Science Fiction / Fantasy

[Steph]

Science Fiction / Fantasy

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Welcome to the whole universe!  This is where we gather to share our experiences in science fiction and fantasy.  We like everything, from Gregory Benford to Stephanie Meyer—hard science to magic and fantasy. Come in, sit down with us, and tell us what you are reading or have read, what you like or dislike.

Links: Fantastic Fiction, bibliographies of 15,000 authors

Discussion Leader:  PatH

Was in Barnes and Noble on Saturday.Found two more of the AAbramovich  (spelling weird) books.. I really liked him, so got them both.

[PatH]

What's he like, Steph?

[Steph]

A very odd mixture of science fiction, fantasy and mystery.. Our hero is a magician in the making.. Sort of an apprentice. He works in the police department in London in a special division. He is a regular policeman as well, so he investigates mysterious deaths. You are plunged into a first person book . He worries about doing too much magic ( leads to a stroke and death, he has been told), investigates, his partner ( female) has somehow lost her face and wears a mask. All in all, I am enjoying him.

[Frybabe]

I'm currently reading The Lost Stars: Tarnished Knight by Jack Campbell. It is a "spin-off" of his The Lost Fleet series seen from the side of former Syndics who break away from the Syndicate Worlds after their defeat at the hands of the Alliance Worlds. So far, I can say that is isn't the not to be put down read that The Lost Fleet series (original) was.

Recently finished, Halo: Silentium, the third and last of the Forerunner saga. It was a bit confusing in some spots because I had forgotten the sequence of some of the events referred to happened in the two earlier books. Also, I still don't grasp exactly were "the Flood" originated. It also left a gap in events between it and the introduction of the Flood in the regular Halo series. Neither book explains how the Flood got onto the ring world that escaped in Silentium.  Nor do they explain how the Flood got confined to the underground workings of the ring world and what eventually happened to the evacuees (although I can guess) before it is discovered in the second Halo book with the exception of 343 Guilty Spark (AI with integrated human memories).

[PatH]

I agree with you about The Lost Stars, Frybabe; I started it and put it down.  some of these characters are reappearing in the Geary series, and I suspect they will become more important later.  I don't think politics is Campbell's strong point, though.

[Frybabe]

I had hoped to read The Lost Fleet: Beyond the Frontier: Dreadnaught rather than The Lost Stars: Tarnished Knight but my library seems to have lost the only volume they had. I don't know if they will replace it.

I am still deciding whether or not to read Jack McDevitt's Priscilla Hutchins series. And, I am still searching the Amazon Lending Library for my May read. I am leaning towards Devil in the White City for my next library checkout, but there are others on my list that may yet pop to the top (including Night Circus and Mighty Fitz.

Do we have another book scheduled for May discussion? I forget.

[Scottieluvr]

I'm about 50 pages into "The Difference Engine", its a descriptive read that's for sure. But I'm enjoying it so far.

[PatH]

It'll be a while before I can compare notes with you on The Difference Engine; it has 4 or 5 titles ahead of it in line.

[PatH]

Pamela, I don't know if you're familiar with Jack Campbell, just mentioned by Frybabe and me.  His books are good quality space opera/military sci-fi.  Their strength is a lot of really good sea battles (Campbell is a retired navy officer) which are fought in 3 dimensions by fleets of space ships.  The story line is good too.  The protagonist has been revived from 100 years of frozen sleep in a lost escape pod to find that he is the legendary hero from the start of the now old galactic war.  Plus he is now in command of a fleet stuck in the middle of enemy territory, trying to get them safely home.

They absolutely have to be read in order, or they won't make sense.  The first one is Dauntless.  They're all named after ships in the fleet.  Characterization isn't his strong point, and he tends to repeat explanations too much, but the books are good reads.  I'll fight my way across the galaxy with him any time.

Some of Campbell's other series aren't as good--Stark's War, for instance.

[Steph]

As much as I adore Fantasy and alternate worlds, don't like the Space battles very much..

[PatH]

One of the strengths of sci-fi is it's variety.  I don't think non-fans quite realize how many flavors there are.  In general, I don't read military fiction, but for some reason I love sea battles.  I've read all of Patrick O'Brian's Master and Commander series, which abounds in sea battles, many lifted from actual historical ones.

[Steph]

I like Miles and that series.. and generally do not like battles, but for some reason the Vorsegian series is interesting to me.

[Scottieluvr]

I am still plowing through "The Difference Engine". Its an enjoyable premise but feels too detailed. Its another book I have to put down for a moment before continuing on.

[Frybabe]

I am about three quarters of the way through The Lost Fleet: Beyond the Frontier: Dreadnaught. I am glad that I read The Lost Stars: Tarnished Knight first otherwise I would not have paid much attention to the references to Drakon, Rogero and Iceni.

So the Fleet went back through the Midway star system before the inhabitants threw off the Syndic government yoke. It will be interesting to see if the Fleet gets back to Midway in the future and how the romance between the Syndic and Alliance officer plays out. I am not too interested in the Enigma race turning out to be aquatic, though. S.L. Vhiel did a series featuring an aquatic race, but I didn't bother reading it. I think there a several others who have explored that avenue also.

My library has the Wool Omnibus already, but there is a waiting line for the only book they list.

[PatH]

I read enough of Tarnished Knight to help make sense of the Midway politics.  What is Rione up to, though?  Or Jane Geary, for that matter?  I want to hear your comment when you finish the book.

I'm amused at Campbell's solution to the language problem of all these different peoples.  He ignores it; everyone speaks the same language--unlikely  when they have been scattered for so long.  I'm not complaining; you have to simplify some aspect or other of space travel, or your story gets cumbersome.

[Frybabe]

Still don't know what Rione is up to except that she, like the others, was probably sent on the mission in the hopes that no one would come back. Jane Geary has probably decided she needs to show that she is a Geary. Remember she was assigned a battleship command because she was not deemed aggressive enough to command a battle cruiser.

The language thing. Hmmm. I don't recall that they actually broke deciphered any of the languages. The Enigma race apparently deciphered enough of human language to use a rather simple and repeated message. You would think they could have done better than that having held humans hostage for so many years.

I recently finished a book I borrowed from Kindle Lending Library called Into the Black by Erik Currie (I think). Their solution to the language problem was: 1) they had a linguist on board who had phenomenal linguistic skills, 2) the computer software that the linguist devised to find and parse patterns, etc., 3) language translation software built into the armor/environmental suits that were tied into the computer programming. What foresight the designers of the program that sent this first spaceship able to travel through intergalactic space in a reasonable time period, especially considering they wouldn't have known if they would actually meet an alien culture. But then we are such optimists and planners for even slight contingencies. By the way, it was a pretty good book.

Now comes the big debate, what to read next. I am probably not going to finish Devil in the White City. While certainly interesting, it is more information that I care for regarding the Expo. Very little, so far, about the serial killer. My sister has just bought the book, so when she is done I may borrow it from her. It's not a book I care to plaugh right through. Interesting, but not a page turner.

[PatH]

I meant language among the humans.  They all can just talk to anyone from anywhere without difficulty.

[Frybabe]

You mean like dialects and deviations because of not having contact with each other for long stretches, Pat? Into the Black deals with that rather easily with the linguist and his software. The dialects and speech patterns, slang, etc. between planets necessitated another tweaking of the software. The alien bugs were more difficult, but they could pick out patterns in association with some actions patterns. Jack Campbell doesn't seem to have thought of that in his series.

[PatH]

Last week’s f2f sci-fi book was Kim Stanley Robinson’s Red Mars.  This tells the story of the colonization of Mars, first by a group of 100 scientists, then by many more.  It deals both with the technical and practical aspects of how to set up the colony, and with the personal interactions of the first group, and their division into politicized factions, which interact with the various power groups back on Earth.

There is a lot of science in it; everything they do is explained thoroughly and convincingly.  But unlike many hard science books, the characters are also fully developed.  It’s told switching around among the points of view of some of them, so you see how they feel about themselves versus what others think they are up to.

You have to work hard as a reader, though.  There are a lot of characters to keep straight.  The conflicting policies and who is for which one are complex.  Things make more sense if you keep track of the geography of Mars (there’s a map) so you know what’s happening where.  And it’s long, 450 pages in my copy.  I didn’t quite finish it in time for the discussion—ran out of time, but by then you could see where it was going.  I was also a little depressed by the political situation, things being bad both on Earth and Mars, with no end in sight except setting us up for the sequels.

It is a good job.  If you’re in the mood for that flavor of sci-fi, it would be a good bet.

[Frybabe]

I am a little more than half way through The Lost Fleet: Beyond the Frontier: Invincible. Oddly, I don't find it quite as compelling as the previous books. When I read about the "teddy bear" aliens and their planetoid defense system, I thought of Star Wars. However, they aren't the friendly furries that the Ewoks are. The spider aliens and their thought/communication processes as well as, and especially, the structural framework in which they live is quite interesting. I kind of hope I see a little more of them. The duct tape episodes are funny. Imagine duct tape in space, centuries from now, still holding things together. At the moment, I cannot figure out what it is that makes the book slightly less appealing than the others.

[Steph]

I read part, not all of the Red Mars.. Very difficult to keep people straight.

[PatH]

I read part, not all of the Red Mars.. Very difficult to keep people straight.

I'm not the only one then--both not to finish and not to keep the characters straight.

[Steph]

Every once in a while, I find a book that simply has too many characters and not enough division to figure it out. I refuse to keep a list any more.. So, I just write it off.

[Frybabe]

I take it the political intrigues and manipulations in Red Mars would put Victoria Rione (Lost Fleet) to shame. I am not sure I would have the patience for a book like this anymore. And to think, there are three of them.

[Steph]

I seem to like fantasy the most in this genre.. Alternate worlds also interest me and TerryPratchett, who can make me laugh and laugh.

[PatH]

I seem to like fantasy the most in this genre.. Alternate worlds also interest me and TerryPratchett, who can make me laugh and laugh.

Pratchett is absolutely the funniest author I know of.  I wish there were more like him.

Frybabe, the politics in Red Mars has several components.  There are factions among the original colonists about how to develop the planet--keep the original ecology intact, terraform as rapidly as possible, or intermediate.  There's a lot of Earth politics, who gets sent up to Mars, national power struggles.  And both places there are individuals struggling for power.  The book opens with one of the characters murdering another for power; this actually happens half-way through the book.

[Frybabe]

It sounds like something a political thriller reader would like. I assume this is what the Mars series is primarily. I don't think I could stand three volumes of it.

[PatH]

I'm not going to stand three volumes either, not even finish the first.  One advantage of my f2f club is that someone will have read the rest of the series, and can tell you where it's going to go.

[Steph]

I loved that statement f2f club always has someone who has read the whole series. That is what I need on some authors..

[PatH]

I loved that statement f2f club always has someone who has read the whole series. That is what I need on some authors..

It's been very useful.  They've saved me a lot of grief.

[PatH]

I just spent a week in Portland, OR, visiting my children and grandchildren.  My SIL Matt sees it as his duty to fill in my movie experience, take me to any movie showing that I haven't seen but would like to.  In return, I'll go with him to any movie he would like to see but is too scary, violent, or otherwise uninteresting to my daughter for her to see with him (but that I'm OK with).

I really cashed in this time.  The second of the new Star Trek series is in the theaters.  I hadn't even seen the first one, so Matt watched it with me on his super home setup, then took me to see the second.

Perhaps all the fans of the original series have already seen these, but if not, I recommend them.  They have done what Matt calls rebooting the original series, starting over with Kirk going to the Space Academy, meeting Spock and Uhura, getting (and losing and getting again) command of the Enterprise, and on to adventures.  I think they did an awfully good job of getting things right.  As a Trek fan, I'm not upset by the changes they've made; they've kept the spirit of the original.  Casting is really good.  Kirk is just the sort of daredevil young kid spoiling for a fight that he should be at this age (he's still a teenager at the end of the second movie).  Nobody can be Leonard Nimoy, but Spock comes across very well; it's a slightly different take on the character.  The other old faithfuls are good too.

The plots are OK.  The first movie is kind of ragged; they're revisiting the past, and putting in an odd time loop sequence to set things up for the future, and the plot suffers.  The second is more coherent, could stand on its own.  We meet an old villain, Khan (The Wrath of Khan) shown in a different way.  Both movies are full of violence, and very improbable battles, but  the gore is bearable.  And both hold your interest the whole time.  They should be seen in order.

[Frybabe]

I haven't seen either one yet PatH. My sister really liked #2. I don't remember what she thought of #1.

BTW, with all of the Jack Campbell Lost Fleet series I've been reading, it should not have come as a surprise that NASA and others are working on a real "space dive" suit (and I thought that jump a while back was some glory seeker) and there is a company already in business looking specifically to do asteroid mining (forget the name).

[Steph]

I watched the first of the reboot of Star Trek in 2009.. It was actually the last movie, that my husband and I saw.. We were in Portland,Oregon and it poured the entire day. We had been trying to go to the gardens, etc, but finally gave it up, checked into a motel and went to the movie instead. A funny sweet day, now very bittersweet. I have been avoiding the second one because of this, but I will try to see it sooner or later.

[PatH]

Bittersweet indeed.  I don't know if I would be able to tackle the second movie after that.

It almost always rains all day in Portland, but I did find a clear time to go to the Japanese Garden--my favorite.  My 20 month old granddaughter turns out to be an enthusiastic koi spotter.

[ANNIE]

PatH,
Ella and I led a discussion on "Devil in the White City" several years ago and all of ours posters seemed to really enjoy this non-fiction story.  I wouldn't miss it if I were you.  The discussion should still available in our Archives.  The author wrote another book about Times Square which I just couldn't get into.

[Steph]

We did go to the Japanese Garden in the rain and I have pictures of both of us. MDH was a confirmed Bonsai fanatic and he adored it, rain and all.

[Frybabe]

I've put aside my reading of the first Rho Project series book, The Second Ship, to continue Wool. I read the first book in the serial as a freebie from Amazon. Now I have the omnibus with all five from the library. Wool is one of those increasingly popular "serial" books where the author releases a series of "episodes", from several chapters in length to novella size, one at a time as an ebook. After the serial is complete, they often bundle them together into a print book. It kind of reminds me of the old books (like The Moonstone) that were originally published in magazines in serial form.

[Steph]

I need to investigate this Wool, since I keep hearing about it.

[Frybabe]

So far it is quite interesting, Steph. It is one of those, what are the called, dystopian? stories. It is about life in a "silo" where people are living because the atmosphere on the surface has become too toxic from wars and environmental depredations. Anyone who volunteers or gets volunteered to go outside to clean the only windows they have to see out is on a suicide mission.  Births are strictly controlled, one birth for one death so as not to overwhelm the limited habitat. Everyone is aware that it may take generations, if at all, for anyone to be able to live on the surface again. The goal is to keep things going until then. So far, the series has a hopeful feel to it, not heavy or depressing like some. So far, no major conflicts, although I see a potential one coming soon. The first section in the series is from the prospective of the sheriff, the second on is seen through the eyes of the mayor. I think you can still get the first ebook segment free for Kindle.

[Steph]

Since I am on my IPAD until my lap top is fixed, I will wait a bit before working on more stories.