Sankara Jayanth S > Recent Status Updates

Initial setup is great! It already feels like a thriller. Feels like the start of 'The Shape of Water' by Guillermo del Toro, only much sinister. [not a spoiler]

"Footprints?"
"Footprints."
"A man's or a woman's?"

Dr. Mortimer looked strangely at us for an instant, and his voice sank almost to a whisper as he answered:-- "Mr. Holmes, they were the footprints of a gigantic hound!"

* * *

One of my favorite story moments in all the books I've read, few come close. Burnt into my memory for how charged, yet silent, the atmosphere in 221B Baker Street would have been.

"I am afraid, my dear Watson, that most of your conclusions were erroneous. When I said that you stimulated me I meant, to be frank, that in noting your fallacies I was occasionally guided towards the truth."

Savage by Holmes. If someone were to say this to me, even a best friend, I'd straight up walk out.

Yearly re-read of my favorite story begins early this year. :D

I took 2 weeks to finish a 150 page book. 😐 Seems rather set in deeply, my capriciousness with reading. books.

"To conform to a type, to be the captive of a form, means the decadence of an art, it is said sometimes. But what of folk arts like this puppet theatre — have they not become what they are with the help of hard, fixed standards?"

"We can't make a decision between being sad for a little while and being wretched for the rest of our lives. Or rather we've made the decision and have trouble finding the courage to carry it through."

"Kaname felt her hand brush against his neck two or three times, but her touch was as cool and impersonal as a barber's."

The opening chapter of this book quite vividly, with beautiful writing, paints the broken relationship between married couple Kaname and Misako.

Hugh Laurie name drop! Was waiting for this.

I can't wait to read about Fry and Laurie's friendship. Their 'A Bit of Fry and Laurie' is a riot. They both had hilarious roles, Stephen's a lot smaller role than Hugh's, in Rowan Atkinson's British comedy series 'Blackadder'.

I think I'm going to double down strongly on my opinion that these books are unnecessarily long. I understand the sentiment that the book is rich in details and interesting too but I honestly think the plot moves slow for its own good. The avalanche at the end is always thrilling, of course, but it shouldn't be a dredge to get there and sometimes, Stormlight Archive books feel like that.

"Nothing prayed for — it is life's strictest and least graceful rule — comes to you at the time of praying. Good things always come too late."

"Omphalos" - This story was both gratifying and slightly triggering for me personally because it deals with religious people reconciling their faith in God with the scientific discoveries about our universe. Nothing to do with the writing, it was great.

"The Truth of Fact, the Truth of Feeling" - Our memory is far from perfect. But what if there is tech that will make our memories perfect? If our entire life is recorded with body cams and there is a search engine in our heads that can bring out video clips from our Lifelog, then all drawbacks of human memory are subverted and we gain lossless memory of events.

Liked this short story.

"Dacey's Patent Automatic Nanny" - Is this how it will be for real if a child is taken care of by a machine from birth? I have to read about this on the internet. Curious.

Just finished 'The Lifecycle of Software Objects'... It left a lot to think about. It is not going too far to say that the nature of human race's coexistence with other life forms is not a healthy one in its current state. There are varying level at which people draw a line and call it inhuman treatment of other living things. This story explores the same moral landscape in a far future with AI beings.

There is a lot of British slang and vocabulary that I just don't understand :/ And references to British stuff. But I just ignore them unless they seem important. Can't keep looking up every other word.

The story "What's Expected of Us" - What the fork!!! Free will, ftw!!!

Akinetic mutism sounds bone-chilling!

The story 'The Great Silence' hit me right in the feels.
Don't make parrots go extinct, please!

The second short story is called 'Exhalation' and boy, it is remarkable. How do people do this - create a world that sounds both implausible and plausible at the same time and give it life like they do. Amazing story!

The first story 'Merchant and the Alchemist's Gate' was great. I usually cannot wrap my head around time loops and time travel with the whole cause and effect shenanigans that involve it. But this short story was well written.

But...I do not at all like people validating religions after the fact with something they themselves came up with that makes more sense than the original texts. All religions, not one.

The loudness and hattedness of Other Parents were not conducive to the particular Fry tokens of love: tiny exertions of pressure on the hands and tight little nods of the head that stood for affection and deep, unspoken understanding. A slightly forced smile and bitten underlip aside, Mummy always left the platform outwardly resolute, which was all that mattered.

Stephen Fry is a treasure.

I do not read non-fiction much, if at all. So autobiographies are strange territory for me. But 10 pages into Fry's autobiography now, there is a wide smile on my face because every turn of sentence has evidence that it is a Stephen Fry make and I have enjoyed and loved everything I saw, read and heard that was by him.

What the F is happening!