The Science Fiction and Fantasy Thread: Read the OP, Bridge of Birds, and Murderbot

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tooterfish: Jul 13, 2013

Furism posted:

I've just finished reading Neuromancer as per the recommendations in this thread. My final opinion is a bit mitigated. For a book written in the 80's, it sure was visionary - abstract AI (unlike the robots that had been done to death since the 50's), inter-networking, pretty dystopnian (but not as much as I expected) and augments. But I wasn't fond of William Gibson's style - apparently not using pronouns was a thing in the 80's? There are also a few things that I didn't understand:

- Why is Molly jumping on Case's dick as soon as they meet?
- How was Armitage "constructed" from Corto?
- What leverage did Wintermute have on Riviera to make him cooperate?
- Actually, what was Riviera's use? Just to get close to 3Jane using his hosed up hologram show?

Loved the Rastas in space, though, listening to "righteous dub." Maybe I missed the points above because I was in a very similar condition than them when I read the book.

Haven't read the book in a decade, so these are from memory and I might be dead wrong about some things. The writing style is called "crammed prose", it's quite deliberate. Although some people hate it., it was one of the things that set the cyberpunk authors apart from other genre sci-fi at the time.

Why is Molly jumping on Case's dick as soon as they meet?
Probably because she wanted a gently caress.

How was Armitage "constructed" from Corto?
Psychological manipulation. Wintermute brainwashes the guy while he's in an asylum suffering from PTSD.

What leverage did Wintermute have on Riviera to make him cooperate?
He can only get off by betraying people, so I think the plan was he gets to get his rocks off by betraying 3Jane. It's the ultimate score for him. Also, he's a junkie so maybe he was just getting paid? Don't know this one for sure.

Actually, what was Riviera's use? Just to get close to 3Jane using his hosed up hologram show?
3Jane has a kink for twisted assholes. He's there to seduce her and get the rest of the team inside as far as I remember.

# ¿ Aug 23, 2015 02:01

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# ¿ Apr 29, 2024 01:11

tooterfish: Jul 13, 2013

Fart of Presto posted:

Plenty of well known authors and Sterling's Schismatrix Plus is one of my favourite post-human sci-fi books, that also contains the complete Shaper/Mechanist collection.
All books are available as epub, and also as mobi or pdf.

Schismatrix Plus is worth the $12 on its own IMO, it's loving amazing.

# ¿ Aug 24, 2015 22:15

tooterfish: Jul 13, 2013

Yeah, good book. All the Bas Lag books are good.

Bring a dictionary along for the ride though...

# ¿ Sep 3, 2015 23:49

tooterfish: Jul 13, 2013

I'm currently reading the First Law trilogy on the recommendation of this thread. It's actually turning out pretty good, so well done thread.

Also, maybe give the Howard era Conan stories a try. Not exactly high brow poo poo (he was a pulp author), but really well written and the character is very different to the films/comic books.

# ¿ Sep 4, 2015 00:22

tooterfish: Jul 13, 2013

Yeah, kinda goes without saying. You'll have to try and see past that.

They're not political treatises, they're pulp stories from the 1930s.

# ¿ Sep 4, 2015 21:12

tooterfish: Jul 13, 2013

Autonomous Monster posted:

...or not? I mean, there's no law that says you have to enjoy or even read Conan, and "too much racism" is about as good a reason to a book down as any other. Better than most, in fact.

Well sure, leave it to your own conscience. It's not like by reading it you're promoting or ascribing to those views though.

I personally love reading ~~silver age~~ early 20th century and pulp science fiction. You'd be surprised at just how prescient some authors were, even going back further than the turn of the century. But to enjoy it you've got to accept that you'll occasionally come across things you don't agree with. Racism in 1930s America was like background radiation, almost impossible to get away from.

e: because no one calls it the silver age.

tooterfish fucked around with this message at 22:11 on Sep 4, 2015

# ¿ Sep 4, 2015 22:06

tooterfish: Jul 13, 2013

DeusExMachinima posted:

How you could possibly see anybody besides Lovecraft as the King poo poo of SF racism in the 30's is one big to me. The core of Conan the Cimmerian is basically adventure for adventure's sake and oh yeah the author lived in the 1930's so prepare yourself for the baggage. OTOH, Lovecraft's entire concept of Cthulhu/the fishmen/whoever else interbreeding with cultists is pretty core to his entire universe and is 100% an anti-race mixing thing. He's explicit about it in his letters.

This is the way I see it. The better Conan stories are just him breaking and entering, and then trying to steal whatever the gently caress isn't nailed down. This epic struggle of races thing just doesn't figure in those that much... I don't know, maybe I'm just wearing the old rose tints.

That article is interesting Darth Walrus, thanks for linking it. I personally don't see the point of dismissing all of the stories out of hand despite their flaws though, and especially despite the flaws of their author. Like I said, leave it to your own conscience. Also, the comments section is full of people saying "yeah, I haven't read any of them BUT I AGREE WITH EVERYTHING YOU SAID", which is pretty loving hilarious, so thanks for a good laugh too.

tooterfish fucked around with this message at 23:42 on Sep 4, 2015

# ¿ Sep 4, 2015 23:40

tooterfish: Jul 13, 2013

Funny thing is, I think I only mentioned Conan because I'm reading First Law after seeing it highly rated right here, and Ninefingers reminded me a lot of a possible older Conan... one full of regrets about the terrible things he's done.

For a slightly less controversial recommendation, how about the Warlord Chronicles by Bernard Cornwell? Ignoring the fact that Arthur is mythological and probably didn't exist, it's very grounded and actually pretty historically accurate in the gritty details. Cornwell can tell a good story, even when he isn't talking about a certain rifleman. I rather enjoyed it.

# ¿ Sep 6, 2015 03:08

tooterfish: Jul 13, 2013

Darth Walrus posted:

I'm operating off encyclopedia.com, which suggests the opposite. Eugenics programs were big in the mid-twenties, and then the Depression hit in 1929 and enthusiasm rapidly drained off. There was a bit of inertia involved which meant that several major programs still got authorised later on, but that was a simple consequence of major government projects taking a while to get going (and the effects of the Depression taking a while to become obvious) rather than continued, avid enthusiasm.

With all due respect, that article is weaselly as gently caress. It really downplays (in fact unless I'm mistaken it completely forgets to even mention) the huge influence American eugenicists had on the rest of the world, especially Nazi Germany (they loving proselyted to German scientists). Some Nazi research in the 30s was even funded from US sources.

It also attempts to lump the Britain in with the US and Germany, which is pretty disingenuous. For all the UK's numerous flaws (lets not derail the thread further with these please), eugenics never really gained any significant traction over here politically. Sterilisation programs (forced or voluntary) were pretty roundly rejected by the government, and while there was some "private" practice, it was most definitely very illegal and without any kind of state sponsorship.

# ¿ Sep 6, 2015 19:26

tooterfish: Jul 13, 2013

Most of the main characters of the stand alone novels all appear as minor ones in the First Law Trilogy, and several actually have character arcs that span all six books. Not the end of the world if you don't start from the beginning, but it's fun to see the characters develop and change over the years.

I'm currently on the last one now (Red Country). They're all good solid books, so it's worth reading from the start anyway... although to be honest you'll see Abercrombie's "subversions" from a loving mile away, he's not all that subtle about it.

# ¿ Sep 18, 2015 03:02

tooterfish: Jul 13, 2013

Isn't the majority culture in Dune Islamic?

I'm not talking about the Fremen (captain obvious), but the rest of the galactic community. The emperor's title is Padishah, and the rulers of planetary fiefs were "Siridars", which is close enough to Sardar it can't be a coincidence.

I don't think Herbert deals much with the Hajj either though.

e:gotcha.

# ¿ Sep 27, 2015 23:21

tooterfish: Jul 13, 2013

House Louse posted:

Nope, not really. London is three times the size of any other city in England, it's internationally important in several different ways, it's very diverse, and the next biggest cities are a) a lot younger (places like Manchester were nothing special until the Industrial Revolution) and b) not in the South. Plus, there are lots of other famous books set there.

I won't argue with your other points, but this is bullshit.

Back when the likes of Manchester were "nothing special", neither was London quite frankly. They're both actually contemporaries, they were established as Roman forts at roughly the same time. It's only relatively recently (in historical terms) that London has come to dominate politically and culturally, and that's a matter of policy rather than anything inherently special about the place... because frankly it's a loving shithole. A shithole that just happens to be full of self congratulatory toffs. :colbert:

tooterfish fucked around with this message at 16:31 on Dec 2, 2015

# ¿ Dec 2, 2015 16:25

tooterfish: Jul 13, 2013

goodness posted:

Any great short stories available freely online? Working an overnight shift and need something I can read in the iPad safari browser

http://archive.ncsa.illinois.edu/prajlich/forster.html

# ¿ Feb 5, 2016 07:16

tooterfish: Jul 13, 2013

the trump tutelage posted:

Are there any good sci-fi books that take place at a time when humans have colonized the solar system but haven't yet spread beyond it?

Hello sir, have you read Schismatrix?

# ¿ Mar 23, 2016 12:20

tooterfish: Jul 13, 2013

holocaust bloopers posted:

The Dark Forest by Cixin Liu was terrific.

It's a deeply flawed, meandering mess of a book?

Three Body was pretty good though.

# ¿ Mar 24, 2016 20:07

tooterfish: Jul 13, 2013

holocaust bloopers posted:

Nah. It was great. Sorry you didn't like it.

I just think it's massively overrated. I'd stretch to okay, but I certainly wouldn't call it terrific by any means, it has far too many issues for that.

A lot of the plot threads don't make any sense (e.g. the wallfacer/wallbreaker stuff. The wallbreakers actually helped humanity three out of four times!), some of them peter out to nothing leaving me wondering why they were even in at all (e.g. the assassin virus), and the ending is very anti-climatic.

tooterfish fucked around with this message at 20:33 on Mar 24, 2016

# ¿ Mar 24, 2016 20:26

tooterfish: Jul 13, 2013

Phummus posted:

I kept waiting for someone to show up as the 4th wallbreaker.

I'm not sure why?

# ¿ Mar 25, 2016 18:30

tooterfish: Jul 13, 2013

I still don't get it. :downs:

# ¿ Mar 25, 2016 22:17

tooterfish: Jul 13, 2013

I see.

That's almost as bad as Dark Forest's gaping plot holes! :shobon:

# ¿ Mar 25, 2016 22:24

tooterfish: Jul 13, 2013

the_homemaster posted:

lol plot holes

Yes. loving massive ones in fact.

# ¿ Mar 26, 2016 00:05

tooterfish: Jul 13, 2013

It suffers from a lack of focus more than anything else in my opinion. Also, if you thought the first one was super goony.... there's an actual honest to god loving waifu in Dark Forest.

Still worth a read though, the core premise is decent.

# ¿ Mar 26, 2016 12:44

tooterfish: Jul 13, 2013

coyo7e posted:

So the feelings of autistic people are more important than those of overweight people. Got it.

If you're overweight, it's most likely the result of lifestyle choices you've made. Autistic people can't change their diet and do a little exercise to become less autistic.

So, yes. Fatty.

# ¿ Mar 27, 2016 19:52

tooterfish: Jul 13, 2013

Doesn't Alistair Reynolds or Niven write about that? (or maybe both!). Assuming slower than light travel, all human colonies could practically trade are ideas.

But that's interstellar trade. Interplanetary is probably more doable, provided they have something Earth wants (which is doubtful). The asteroid belt certainly though, lots of easily accessible minerals and no pesky gravity well to get in the way of export. That's where the new gold rush will happen... except probably not gold, because gold is worthless.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S6QdY6YDfj0&t=26s

# ¿ Mar 29, 2016 21:09

tooterfish: Jul 13, 2013

FoldOgey posted:

Some interesting questions about whether or not the games we play & the way we play them say something about our society. Banks seems to suggest so.

I apologise if I come across as a bit condescending here, but I think you might have missed the bigger picture.

It's not a story about a board game, it's social commentary on how wealth and privilege can reinforce and perpetuate an elite oligarchy even in what is ostensibly a "fair and meritocratic" society. Azad is a metaphor for our own political systems.

# ¿ May 4, 2016 18:43

tooterfish: Jul 13, 2013

FoldOgey posted:

The game is the empire. What does it mean that when Americans think of board games, they think of 'Monopoly' or 'Risk'?

You have a point there. Monopoly is actually supposed to be a scathing critique of laissez-faire capitalism AFAIK, I doubt most people see it that way though.

# ¿ May 4, 2016 19:19

tooterfish: Jul 13, 2013

pseudorandom name posted:

A safe rule of thumb is that if the book is published by Baen and it isn't by Lois McMaster Bujold, it is trash.

It's a good general rule.

Keith Laumer and James Schmitz are loving great though.

# ¿ May 16, 2016 01:24

tooterfish: Jul 13, 2013

bonds0097 posted:

It is not at all uncommon in democratic countries to require military or civil service from citizens. I think the US is an exception in not requiring any kind of civic engagement from its citizens rather than the rule.

Not really, it's definitely not the norm for liberal democracies. There's only four countries in Western Europe that still do it for example, and that's mostly due to inertia IMO: Switzerland, Greece, Norway and Austria.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conscription

And it's never about enfranchisement, you aren't required to serve to get a vote.

edit: beaten while I was deciding what to type...

# ¿ May 27, 2016 12:27

tooterfish: Jul 13, 2013

House Louse posted:

Anyway, it's foolish to say that "liberal democracies"* aren't into conscription or national service; go sixty years back and there'd be plenty more countries highlighted. It comes and goes.

It might come and go (although I'm not convinced), but right now it's definitely mostly gone... i.e. it's uncommon, or not the norm. I don't see how what I said is foolish in that context.

# ¿ May 27, 2016 17:34

tooterfish: Jul 13, 2013

House Louse posted:

You said that conscription is unusual now, therefore it's always unusual in liberal democracies, which seemed foolish to me.

Haha, you just made that up. I said no such loving thing. I said it's "not the norm" now as a counter to the statement that it's "not unusual" in democracies outside of America now.

Frankly I wasn't even the first one to make this point, so I've no loving idea why you've even latched on to me for this.

# ¿ May 28, 2016 15:03

tooterfish: Jul 13, 2013

Amberskin posted:

IIRC the concept of a conscript army (or a "citizen army") was pretty progressive when it was proposed, as it gave the weapons to the "citizens" instead of the usual morons (paid mercenaries and/or aristocrats).

Conscription and citizen militias date back to the bronze age.

# ¿ May 28, 2016 20:16

tooterfish: Jul 13, 2013

anilEhilated posted:

e: I'm aware they aren't cheerful reading,

Don't let discussion about Use of Weapons fool you. It's mostly a very optimistic setting, even whimsical at times.

It's not even a tiny bit grimdark.

# ¿ Jun 9, 2016 18:01

tooterfish: Jul 13, 2013

bonds0097 posted:

This is such poo poo. I can't even order the book myself an gift it to someone in another reason, what the gently caress. What is it that publisher's think they're accomplishing with this?

Well see, Australia is way out in the sticks and it's a long way for those ones and zeros to go.

Much more efficient to load up a massive oil burning boat with dead trees and ship books in that way.

# ¿ Jun 13, 2016 12:30

tooterfish: Jul 13, 2013

flosofl posted:

I'd say I'm negative compared to the wankery I see about how "it's the greatest book ever!" I see. I liked both books, but also feel they had some very real weaknesses that should have kept them off the award lists.

Normally, I wouldn't even post about it. But that masturbatory post by the_homemaster just irked me. If you like the book, that's cool. And if you don't, that's cool too. But coming in to enlighten the unwashed masses that they hold the wrong opinion? gently caress off to DnD where they eat that poo poo up.

It's his thing. He got upset when I dared to say I found The Dark Forest a tad overrated last year too.

I think it might be the only book he's read.

edit: Also, the "beautiful love story" in TDF is possibly some of the creepiest objectifying poo poo I've ever read, so maybe he's trolling or something.

tooterfish fucked around with this message at 02:14 on Aug 1, 2016

# ¿ Aug 1, 2016 02:10

tooterfish: Jul 13, 2013

Silver2195 posted:

The main character's wife ends up deciding to leave him for hundreds of years in order to force him to do his job.

It's more how he meets her in the first place bub.

# ¿ Aug 1, 2016 16:07

tooterfish: Jul 13, 2013

Probably best not to describe it as a "beautiful love story" then?

Which was, you know, the entire point I was making.

# ¿ Aug 1, 2016 17:16

tooterfish: Jul 13, 2013

FastestGunAlive posted:

Reminds me of the group trying to build their own sovereign citadel; complete with mspaint, home brew rpg style map: http://iiicitadel.com/about.html

I like how there's no hospital marked on that map, but they made sure to make space for an arms factory and firearms museum.

Certainly got their priorities straightened out there.

# ¿ Aug 15, 2016 21:55

tooterfish: Jul 13, 2013

Yes, I agree.

You'd think after 30 or so years of that poo poo, they'd start equipping people with body armour at the very least.

But no, even after all the well documented horror stories people are still exploring entirely unknown biospheres in their shorts and university branded sweatshirts, and using entirely improvised weapons to defend themselves.

# ¿ Aug 17, 2016 00:33

tooterfish: Jul 13, 2013

evilbastard posted:

I also liked Hao Jingfang's acceptance speech where she said something along the lines of "I just turned up because I wanted to go to George RR Martin's Losers Party, what do I do now"

"It's okay nerd, you're still a loser so you can still go."

# ¿ Aug 21, 2016 04:33

tooterfish: Jul 13, 2013

And there I was thinking they got an especially patriotic eagle to pose stoically for it.

# ¿ Aug 30, 2016 03:15

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# ¿ Apr 29, 2024 01:11

tooterfish: Jul 13, 2013

I just found Accelerando on my e-reader and I can't for the loving life of me remember how it got there.

Did I get it on the recommendation of this thread? Is it good?

# ¿ Sep 2, 2016 23:55

The Something Awful Forums > The Finer Arts > The Book Barn > The Science Fiction and Fantasy Thread: Read the OP, Bridge of Birds, and Murderbot

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