Tentatively, Convenience's Reviews > The Wind from Nowhere
The Wind from Nowhere
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Ballard tends to write several bks on variations of the same theme. This is the 1st(?) of his mono-ecological-disaster novels - by wch I mean that one ecological phenomenon reaches disastrous proportions & only a small part of the human (& animal & plant-life, etc) population survives. In this case, a wind whips around the earth faster & faster - gradually flattening all but the sturdiest objects. Ballard has usually managed to stay at the forefront of science fiction that addresses problems of human urban living. I like more or less everything that I've read by him - even when I think the ideas & writing are a bit thin, I still appreciate the bks' realtionship to his overall ouvre.
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Reading Progress
Started Reading
January 1, 1985
–
Finished Reading
January 20, 2008
– Shelved
January 27, 2008
– Shelved as:
sf
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Ben
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Jan 21, 2008 02:50PM

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I was a bit of a Ballard fanatic for a time, reading most of his novels and short stories. I haven't kept up with his recent work.
I didn't notice a listing in your reviews for A User's Guide to the Millennium, have you read it? It's all essays and reviews. I'll lend you mine sometime if you like.

W/ that sd in his favor, I sometimes find his writing style to be a little shallow. I reckon that contributes to his popularity. Not surprisingly, since you know me, I'm more drawn to complex writing styles. Conventional 'transparency' goes only so far w/ me & then I hunger for greater conceptual obstacle courses.
Ballard was, at one time in my list of greatest SF writers - a list that also included Philip K. Dick, the Strugatsky Brothers, Samuel Delaney, Stanislav Lem, Michel Jeury, & Vladimir Savchenko - w/ vacillating possible membership for Greg Bear, Greg Egan, Robert Anton Wilson, & probably others that I'm not thinking of right now.
Since that time, some of those writers have become a little "been there, done that" for me insofar as I sucked up everything I cd find by them & then got jaded. Lem is someone that I still have a fresh appreciation of, as are others. Dick was great but I burnt out on him. Etc..