What Else Are You Reading - July 2019

[John (Taloni)]

Read Thirteen by Richard K. Morgan, who wrote the Altered Carbon series. I read the second book in the universe, Thin Air, without realizing it's a shared universe. If I think about it, the Altered Carbon books are kind-of related as well since all of them emphasise the difficulty of traveling in space and finding ways around it. The two series' aren't explicitly related, well not if you believe Wikipedia, but I still find similarities.

Anyhoo. It's the 2190s and Earth has a presence on Mars. The MC is a "thirteen," a human variant created by genetic engineering. They're the special-ops throwbacks to the kind of hunter / killer of human tribal days.

Nominally this is about the hunt for a killer returned from Mars, a thirteen who rampages across North America taking down unrelated people. It's really more like an exploration of current political trends and their projected outcome. We've got the Rim States, who seceded from the US, along with "Jesusland" from middle, plus a rump Northeast which seems to include New York. Well, it's so mashed up it's hard for me to keep straight. At one point I was sure they were in New York but the MC wakes up the next day and goes to some San Francisco related areas. And the political commentary makes me roll my eyes. I'd more easily believe in the genetic engineering involved than this trumped up "Jesusland" of Southern caricatures.

Plenty of mystery and misdirect, and a convoluted plot that delivers. There's a round dozen of Chekov's Guns and they all get fired. Gore, blood and violence, yes - what else would you expect of Morgan - but the plot delivers. Also, to my amusement both Britain and Mars figure in the MC's life, but we never visit them in the book. It's like an early Doctor Who where the villain is just offscreen.

Both this book and Thin Air are nominally dystopias. Paradoxically, I found them hopeful. Despite bad governments, self-interested corporations and violence everywhere, we would still go to space. We would overcome technical obstacles and place our footprint on other worlds. If that is a dystopia then I think I can live with it.

[Iain]

John (Taloni) wrote: "Read Thirteen by Richard K. Morgan, who wrote the Altered Carbon series. I read the second book in the universe, Thin Air, without realizing it's a shared universe. If ..."

Dystopian or slightly worse than real life?

Morgan amplifies the plight of the underclass to what they were probably like in Victorian times. Basically gilded age treatment of working people while the rich live in luxury and benefit from the technical advances.

[Seth]

Tracey wrote: "I read Magic for Liars because I saw it popping up a lot on Goodreads and wanted to see what they hype was about. I really loved it. It's a solid detective mystery set in a Hogwarts-esque school..."

Glad to see someone else enjoyed it too, I've seen some less happy reviews here also. I think maybe because despite being set in a magical academy it had more mystery tropes than fantasy ones. The detective does a lot of contemplation that gets bound up in their past experience and complicated family dynamics - I could see how a fantasy reader might not be completely happy with that.

Anyway, finished Grey Sister and will now try to squeeze Vessel in before the end of the month.

[Joseph]

Decided it was finally time to read John M. Ford's The Scholars of Night, which has been sitting on my shelf for an embarrassingly long time.

[John (Taloni)]

Recently finished Hexarchate Stories and...saaaay, did someone ask my opinion of that book?

Silvana wrote: "Let us know what you think after reading it! I loved it a lot. "

Why yes, someone did! So.....

This book is definitely separated into a first half / second half. The first half is back ground and side stories about Hexarchate characters. I was up and down about those. The "early life of Jedao" ones felt off, suggesting that there could ever have been another path for him. Once he joined the Kel they were going to keep putting him in danger until he did what he did. The "Caper" story was outright bizarre, and didn't at all feel like something Jedao would have done. The other character lacked motivation as well IMO. I did love the Cat story featuring Zehun.

Jedao's mom is up to something potentially really gruesome with the geese, and her detachment is downright bizarre. Sending goose fat with the note that it's from a goose descended from Jedao's favorite pet bird? I can only imagine what passed for affection in that family. That in itself provides some interesting backstory on Jedao and his ability to similarly detach.

Most of the stories early in the book felt like Yoon Ha Lee was dumping out the contents of their backstory writing file, on request of the publisher for something, anything to exploit the current popularity of the trilogy. Of those, the only one that felt completely on point was where Jedao was evaluating leaders for the fleet to deploy his very bloody weapon. That had some pretty good background on Jedao's motivations.

The short short on Calendrical Rot and its implications was helpful, and Lee is right in that it would have helped explain the earlier parts of the trilogy. It reminded me of an early Thor Comics annual, where the existence of Pantheons is explained as the combination of the beliefs of humanity with an existing Demiurge, giving body to those beliefs. Similarly the combined belief of the population of the Hexarchate allows their technological society to exist. At what price? Lots of torture and killing, so I can see why Jedao was determined to bring it down.

And then...then we get to the final story. Less a story than a complete novel (I rough-calculated it to be 50K words), it is presented as a novella. We'll go with Yoon Ha Lee's description.

This novella is a truly worthy successor to Revenant Gun. I expected a puff piece novelette revisiting the characters and settling some minor point. Oh no. This one gets into the heart of the unresolved plot points of Revenant Gun and digs deep into the emotional core of the trilogy.

Even better, the story shows how the "end" of the trilogy is really just another beginning. There could easily be another trilogy after this. And I want it - Mount Splashmore style! (Now now now now NOW!)

[John (Taloni)]

Oh, and how could I forget! (I know I could edit it in above but it's already so long). The Servitor! The bit where Cheris mentions he's proud of his serial number, without further explanation. That serial number being 1491625. Took me a few seconds to parse out the square of the first five digits. Felt kinda like the Futurama bit where Bender and Flexo have a laugh over their serial numbers since both are the sum of two cubes, while Fry looks on puzzled.

[Joseph]

Finished The Scholars of Night (which was great, and it's a darned shame that John M. Ford's books will likely never be reprinted) and started The Devil in a Forest by Gene Wolfe.

[Silvana]

Been a while since my last update; been in a reading lull this month.

Starting Thrawn 3: Treason in audio!

John (Taloni) wrote: "There could easily be another trilogy after this. And I want it - Mount Splashmore style! (Now now now now NOW!)

"

I love your elaborations! And yes, I too want MOAR.

[Viola]

Reading Homicide in Hardcover.

After a book about food waste and another about hoarding I felt I needed something easy.

[Mark]

Finished Jade War by Fonda Lee. Looking forward to the conclusion some day. Now it's on to the next war, The Poppy War, but not before paying my respects...