more 30 second book reviews
by John at 8/17/2004 10:21:00 PM
Pattern Recognition - William Gibson
This is not your regular Gibson cyberpunk novel. In present day London, a woman with an interesting talent for marketing gets involved in a plot to discover the source of some remarkable video clips found on the web. Adventures follow. What struck me while reading this book is that Gibson writes about everyday stuff (email, encryption, discussion boards, web browsers) with the same detachment he has when writing about neural implants and cyberspace in his older cyberpunk novels. It seemed to me that perhaps he had never actually used the mundane things he was writing about. I find that hard to believe, so I guess it is just his style. Go ahead and read it - all the cool kids already have.
Reason : Why Liberals Will Win the Battle for America - Robert B. Reich
I hear Reich a lot on NPR while driving in may car. He was the first Labor Secretary for President Clinton, and is a moderate liberal (I expect some are saying "He is a far-left liberal!" right now). He makes some interesting points in this book, and makes the hard to deny case that most Americans hold the moderate liberal values of tolerance, diversity, government safety nets and the like. He also does a good job describing how we got to the current state of political demonization of one side by the other, and lays most of the blame on the Republicans. But in a sense this book failed; I have no additional confidence that, given the apathy of the majority of Americans and the rightward tilt of modern political speech (did you ever wonder why it is that "liberal" is a dirty word and "conservative" a badge of pride?), that liberals will win (whatever that means) in the end. So what if we don't win? We go on anyway.
Supermen: Tales of the Posthuman Future - edited by Gardner Dozois
This is a collection of short stories that focuses on one of my current favorite sf genres, transhumanism (or posthumanism, the Singularity, whatever you want to call it). The stories are generally by well-known authors, and because they are arranged chronologically by publication date, they demonstrate the development of posthuman fiction in the last five decades. Most of the stories are quite enjoyable, although a couple are stinkers. I found the following works particularly interesting: "Mortimer Grey's History of Death" by Brain Stableford, "The Wedding Album" by David Marusek, and "Border Guards" by Greg Egan.
Supertoys Last All Summer Long: And Other Stories of Future Time - Brian Aldiss
Another short story collection, this time the work of a single author. "Supertoys Last All Summer Long" was the inspiration for Kubrick's/Spielberg's film "Artificial Intelligence: AI". The author worked with Kubrick on the screenplay, but was eventually fired, more or less. During that time, he wrote two sequels to "Supertoys" that were not really incorporated into the film, but they are included here. Aldiss also uses several stories to explore an optimistic transhumanism that pleased me - if I recall correctly, in one story the key technology was a pause button built into the brain that forced you to stop and think in times of crisis instead of just acting. Some other stories were unimpressive, and his writing style is a bit unusual, but overall I enjoyed the collection.
The Lathe of Heaven - Ursula K. LeGuin
This is a classic sf novel first published in the early 1970s. I had often heard about it but never read it. So, trying not to give too much away, it is an allegory concerning the inability of those who pursue social justice to implement it. I just wrote a few sentences summarizing the plot, but then deleted them because they were too revealing. I also wrote a sentence that describes what I think is real the moral of the story (it is not really about social justice), but then I deleted that too because it gives the ending away. How's this: it's about a guy whose dreams can change reality. I think this is an OK book, but I only halfway recommend it.
Jupiter - Ben Bova
This story is set in the same "universe" as his Mars novel. He has written, in fact, a whole string of novels named after planets in our solar system. In this one, a young man is (supposedly) sent to work as a graduate student on a large space station orbiting Jupiter. Actually, he is sent there spy on the scientists on behalf of the fundamentalist religious organizations that control Earth politics. It seems the scientists might have discovered something that would shake the foundations of Jewish/Christian/Islamic religion. If this story had been written in the 50s it would probably be called a "juvenile", which is not necessarily bad. But in this case, this was a pretty predictable novel. You're not missing much if you don't read it.
Heal Your Headache - David Buchholz
If you or someone you know gets headaches regularly, you might want to read this book. Dr. Buchholz's (he's an M.D. and neurologist at John Hopkins) first premise is that all normal headaches (tension, sinus, migraine) are caused by the migraine response, which is when blood vessels swell in the neck, face, or head. His second premise is that there is a three step plan for controlling these kinds of headaches, perhaps without medication. Step 1 is to give up all painkillers that cause rebound, which is when blood vessels dilate drastically after being medicinally constricted. Step 2 is to remove all the common dietary triggers, like caffeine, chocolate, MSG, and just about any aged or fermented food. Step 3 is the optionally one (if 1 and 2 don't do the job), and it involves taking medicine to raise the migraine threshold so that triggers don't activate the response. I've been trying step 1 for a couple of weeks (plus the no caffeine, chocolate and MSG rule) and I am having moderate success preventing what had become regular weekend headaches. We'll see. Most annoying thing? He doesn't think science has the capability to demonstrate the efficacy of his method. This is a prime indicator of quackery.
Forty Signs of Rain - Kim Stanley Robinson
"Wow". After I finished this short novel, that's what I thought. I really liked it, much more than any other fiction I've read recently. It takes place maybe five or ten years from now and concerns a married couple who work in Washington DC. She's a director for the NSF and he's an environmental consultant for a liberal senator. The backdrop is rapid global climate change due to the greenhouse effect. Mostly, though, it is a story about friends and family and minor epiphanies. Robinson's politics usually infect his work, and because he is sort of a socialist (or at least an anti-capitalist), this frustrates many of his readers. Me? I like it. Anyway, I thought this story was very touching because it is more about the little things than the big things, and it's about going on anyway. Update: I just went to Amazon.com to read other reviews of this book, and I found out it is the first part of a trilogy. That is, actually, a little disappointing, because I liked the ending the way it was.
Emergence: The Connected Lives of Ants, Brains, Cities, and Software - Steven Johnson
This book is about the fairly modern science (art?) of emergent systems. Emergent systems are systems that display complex, usually adaptive, behavior based on individual agents operating under simple rules. Typically, emergent behavior is not designed, it is discovered. He talks about some of the current applications of emergent systems in the world, and draws comparisons to natural systems and organisms to fit it all together. Having played around a bit with agent-based modeling in the past and having at least a passing familiarity with emergent systems, I enjoyed this book. It is certainly not written for the expert, but gives enough detail to, I think, draw interest in the subject from the lay reader. There is also a nice bit about why large internet discussion boards usually fail, but why Slashdot still works.
War Is a Force That Gives Us Meaning - Chris Hedges
This book is a very personal meditation on war by a long-time war correspondent. His presence in battle zones gives him the authority to write on the subject without the messy confusion of justification or guilt. To Hedges, war is an addiction that affects people, and even whole nations. It changes everything about the societies it overtakes. His thesis is well supported by the evidence he draws from fifteen years experience covering wars in Central America, the Balkans, and the Middle East. To me, his thoughts ring true - but what do I know about it? A lot, for I am also at war, or so my government tells me. The book was published in 2002, but any person with the capacity for reflection will be able see parallels with what he describes as the typical responses of people and nations at war and what has occurred in our country since September 2002 (no, that's not a typo). It is not flattering. If you read only one book on the list above, I think it should be this one.
Remember, you can find all these books and more at your local library - I did!
This is not your regular Gibson cyberpunk novel. In present day London, a woman with an interesting talent for marketing gets involved in a plot to discover the source of some remarkable video clips found on the web. Adventures follow. What struck me while reading this book is that Gibson writes about everyday stuff (email, encryption, discussion boards, web browsers) with the same detachment he has when writing about neural implants and cyberspace in his older cyberpunk novels. It seemed to me that perhaps he had never actually used the mundane things he was writing about. I find that hard to believe, so I guess it is just his style. Go ahead and read it - all the cool kids already have.
Reason : Why Liberals Will Win the Battle for America - Robert B. Reich
I hear Reich a lot on NPR while driving in may car. He was the first Labor Secretary for President Clinton, and is a moderate liberal (I expect some are saying "He is a far-left liberal!" right now). He makes some interesting points in this book, and makes the hard to deny case that most Americans hold the moderate liberal values of tolerance, diversity, government safety nets and the like. He also does a good job describing how we got to the current state of political demonization of one side by the other, and lays most of the blame on the Republicans. But in a sense this book failed; I have no additional confidence that, given the apathy of the majority of Americans and the rightward tilt of modern political speech (did you ever wonder why it is that "liberal" is a dirty word and "conservative" a badge of pride?), that liberals will win (whatever that means) in the end. So what if we don't win? We go on anyway.
Supermen: Tales of the Posthuman Future - edited by Gardner Dozois
This is a collection of short stories that focuses on one of my current favorite sf genres, transhumanism (or posthumanism, the Singularity, whatever you want to call it). The stories are generally by well-known authors, and because they are arranged chronologically by publication date, they demonstrate the development of posthuman fiction in the last five decades. Most of the stories are quite enjoyable, although a couple are stinkers. I found the following works particularly interesting: "Mortimer Grey's History of Death" by Brain Stableford, "The Wedding Album" by David Marusek, and "Border Guards" by Greg Egan.
Supertoys Last All Summer Long: And Other Stories of Future Time - Brian Aldiss
Another short story collection, this time the work of a single author. "Supertoys Last All Summer Long" was the inspiration for Kubrick's/Spielberg's film "Artificial Intelligence: AI". The author worked with Kubrick on the screenplay, but was eventually fired, more or less. During that time, he wrote two sequels to "Supertoys" that were not really incorporated into the film, but they are included here. Aldiss also uses several stories to explore an optimistic transhumanism that pleased me - if I recall correctly, in one story the key technology was a pause button built into the brain that forced you to stop and think in times of crisis instead of just acting. Some other stories were unimpressive, and his writing style is a bit unusual, but overall I enjoyed the collection.
The Lathe of Heaven - Ursula K. LeGuin
This is a classic sf novel first published in the early 1970s. I had often heard about it but never read it. So, trying not to give too much away, it is an allegory concerning the inability of those who pursue social justice to implement it. I just wrote a few sentences summarizing the plot, but then deleted them because they were too revealing. I also wrote a sentence that describes what I think is real the moral of the story (it is not really about social justice), but then I deleted that too because it gives the ending away. How's this: it's about a guy whose dreams can change reality. I think this is an OK book, but I only halfway recommend it.
Jupiter - Ben Bova
This story is set in the same "universe" as his Mars novel. He has written, in fact, a whole string of novels named after planets in our solar system. In this one, a young man is (supposedly) sent to work as a graduate student on a large space station orbiting Jupiter. Actually, he is sent there spy on the scientists on behalf of the fundamentalist religious organizations that control Earth politics. It seems the scientists might have discovered something that would shake the foundations of Jewish/Christian/Islamic religion. If this story had been written in the 50s it would probably be called a "juvenile", which is not necessarily bad. But in this case, this was a pretty predictable novel. You're not missing much if you don't read it.
Heal Your Headache - David Buchholz
If you or someone you know gets headaches regularly, you might want to read this book. Dr. Buchholz's (he's an M.D. and neurologist at John Hopkins) first premise is that all normal headaches (tension, sinus, migraine) are caused by the migraine response, which is when blood vessels swell in the neck, face, or head. His second premise is that there is a three step plan for controlling these kinds of headaches, perhaps without medication. Step 1 is to give up all painkillers that cause rebound, which is when blood vessels dilate drastically after being medicinally constricted. Step 2 is to remove all the common dietary triggers, like caffeine, chocolate, MSG, and just about any aged or fermented food. Step 3 is the optionally one (if 1 and 2 don't do the job), and it involves taking medicine to raise the migraine threshold so that triggers don't activate the response. I've been trying step 1 for a couple of weeks (plus the no caffeine, chocolate and MSG rule) and I am having moderate success preventing what had become regular weekend headaches. We'll see. Most annoying thing? He doesn't think science has the capability to demonstrate the efficacy of his method. This is a prime indicator of quackery.
Forty Signs of Rain - Kim Stanley Robinson
"Wow". After I finished this short novel, that's what I thought. I really liked it, much more than any other fiction I've read recently. It takes place maybe five or ten years from now and concerns a married couple who work in Washington DC. She's a director for the NSF and he's an environmental consultant for a liberal senator. The backdrop is rapid global climate change due to the greenhouse effect. Mostly, though, it is a story about friends and family and minor epiphanies. Robinson's politics usually infect his work, and because he is sort of a socialist (or at least an anti-capitalist), this frustrates many of his readers. Me? I like it. Anyway, I thought this story was very touching because it is more about the little things than the big things, and it's about going on anyway. Update: I just went to Amazon.com to read other reviews of this book, and I found out it is the first part of a trilogy. That is, actually, a little disappointing, because I liked the ending the way it was.
Emergence: The Connected Lives of Ants, Brains, Cities, and Software - Steven Johnson
This book is about the fairly modern science (art?) of emergent systems. Emergent systems are systems that display complex, usually adaptive, behavior based on individual agents operating under simple rules. Typically, emergent behavior is not designed, it is discovered. He talks about some of the current applications of emergent systems in the world, and draws comparisons to natural systems and organisms to fit it all together. Having played around a bit with agent-based modeling in the past and having at least a passing familiarity with emergent systems, I enjoyed this book. It is certainly not written for the expert, but gives enough detail to, I think, draw interest in the subject from the lay reader. There is also a nice bit about why large internet discussion boards usually fail, but why Slashdot still works.
War Is a Force That Gives Us Meaning - Chris Hedges
This book is a very personal meditation on war by a long-time war correspondent. His presence in battle zones gives him the authority to write on the subject without the messy confusion of justification or guilt. To Hedges, war is an addiction that affects people, and even whole nations. It changes everything about the societies it overtakes. His thesis is well supported by the evidence he draws from fifteen years experience covering wars in Central America, the Balkans, and the Middle East. To me, his thoughts ring true - but what do I know about it? A lot, for I am also at war, or so my government tells me. The book was published in 2002, but any person with the capacity for reflection will be able see parallels with what he describes as the typical responses of people and nations at war and what has occurred in our country since September 2002 (no, that's not a typo). It is not flattering. If you read only one book on the list above, I think it should be this one.
Remember, you can find all these books and more at your local library - I did!
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