Literature - What are you reading?

[I am ST]

I am now in a Science-Fiction mood, and have spent all my spare time in the past few days devouring classics.

Accelerando, by C. Stross - The kool Game Cat from Jeff Noon's Vurt meets Charles Stross' idealized vision of himself. They go off into the Singularity, don't like it, so go for the Star Trek future instead. Has a very 2001 "behold, multitouch phones!" feel to it. Pretty terrible overall. Still had I never heard of Kardashev scales, Matrioska Brains, computronium, AI, uploading, solar sails and the like, I would probably be blown away. So I give it Two stars.

Canticle for Leibowitz, by Walter Miller Jr. - "How the dark ages would have looked like if the Romans and the Han had destroyed each other in a nuclear exchange" except, of course, the Nuclear apocalypse happens sometime in the 20th century. More fantasy than sci-fi, really. Snippets from across 2000 years, as Humanity is slowly rebuilding after the Fallout. Christianity plays a central role as half the book is basically melancholy comparisons to Irish monks. Humanity seems doomed to repeat its mistake, except at the end the leaders talk about "dirty" nukes that would render whole continents sterile for millennia. There's even the customary escape to α-Centauri at the end. Still, as post-apocalypse stories go, it's pretty damn good. Three Stars.

[Tinker]

My wife really liked Accelerando. Charles Stross is good.

[YMix]

The Wages of Destruction - The Making and Breaking of the Nazi Economy, by Adam Tooze. A fascinating book, at least for me. Government intervention, the threat of inflation, huge spending on weapons and soldiers that were going to be made good by the victory, the German plan to either kill or expel the entire population of Poland and Russia, the food crisis of 1942, the conquest of France, Belgium and Netherlands that proved to be a major mistake, the obsession with weapons production and the need to finish the war in the East quickly, in order to defend against the expected attack from UK/USA.

[Azrael]

Borges: A Life by Edwin Williamson

[Endovelico]

I just finished "Freefall" by Stiglitz. Very enlightening.

[Torchwood]

The Meme Machine by Susan Blackmore

In the school of Dawkins, but fleshes out the idea; rants against religion, but the ending is almost Buddhist (she is into Zen). Silly in some ways, but readable.

[Colonel Sun]

[Marcus]

64 full-color plates • Mississippi River Journal • Missouri River Journals • 45 entries from the Ornithological Biography • letters and other writings

http://www.loa.org/volume.jsp?RequestID=135

Browse the site . . excellent stuff, well-made, good prices . .

[Azrael]

Another good non-fiction read is by Adam Tooze, the economic history of the Third Reich.

[YMix]

[Azrael]

[YMix]

Hitler was a moron. The Germans occupied/got under control a large part of Europe, only to realize that there was not enough oil, coal and food for everybody. Taking the British out of the war in order to break the naval blockade and resume the import of oil and food would have made a huge difference.

[Apollonius]

[Azrael]

[Caskhades]

Mote in God's Eye, by Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle
The Empire of Mankind discovers an advanced alien race bottled up in a single star system. Both humans and aliens must decide how to act. Aside from the fictional "Alderson" drives that instantly move ships across light-years and the "Langstrom" fields, the story is 100% hard science fiction. The story telling is superb. The characters act rationally, yet humanly. There are IPads in this 1975 book. To ensure a moderately happy ending, the book dissapointingly relies on playing with the two non hard sci-fi concepts. Still, one of the better hard-sci-fi stories I have read. Four Stars

[Azrael]

[Caskhades]

ST recommended KS Robinson's "Red Mars" books. I think they're the best, especially the very first one (the last two are a little more blah).
Tinker brought up "Diamond Age: A young lady's illustrated primer" and the first half of that book is also five stars.
If you haven't read it, "Les Fourmis" by Bertrand Werber is worthwhile, though not exactly sci-fi.

I'm mostly into hard Sci-fi. So the classics: Asimov, Brin, Benford, Bova, Clarke, Clement, Heinlein, Jameson, Niven, Pohl, Pournelle.
Newer stuff: Look up Greg Egan.
http://www.amazon.com/Hard-SF-Renaissan ... 0312876351

[Demon of Undoing]

Just finished " Soldier of the Mist " and now reading " Soldier of Arete " by Gene Wolfe . It took me a while to get used to the loss of memory as a convention, but it's very good. Makes you think about how the ancients constructed their world, what they would consider real and exactly how much the gods are still with us .

[Tinker]

[Hoosiernorm]

Re reading Hero with a thousand faces by Joseph Campbell. Not enjoying it as much as the first read a few years ago. So I went back to re read Cats Cradle by Kurt Vonnegut and I still love reading that darn book. Will finish up Campbell and then dig through the box for something else to either finish or re read.

[Tinker]

[Hoosiernorm]

[Torchwood]

Why is it not surprising that a bunch of nerds addicted to an internet forum like sci-fi?

So, in the spirit of the thing, I have been reading my favourite sci-fi author's new book, Surface Detail, by Iain M. Banks. Brilliant though IMB is, he has gone off in recent books, not the guy who wrote masterpieces like the Player of Games and Excession, he has got too long, rambling and savage.

True this time as well, but better plots and a new level of savagery which is brilliant. In a twist on the Omega Point, Frank Tipler etc., advanced civilisations in his books can indeed upload complete mind/body states, so guaranteeing immortality for those who want it - a scientific religion that really works. Some "moralistic" societies fret that even the degenerate can access this, without punishment for their sins - so they construct virtual Hells, with exquisite punishments as only man can think up. Without giving too much away the main plot is the battle to close the Hells, and success is not guaranteed...

Well worth reading if you can stomach it.

[Sparky]

[Colonel Sun]

Have not read this, but there may be some Tolkein fans here so . . .