10)
I'm sure others can beat that."

I've been at 100% since we read "Eye of the World"

It's easy to catch up if you start early (S&L Pick 10) ;-)

I bet she's read most of them before the finalist list is published ;-)

Brad wrote: "So I finished A Gathering Of Shadows by VE Schwab and wow did this book take a sharp nosedive. The first book was really propulsive and fun whereas this book felt like it spun its wheels for the mi..."

The whole series was diminishing returns for me.

Book 1 Great, Book 2 Good, Book 3 Meh

My suggestion.

Once the list is finalised we narrow down the list.
-Remove any books we've already read.
-No sequels.
-No authors we've already read.

Then have a poll of the remainder and just read the top pick as a S&L pick. What ever's left we can read 1 per month as an alternate pick throughout the year.

We had a discussion around this when we read Ninefox Gambit.
Yoo Ha Lee has Aphantasia (the condition you describe)

https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...

Dara also started a thread about this:
https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...

I always have images in my head while reading. Not always the same as the author describes. If I have seen the movie version then those images will replace my own made up image.
I can't read Lord of the Rings without seeing Peter Jacksons version in my head.

That's one of many problems. Also "in the theory" infinite universes would take the same branch, and infinite universes would take the alternate branch, and infinite universes would never have that branch at all. You can get away with a lot of quantum crap when you add infinity into the equation.

Just because maths says it's possible doesn't make it so.

Trike wrote: "Is that Xbox?"

Yes. They let you change your gamertag once for free. Then it's about $10 to change it after that. Which is a rip off

Cutter (The Gemini) wrote: "I beat Assassin's Creed Unity and am working on Odyssey this year. Probably more about 90 percent on Unity. More power to you 100 per..."

I loved AC: Unity. I got absolutely everything on that, including DLC for 1500/1500 gamer-score.

That's the reason I haven't started Odyssey. I was a bit Assassin Creed-ed out :-?

As a Gemini, my vote goes for that one.

Choose wisely, you only get 1 free name change. They charge you for subsequent changes.

Sword and Laser mirror universe.

Jan wrote: "Trike wrote: "Not necessarily. Maybe we just got lucky, first time out of the gate.

It just feels so ... unlikely? One shot, and infinitesimal chance - and we are still here?"

That's the Lottery Fallacy. The odds of me winning the lottery are millions to 1. The odds of someone winning is almost certain.

The odds of us being here, the universe and planet being just right to allow our existence, us becoming sentient and surviving are almost impossible. But the odds of something being here at this time is highly probable. We are just the lucky species that won the Earth based species lottery.

In Theoretical Physics and Quantum Physics the cream of the ideas, usually, rises to the surface. But so do, unfortunately, the odd turd ;-)

Iain wrote: "regarding the quantum "whooo" application, Ted Chiang has a short story on the subject in Exhalation: “Anxiety Is The Dizziness Of Freedom."

Greg Egan did it years ago with [book:Q..."

I'm not a fan of the multiverse theory. If it were true, then 99.999 (with 9 continuing to infinity) percent of all universes would not have any humans in it.

I look at the theory as nothing more than a crazy thought experiment.

I do believe there may be other universes. But completely independent of anything in ours (maybe even different physics) and not infinite.