Children of Memory (Children of Time #3) [January 30, 2023]

[Mel]

*dances in place, waiting for my library loan to come in*

Ooh! Tardigrades! So many tantalizing hints of what’s to come!

I get you though, Choko, about envisioning mites in mattresses and such. I have OCD, but it sometimes can feel very arbitrary as to what triggers it. Sometimes I can conveniently forget about it. Then all off a sudden one day everything feels itchy and I need to launder all my sheets and take a shower and don’t want to touch. Anything.

[Choko]

Haha! Me too!!! But as you said, it's periodical and selective:)))) Thank goodness! Sometimes being ignorant or oblivious is a bliss:)

[Choko]

Finished Children of Ruin, Section 4, Present 2, In the Belly of the Wale

(view spoiler)[Kern in her current iteration, is a bit scarier than the versions of her in book #1. She remembers killing some of the humans from the Gilgamesh and wants to do it again?! She totally hacked into M's brain and kind of highjacked him, and now, even though she knows it's wrong, wants to keep him safe so she can do it again! Then she has itchy trigger finger, and is getting distracted for some reason... I hope she hasn't already been infected by the "We"... And that yearning for another like her, is it really her or again, could she already be infected somehow?

The first meeting of Paul and Portia+Helena was so awesome!!! I am very sad for losing Bianca though...

The ship's reaction to the attack was also interesting, because it spoke of its construction and the prevailing spider design... I have a vague idea of what it could be like, but it's enough to be very interesting! (hide spoiler)]

[Choko]

Children of Ruin, Section 5, Past 3, For We are Many

(view spoiler)[ 3, the We considers the human's body as a new, inhospitable universe. It is awesome how it sees all the immune response as storms and fire and just everything that could destroy it, but it still figures out a way to override the immune system... It's days for the human, but generations for the We... This hive mind of the organism parts is terrifying!

Boltile has a crush on Senkovi, but S has no sexual interest... I kind of felt sorry for him here...

7. OMG, the We just injected itself into Ronnie as well... It's thinking and need to overtake the others are creepy as hell!!! You feel the irrational fear of such personal invasion viscerally even while just reading... To me that is horror!!!

"WE ARE GOING ON AN ADVENTURE"!!!

I wonder if We hadn't felt threatened by the impending treatment, if it would have stuck with just the one human...

"It's Us We, Usuf! It's still us, still We... We studied us and they studied We..."... WTF!!! I mean, we all could see where this was going, but it is still absolutely horrendous!!!

We are on adventure... WTH!!! We are Usef, we cure your singularity!!!! nnnoooooo!

However, it is kind of right about what humans are doing in space, Teraforming and colonizing other planets... Not that different... But the We getting ahold of the technology to do the same in space, that is unacceptable! (hide spoiler)]

[Choko]

Children of Ruin, Section 6, Present 3, Rolling Back the Stone

(view spoiler)[ The girls, trying to figure out a way to communicate with the octopuses is so well written, in the frustration and small victories... And how she had to speak in emotional words and then speed it up at least three times so it would keep their attention, hahaha! Attention deficit indeed! :)

The creatures are trying to warn them not to "roll back the rock and open the cave", not to wake the bear, but Kern, as always, thinks she knows best... And sure enough, the We had been in hibernation all this time, and now is waking up... And I feel for what the We had done to the humans it had taken over... That spacesuit still had liquified iqor with the We in it!!! And the We actually reformed enough to move with the spacesuit enough to be threatening... Those are total horror elements used in a beautiful way!

"We are going on adventure!" (hide spoiler)]

[Nirkatze]

Choko wrote: "Ooohhhh my goodness! Water Bears or their more proper name, Tardigrades, are scary adorable as well!!!! I have read about them before and every time I get in the Ocean or a lake, I imagine them in ..."

The science teacher in the classroom next to mine has student drawings of tardigrades all over the hallway and windows... every time I walk past them now I think of these books... and the bodies are cute, but the mouths are those circular gaping holes of teeth.... I definitely feel that same *grglkrkshiver* about them... and dust mites.... *grglkrk*

Describing the octopi as like, ADHD, I think is very on point...!

I also look forward to seeing your biblical background analysis Choko! My only bible knowledge is google and children's books...

[Nirkatze]

Choko wrote: "Finished Children of Ruin, Section 4, Present 2, In the Belly of the Wale

Kern in her current iteration, is a bit scarier than the versions of her in book #1. She remembers killing some of the hu..."

I really thought Kern's activities there very interesting--(view spoiler)[and how you mentioned you were worried she might have been infected by We already. Her attitude toward M felt very We-like to me too--how she both cared, but only as far as her own use of him was concerned... she was using him up, draining him, making use of his senses... (hide spoiler)]

[Nirkatze]

Choko wrote: "Children of Ruin, Section 5, Past 3, For We are Many ..."

I really think it cool how you connected the We to colonization... such a good point!

[Nirkatze]

Choko wrote: "Children of Ruin, Section 6, Present 3, Rolling Back the Stone....."

Ooh, I hadn't thought of it as a warning... (view spoiler)[And this is the part that still confuses me... how did the We get in that suit on the space station? I thought the only We that left the planet was Baltiel in the shuttle--and that crashed... (hide spoiler)]

[Barry]

Hi guys. I’ve started on Children of Memory. Just tanggung the thread here.

[Choko]

Barry, we will be with you right away:)))

[Tonari no Emily]

Oh man, that line in Children of Ruin (view spoiler)[ "we are going on an adventure" is just so chilling now! (hide spoiler)]

I don't have any audible credits at the mo' so I'm waiting on a library hold for Children of Memory..

[Franziska (tintenklexxe)]

Barry wrote: "Hi guys. I’ve started on Children of Memory. Just tanggung the thread here."

I'll start friday :)

[Choko]

I just finished Children of Ruin . Loved it, but I thought the ending was a tad rushed ... The author definitely relied on our previous knowledge of the characters and that discovery we went through in Children of Time was missing somewhat. However, if we didn't have those huge expectations from the first book, this one would have been great. I still really enjoyed it. I have similar questions as Nirkatze for the final resolution, but we are lucky book 3 is here and maybe we will get some more definitive answers... I am just loving this series!!!

[Mel]

Haha , I’m just starting Children of Ruin, been waiting on a library hold as well, so I’ll be a bit behind. Just a reminder, the Memory chapters will probably be organized differently anyway, but be sure to mark which book you’re on.

[Nirkatze]

I'm still trying to finish up my current eyebook, but I'll be along with CoM when I'm done.

[Tonari no Emily]

Okay I have my technological hands on Children of Memory..

I kind of appreciate the bit of grounding we get with the summary of the first two books before we get into this one... Someone else does this with his books... Was it Mark Lawrence? not sure...

[Nirkatze]

I do think Lawrence does that--has a summary section at the start of each book. I think Brent Weeks does to... I know I've seen "the story so far" in a bunch of different series...

[Tonari no Emily]

Ah yes was thinking of Weeks as well...

[Barry]

Yeah, I'm also grateful for the brief summary of the previous books. Coincidentally, I'm also reading Tchaikovsky's Shadows of the Apt series. He also wrote brief summaries in the beginning of each book in that series. At least for the first three books that I've read. I guess it's a thing for him.

Children of Memory

Part I
(view spoiler)[
Right off the bat, I was thinking of the timeline here. I recall the Humans-Portiids-Octopi-Nodian creature had identified a signal indicating an intelligence life from somewhere. Had the signal come from this new planet (Imir) that Capt Holt was going to?

Could somehow the Humans-Portiids-Octopi-Nodian exploration team be the source of the mysterious signal that the Enkidu crew detected from Imir?

Or was the mysterious Imir signal from the Ancients?
(hide spoiler)]

Part II - Liff
(view spoiler)[
Somehow I got the vibe of M. Night Shmalayan's "The Village" while reading Liff's section. "The elders" of Landfall must be hiding some things from the common people, especially from children like Liff. I don't know why their technology is so "outdated", that they're having problems fixing their stuff up. Were there no capable engineers brought down from the Enkidu? Or did they lose the engineering knowledge along the way?

Also, what's up with the pair of birds? Kind of creepy. Miranda must know the birds?? Surely. (hide spoiler)]

Part II - Miranda
(view spoiler)[
I guess Miranda is the Nodean creature thing? She used "the Words We say".
And she's friends with Fabian, Paul, Portia. How did they all become humans? (hide spoiler)]

Part III - Gothi/Gethli
(view spoiler)[ Or were they the Nodean creature? They keep using the words "We" to refer to themselves. Granted there were two of them. But, it's how the Nodean referred to itself as well.

These two must've been the birds that both Liff and Miranda had spotted. (hide spoiler)]

Part III - Miranda
(view spoiler)[
Ahh, okay. Now we know Miranda was the Nodean creature.

And the birds were the engineered creature from Rourke, which was different than Imir. I keep mixing up which one was Gothi and Gethli lol.

And now they were all going on an adventure to Imir ...
(hide spoiler)]

Part IV
Liff (view spoiler)[
Somehow I doubt there really were these "seccers", who separated from the main settlements. Could be just a way for the "councilors" to try to scare the population to assert some sort of control.

Uncle Molder looked to be trouble to me.

Now who could be "the Watchers"? The one who originally sent the signal from within Imir? Or somebody from Miranda's group of people?<

Hmm ... I didn't think there could still be some people left onboard of the Enkidu. Could Miranda be correct? Could those people left onboard of the Enkidu set up a separate settlement?

That's an interesting dyad. Is it also true of earth crows?

Now Gethli/Gothi were saying that they had been unsuccessfully looking for their teammates, whom I assume to be Miranda, Paul, Fabian and Portia. But, they were right there in town. How could the two birds not have noticed them?
(hide spoiler)]

Miranda (view spoiler)[
Man, I'm dying to know how they got into their human forms. Especially Paul. It looked like his children were avatars of his tentacles.

I guess there's gonna be trouble in the next chapter for Miranda and the gang? (hide spoiler)]

Liff (view spoiler)[
Lol Kern as the Witch. I like how Liff saw everything in a fairy-tale kind of way.

I wonder what sort of catastrophe was Kern preventing Landfall from by staying where she was? What's the connection with Holt's disappearance and the mysterious original signal from Imir? Kern must've met with Holt, if Holt truly had gone into the forest as Liff had seen him do?
(hide spoiler)]

Miranda (view spoiler)[
Well that went down quickly. So they died? (hide spoiler)]

[Timelord Iain, Tech Support]

I’ll probably read this next week, tues/wed/thursday

[Tonari no Emily]

It was a little difficult for me to figure out what was going on at the start of Children of Memory, but I'm starting to understand some things now...

Through Part 4.1 Liff (view spoiler)[ The structure of these books are always so interesting! Here it seems we had a bit of a prologue of the ark ship finding Imir, then "now " with Liff and the "close to now" with Miranda and her/their ship..

Very interesting the Nodeans have reigned themselves in and other species are willing to work with them. I wonder how they sampled Miranda's brain? Did the these of we go in and out or are there still some Nodeans left in there wherever the original Miranda is...

I'm super intrigued to find out who the Watchers and Seccers are... I'm leaning into Miranda's explanation a bit that they're from the ark ship.

I wonder how much time has passed since the original colony they sent down? And what does that original signal have to do with all of this?

Ahhh! So excited with all these questions we get to find answers to!

Somehow I got the vibe of M. Night Shmalayan's "The Village" while reading Liff's section.
Agreed! I was getting that vibe too.. The elders know something/keeping something a secret.. (hide spoiler)]

[Franziska (tintenklexxe)]

Tonari no Emily wrote: "It was a little difficult for me to figure out what was going on at the start of Children of Memory, but I'm starting to understand some things now..."

Same, I've read Part 1 and 2 and didn't know what to say about it... I love the series, but it's sometimes hard for me to understand everything.
I'll read a little more today and try to put my thoughts into words :D

[Tonari no Emily]

OKAY Children of Memory Part 6.2 (view spoiler)[ There is for sure something fishy going on! I know there's been confusion on all parties on this world.. What I'm wondering now is who got to the world first? What was that mysterious signal in the beginning?

Lif calls Holt grandfather, but Miranda and co (as well as the villagers before this part) seem to think they've been there for many generations.. But here Lif is confirmed to be his actual granddaughter? Was there like a reset of minds or something?

The seccers are probably the colonist abandoned on this ship.. Most likely left there because the planet colony couldn't provide for that many people... That expedition Holt/Essie are talking about is probably that mysterious signal...

And how is Miranda already there at the beginning? Why doesn't Miranda and her crew from the last part know what's going on? and why were they separated from the Corvids and Kern?? I have a feeling all this confusion has something to do with the Corvids, but I can't say what. AHHH just so many questions!!!!!

I feel like I'm just on the cusp of getting it! (hide spoiler)]

I'm so intrigued by this book right now, I just NEED to find out what's going on!

[Franziska (tintenklexxe)]

I finished part 3 of Children of Memory.

(view spoiler)[
I'm really glad we get some sort of summary/overview. It helps me to understand the complex worldbuilding a bit more.
Tchaikovsky is great at displaying alien life, it's really fascinating how many different species, with different ways of thinking are in this series.
I'm a bit creeped out by Miranda/the nodean organism. (We are going on an adventure!)
I liked the fairytale-esque vibe of Liffs chapter in part 2.
And I'm curious about that mysterious signal the ark ship Enkidu picked up.

I feel like I don't understand half of the story and I don't know if it's because of language barrier or just because it's complex...
(hide spoiler)]

[Tonari no Emily]

Tonari no Emily wrote: "OKAY Children of Memory Part 6.2 "

Still at the same part, but I just want to emphasize the ending of the chapter(view spoiler)[ "What are we forgetting?" And the title of this book is making so much sense in that there is something going on with the memory of EVERYONE! Kern didn't even seem to fully grasp the picture... Was that original signal that caused all this? Another alien species??

I didn't mean to just ask more questions here, but that's all I have right now xD (hide spoiler)]

[Tonari no Emily]

CoM Part 6.3 MOAR questions! (view spoiler)[ At the beginning of this chapter I was starting to think this was a different Lif-- Miranda had mentioned that there had been many different repetitions of the same name throughout the generations.. But now I feel like almost the same story is being repeated again... A different iteration with the same people... Is this a simulation? And Kern says "Listen, I don't know precisely why it's you I need to have this conversation with, but the birds have you in their sight. And that means I can come to you without introducing more chaos in the system" Which definitely sound simulate-y to me lol And also makes me think the birds maybe have something to do with things??? And also Kern sounds like she maybe has had this conversation before... And well Kern and LIf sorta did right?? And she mentions permutations... I've got to be on to something here, but I can't make the pieces fit! (hide spoiler)]

[Tonari no Emily]

CoM 6.4 beginningish! (view spoiler)[ Is the "we" here the Nodeans running simulations in the Corvid-way to try to understand them?? (hide spoiler)]

[Tonari no Emily]

CoM 7.2 (view spoiler)[ with the Nodean Miranda refusing to believe what it's in front of her (all the abandoned people in stasis) and the repeated references to the "story" of the people... I'm thinking more and more what is going on with the colony has something to do with the Nodeans and a repeated "story" or permutation.... (hide spoiler)]

[Tonari no Emily]

Finished Part 8 of CoM (view spoiler)[ This is really reminding me of Harrow the Ninth in that I feel like I should know what's going on but I'm still very stumped lol

But Kern seems trapped somehow and Miranda and Lif are at the center of it, while the birds seem to have some idea what's going on... (hide spoiler)]

[Tonari no Emily]

CoM through Part 11! (view spoiler)[ aha! A simulation... Knew it! Although I was wrong about who was making the simulation... Seems like the alien... machine.. made it and then didn't know what to do with Miranda. Meanwhile the Corvids were trying to extract her with Kern..
Honestly this was very well done. The whole thing is just kind of explained when it comes to a head which does take the excitement out of discovery just a bit, but I NEEDED to know what happened!

The Corvids are fascinating... Kind of like AI but in an organic form... And this book kind of feels like the mashup of three, no four different iterations of "artificial intelligence" or simulations. We've got the obvious Kern, the Nodeans who simulate being other individuals through "understanding", the Corvid pairs with their Thought and Memory, and then this unknown alien "machine" who just kind of throws events together. I don't know if there is any motivation to doing this, but it's running simulations and has people it centers on, so it kind of fits as the fourth AI...

Lots of speculation about what it means to be intelligent or a person, or one individual vs another... Fascinating stuff! (hide spoiler)]

[Tonari no Emily]

CoM 12.3 (view spoiler)[ And now I'm wondering if they're even out of the simulation? Reminds me a bit of Infinite... I mean things are seeming more linear so probably not.. The machine would have had to incorporate more people into it... kind of.

And would going "back" to Imir put them right back in if they were'nt in a simulation already?

My brain hurts. Is this a simulation? xD (hide spoiler)]

[Tonari no Emily]

Finished! Loved it! :D (view spoiler)[ Somehow I didn't see the WHOLE settlement being a simulation from the landing! Makes sense though.. It's kind of crazy the simulation created that many different intelligences! I wonder before Miranda got there, how many times did it go through the birth and death of Imir... Were any of the simulations different or did it always take the most "logical" or likely path... (hide spoiler)]

[Franziska (tintenklexxe)]

Finished CoM part 6 and I'm thoroughly confused XD

(view spoiler)[
Which timeline is this part? Before Part 4? Parallel to part 4??
It feels a bit like a fever dream o.o
I'm really intrigued by the story, but I can't make any sense out of it.
Is there something wrong with the memory of all of them? Or only some of them? Are these repetitions happening after one another or parallel? What is going on??????

@Tonari
I think a simulation could explain some aspects, but not all....

Also, what's up with the birds? They seem to play a central role....

I'll just read on and hope I understand more with more pages and time XD
(hide spoiler)]

[Tonari no Emily]

Franziska (tintenklexxe) wrote: "I'll just read on and hope I understand more with more pages and time XD"

Pretty much! :D

[Hailee]

Just finished Part 5 of Children of Time

(view spoiler)[My throwaway comment of Guyan being a dictator in the making was a lot more accurate than I expected. I'm really interested to see how much trouble his uploaded self will cause to the Gil's systems.

The spider's social structure is a lot more complicated than I would have thought. I had a lot of sympathy for poor Fabian. His definitely didn't deserve the death he got (hide spoiler)]

[Franziska (tintenklexxe)]

just read CoM part 7-9. And I still can't figure out what's going on.

(view spoiler)[
Liff is somehow at the center of it all, but I don't know why.
It breaks my head thinking about how she lives in different timelines/realities at the same time.
It's implied that Miranda is the problem, but I don't really believe that it is all her doing...something is off.

(hide spoiler)]

[Franziska (tintenklexxe)]

CoM 10.1 Miranda

(view spoiler)[
"Miranda herself can feel the hunger, but she can also dial it down. It's an experience, and she lives for experiences, but she can always dismiss them when she's had enough of them."
As someone with multiple health problems and chronic pain this seems like a great super power to have! XP
(hide spoiler)]

[Timelord Iain, Tech Support]

Finally started... I liked how the summary of the previous books kept the 8 motif...

And I can see why I saw a bunch of comments about feeling lost at the start...

How fast is the Faster Than Light travel invented by the octopods?... Doesn't seem very fast, considering how long the explorers spent in stasis... Then again, I forget how long it took the initial terraformers to reach Kern's World in book 1...

[Timelord Iain, Tech Support]

Some comments through 2.2 or 2.3 of Memory: (view spoiler)[ the plan to go planetside gave me book 2 vibes, but it went better here without any mutineers... The little girl is giving me Nona the Ninth vibes with her weird memories... I love the idea of These of We as a narrator to the story... (hide spoiler)]

[Timelord Iain, Tech Support]

Through 4.5 now, I think: (view spoiler)[Nona still seems like a good comparison... And maybe that M. Night Shyamalan movie with the people in the woods acting like it's the 1700s, and the blind girl that escapes... Kern also talks like it's a simulation... Buy I wonder if these were explorers that found some of the crazy alien planets and fled, like the people on the spaceship in the first book and the algae planet... Before Kern was revealed, I wondered if there was a splinter group of These of We... The story jumps from incorporating the raven people to the Earth plot really quick... And is These of We exhibiting molecular control of his hosts, to allow them to shapeshift and split into multiple people like Paul & his limbs? (hide spoiler)]

[Timelord Iain, Tech Support]

Read a few comments and it seems I'm saying similar things about the early sections... I'll read more later when I have time...

[Timelord Iain, Tech Support]

I might have actually been in 5.1 last time...

But further now, but still in Part 5, I think: the structure of this book is definitely complicated, Franziska... (view spoiler)[ to simulated the seemingly random nature of bird brains?... The story definitely isn't linear... Or if it is, it's because we're jumping between iterations of Lift's village... It definitely seems to be repeating, but Liff retains old memories, and new characters like Miranda get incorporated...

I think I've missed a lot of the Fabian stuff... Is this a simulation of ArtiFabian, from the previous book? (hide spoiler)]

[Timelord Iain, Tech Support]

I suck at chapter tracking… I was in Part 6 last time… noticed when I reached Part 7… in 8 now… (view spoiler)[looks like simulation was right… the whole book so far has taken place in the program/signal noise the birds have been playing with… but they’ve found a new burgeoning AI grown from the collective
Experience?… reminds me of the Jake
Gyllenhaal movie where he keeps reliving the same few minutes to try and solve a train bombing… Source Code…

As usual, Kern is causing problems :D (hide spoiler)]

[Timelord Iain, Tech Support]

Thoughts on Emily’s 6.2 comment: (view spoiler)[has These of We and the Portid friend virus and the Intelligence virus in general made all the sentient species susceptible to
that original Earth virus that killed electronics, and instead it wiped
memories?… and they’re trying to piece it back together like
decrypting a hard drive?… but the birds are doing it with trial and error?… (hide spoiler)]

[Timelord Iain, Tech Support]

Got the ebook sample and I see the structure of the novel just has some shorter parts than previous books, so parts end sooner than I expect…

[Timelord Iain, Tech Support]

@Franziska 10.1: (view spoiler)[ everyone has that superpower, to some extent… you pay less attention to chronic flat pain vs sudden new pain or fluctuating pain… and once the pain stops, the memory fades until it returns… (hide spoiler)]

[Timelord Iain, Tech Support]

10.3: (view spoiler)[I love the philosophical debate about neuro-athpicality, basically autism, and whether or not the ravens are sentient… even tho they’re basically external left brain+right brain pairs… they even joke about what that say about Human sentience… Adrian Tchaikovsky is an amazing writer…

I think I’m loving this book more than book 2… or maybe it’s the novelty of a new book… I loved Ruin the first time too, and a bit less on re-read… (hide spoiler)]

[Timelord Iain, Tech Support]

End of Part 10: (view spoiler)[I feel like I should have seem Simulation Theory/Delusion coming a mile away… makes total sense, given everything else that’s been revealed… (hide spoiler)]

[Timelord Iain, Tech Support]

End of Part 11: (view spoiler)[ what a tragedy :( (hide spoiler)]