Andy Weir hit the headlines with his first novel The Martian, a tale of early exploratory missions to Mars going just a bit wrong, leading to a movie featuring Matt Damon and some potatoes (you may have found it hard to spot the difference). It was always going to be interesting to see how he followed that up, and the answer was to stick to a near-future SF novel with a decent grounding in plausible “what if” science. Artemis is set on humankind’s first lunar […]
How flattering, I said, meaning the opposite
Hey you. You. I’m talking to you. A human living in the world in 2017 who takes things like The Handmaid’s Tale incredibly personally. A human living in the world in 2017 who is horrified by what has been happening for centuries in a very real, cold-blooded, and methodical way to the Native American community. A human living in the world in 2017 who cannot believe that people don’t believe in science and climate change. A human living in the world in 2017 who still finds […]
Connie Willis is OBSESSED with communication.
I really, really ended up enjoying this, but it was touch and go there for a bit. Connie Willis’s writing always has this distinct, relentless tone to it, and it gets under your skin until you see where it’s going. I’ve had that same experience with all the books I’ve read by her, although the tone takes a different specific tenor every time. In Doomsday Book it was the tedium of death. In To Say Nothing of the Dog it was the farcical nature of […]
This book also has a drone in it that just delivers burritos. That is the dream.
This was the best fart/poop/butt joke book collection I’ve ever read that also happens to have a plot. Despite it not being exactly everything I hoped it would be, this book had me about three pages in when the heroine (ordering fast food while sitting in her self-driving car) contemplates how did people ever “eat their car chili” if they had to keep their hands on the steering wheel. This girl clearly has her priorities straight. If the future allows me to eat car chili while cruising down […]
This is why I am slightly afraid of plants
Melanie is one of a small group of children who are educated at an exclusive facility, with highly trained security personnel and top-tier medical experts on hand. Her education is extensive and varied. She is a precocious and brilliant girl, with an inquisitive personality and a great deal of self-control. Her survival instinct is finely honed. This all comes in very useful when she, her favourite teacher, two of the guards and one of the doctors are forced to flee their facility and run for […]
A scary, political, techno-thrilling ride of a book.
I think I might be too stupid to write this review. Long story short: This book was a hell of a ride. It was slightly problematic as a novel, but damn if it wasn’t powerful anyway. It should probably be required reading. Long story long? Weeeeeellll. That’s when my brain starts to make whirring and booping noises and then I want to put my laptop away and go to sleep. Or eat a milkshake. Either one of those things, really. Marcus Yallow is a seventeen […]