Before I finished my last read, I started poking around in The Long Way to a Small Angry Planet by Becky Chambers, trying to pick my next read, when I noticed the page “A special note from Becky Chambers” all the way in the back. I assumed it would be an acknowledgement page or maybe a teaser for an upcoming book or even just a note to her fans, but instead, Chambers included a note to encourage aspiring writers not to give up. The timing […]
When the Apocalypse Comes, We Go Shopping
The fantasy is always that one can stave off tragedy through preparation: if only one has enough lead time and enough resources, and a place to hide out with one’s loved ones, one can stay safe while the world goes up in flames. In Station Eleven by Emily St. John Mandel (2014), the protagonist Jeevan gets an early warning phone call about the epidemic that will eliminate majority of the world’s population and is able to do his shopping before the rest of the world realizes […]
Just don’t get it.
The premise of this book, and the great reviews of a lot of Cannonballers, placed this one on my TBR pile. A boarding school for “problematic children” serves as a refuge for kids that have found portals into alternate worlds. Having flourished in these different worlds, returning is painful for them. They don’t belong here anymore and long for the place where they can be themselves again. Unfortunately, the back story of each of the characters and the structure of these portal worlds into lands […]
“Violence is the last refuge of the incompetent.”
I really liked this book, in the way that I always enjoy thoughtful science fiction. Every once in a while, I enjoy a book designed solely to make you grapple with a question, and think, “what if?” The focus here isn’t on Asimov’s characters (though it DOES have actual characters in it, unlike the work of some 1950s sf authors). It’s actually impossible for this to be a character-centric book due the premise. Instead, the arc is on the Foundation itself, on tracing the decline […]
Stories About Technology and Discovery
The e-book version that I got from my library was actually titled Arrival, with the note that it had been previously published as Stories of Your Life, and I got it because I wanted to read the story that the movie Arrival was based on, so I’ll start with that one. It’s titled “Story of Your Life,” and it’s good. I think the movie is better, which I don’t usually think, but I also don’t usually see the movie before reading the book. I don’t want to spoil […]
Delightful, feel-good space opera
A closed and common orbit is the sequel to The Long way to a Small Angry Planet, so… A Closed and Common Orbit follows Lovelace the AI after she’s been downloaded into a kit resembling a human body. Pepper takes care of her and brings her back to her home planet. Lovelace changes her name to Sidra, a human-name, and tries to adjust to life with different senses in a strange place. She is no longer a ship with a camera in every room, […]
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