The Hugo Death Sentence

I recently mentioned that I have backed off my original goal for finishing the Hugos.  I also thought I might have a better idea of how far off I am.

It took me nine weeks to read Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norell.  It was an extraordinarily long book, but it wasn't nine weeks long.  While I was reading it, I was also studying for the GRE and I may have watched an episode or two, or a season, of Downton Abbey when I wasn't jamming books in my face.  

Now I have found myself back in school, still working, still a dad, and with just over a handful of Hugo's left, some of them being nearly as ridiculously long as Jonathan Strange.  That is to say, I've taken too long to finish the Hugo's and now I'll have more reading with more urgent deadlines and all of my usual things to do and a lot less time to fit the Hugo's in.

I had originally envisioned that I would go back to this year, but I had also thought I would be done with the Hugos by then.  Ha!

So, how do I now approach these final Hugos?

Well, to start, I should explain that I am a slow reader, or I should say that I am a careful reader.  I read and re-read passages that are confusing, enlightening, awkward, or just rad.  I stop and think.  I drink a little wine.  I figure reading a novel should be taken seriously and approached with the same gravitas that any thousands of years old craft deserves (kind of makes you wonder why I started this challenge right?)  Okay, sometimes I read while Emmeline watches Powerpuff Girls or My Little Pony, but when I can, I like to have all my things arranged and I like to dig in.  This challenge aside, I take forever to read even the shortest books and I like it that way.

When I started this challenge, I finished each book with days to spare.  I was psyched, the books were shorter, I was staying up until all hours of the night and operating during the day on a tiny, coffee fueled replacement brain.  Since then the books have grown longer, I've taken on more commitments, staying up past midnight has become a death sentence, my brain is real (and still tiny) and I've had trouble getting through any book in under two weeks.  Erg.

With that in mind, my first thought was to just finish them out via audiobook, because it's possible that I could end up reading these until the end of time, but that's out because they aren't all available at my library.  Also, apart being a little disappointed about not meeting my self-imposed goal, I'm not terribly depressed about the idea of continuing this for a little longer.

I don't know yet how easy it will be to balance my required reading and my Hugo reading, but with just few to go, I don' t imagine it will take me more than a few more months.  I might take a while to finish the longer books and my posts might be a little irregular for the first few weeks, but hopefully I'll get into a groove soon and everything in the entire world will be perfect.  Let's plan on that.

And if all else fails, instead of "64 books in 64 weeks", The Hugo Endurance Project will just have to mean that I'm "reading books to death".  It might be a confusing goal at first but I assume the autopsy will clear it right up.

The End of Everything

As we all know, I am the worst at things.

This blog was meant to chronicle my time spent training for my first marathon while at the same time reading through every Hugo Award winning novel in as many weeks as there are winners, or the other way around.  Being that there are 64 Hugo winners, including the retros, this meant that had I stayed on schedule the entire time, I would have finished reading every Hugo novel ever, yesterday.  Anyone keeping track (to my knowledge this is just me, and that is only sometimes), knows that this has not happened.  In fact, I still have yet to finish eight more Hugo's.

Books like Cyteen, Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norell, and the Mars Trilogy, combined with a ton of really poor excuses (which I'm going to lean pretty heavily on anyway) to pretty seriously delay progress at several points over the last few months and even though I'm so near the end, I know that I have a couple of whammies that could still make my life difficult.

At the same time, listening to audiobooks more than I ever thought I would, has also allowed me to make some good time when I otherwise would not have been able to.  Currently, I've started, and found many excuses not to dig into, Paladin of Souls and I'm also about two-thirds through American Gods audiobook.

Continuing progress notwithstanding, I have obviously failed meeting my reading goal for this challenge.

The silver lining here is that there are about two maybe three people actually reading anything I write here, and fewer people who care, so I'm thinking no one will really hold it over my head and I can just keep chugging until I get there.  Except for myself.  You know I'm going to lord it over myself every chance I get.

So, I'm hoping that, if I haven't upset the SF gods too much, I will have an amended goal within the next few days.  I should be telling you all how disappointed I am, I am I assure you, but the writing has been on the wall since somewhere around week two, so I've had some time to come to terms with my inadequacies (see first sentence).  In terms of the stages of grief, I'm well into Shoving Down Emotions and Proceeding as if Everything is Fine (probably because of all the "handshakefullness" workshops I've been attending).

Light up the comments if you'd like.  I deserve it.  But know that I'm still going strong, just slower.  And to those of you who have been around since the early days AND to those of you who continue to leave comments and encouragement: THANKS AND PLEASE STICK AROUND!

Oh, and if you see my wife around, remind her how patient and forgiving she is :-)

Gross, Hagrid

I finished listening to Harry Potter today.  Jim Dale is so much fun.  Of course I have several other reviews to write before I can get around to reviewing it, but I wanted to take a moment now to have some fun with it anyway.  You see, one of the worst things about the book is that Rowling completely fails to capitalize on the year when Harry and Ron start to notice girls and well, Hermione’s feelings are pretty much non-existent.

I refuse to miss out on all the magical teenage anguish that must have been floating around Hogwarts, so I did my very best to remove a few quotes as far from their context as possible and imagine that Rowling was actually giving us closely guarded hints at how being a teenage witch or wizard might really have been with so many students and so few teachers.

Let’s ease into this.  What exactly did Harry have in mind, I wonder:

And as the vela danced faster and faster, wild, half-formed thoughts started chasing through Harry’s dazed mind.  He wanted to do something very impressive, right now.

Harry’s dirty thinking - Chapter 8

This makes me uncomfortable for so many reasons:

“Nice socks, Potter.”  Moody growled as he passed, his magical eye staring through Harry’s robes.

Mad-Eye Moody to Harry - Chapter 23

I always figured Hagrid for a despicable old half-giant, but this is just obscene:

“Big bones…I’ll give her big bones.”

Harry, Ron, and Hermione looked at one another nervously…

Hagrid to the Gang - Chapter 24

Never, ever, say prod:

(his voice was so quiet now, Harry leaned closer to listen) “if I can help at all…a prod in the right direction…I’ve taken a liking to you…”

Ludo Bagman to Harry - Chapter 24

Everything about this next one is filthy, but then her name is Moaning Myrtle after all:

“Oooh, very good,” she said, her thick glasses twinkling, “it took Diggory much longer than that!  And that was with her awake too”

Moaning Myrtle to Harry - Chapter 25

I’d venture to guess this is illegal for several reasons, but what do I know about Wizarding Law (also this is not actually funny):

Ron was tied between Hermione and Cho Chang.  There was also a girl who looked no older than eight…All four of them appeared to be in a very deep sleep.

Chapter 26

I can’t tell if it’s the “master” or the “winky” that makes this sound wrong:

“Master is needing his…Winky!”

Winky to Hermione - Chapter 28

I actually look forward to reviewing this book, and I hope to get around to soon.  Until then, which was the least appropriate?

The Brother from Another Planet

I am both disappointed and excited about this post.  The disappointment is the result of the end of the 2013 Sci-Fi Experience.  I had very high hopes for this year.  In particular I wanted focus on expanding my participation this year to film/television in addition to my Hugos (they are mine).  In fact I did that and more.  As a result of Carl’s delightful non-challenge (we are teaching Emmeline to say “delightful!”) I read part 1 of the graphic novel Akira by Katsuhiro Otomo, made a return to the delightful concept album Deltron 3030 (and actual posted briefly, but I’m not sure if it counts), finally began to wade into Star Trek: The Original Series (5 or so episodes written by Hugo winners or other SF writers), and I also watched the delightful film from the 1980’s, The Brother from Another Planet - the topic of today’s post.  I’m also disappointed that I wasn’t able to write about more of these experiences so, on this last day of the non-challenge, I am tearing myself from studying for the delightful Graduate Record Examination to sneak one last review in before the closing bell.

Stats

The Brother from Another Planet (1984) – Rated R

Dir. by John Sayles

Starring Joe Morton, Daryl Edwards

109m

After Joe Morton (The Brother) escapes his home planet, where he was a slave, he crash-lands his horrible shaky light-up cardboard box delightful spaceship in New York Harbor.  Luckily for him, he passes for human as no one ever seems to notice his feet.  Aside from a few really hairy moments and his inability to speak, his assimilation is unbelievably rather uncomplicated.  Shortly after his arrival in NY however, we also learn he is being pursued by two ridiculous men dressed in black.

The Brother from Another Planet is about outsiders, featuring outsiders.  It isn’t a pretty film.  It’s dark and grainy, and the sound, lighting, and effects can be a bit wonky at times.  Nevertheless, it was precisely those elements that made it feel all the more serious at times.    

The Brother From another Planet vacillates between biting social criticism and hilarious parody.  The film plays with and goofs on traditional alien tropes but in a way that is but can be dead serious too.  “The Brother” as the speechless alien trying to interpret some of the most inexplicable phenomena that make up the modern human experience provides plenty of laughs but other times strips our social conventions to the bone with just a look.  He comes to earth and though he’s certainly the outsider, he understands so much in his wordless yet hyper-expressive way.  Morton is well worth the watch (and stay for the delightful scene featuring Fisher Stevens).

I’d like to say more, but it’s late, I’m tired, and it’s almost March.  Please check out this vastly under-appreciated, delightful film.  It’s on Netflix Instant so make it happen.

Oh, and if you were wondering: 8 times.

"Employ Political Moral Offsets"

I've been such a lazy blogger lately...and I don't have much for you right now either so I'll just leave a brief note:

Orson Scott Card has been getting a lot of attention of late.  Between the Marvel hire and forthcoming adaptation of Ender's Game, there are a lot of people asking whether it is a moral question to consume the work of an artist committed to .  I'll offer my thoughts by way of weighing-in on Alyssa's recent post in which offers several suggestions as to whether and how to watch a movie based on the work of a vocal and committed anti-gay activist.

Alyssa proffers 4 choices for people who loved the book and desperately want to see the movie but don't want to support a man with intolerable political views even indirectly.  Here was the choice most salient to me:

2. Employ political moral offsets: If Card has points on the back end, the percentage of the purchase price of your movie ticket that goes to him will still be relatively low. But even so, offset that financial contribution to his well-being with a political contribution to an organization that fights precisely the kind of hatred that Card supports. As a ballpark, I’d suggest twice the price of your ticket purchase to Freedom to Marry, an exceedingly canny organization that does all sorts of wonderful marriage equality work. The Gay And Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation, which does a lot of media work, including publishing the excellent television census of LGBT characters, the Network Responsibility Index, is also a great candidate for donations.

In all likelihood, I won't see it in theaters but if I do, I'm taking Alyssa's advice and making an equal or greater contribution that will help fight hatred.  I hope everyone else who chooses to see this film will too.

Hyperion

First some housekeeping:

I didn’t realize until the other night that I’ve overshot my one year anniversary of beginning this challenge.  Go me!  I feel like I have learned the true meaning of the words bleary-eyed, but overall it has been too much fun and I really appreciate the conversations and support.  It means a lot.  That being said, I’m not going to succeed.

On time, I mean ;-)

I’ve really been working hard to catch up and I’m about a couple days’ worth of reading from doing just that!  But when I look at some of the behemoths that I’ll be up against in the remaining eleven weeks, I just don’t see how I can manage.  I think I’ve mentioned, I read novels pretty slow.  I don’t like zooming through them.  It disagrees with me when I do.  Plus I really need to start studying for the GRE and also DO EVERYTHING ELSE.

So while I won’t have any problem finishing off the Hugo’s, I won’t do it in the heretofore promised 64 weeks (and hey Blackout/All Clear is really two books anyway so I should have made that 65 weeks).  I hope you’re not too disappointed and that you don’t all hate me for it, but if you do, well…let me think how to put this.

Too bad.

#########

Stats

Hyperion by Dan Simmons

1990 Hugo Award Winner

A multi-voice narration

Got it from: Public Library

20h 58m

Told in the fashion of The Canterbury Tales or The Decameron, eight travelers have been sent on a pilgrimage by The Church of the Final Atonement, to visit the Shrike, a terrible, world-ending, creature of destruction.  Each pilgrim sets to telling the others their tale in the dual hope of passing the time and trying to uncover how to defeat the Shrike.  The collected stories are nothing short of fabulous.

What I (didn’t) like

The universe Simmons has created in Hyperion is the bomb-diggity.  But somehow, the total work of art never came together for me.  The shrike, the time tombs, the ouster/hegemony/Technocore dynamic – THE CYBRID! – were all remarkable, at least intellectually.  The way that Simmons reveals, in pieces, the full dynamic of Hyperion’s universe represents some really skillful world-building.  Thinking back on it all now, it sounds like serious good stuff, and yet as I was actually listening to Hyperion, I just couldn’t force myself to give a crap at any given moment whether my stereo blew up and I never had a chance to finish the book (blasphemy!!!).

I know, it’s just not right.  In addition to all of the above, Hyperion was also a theological SF/modern lit lover’s heaven.  It recalled to me some of those really great theological Hugo winners of the past: A Canticle for Leibowitz, A Case of Conscience, even some notes of Zelazny’s Lord of Light (I think of these as the “Big Three” of the theological Hugo’s…so good).  Erg…this alone should have been enough to push Hyperion over the top in my usual estimation.

Well actually, Martin Silenus alone came pretty close; not only was “The Poet’s Tale” JUST RIDONKS, but it stands as probably the best and most comprehensive inclusion of poetry (and modern literature) in SF of any of the previous Hugo Winners (and based on what I know of the remaining 12 or 13 I have left, will probably remain that way.  “The Poet’s Tale” was also one of the best readings of the many really superb actors involved in Brilliance Audio’s audiobook.

Geez, you have got to listen to the telling of Silenus losing his vocabulary.  Literally, spit-take funny and oh so gloriously vulgar.

Alas, any one tale independently just didn’t do it for me.  All that coolness, and it somehow just never gelled.  Maybe I was preoccupied.  Maybe I’m a bonehead.  I think it was simply that I was just so completely absorbed with each story that I was never able to string them together in my mind very well.  The arcs of each story swung so wildly and ended so abruptly that they all somehow remained compartmentalized for me – which is complete baloney because NONE of the stories are self-contained.  My idiocy is inexcusable and now the world knows it.

I should end this with a clearer statement.  I loved this book.  Simmons writes and creates his world unforgettably (and the audiobook was read with fabulous passion by everyone involved), the tech is minimal…BUT FANTASTIC (I hope someone has already started work on cybrids – scientists, I’m looking at you), and his use of poetry, religion, mysticism, and literature creates a novel that is both terrifically dark and hysterically funny.  I will read The Fall of Hyperion.  But for whatever the reason, I just didn’t feel like the end result was greater than the sum of its parts.

You may commence the tomato pelting.

Recommendation

Hyperion has made a lot of lists and won both the Hugo and Locus SF awards.  The pilgrim’s tales are each fascinating and I found myself disappointed when some of them ended.  I suspect that I’ll (retroactively) care more about the universe and the broader political and social aspects that were limited to the periphery in Hyperion when I get to The Fall of Hyperion.  I’m really on the verge of saying that after 50 or so Hugo’s under my belt, Hyperion is one of the most beautiful and smart yet.  But I don’t think I’m quite ready for that kind of commitment yet…

HEP SCORE

Universe 3/5

Social/Political Climate 3/5

Dialogue 5/5

Scientific Wonders 4/5

Characters 5/5

Overall 20/25

In addition to my ongoing quest to read every Hugo Award winner, I also read this book as part of the 2013 Science Fiction Experience.  Check it out.

I Forget Things

1980's

If you have ever read any one of my posts, you know I forget things a lot.  I forget to type words, or talk about something I really meant to.  I do it a lot I think.  I forget how many times :-)

ANYWAY, after my 80's wrap-up, L asked me today if I've noticed any trends throughout the decades.  This is exactly the question I had hoped to get some insight into through the word cloud I post at the end of each decade.  In the previous decades, I've been pretty upset with myself for all the garbage I continuously spew.  This time around I saw the same damn words popping up and decided to look at a list of words with totals.  I was a little happier after that, and probably finally gained that insight I was looking for.

When I saw the list I saw quite a bit more conceptual language, but there were so many different words that the totals ended up low.  Too low to tip the scales when I use words like 'book' over a hundred times in one decade.

Which brings me to my first point: I write like a moron.  There's no getting around it, despite what I might say in the following paragraphs.  It's really a wonder that I'm able to communicate with members of my own species at all.  I'm not sure how many times I expected to use words like gender or hierarchical without sounding like I'm writing for Bitch Magazine or trying to get extra credit in PHI 100.

1970's

I remember a week in high school when I tried to start a trend of carrying one of those tiny dictionary's in my shirt pocket with me every day and challenging myself to use some stupid word like conundrum a couple times that day.

Yes.  I was a hit with the ladies.

1960's

My high school challenges obviously didn't take because after just a few months of blogging, I feel like a phraseological castrato (at least that explains my angel voice). 

But really, to answer L's question, finding out that the words I use most are just prepositional/dumb did make me realize that, at least through the 1980's, there has been considerable variety in the Hugo winning Novels.  With such variety then, it is only natural that my writing would bounce from topic to topic and those word cloud scripts would only pick up on the most frequently used/not glamorous at all words that I use too frequently.

A glance though the list of winners just confirms how many different themes have been covered over the last 40 or so weeks.  And that makes me so, so happy.

1950's

Thanks for the good question L, and I hope I'll remember to tackle it in more detail when I finally finish this challenge.

Admonishing Myself...and Feeling Pretty Good About It

I am exceedingly good at setting impossible and only half-thought out goals for myself.  Case in point: The Hugo Endurance Project.

You may have noticed that my posts have become less and less frequent.  Often my only posts for weeks are my actual reviews and it seems every week is harder to post, even those, on time (regardless of when I actually finish the book).  Well, behind my absence of posts, there is actually a lot going on; I am have been working through some problems.  So, since you’re all along for the ride, how about making some time for the airing of grievances eh?

Issue 1: Finishing books on time.  I suck at that.

Do you remember back when I was reading Stand on Zanzibar and thought I was so clever for choosing to start the book early because it was “too long”?  It’s funny how I thought I had conquered the Hugos and was rapidly marching my advance with nothing to stop me.

I am an idiot.  I think I’ve said this before.

So then came Downbelow Station, and you all know how that went.  And the very next week my wife came home from the library with her hand hidden in the library bag and just said, “I’m so sorry Jeremy,” and pulled out CYTEEN.

Issue 2: Long distance running.  I suck at this too.

About the same time that I was struggling through Downbelow Station, my marathon training schedule was starting to get ridiculous.  Up until that point, I had been running in the evening, often after my daughter was put to bed and because my runs were always pretty short, I was done quickly and still had some time to spend with my wife before reading and blogging.  But now while my weekend runs have rocketed to upwards of 15 miles, even my week day runs have gotten long enough that I just don’t have time to do this and actually be a part of my family AND read crazy amounts of pages and then talk like an idiot on the internet about them.

So I started thinking about the early start time of the Space Coast Marathon – 6:15 am – and said hey, I better get practicing at that time.  I figured I’d stumbled onto the secret to making time for running and for books and from here on out, life would be peaches.  I hadn’t and it isn’t.

Issue 3: Listening to my body.  I don’t.

I am always treating my body like I’m still a little kid.  In my mind, I still run my high school sub 6:00 mile.  In my mind, I can wake up on any given day and my body will do any given thing I ask of it and I have super powers.  In reality, my body does not respond the way I want it to, sub 8:00 miles are tough and recovery seems to take weeks (my wife suggested I’m just getting older which sounds to me like she is crazy).  Unfortunately, I do not have those super powers, and that is just one of the harsh realizations I’ve had to face up to since the double-whammy of C.J. Cherryh and miles and miles of training created the perfect storm of collaboration against me.

ANYWAY, making the switch was way, WAY, harder than I expected.  The first time I ran eleven miles after waking up, my body almost called it quits.  I refused to believe it was my fault.  It must be the heat!  Maybe my Camelbak isn’t big enough?  Maybe I just need to do it MORE!  Then one morning I was listening to Foundation’s Edge and thinking, how is it these people, with such incredible mind control, can still have hidden parts?  And in a moment of inspiration I thought, You do…you don’t listen.  You don’t listen…and you know it.  It was a moment of clarity and intense self-loathing, inspired by none other than 1983’s Hugo winner (my birth year, freaky huh?).

Issue 4: Following directions.  I can’t.

So after some soul searching, I decided I needed to get serious about making some changes.  I needed to go to bed earlier, wake up earlier, pay more attention and just keep working hard.  So what is the first thing I do?  Decide to start a new (to us) TV series on Netflix with my wife.  I told myself I needed balance, not just between pages and asphalt, but with my wife too.  I was probably right, but that led me to continuing to make the same poor sleeping and reading decisions.  The result:  I’m still not even half-way through Cyteen and I continued to struggle with waking up early enough to run before work.  So you add that to all the other rules I’ve broken in the course of this dual challenge and wow, my record of violations is embarrassing.

But you know what?  Who the hell cares!  Despite all my complaining, I’m getting a heck of a lot better and smarter as a runner (15 miles last Saturday and another 13 this week); I’ve actually amassed over 200 training miles now.  That must count for something…right?  I’m also over half-way through the Hugos.

Say WHAT?!

Yeah.  I’m half done and I’m only behind by one book.  I’ve been listening to more audiobooks and 24 became too stupid for me to continue watching so I’m back to slogging through Cyteen so it’s looking like I’ll be back on track soon.  BOOYEAH!

Despite some of my setbacks and complaints and not being able to follow my own rules, I feel pretty good about finishing this thing.  In just over 9 weeks, I’ll have run a marathon.  About 20 weeks later, I will have read every single Hugo winner.  In terms of my own personal fantasy-world opinion of myself, I’m kinda feeling like a BOSS right now (not really, I always feel like crap ;-) ).

C.J. Cherryh Wants Me To DIE!

Okay.  This is impossible.  Last week was so freaking hard to finish Downbelow Station, I am literally trying to figure out what kind of magic worked in my favor.  Still, I won't have the review up until tomorrow and I have already lost a staring contest with Cyteen.  For a second I thought, if I try real hard, I can read anything in a week.  Then the nuts and bolts and dry beans rattling around inside my skull were kicked into life by my wife when she saw the my future tombstone sitting on the bedside table.

So I google'd that online stopwatch thing that professors use to freak the crap out of their students during tests and set to figuring out how long it will actually take me to read this book.  Trying to read Downbelow Station at a frantic pace ruined it for me as you'll see tomorrow, so I determined myself to read at a reasonable enough pace that I could make some sense out of this tome.

It turned out it would require about 4.5 hours of reading each day to finish Cyteen by Saturday.  This is physically impossible for me.  After work and trying to be a dad, husband and maintain at least some of my friends throughout this challenge, there is no way I could read that much every day.  A couple of days, maybe three, yeah I could keep that pace.  But this would cause not only a loss of face time with my family, but a loss bed time, in which my idiot brains leak from my mouth to my pillow.

So then I thought I could get the audiobook and listen during my 1 hour commute every day.  Alas, the math still does not add up.  Not only is 3.5 hours exactly .5 hours more than Downbelow required of me, but the audiobook is actually longer than it would take me to read it, so I wouldn't even get the full hour worth of reading time.  Shit.  Now what.  Okay, brain, make this work.

Millennia pass...

Alright.  I think I know how this can work.  As you have probably noticed, apart from last week, the trend was becoming that Monday was the new Sunday and then Tuesday became the new Monday.  Last week got be back on track and I was excited to stay on time this week when car trouble sucked my day away.  So, I haven't been exactly studious at keeping each book within the precise week allotted to it, but I have been able to make up for it eventually.  While I've been disappointed about shifting my weekly goals, I would be absolutely heart-broken to not be able to finish this challenge on time.  

With all that in mind, I think the way this works is to take two weeks to finish Cyteen.  I know that is terrible.  There are no words for how disappointed I am, BUT the silver lining is that next week, when I am supposed to read Foundation's Edge next week, I can listen to that as an audiobook on the way to work and read Cyteen at night.  That doesn't give me quite enough time for the audiobook, but hopefully I'll finish Cyteen a little sooner than 14 interminable days from now so that I can still finish Asimov next week.  How I'll do that and crank out 2 reviews AND all the retrospective shtuff I normally go through, for the 1970s which I'm behind on, I don't know.  At least I'd be on the right side of my 64 week goal.

What do you all think?  Is there some magic pill I can buy to make this work better?

I Am Really Slacking

After my first 3-or-so months of beginning this blog, I had racked-up about a hundred miles of training runs and was progressing pretty well toward my goal of being able to run a marathon by the end of November.  I was battling long-lasting sicknesses throughout and then the heat of Florida's summer set in and I apparently felt sufficiently justified to explain away my poor training habits.  Of course they were never good excuses anyway, but now I've really got stop avoiding it.  The race is coming up in only 16 weeks and I've got to get moving, so hopefully you'll start seeing my mileage ticker slowly increasing again.  NO MORE EXCUSES!

Zelazny...

I have been dreading this post for a long time now.  It should have been weeks ago that I arbitrated over yet another Master of the Precious determination.  The contenders: This Immortal v. Lord of Light.  They were two very different experiences and I willingly admit that this forum of blazing through books each week was not conducive to an appropriate and fair reading of LoL.  So how do I make this determination?

I will make note of a couple of things.  First, TI has aged very well.  I recall that it was difficult to get into, but now my only recollection is that it was insanely fun.  I am confident that TI would re-read very well.  LoL has also aged well, though not even close to TI and while I think it would fare much better in a re-read, it will definitely require some time to mull over.  LoL was thick not in size but in concepts, theology, mysticism and mythology.  In that way it would appear LoL is at an advantage since TI was a much more straight-forward and plain story.  I just can’t get over how much fun TI turned out to be though.

I’m reluctant to get too deep into this one since it seems LoL is clearly the better fighter in this match, but as a result didn’t train thoroughly enough.  With EXTREME RELUCTANCE I have to call this a TKO by This Immortal.  If you never got around to reading the review (or the book for that matter), do it now.  It doesn't feel right to say, but I guess that means in this case, LoL is just a stupid, fat hobbit.just a stupid, fat hobbit.

I know this will disappoint some, but I have to base my decision on my experience during the challenge, and with that in mind LoL was left lacking.  I’d put money on Lord of Light in a rematch though…

Computrid

The worst thing ever, happened yesterday.  My compy died.  Totally kaput.  BIOS update interrupted and now its just dead dead.  Sending it in and hoping they will fix it for me.  Until then, I don't have any efficient way of updating the blog (currently using my wife's semi-functional hp tablet).  I guess that unless I figure something out, everything is gonna have to be on hold for a while... Oh gods... I'm gonna go cry...

Stranger in a Strange Land

I think this is one of my favorite SiaSL covers

Stats

Stranger in a Strange Land by Robert A. Heinlein

1962 Hugo Award Winner

Published by Putnam Publishing Group

408 Pages

Earth’s first expedition to Mars was thought to have resulted in every crew member dying.  Earth’s second expedition to Mars, some years later, revealed that not only was Mars inhabited, but there was even a survivor from the first crew…and he’s coming home.

As it turns out that survivor is Valentine Michael Smith, actual the son of two of the crew members, born in space and raised by Martians.  When he finally arrives it becomes clear that he is more alien than human and the rest of SiaSL is spent with Mike, the Man from Mars, trying to figure us out, to grok us.  What he finds is funny and sad and horrific and finally, he learns, hilarious.

Coming to Earth

I’ve read this book a few times and Mike’s arrival on Earth was still funny.  I still laughed out loud at his failure to understand and everyone’s frustration with his innocence.  For whatever reason, I’m really attracted to the idea that extraterrestrial life would be so different from our own that even if we were able to make contact, we would utterly fail to interact.  The beginning half of SiaSL appealed to me for exactly that reason.  Martians exist, but the only Martian we could ever hope to talk to, and still struggle mightily with, is the one who is half-human (bodily he’s 100% human, but culturally Martian).  It’s funny and a little sad and I like it.

“The Heinlein Voice”

Bulky paragraphs of text which read like an undergrad philosophy paper do not constitute Hugo-Award-winning dialogue.  Unless of course you are Robert Heinlein.  There were actually 2 or 3 instances when the characters acknowledge that they are preaching, long-winded or just ranting and so it seemed to me that maybe by 1961, Heinlein was aware of his criticism and was basically telling people, I know and I don’t care and I can lecture all I want and you’ll still love it.  Which people did.

When I have read this book in the past (the last time being a number of years ago), I missed or overlooked or whatever, all of this.  I guess I only heard what I wanted to at the time.  I think I read this for the first time in college, so maybe the lectures seemed normal to me at the time.  I’m not sure how I missed the homophobic and misogynist attitudes by a group of people claiming to eschew prejudice and promote free love for all, but it bothered me quite a lot this week.

These things were so barefaced that Jill, Mike’s water brother who almost never speaks wrongly, tells him “Nine times out of ten, if a girl gets raped, it’s partly her fault.”  In some of his other books, I’ve thought maybe the way he treated women was kind of tongue-in-cheek, but once you start considering the role and treatment of women throughout his work, it starts to look like a history of violence toward women.  SiaSL must be one of the most blatant examples, and the most troubling to me.  A man comes from Mars and starts a cultural revolution full of stereotypical gender roles claiming it’s something new and different when really it’s just reheated leftovers.

If it is the most blatant, it is also the most offensive.  The above quote speaks for itself, but there is also a decidedly anti-intellectual tone which was a little off-putting.  Sure I think universities have tended to become more like fast-food restaurants than I’m comfortable with, but Heinlein dismisses the value of intellectual and scientific discourse offhandedly while at the same time resting the crux of Mike’s beliefs and Martian culture on philosophy’s that he would excoriate elsewhere.  It’s disingenuous and deceitful in my opinion.

It seems to me that the peripatetic style of Jubal and Jill and Mike would appeal to those who are interested in philosophical topics but haven’t much experience with them (maybe this applied to me), but Jubal and Mike are so muddleheaded sometimes that I can’t believe I ever fell for it.  This is one of those instances in which a thing looks like a duck and quacks like a duck but is decidedly NOT a duck.

I was warned that Heinlein’s tendency to lecture hit a high point here and I doubted it and I was wrong.

Recommendation

Although SiaSL was fairly popular at the time of its release, it is probably best described as a cult classic now.  I’m aware it influenced a generation, but to read it now is at times, more than a little difficult.  When Mike first comes to Earth and during his time spent in “the place”, Jubal’s own Fortress of Solitude, some of the dialogue is funny and Mike’s inability to grok is even funnier, but that’s about it.  I can’t say whether that will be enough to propel you through the rest of the book but I will tell you that the last 100 or so pages were excruciating.  While the beginning was great, I hated the end of this book so much that I’m embarrassed that I have ever liked it and recommended it to other people.  Erg…

HEP SCORE

Universe 3/5

Social/Political Climate 5/5

Dialogue 1/5

Scientific Wonders 5/5 (Here, I’m counting Mike’s Martian abilities)

Characters 4/5 (After everything I’ve said I still liked the people, especially Jubal if he would just SHUT UP!)

Overall 18/25

The roll of the die

This week’s book is The Wanderer by Fritz Leiber.  I had to enlist the help of my favorite librarian (my mom) to get ahold of this one, so it better be worth it.  My copy is one of those university copies with tiny print and zillion words on each page.

Next week’s book is The Man in the High Castle by Phillip K. Dick.  I’ve read one other PKD novel, Androids, and it was amazing, so I have high hopes for this one.

We All Know This Blog Is Crap Anyway...

I don't know what to do.


Last week's book really messed with the HEP score and I'm not sure how or if I should fix it.  When I created it, I thought the category "Scientific Wonders" would be broad enough to cover any of the cool scientific advancements/other random creations in any book.  I've found that in books like The Demolished Man and especially This Immortal, there are some SF elements that just aren't captured there.  Notably ESP and terribly mutated people/beings/things.  These aren't "scientific" achievements per se, though in the case of the mutants, I suppose they only existed because of cobalt bombs.


When I created those 5 categories, they were the elements of the genre that most appealed to me.  Now that I've read a few more titles, I see that there are some slightly similar but also very different things that aren't captured here so maybe I need a 6th category, or to change the name of "Scientific Wonders".


Then again, those categories represent what first captivated me about SF, so maybe I should leave them the way they are and the scores will, in the end, demonstrate how my tastes in SF change throughout the project?


I don't know what to do.

Starship Troopers

Stats

Starship Troopers by Robert A. Heinlein

1960 Hugo Award Winner

Published by The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction

279 Pages

After graduating high school, James Rico decides to follow his friend into the Navy.  He never really intended to join up, and although the only way to become a voting citizen is through the armed forces, he doesn’t really seem all that motivated by anything other than the fact that no one really believes him that he will.  As it turns out, the Navy doesn’t want him but he is accepted into the Army’s Mobile Infantry by default.  He almost never makes it out of boot camp and when he does, he finds himself in the middle of the galaxy-wide “Bug War” with an even worse chance of survival.

The Template

For me, reading Starship Troopers was like a fan of vampire movies finally getting around to seeing Nosferatu and finding out where so many of the tropes that are now so common and loveable originally came from.

I very recently read, Old Man’s War by John Scalzi; probably the most obvious descendant of ST.  Had I known exactly how similar the two books were I probably would have waited to read OMW.  That being said, I’m kind of glad I read them in the order I did.  If I had read them in the other direction, I’m curious whether I would have thought of Scalzi’s as a rip-off.  The thing is, OMW is so freaking good, it’s hard to care one way or another.  And this is the case with a number of other Military SF that I could name off the top of my head.

In the end, I think it might be like how every vampire movie borrows something from Interview with the Vampire and it probably says more about the quality of the original than anything about plagiarism.  Starship Troopers is one of those books that, as they say, “started it all”.

The Flatness

I wouldn’t say Heinlein wrote poorly, I’d just say ST falls a little flat.  It’s difficult to understand what exactly is motivating Rico and as a result, it takes quite a long time before there is any reason to care about him at all.  The prose is straightforward and bland and there’s none of the personality that I’m accustomed to from Heinlein, anywhere.  It’s like someone went through and ripped out the crucial chapter and I was just left wondering, “okay, who cares?”  We don’t actually get to know our main character very well at all and it’s a little difficult to separate Heinlein’s lectures from what Rico actually thinks so here we have a case of an author committing a crime against wordsmithery.  He commits the crime of telling so egregiously that it actually confused me about where the main character stood.  Not okay!

And then there are The Bugs.  They are “The Other” straight out of any war propaganda, and other than learning a little of their physiology, we don’t really know where they come from, what they are doing or where they fit in the universe and neither does anyone in the book, try as they might.  I’ll admit, this could be an opportunity for greatness, but how does humanity respond?  Terror.  They are physically unable to associate in any way with the actual thinking members of Bug society and even hardened army vets are terrified just at the sight of them.  In the end there was no reflection whatsoever about the Bugs or humanity’s approach to them.  Bummer.

Public Service (The Flatness II)

It’s funny; the cover of my book claims ST is the “Controversial military classic”.  Having read some of his others I was pretty curious and excited.  What I experienced was just more flatness.  Okay, I understand people don’t often appreciate their freedom, people don’t often work for it or understand what it takes to maintain it, but what Heinlein has created is some kind of pseudo caste system.  Instead he glorifies military service and vastly undervalues the role and importance of all kinds of public service which doesn’t involve killing.  And I think we all know what happens when you force people to appreciate anything, they stop caring anyway!  C’mon!  This was really disappointing and such a puerile idea that I’m not sure what was so controversial.

The fact that he wasn’t even able to convey this little bit half-thought out philosophical muck without just straight-up lecturing his readers is just the nasty cherry on top of this mediocre sundae.

And since were on the subject of weak sauce.  You may remember I ended the 1950’s with a request of the 1960’s winners to step up their game and include some women at all.  Well Heinlein did, in typical Heinlein fashion.  What he sees as inherent differences between men and women are over-emphasized and of course women are highly and mostly sexualized.  He does this thing where women in his novels are the only people who can perform certain, highly specialized and necessary jobs which seems like an expression of respect but also seems like just another way of objectifying them.  I’ve stood up for Heinlein’s women in the past because there are some who are just so cool but ST makes it hard to keep defending him.  Erg.

Recommendation

If I had to characterize my appreciation for Heinlein I’d say I was in the Waxing Gibbous phase as I began this blog (maybe actually full moon after The Moon is a Harsh Mistress, but that’s coming later).  With a little more SF under my belt I think it may be safe to say that I’m entering the Waning Gibbous or even just Third Quarter phase (Yay random moon phase analogy).  I think ST might represent his most limp philosophizing, hollow characterization and his most weak sauce…ever.  Starship Troopers was fun but if I’m in the mood for military SF, I’m going somewhere else.

HEP SCORE

Universe 3/5

Social/Political Climate 3/5 (I don't know, this could have easily been a ‘2’)

Dialogue 3/5

Scientific Wonders 4/5 (There were few, but they were good)

Characters 2/5 (Who are these people again?)

Overall 15/25

Let the Grudgematch begin!

This week’s book is …And Call Me Conrad (This Immortal) by Roger Zelazny.

Next week’s book is Dune by Frank Herbert.  This will also be my second re-read of the project.