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Post by EdoBosnar on Oct 26, 2019 8:03:31 GMT -5
Deus IraePhilip K. Dick and Roger Zelazny (1976) Getting around to reading the last few novels by PKD that I still hadn't read; almost forgot about this one because I have an e-book edition on a flash drive that I hardly ever use. This novel is set in Utah in the far-flung future (the 1990s I think), in which the world has become a post-apocalyptic hellscape due to the unleashing of some kind of super-descructive weapon in 1982. There are some pockets of normality, like a small town called Charlottesville (kind of an ominous name, in retrospect), where some of the people, besides eking out a bare existence, engage in theological debates. The small numbers of remaining Christians are challenged by the adherents of a new religion, the Servants of Wrath, who worship the inventor of the aforementioned WMD, Carlton Lufteufel (German for 'air devil'), whom they call the 'God of Wrath' (hence the novel's title). A priest of the Servants hires a young armless and legless artist (who has cybernetic appendanges in lieu of arms) named Tibor McMasters to go on a pilgrimage to find Lufteufel (who's reportedly still alive and living somewhere nearby) so he can paint his portrait as he is now. So McMasters, who has to travel on a small cart pulled by a cow, heads off into the wilderness, filled with mutated creatures, including sentient, talking lizards, rodents and bugs, and other perils. Meanwhile, the town's Christians aren't too happy with the idea of their rivals having a new portrait of their god (for reasons that weren't entirely clear to me), and the local pastor asks one of his congregation, a rather sickly fellow named Pete Sands, to follow McMasters and keep an eye on him. I like both PKD and Zelazny as writers, but I was pretty lukewarm about this. I found the many theological discussions a bit tiresome to be honest. The encounters with the mutated animals in the wasteland were pretty amusing, though.
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Post by wildfire2099 on Oct 26, 2019 11:22:06 GMT -5
An Absolutely Remarkable Thing By Hank Green
I read alot of sci-fi.. especially old sci-fi. One of the main elements of sci fi (especially in it's heyday in the 50s and 60s) is teenage wish fufillment.
What wishes did teenagers have then? They wanted to be astronauts. Or spies. Or pirates. Alot of 90s sci fi the hero is all three... most often a youngish person that suddenly someone (usually the aliens, sometimes the secret goverment project) discovers is special, then they stop the bad guys and save the world.. usually getting the girl along the way.
I was watching Overlord (it's a 'trapped in the video game-type anime), and I realized that these teen wish fufillment stories are still the same, it's just the wishes that have changed.. instead of a secret agent space pirate, now teens want to be an all powerful character in a video game, or, as in this book, the want to be internet-famous.
I think my low rating of this book is a 'it's not you, it's me' sort of rating, I can picture lots of people liking it, I'm just not one of them.
There's a kernel of a great sci-fi story buried in the Carls, but it gets completely drowned out by April May, the main character who makes me afraid for the future of humanity.
I hope she's meant as a caution of Millenials gone wrong, but a quick scan of the reviews seems to indicate people like and relate to her. I could certainly document all the stupid, selfish things she does because being internet famous is more important to her than the future of humanity in the story, (starting, but not limited to, lying to the President on a matter of national security for no other reason than 'I want to do it and be the story'). By the end of the book I was feeling bad for her friends and happy the sci fi angle didn't go anywhere, but aliens that thought she was a good example of humanity probably aren't going to help us that much.
As far as the story goes, the Carls could be a really good first contact story, and there are some good elements, but the author doesn't even try to use them, they're basically just an excuse for April May to become famous. They didn't have to be aliens, they could have been anything.. a new video game, terrorists, publicity stunt, literally anything, and the story wouldn't have changed at all.
Which is too bad, because I'd have loved to hear this story from another perspective... say the goverment agent that was keeping tab on April, or just a 3rd person style... there could make things alot more interesting.
As it is, if you're into today's internet culture and follow a bunch of people on You Tube, you'll probably love it. Otherwise, it'll make you a little sad and feel like an old curmudgeon.
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Post by Duragizer on Oct 27, 2019 22:12:00 GMT -5
Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children (Ransom Riggs) The first three/four chapters hooked me in, but then ... I dunno. It certainly wasn't a poorly written novel, but it plateaued quickly and failed to retain my interest. Photos were a nice touch, though. 6/10
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Post by Deleted on Oct 28, 2019 10:14:27 GMT -5
One of my goals for Halloween was to sample one of Fritz Leiber's horror novels finally. I had been a fan of Leiber's sword and sorcery stuff since high school, but had never ventured into his horror work. I had picked up a couple over the years, but never got to any of them until now. I dipped in to it with Conjure Wife... an interesting twisted tale of witchcraft and campus politics. Well written with well developed characters, Leiber grounds his horror in folklore and anthropology giving it a sense of verisimilitude, making the horror all the more horrific and engrossing. -M
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Post by berkley on Oct 28, 2019 14:30:03 GMT -5
One of my goals for Halloween was to sample one of Fritz Leiber's horror novels finally. I had been a fan of Leiber's sword and sorcery stuff since high school, but had never ventured into his horror work. I had picked up a couple over the years, but never got to any of them until now. I dipped in to it with Conjure Wife... an interesting twisted tale of witchcraft and campus politics. Well written with well developed characters, Leiber grounds his horror in folklore and anthropology giving it a sense of verisimilitude, making the horror all the more horrific and engrossing. -M Yeah, a very good book that left me feeling it could have been even better, somehow, though I can't say exactly what I thought was missing, if anything. Maybe I just wanted a sequel.
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Post by wildfire2099 on Oct 29, 2019 12:54:46 GMT -5
The Con Man Ed McBain (87th Precinct #4)
This was my favorite one so far... recently revived 'star' detective Steve Carella (I love the afterwards about the series by the author almost as much as the book itself) is on the trailed of a floater, while Arthur Brown hunts the city for a con man.
The author does a great job here of having enough of Carella to satisfy the editors, but to really to expand the ensemble more. We get a focus on Det. Brown (who is the African American in the cast... McBain does love to mess with us about names), not to mention Steve's wife Teddy, who is a fantastic character. I can't help but picture her as a younger version of the actress that plays Joey Lucas in the West Wing.
He also did a pretty great job with the tattoo parlor guy Charlie Chen... a bit too much of the 50s 'oriental' stereotype for modern readers, but he turned out to be a very cool character that I hope comes back at some point.
Through 4 books, the goal of having the Precinct itself be the main character is doing pretty well.. I'll forgive the editors desire to have a 'face'.
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Post by Rob Allen on Oct 29, 2019 18:09:47 GMT -5
One of my goals for Halloween was to sample one of Fritz Leiber's horror novels finally. I had been a fan of Leiber's sword and sorcery stuff since high school, but had never ventured into his horror work. I had picked up a couple over the years, but never got to any of them until now. I dipped in to it with Conjure Wife... an interesting twisted tale of witchcraft and campus politics. Well written with well developed characters, Leiber grounds his horror in folklore and anthropology giving it a sense of verisimilitude, making the horror all the more horrific and engrossing. -M I have no idea how they arranged it, but Marvel published Conjure Wife in the first issue of their brief experiment with a digest-size prose magazine in 1973, some thirty years after the book was first published. That's where I first read the novel:
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Post by berkley on Oct 29, 2019 21:29:21 GMT -5
One of my goals for Halloween was to sample one of Fritz Leiber's horror novels finally. I had been a fan of Leiber's sword and sorcery stuff since high school, but had never ventured into his horror work. I had picked up a couple over the years, but never got to any of them until now. I dipped in to it with Conjure Wife... an interesting twisted tale of witchcraft and campus politics. Well written with well developed characters, Leiber grounds his horror in folklore and anthropology giving it a sense of verisimilitude, making the horror all the more horrific and engrossing. -M I have no idea how they arranged it, but Marvel published Conjure Wife in the first issue of their brief experiment with a digest-size prose magazine in 1973, some thirty years after the book was first published. That's where I first read the novel:
I don't remember seeing this on the stands back in the day and I've never been able to find a reasonably priced used copy of it. Where was it displayed, with the comics digests, Archie and things like that? Were there any illustrations inside?
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Post by EdoBosnar on Oct 30, 2019 5:16:31 GMT -5
I have no idea how they arranged it, but Marvel published Conjure Wife in the first issue of their brief experiment with a digest-size prose magazine in 1973, some thirty years after the book was first published. That's where I first read the novel:
I don't remember seeing this on the stands back in the day and I've never been able to find a reasonably priced used copy of it. Where was it displayed, with the comics digests, Archie and things like that? Were there any illustrations inside?
Actually, Conjure Wife was serialized, so the concluding part appeared in the second, and final, issue:
I have both of them, purchased from an online dealer (Graham Holroyd, I think) about 5-6 years ago at a pretty reasonable price, $6/7 each or something like that. But yeah, I see that now they're harder to find at a such a low cost. And yes, they are quite nicely illustrated. Here's the opening pages of Conjure Wife:
And there are also stand-alone illustrations, like this one from Freas:
And even double splash-pages, like this one from Simsonson:
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Post by Rob Allen on Oct 30, 2019 10:40:03 GMT -5
I don't remember seeing this on the stands back in the day and I've never been able to find a reasonably priced used copy of it. Where was it displayed, with the comics digests, Archie and things like that? Were there any illustrations inside?
Edo's already shown us some of the illos (thanks Edo!). I recall that the magazine was on the stands next to the sf and mystery digests - Analog, F&SF, Galaxy, Amazing, Fantastic, Ellery Queen, Alfred Hitchcock, Mike Shayne, et al.
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Post by wildfire2099 on Nov 1, 2019 21:39:25 GMT -5
The Drifter Detective by Garnett Elliott
<Just wanted to point out I love this thread... I never would have even knew this existed without Slam's recommendation>
Had a night time road trip tonight, so I broke out the sort-of kindle for this one... I think I liked Elliotts sci fi better than the PI story. Jack Laramie reminded me very much of a poor man's Jack Reacher. There was a 'modern western' kinda twist on it (modern being the 50s I think? The setting is definitely much closer to WWII than we are now. the cars indicated late 50s, but it was a hick town, so it could have been a bit later).
The bonus story 'fighting chance' was a story about a boxer trying to break away from the mob which was quite good.. perhaps better than the feature.
I think this is the case with all kindle ebooks, but I found it very annoying that it says it's 103 pages, when at least 20 of those pages are ads, and they could all the stuff at the beginning of the book as well.. it was really only about an hour's read.
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Post by wildfire2099 on Nov 2, 2019 17:17:40 GMT -5
First on the Moon Jeff Sutton This is Jeff Sutton's first book, and unlike the later one I've read, Apollo at Go, which is a very hard sci-fi vision of the first Moon Landing, this one is more of a cold war adventure. The main Character, Adam Crag, is one of three alternates to go on the first moon mission, and gets thrust into the command chair when the other two are assassinated by Russian agents. The rocket get off the ground, but so do the Russians,and whoever gets a base set up first gets to claim the moon as their own. Sutton pictured atomic rockets, that were just about read to go, but the staged rockets of the time had to go first to get there before the Russians could. There is lots of spy stuff, and an actual battle on the moon between the two crews, and nuclear missiles shot at the landed ships. While realism was definitely sacrificed for adventure, it is definitely a fun book, especially if your a fan of cold war era fiction with evil Russians.
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Post by Slam_Bradley on Nov 2, 2019 21:49:26 GMT -5
The Drifter Detective by Garnett Elliott <Just wanted to point out I love this thread... I never would have even knew this existed without Slam's recommendation> Had a night time road trip tonight, so I broke out the sort-of kindle for this one... I think I liked Elliotts sci fi better than the PI story. Jack Laramie reminded me very much of a poor man's Jack Reacher. There was a 'modern western' kinda twist on it (modern being the 50s I think? The setting is definitely much closer to WWII than we are now. the cars indicated late 50s, but it was a hick town, so it could have been a bit later). The bonus story 'fighting chance' was a story about a boxer trying to break away from the mob which was quite good.. perhaps better than the feature. I think this is the case with all kindle ebooks, but I found it very annoying that it says it's 103 pages, when at least 20 of those pages are ads, and they could all the stuff at the beginning of the book as well.. it was really only about an hour's read. I, on the other hand, much prefer Elliott's other work to his SF. My favorite of his is Scorched Noir which is a sizzling short story collection. Close after that is Dragon by the Bay which is a rousing martial arts western fantasy adventure. I've never read Jack Reacher so I got nothing there. Jack Laramie is a WWII vet. A former POW and gunner on a bomber. It's set in the late 40s or very early 50s. Sorry you weren't as happy with it as I was.
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Post by wildfire2099 on Nov 2, 2019 22:08:07 GMT -5
It's not that it was bad, just not as good as I was hoping. Jack Reacher is a former MP that just sorta wanderers around the country and accidently solves mysteries for people. It's set in the current time, but there's alot of character similarities.
I think next time I have cause to grab a kindle book I might try Dragon by the Bay... that sounded really fun, and I really liked the 2 sci fi ones.
I also learned that Amazon sells 'short story megapacks' by just about everyone that's ever written a short story, and most are .99 or 1.99. I grabbed a Frederic Brown one at the same time as I got this.. really good value for my .99.
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Post by Slam_Bradley on Nov 2, 2019 22:12:23 GMT -5
Redheads Die Quickly and Other Stories: Expanded Edition by Gil BrewerStark House gives us an expanded edition of its collection of Gil Brewer short stories. And thank them so much for it. Brewer was one of the great writers of paperback noir originals. But he's been mostly and afterthought since before his death. Most of these stories haven't been reprinted since they were published in the 50s and 60s. And since that was beyond the heyday of short crime fiction they didn't get a huge reception at the time. Almost as important as the stories we get a short but interesting look at Brewer, the man and the author. And we find out why he was writing short stories (in a market that was pretty much Ellery Queen Magazine and little else) when he had been one of the premier writers of paperback originals just a few years before. The stories themselves are uniformly very readable. But they probably read better spread out one or two a night. In almost every one there are a man, a woman and a third man or woman depending on the story. Brewer was not a writer of detective fiction (there's only one detective story in the book). Given that the few digests publishing these types of stories emphasized detective fiction it's a testament to Brewer's strength as a writer that his pure noir stories were finding a home. I'm not saying that the stories are overly same-y. But there's a formula and Brewer was writing what he was comfortable writing. So parcel them out instead of plowing through and you'll get a much better read.
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