Shawn > Recent Status Updates

I should buy this after returning to library b/c it’s so dense and informational

Really geeked for this. It’s put together very well—the cover, the preface, the art and illustrations, and the writing is shiny & polished in a very artistically sensitive way—thus far!

Very short interviews, not too deep but each one is revealing & informative, kinda racing through them bc they’re like snippets, kinda like scrolling. It begins from the 1970s.

Almost done appreciate the context & histories

A little too much historicL context! He’s filling the paragraphs with names & french names & kings & republics & dates & paintings & it’s overkill…

Nice writer woohoo!

I like his style/approach. It’s somewhat cheesy, predictable, & YA, but he delivers ‘pizza’ to my brain as a reading experience and I just can’t dislike that! I game a lot & binge SF, and Ernest Cline meets me there.

After a while ya grow numb to the effulgent descriptions of these mind-boggling worlds of Simmons. Like the Hyperion series, the wonder & awe move as if on an asymptote, ever escalating, yet never reaching a climaxing point.

On other notes, the Achilles depiction is entirely apart from but equally cool as the Achilles in Ada Palmer’s books.

…and loving the moravecs Mahnmut & especially Orphu of Io!

OK unfortunately this book was slightly spoiled for me, and I finally crossed that spoiled point, but still, a wild read, still wondering where/how it ends

Was laughing in the car at the stoplight: this book has robots, dinosaurs, Shakespeare, & Greek mythological heroes, is way in the future, out in space, on earth & mars & earth-in-mars & mars-in-earth

Just learned of Simmons’ alleged Islamophobia…a disappointment. Also, well, I was feeling confused and underwhelmed, and looked at reviews which confirmed that this book ain’t as ‘good’ as the first. Lotta Greek/Trojan war n not enough SF yet

Orphu!

100% loved Ilium—grateful for this sequel/conclusion

I’m hooked—gripped—whatever!