(1) MORE CORE. Some might wonder if James Davis Nicoll has hit peak trollage with his latest list, “Twenty Core Problematic Speculative Fiction Works Every True SF Fan Should Have On Their Shelves”. Some might thank him for listing their favorite book.
As with the previous core lists, here are twenty Problematic Speculative Fiction Works chosen entirely on the basis of merit and significance to the field 1 and in this case, the likelihood of encountering their avid fans. No implication is intended that these are the only twenty books you should consider or the only twenty books whose fans may some day corner you so they can expound at length on the virtues of these books.
Here are the first three on his list of 20 —
- The Heritage of Hastur by Marion Zimmer Bradley
- Ecotopia by Ernest Callenbach
- Naamah’s Curse by Jacqueline Carey
(2) YOUNG PERSON WATCHES OLD SF. Echo Ishii’s next excursion into old sf TV series has a William Shatner connection – “SF Obscure: TekWar”.
Tek War is based on William Shatner’s TekWar books, ghostwritten by Ron Goulart. There are about nine books in the series. The show started as a series of two-hour TV movies and then a proper second season, from what I can figure out. Open to corrections.
(3) THE SOUND OF WHO. Some of the more, ahem, “experimental” Dr Who soundtracks. “12 ‘Doctor Who’ Jazz Funk Greats” at We Are Cult.
The Sea Devils (1972)
A relentless barrage of white noise that was the result of a life or death struggle between sonic terrorist Malcolm Clarke and the Radiophonic Workshop’s massive EMS Synthi 100, otherwise known as the ‘Delaware’. Anticipates, at various points, Throbbing Gristle, Metal Machine Music, Frank Zappa’s Jazz From Hell and – in its calmer moments – Eno & Fripp’s No Pussyfooting. A BDSM specialist’s shag tape.
(4) DON’T RUN, WALKAWAY. The Reason interview with Cory Doctorow, “Cory Doctorow on Cyber Warfare, Lawbreaking, and His New Novel ‘Walkaway'”, is also is available on YouTube.
Katherine Mangu-Ward: Do you think that the underlying conditions of free speech as it is associated with dubious technologies, are they getting better or worse?
Cory Doctorow: There is the—there is a pure free speech argument and there’s a scientific argument that just says you know it’s not science if it’s not published. You have to let people who disagree with you—and who dislike you—read your work and find the dumb mistakes you’ve made and call you an idiot for having made them otherwise you just end up hitting yourself and then you know your h-bomb blows up in your face, right?
And atomic knowledge was the first category of knowledge that scientists weren’t allowed to freely talk about—as opposed to like trade secrets—but, like, scientific knowledge. That knowing it was a crime. And so it’s the kind of original sin of science. But there’s a difference between an atomic secret and a framework for keeping that a secret and a secret about a vulnerability in a computer system. And they’re often lumped together….
(5) DID YOU KNOW? Complaints Choirs took their inspiration from a conversation in Helsinki.
It all got started during a winter day walk of Tellervo Kalleinen and Oliver Kochta-Kalleinen in Helsinki. Perhaps it was due to the coldness of the day that they ended up discussing the possibility of transforming the huge energy people put into complaining into something else. Perhaps not directly into heat – but into something powerful anyway.
In the Finnish vocabulary there is an expression “Valituskuoro”. It means “Complaints Choir” and it is used to describe situations where a lot of people are complaining simultaneously. Kalleinen and Kochta-Kalleinen thought: “Wouldn´t it be fantastic to take this expression literally and organise a real choir in which people sing about their complaints?”
As complaining is a universal phenomenon the project could be organised in any city around the world. Kalleinen and Kochta-Kalleinen offered the concept to different events where they were invited as artists – but it was only after Springhill Institute in Birmingham got excited about the idea that the First Complaints Choir became a reality.
And here’s a detailed plan for starting a complaints choir in your town.
STEP 1 – Invite People to Complain
Invite people from your city to join the complaints choir. Distribute flyers, spread posters and write a press release. Everybody can join, no singing skills required! The more diverse the participants the better. From pensioner to teenager, everybody has something to complain about. The people that sign up for the choir send in their complain before the first meeting….
(6) RECOMMENDED. Professional filker Miracle of Sound has a released a Wonder Woman song.
I walk a wild new world
The strangest sights surround me
I grow into
This sense of wonder that I’ve foundThere is pain
There is joy
There is so much they destroy
Every soul here is a two way battleground
(7) TODAY’S DAY
Octavia Butler Day
Here are links to the first five of a dozen posts BookRiot has published in honor of the day.
- Science Fiction Short Story Collections by Authors of Color – Amy Diegelman
- Fear and Butler in America – Jessica Pryde
- Fierce: The Short Fiction of Octavia Butler – Cassandra Neace
- A Smurfette in Science Fiction and Fantasy: Octavia’s Legacy – Priya Sridhar
- LUMINESCENT THREADS: Knowing Octavia Butler Through a Community That Loves Her – Deya
(8) TODAY IN HISTORY
- June 22, 1960 — The House of Usher starred Vincent Price, screenplay by I Am Legend author Richard Matheson, and directed by Roger Corman. The film was the first of eight Edgar Allen Poe based feature films that Corman directed.
- June 22, 1979 – Alien premiered.
(9) FROM SOMEBODY’S MOUTH TO GOD’S EAR. Yesterday it was (supposedly) speculation. Today’s it’s a done deal. The Hollywood Reporter says “Ron Howard to Direct Han Solo Movie”.
“I’m beyond grateful to add my voice to the Star Wars Universe after being a fan since 5/25/77,” Howard tweeted Thursday afternoon. “I hope to honor the great work already done & help deliver on the promise of a Han Solo film.”
Howard, who directed 1995’s Apollo 13 and won an Oscar for helming 2002’s A Beautiful Mind, comes to the Han Solo film with several connections to George Lucas and the worlds of Lucasfilm. He appeared in Lucas’ 1973 breakout film American Graffiti and helmed Lucas’ 1988 pet fantasy project Willow. Howard also revealed on a podcast in 2015 that Lucas had approached him to direct the 1999 Star Wars prequel The Phantom Menace.
(10) GONE IN SIXTY DIGITS. Another unexpected side-effect of tech: “‘How I could have stolen my old car using my smartphone'”.
Charles Henderson loved his “awesome” convertible, particularly the fact that he could start, lock and unlock it remotely via his mobile phone.
It was one of the first connected cars that synchronise wirelessly with smartphones for entertainment and work purposes.
But after he sold the vehicle, he was astonished to discover that he could still control it using the associated smartphone app.
“I could have found out where the car was, unlocked it remotely, started it and driven off with it,” he tells the BBC.
Mr Henderson, from Austin, Texas, is global head of X-Force Red, IBM’s offensive security group, so he knows a thing or two about security. He tests companies’ defences, both physical and digital.
(11) NEXTGEN ST. BERNARD. (Video) “The soft 3D-printed robot that could come to the rescue”.
Engineers at the University of California are working on a soft legged robot that can navigate difficult terrain. Its complex design has been achieved through 3D printing.
One possible use for the robot would be to help in search and rescue operations – perhaps in a collapsed building. Its legs can alternate between walking, crawling and climbing.
(12) TIME MACHINE OUT OF ORDER? Tech failure: “California earthquake alarm sounded – 92 years late”.
A computer error caused the US Geological Survey (USGS) to issue the false alarm about the magnitude 6.8 quake.
The quake actually took place in 1925 when it laid waste to the city of Santa Barbara and caused 13 deaths.
In a statement, the USGS said its computers had “misinterpreted” data causing the alarm to be wrongly issued.
Substantial collapse
News organisations across the US received the emailed alert about the quake which, if it had been real, would have been one of the largest ever recorded in California.
Few organisations reacted directly to the news because it was dated 29 June 2025 – exactly 100 years after the actual event took place.
The LA Times, which uses AI-based software to automatically write up the USGS alerts, did issue a news story based on the alarm notice.
(13) PLANETEXIT. The UK gets ambitious: “Queen’s Speech: Plan aims to secure space sector”.
The stated purpose of the new Bill is to make the UK the most attractive place in Europe for commercial space – including launches from British soil.
(14) DEAR DIARY. Aaron Pound reviews Carrie Fisher’s Hugo-nominated The Princess Diarist at Dreaming of Other Worlds.
Short review: Carrie Fisher found some old diaries she wrote when she was filming Star Wars and having an affair with Harrison Ford. She used them as the basis for a book.
Haiku
When filming Star Wars
Fisher had a fling with Ford
Now she remembers
(15) HAPPPY NOMINEES. Fangirl Happy Hour is a Hugo-nominated fancast where Ana of The Book Smugglers and Renay of Lady Business team up to discuss books, comics, TV and movies, fandom and pop culture.
One great feature is the episode transcripts. Their transcriber has caught up to the episode that discusses the nominees for the “2017 Hugo Awards” – of which they are two.
Renay: Yeah, I remember telling everybody, “Hey, Bridget’s doing great work, why don’t we nominate her, ” and apparently everybody was already planning to because here she is. I was super excited. And then next category is Best Semiprozine which has you in it! Yay!
Ana: Yay!
Renay: It’s Ana! I’m so excited, The Book Smugglers, edited by Ana Grilo and Thea James. Look at you guys. Look at you on the ballot. so cute!
Ana: I’m very pleased about that. There is a lot of work that goes into the Book Smugglers as you know. I’m happy to be here. There are other amazing nominees in this category and I am like, “Oh fuck.” [laughter]
Renay: Would you have your feelings hurt if I voted for Strange Horizons first and then you second?
Ana: I would, but I would also understand.
Renay: Well I’m gonna put you first, and Strange Horizon second. I was just feeling it out.
Ana: I was very conflicted, because I love Strange Horizons and I think Niall Harrison has done such amazing work for the past few years. And he announced that he’s stepping down from being editor in chief of Strange Horizons and I’m like FUCK so this means that this is the last year that he’s eligible for the Hugos. And I’m like, I think he deserves one? But I also want one!
(16) ANTIQUE VERBIAGE. Brenda Clough takes us on a visit to “The Language Attic” at Book View Café.
Our language is a treasure house. Some of its glories are well-used and well-polished, taken out and set on the table every day. But up in the attic we’ve got some thrilling long-lost terms. This is a series devoted to dragging some of the quainter antiquities out, and dusting them off for you to see.
And today’s fun word is fistiana. Oh, you have a dirty mind. I can see what you’re thinking. No, no — it had nothing whatever to do with X-rated matters. We have pure minds around here, at least at this moment. Maybe later in this series we’ll get some really colorful words. This word’s close relative is boxiana, and both words refer to boxing — pummeling people with your fists.
(17) FOUND IN SPACE. Kyle Hill of Nerdist calls on everyone to “Join Us on the Bizarre Pop Culture Quest that is THE S.P.A.A.C.E. PROGRAM”
As Nerdist‘s resident sci-fientist (TM), there are never enough collisions between science and pop culture. I truly believe that exploring our nerdy passions with science helps appreciate both even more. I’ve tried my best to do this for the last few years with Because Science, but something was missing…oh, right, I wasn’t in sppppppaaaaacccccceeeee!
Starting today, you can watch the first episode of my new Alpha show The S.P.A.A.C.E. Program. It takes all the geeky analysis that I do on Because Science and combines it with a real set, actual production value, and a snarky artificial intelligence. It’s like if Carl Sagan’s COSMOS and Mystery Science Theater 3000 had a weird, long-haired baby. Check out a promo below:
[Thanks to John King Tarpinian, Cat Eldridge, Martin Morse Wooster, Aaron Pound, Chip Hitchcock, Jay Byrd, and Mark-kitteh for some of these stories. Title credit goes to File 770 contributing editor of the day Bill.]
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I dont know wha t to say.
Not to be pedantic or anything, but my blog is named Dreaming About Other Worlds.
10) Obviously, the app has no way of knowing the car has been sold. The buyer needs to make sure that he changes passwords etc, just like someone buying a house needs to change the locks to keep the old owners out.
2) I remember this show. One of many SFF shows of the 1990s which have been largely forgotten since then. Unlike some of the others, this one is deservedly forgotten.
(1) He did say “problematic”. Although a couple of them, I’m not sure why. Most of them are pretty obvious as to why.
(3) I saw all of these and don’t recall any of the music.
(12) Not only the year, but the date would have tipped them off. Today’s only the 22nd.
Oooh, my reading all the links led me to be FIFTH!
Second fifth is the best fifth!
And I’ve read/seen 15 of the problematic works listed. Not sure what that says about me…
I have to say that Aaron wrote my review of The Princess Diarist for me, and I’d like to know 1) where is the bug you’ve planted in my head, so that I can rip it out, and 2) how much are you going to charge me for writing that?
It’s an enjoyable, bittersweet book — but not the substantial, introspective work I had hoped it would be. Both Wishful Drinking and Shockaholic are only 178 pages each, so I don’t really hold out much hope that they’ll be more substantial, but I may check them out at some point, anyway.
I am hoping that she was writing a lengthy, substantial autobiography, that it was kept current with events, and that it is out there with her agent or attorney waiting to be published at some later date. A bio of Fisher written by someone else doesn’t really hold any appeal for me.
I liked some of Ron Howard’s earlier films, but I’ve gotten tired of them. I don’t know how to possibly figure out if this is why, but my suspicion is that they are so relentlessly focus-grouped that everything interesting is strained out of them. He might still be able to make a good corporate project.
(Geez, Mike, I’m beginning to think that you persist in “Edgar Allen Poe” just to drive me crazy!)
(15) So happpy you P’d all over 🙂
(16) bets on “fistiana” and “boxiana” making it into a JCW screed in the near future?
@JJ – It’s an enjoyable, bittersweet book — but not the substantial, introspective work I had hoped it would be.
I had to work very hard to not be disappointed and I was only partially successful. Now that I know what’s in the book, and read what you and Aaron had to say, I might try to read it again in an effort to assess it on its own merits.
Oh and I really liked Wishful Drinking, which seemed slight at the time but lingered long enough to take up permanent residence in my brain.
In other Hugo reading, John C. Wright’s story is going below No Award on my ballot. Unsuccessful message fiction is the worst, even if the writing is competent, which this wasn’t.
(1) MORE CORE.
I suspect this was a missed opportunity to include Paolo Bacigalupi’s “The Windup Girl”, which I liked. James, not so much.
(But then I guess, having to whittle the list down to twenty means that many miss out.)
“Windup Girl” certainly was problematic, in so many ways — more than some of the ones on the list. Not only socially, but in ignorance of things like physics and biology and chemistry and physics.
@Oneiros: nah, those involve bare knuckles. JCW, as we all know, prefers tire irons, ax handles, and canes. Although it’d be fun to see him try to reclaim “fistiana” (which, even if Not Naughty, sounds like a medical problem; “boxiana” sounds like a genus of plant).
Cheryl S.: I had to work very hard to not be disappointed and I was only partially successful. Now that I know what’s in the book, and read what you and Aaron had to say, I might try to read it again in an effort to assess it on its own merits.
Honestly, as Aaron says, the section of the book which is the diary of a lovelorn 19-year-old is really quite banal and not terribly interesting — to the extent that I just skipped a lot of that.
The interesting part of the book is what’s written by a woman with decades of life experience as an actress and screenwriter — a woman of wit and cleverness, someone who all too aware of, and owns, their weaknesses yet who persists nonetheless. But it doesn’t delve as deeply into personal introspection as I would have liked.
Hopefully that part of it is in a lockbox somewhere, and we’ll eventually get to see it.
Gah. Windup Girl. Don’t get me started. 🙄
1) Nice of James to include a representative Heinlein….
3) Much I’d agree with, here. The only sound I think I’d want to add to the list is the rampant organ (get your minds out of the gutter) in the Tom Baker story Pyramids of Mars. (Let us draw a kindly veil over the “Ballad of the OK Corral” in The Gunfighters.)
@Jeff Smith
I really enjoyed Howard’s recent Rush which I thought really captured the spirit of Formula 1 in the 70’s in which it was set.
7) Re: Luminescent Threads. I am one of the people who has an essay in the book. I got to read my essay at a book shower for the book while at Continuum in Melbourne, virus and all.
4) I have very mixed feelings about WALKAWAY that I’ve not been able to write down and articulate, as yet.
Since someone else did the Proclaimers a few days back:
If you go, will you scroll back,
the Pixels on Mike Glyer’s site?
9) The good folks at Lucasfilms sent him a message: “Help me, Opie-Wan Kenobi. You’re my only hope.”
3) Great sounds. I’m not really a Whovian but this article might push me in that direction!
10. add self driving cars to the mix and you have the 21st century’s version of the horse that was trained to come home after being sold.
Clickity
9) — The thing that I find with Ron Howard films is that he’s very good at pushing your buttons, but first he likes to tell you that he’s about to push your buttons, and then afterwards he points out that he just pushed your buttons.
1) I’m going to second Soon Lee and JJ on Wind Up Girl. Problematic as heck. The thing I will wonder with a lot of Bacigalupi is precisely when did vague mysticism about nature combined with learned helplessness become SFnal?
Also, do I have to turn in my SjW cabal card for not liking it?
@IanP
Personally I thought Rush was a bit of a mess. In parts it was brilliant but it was also meandering and insipid for much of the movie too. Related book recommendation:
The Cruel Sport
Which covers F1 in the 50’s and 60’s. Both the stories and photos bring the era to life. Particularly telling are the photos of rookie Dan Gurney, young and fresh faced, contrasted with him rather more aged after just a couple years on the grand prix circuit in a time with much more casual expectations about safety.
This turned up in the morning blog feed: Her Eyes Weren’t Watching God: The Empathetic Secular Vision of Octavia Butler.
My reasons:
The Heritage of Hastur by Marion Zimmer Bradley
Book with major subplot about a guy who uses his position to abuse boys dedicated to a guy who used his position to abuse boys. Also, Darkover is wildly, wildly reactionary.
(weirdly, people have stated that dedication was in a different MZB but it was definitely in the omnibus that contained THOH that I was sent to review in 2006)
Ecotopia by Ernest Callenbach
To pick just a couple points: Callenbach confuses his own sexual preferences for political stances and to quote someone from rasfw, researched African American culture by reading R. Crumb.
Naamah’s Curse by Jacqueline Carey
This is the one where it turns out the high caste lady can do love magic but the low caste one only lust.
White Tiger by Kylie Chan
Mighty Whitey.
Tripoint by C. J. Cherryh
Kid decides he’d rather be with mom’s rapist.
Grunts by Mary Gentle
Rape comedy.
Farnham’s Freehold by Robert A. Heinlein
Fitzhugh’s Cannibals All: the SF novel.
Misspent Youth by Peter F. Hamilton
Manpain: the novel.
Touched by an Alien by Gini Koch
I was extremely put off by the use of torture and threats.
Sword Art Online: Aincrad by Reki Kawahara
Sexism.
The Storm Lord by Tanith Lee
Racism.
The Sardonyx Net by Elizabeth A. Lynn
Weirdly pro-slavers.
Tea with a Black Dragon by R. A. MacAvoy
Mighty whitey.
The Ship Who Sang by Anne McCaffrey
Ableism, of the ‘of course, we euthanize the ones who cannot be made into useful cyborgs’ variety.
(Apparently the government also ensures there is a sufficient supply of potential cyborgs by withholding medical attention, something I forgot or never noticed.)
Voodoo Planet by Andre Norton
Racism, of the ‘she meant well’ variety
Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (film) by J. K. Rowling
It turns out to be more likely to run into a dragon in Jazz era Harlem than a black person. Presumably, this is in the same ethnic cleansing timeline that led to FRIENDS.
The Sparrow by Mary Doria Russell
Awful, awful physics.
The Gate to Women’s Country by Sheri S. Tepper
Eugenics.
Blackout/All Clear by Connie Willis
Idiot plot, asinine research failure
13th Child by Patricia Wrede
Eliminates a genocide that ruined the fun of thrilling settler tales by erasing the victims of the genocide from this history, like a book that fixes the unfortunate parts of the 3rd Reich by having Moses stay in Egypt so the author can focus on the cool tanks
(to be honest, “the Jews never leave Egypt” is still better than one AH I read, where Eurasia east of WWII era Germany was filled with actual, flesh-eating monsters)
@Paul Weimer: I loathed Walkaway. I’ve never much cared for Doctorow, but this one just hit all the wrong buttons. I wrote about why here, if that helps you clarify any of your thoughts. (Or maybe your problems with it were entirely different from mine.)
I feel destined to never like the hot new book of the season. This is, like, the third time in roughly a year for me. (Didn’t much care for Company Town, which has become a Big Deal in my circles, and I thought Elan Mastai’s All Our Wrong Todays, which is also insanely popular here, took way too long to sort itself out and actually get good, to the point where the weak bits in the beginning may not be redeemable at all.)
@August…yeah, some of your concerns are in the frustrating reaction I had to it, and some other things too that I still need to unravel. Thank you for the link. 🙂
I hates it when I can’t quite articulate why a book didn’t work for me when I really wanted it to.
Happy birthday today to Tom Smith, filker extraordinaire!
1) I was surprised that Donald Kingsbury’s Courtship Rite didn’t make the cut. Good book in my eyes but the “trigger warning” list would be long.
Thanks to multiple viewings, the mere word “pedantic” makes me flash on this song from Horrible Histories.
@Paul Wiemer: Yeah, there were other things, too, but they only give me so much space. 🙂
There were several instances where a character’s actions dramatically contradict literally the only thing we’ve ever been told about their motivations (almost always a POV character we’d been living with for dozens or even a couple hundred pages), only to have Doctorow explain why the action *really does* make sense later, almost like an afterthought. It’s very much a case of plot driving character rather than character driving plot, which I tend to find incredibly frustrating.
I’ve heard it said that he doesn’t do any re-writes, that he just plows out that first draft and then that’s it, and if that’s true it would go a long to way to explaining why so many issues like that pop up.
1) I am apparently one of today’s lucky 10,000. I haven’t read a single book on the list, and have only even heard of maybe four of them (I’ve heard of many of the authors, just not those specific books). I quite liked Bacigalupi’s Wind Up Girl, but it was *definitely* problematic.
No implication is intended that these are the only twenty books you should consider or the only twenty books whose fans may some day corner you so they can expound at length on the virtues of these books.
But if I was going to pick a Kingsbury, it might be the one where the runaway teen falls for the hunky middle-aged guy. Although Psychohistorical Crisis does have some Wife Husbandry, as I recall.
@Stoic Cynic
Sounds like the BBC documentary from 2011: Grand Prix – The Killer Years
Part of that that has stuck in my mind is footage from the 1973 Dutch Grand Prix at Zandvoort, where a car has flipped and caught fire. Another driver is seen trying to free Roger Williamson from the wreck, but is beaten back by flames. Then tries to flag down other drivers to assist, who continue to drive past. The race never being stopped. Chilling.
1) I’ve read six or maybe seven; Farnham’s Freehold remains the most problematic of that list, at least from what I’ve seen. I’d need to reread the Carey to see if I can pick up on what’s problematic. As for Tanith Lee (The Storm Lord), I reread that recently and admit the racial stuff must’ve flown right over my head, but I would’ve listed it as belong to that semi-rapey (or maybe not even semi-) “He mastered me and I fell for him” school of relationship depiction.
@OGH: there’s a formatting issue on item 16 (font/indent carried over from #15 instead of being restarted).
@1: I wish he’d discussed what he meant by “problematic” — is it just that the work has fanatic fans? (If so, ISTM that many of the works aren’t qualified.) Is there something about the works that is now considered improper/unenlightened/…, thus breaking an otherwise worthwhile work? If so I’d like to hear more discussion of what features are objectionable; I can think of obvious instances for some of the works, but not even all of the ones I’ve read/seen (14/20, which I think is a record — although I can’t remember anything significant about at least one of them.)
@bookworm1398: that the app still showed the car is trivial; what matters is that the car accepted orders from the app. The story makes clear that even the car’s manufacturer had trouble stopping the car from answering to the previous owner; it sounds like nobody thought about the entanglement of new (tech) and old (reselling) practices — or at least, nobody with the clout to say “We have to have a tool in place to support this.” It also says that the old owner did a “factory reset”, which IMO should have wiped the password in addition to all the personal data, making the car unresponsive even if the app didn’t get the message.
I quite enjoyed Bacigalupi’s ‘Wind Up Girl’ the first read through, problems aside, because there was a very enticing atmosphere that he built with his writing. Once that charm is off, the second reading really become stark regarding his issues. I had a similar experience with ‘The Water Knife’. Ripped through it the first time like a cool eco-murder mystery. First re-read, the winces start early.
Current reading – the House of Binding Thorns, Aliette de Bodard. Hmm. Still set in the shattered remains of Paris, this one is a lot slower to get going than House of Shattered Wings. It has a neat trick of making one of the main characters somewhat appealing, despite being a completely self centered torturer/murderer. I do love the kingdom under the Seine, but I’d advise people not to think about it too much. Lots of “be careful what you wish for” regarding the magic, but a couple of really memorable characters, though others remain cyphers. So, hmmm. The set up for the next book is really promising, and kind-of a decent person does emerge, but I doubt it will last.
So I like it, but it’s recommended with reservations. That last 30 pages or so work fantastically well, despite a bit of deus ex machina to kick off the final action section.
2X2L calling 7-7-0
2X2L calling 7-7-0
Come in 7-7-0
Just finished Critical Failures IV: The Phantom Pinas, by Robert Bevan. I gave it an overview on Goodreads, but to hit the highlights…
This caps off a pretty satisfying Act One for this series. Meet the characters, send ’em on a crazy journey, see more bodily excretions than I was frankly expecting (a downside, but a fairly minor one), and see them level up and reach a solid milestone that ties up several plot threads while laying the groundwork for Act Two.
What’s worth mentioning, especially as a counterpoint to the dick jokes and toilet humor, is the way the author really takes the idea of living in a game world and runs with it. The rules don’t approximate the setting, they define it – weird edge cases and all – and the main characters end up getting pretty good at taking advantage of that. I don’t recall seeing another Sent Into The Game book/series do that before, and it’s pretty nifty.
I rate the story four of five stars, but I have to ding it one for proofreading. It’s not horrible, and may be above average for indie work, but that’s not all that high a bar. There were a lot of omittedspaces and weird punctuation that a good proofreader would’ve caught.
1) You could list ten Heinlein books as “problematic”. And a good handful of Hugo nominees (other than RAH). The list is a little bit selective.
Hugo Watching – BDP Long:
6. Ghostbusters. Not funny.
5. Deadpool. Not very funny.
4. Rogue One. I am not a big Star Wars fan, it was ok otherwise, but not great.
3. Stranger Things. Nicely creepy. Might be even better on rewatching, but there is no time.
2. Hidden Figures. Very good, even if not totally historically accurate.
1. Arrival. Excellent and thought-provoking SF.
Both of these get bonus points for well portrayed (i.e. not obviously terribly wrong) science and scientists.
Tiebreaker was that “Hidden Figures” is a related work rather than SFF. (I’ve got far too many ties already.)
Only category left is Best Series. 22 days left for 33 books… oops.
6) ” has a released a”
Too many A’s?
My feelings about The Wind-Up Girl were well covered in a previous comment thread. As always, I’ve only read a couple of James Davis Nicolls’ list – Tea With the Black Dragon was not what I expected and Gate to Women’s Country is one i enjoyed at the time of reading but wince to think back on…
The Princess Diarist made an excellent audiobook, I say as someone who doesn’t really get on with audiobooks most of the time – Carrie’s performance is excellent. Likewise Shockaholic and Wishful Drinking; I think Shockaholic is my favourite of the three and Princess Diarist is the weakest for reasons well covered by Aaron. I wouldn’t say the first two are weightier per se, as all three cover heavy subject matter in a very irreverent way, but there is ground in Princess Diarist which was already covered better by books 1 and 2.
In Shockaholic, Carrie goes into how going for Electroconvulsive Therapy helped her to manage mental illness at the expense of much of her memory, so sadly it’s unlikely we’d ever have got the big comprehensive autobiography that a life like hers deserves, even if she’d had more time. I’m so grateful for the books she did write, however, that I find it difficult to contemplate putting another book first in Related Work despite some of the objective weaknesses in Princess Diarist.
I’ve had three contributing editorships in four scrolls. You folks need to step up here; Mr. Glyer deserves better.
(1) Problematic SF
I’ve noticed a number of people (here and on James’ blog) wincing a bit at how many of the 20 they’ve read. But it seems to me that part of a book being “problematic” is being good enough not to simply be dismissed as utter crap. So I’d guess that the average SFF reader is a bit more likely to have read (or even simply have heard of) more books on this list than on some of the more topic-specific lists.
(Which, by the way, I clock in at 8 read/watched and an additional 8 heard-of. Which is definitely higher than average for these lists.)
@Heather Rose Jones — Yes, of the ones I’ve read, I think Farnham’s Freehold is the only one that really does make me wince, and that mostly because I reread it multiple times, even after I realized exactly how problematic it was. (Ditto Lucifer’s Hammer, as I think about it.)
But I also enjoy reading lots of older and/or classic stuff, so I have to have a certain amount of tolerance for problematicicity. (Which word I think I just made up, but I’m kind of proud of.)
Wow, I think I’ve read more of the books on James’s latest list than on any of his previous lists. And I love a lot of them. Guess I’m more into “problematic” SF than I realized!
That said, Farnham’s Freehold is one of only two pre-1970 Heinlein novels that I was totally unable to finish. So I guess there’s “problematic” and then there’s “problematic”.
Rob Thornton on June 23, 2017 at 7:50 am said:
Hmm, yes, I love that one. So over-the-top. I find new, subtle (and frequently tasteless) jokes every time I read it. But I have to say that I sincerely hope that no one here is directly triggered by the cannibalism elements. 🙂
Another one I really like–while acknowledging that it’s quite problematic–is David Brin’s Glory Season. Which I’m both glad it didn’t win the Tiptree, and glad it was nominated.
(1): I’ve read 3/20, which is about as well as I ever do on James’ lists.
@Xtfir: I did make it to the end of Farnham’s Freehold, at which point I tore the book in half and threw it in the trash. That was it for Heinlein for me. (Although this was after reading I Will Fear No Evil, which was chronologically the last Heinlein I read.)