Lileks v. XBox360

Need you even ask who wins? LOL. RTWT.

Lileks v. XBox360

Need you even ask who wins? LOL. RTWT.

So I'm lookin' for a girl with a gun and a job

Blew through John Barnes' The Sky So Big And Black last night, and I'm not sure what to think about it. It's the third of his novels about the Meme Wars (WARNING: SPOILERS) and is ostensibly about the coming of age of Teri-Mel Murray, an ecoprospector on Mars. The early parts of the novel are mainly taken up with Teri-Mel being interviewed by her psychiatrist, a policeman who is part of the multilayered Martian defense against One True, the posthuman meme that rules Earth. The story takes several very weird turns, though, and becomes somewhat disjointed toward the end - but for very good reasons. I'm somewhat tempted to check out the other books in this series, Candle and Kaledioscope Century, though the plot summary of the latter book is somewhat offputting, to say the least. I know from his short stories that Barnes can tell a story from a sociopath's viewpoint all too well, and I'm not sure I want to put myself through that.

I also picked up China Mieville's Iron Council and Ken MacLeod's The Eyes of the Calculor. All this fiction is giving me an itch to work on Blood Red Skies.

So I'm lookin' for a girl with a gun and a job

Blew through John Barnes' The Sky So Big And Black last night, and I'm not sure what to think about it. It's the third of his novels about the Meme Wars (WARNING: SPOILERS) and is ostensibly about the coming of age of Teri-Mel Murray, an ecoprospector on Mars. The early parts of the novel are mainly taken up with Teri-Mel being interviewed by her psychiatrist, a policeman who is part of the multilayered Martian defense against One True, the posthuman meme that rules Earth. The story takes several very weird turns, though, and becomes somewhat disjointed toward the end - but for very good reasons. I'm somewhat tempted to check out the other books in this series, Candle and Kaledioscope Century, though the plot summary of the latter book is somewhat offputting, to say the least. I know from his short stories that Barnes can tell a story from a sociopath's viewpoint all too well, and I'm not sure I want to put myself through that.

I also picked up China Mieville's Iron Council and Ken MacLeod's The Eyes of the Calculor. All this fiction is giving me an itch to work on Blood Red Skies.

21 books - Part 1

If you're looking for the Great Books, I'm afraid you're going to be disappointed. Most of the books in these posts would probably make the average American Lit professor turn up his nose in scorn, but that's okay; I'm not trying to impress anyone. These are the books that for one reason or another left their mark on me, changed my life in some subtle (or maybe not so subtle) way, and made me who I am.
( But now that State Security has seized the book anyway, I have no alternative but to publish it immediately. )

( So in the Libyan fable it is told- That once an eagle, stricken with a dart- Said, when he saw the fashion of the shaft: 'With our own feathers, not by others' hands- Are we now smitten'. )

( We have a tradition of freedom, personal freedom, scientific freedom. That freedom isn't kept alive by caution and unwillingness to take risks. )

21 books - Part 1

If you're looking for the Great Books, I'm afraid you're going to be disappointed. Most of the books in these posts would probably make the average American Lit professor turn up his nose in scorn, but that's okay; I'm not trying to impress anyone. These are the books that for one reason or another left their mark on me, changed my life in some subtle (or maybe not so subtle) way, and made me who I am.
( But now that State Security has seized the book anyway, I have no alternative but to publish it immediately. )

( So in the Libyan fable it is told- That once an eagle, stricken with a dart- Said, when he saw the fashion of the shaft: 'With our own feathers, not by others' hands- Are we now smitten'. )

( We have a tradition of freedom, personal freedom, scientific freedom. That freedom isn't kept alive by caution and unwillingness to take risks. )