It's somewhat amusing that you and I were the first LTers to add the new Hartwell/Cramer "Best of the Year" anthology.

Lähettänyt: AsYouKnow_Bob 10:09 pm (EST) May 29, 2008

Hi,

I just finished Tricia Sullivan's Sound Mind. Man, what a book! It had it's flaw(s), but it's totally amazing. I wrote a review for LibraryThing if you want to take a look. You asked originally if I'd say to read Maul first or Double Vision. At this point I'd definitely say Double Vision, then Sound Mind. I have no idea if Double Vision is on the same level as Sound Mind, but even if not, it would be worth it to get to Sound Mind. I thought the characters were fascinating and the ideas were even more absorbing, plus compared to Maul I didn't have nearly as much trouble getting out of the book what I think she intended the reader to get. I think Tricia Sullivan is an astoundingly brilliant person, and her writing keeps getting better and better. She wrote some older books as Valerie Leith, which I got. I looked in one briefly. It's like a totally different writer - I could hardly believe the difference in quality of the writing. Maul is tremendously advanced over the one Leith book I looked at in writing skill and expression, and in Sound Mind she clearly is polishing more subtle but critical points like bringing the reader to her understanding of conceptual abstractions and made great progress at that. I think she is uniquely gifted in abstracting the essence of a concept and expressing it in a concrete way. If she keeps improving as she has been, she'll be producing totally astonishing books of the absolute highest quality in a few years. I don't give many books 5 star ratings, and even with its one obvious literary flaw I had to give Sound Mind five stars. You may not think as highly of it as I did, of course, but I hope you will find reading her a fascinating experience!

Lähettänyt: bibliojim 11:56 pm (EST) Jan 8, 2008

Hi,
Glad you liked the books. Hope you had a good Christmas.
I didn't check your wife's library for Nicholson Baker so I was lucky not to pick one that she had.
I love Nicholson Baker and hope you enjoy the book. The Ballard book seemed to be more of an obvious choice for you, hope you enjoy that too.
Still waiting for my delivery!
Paul

Lähettänyt: nozboy 11:14 am (EST) Dec 27, 2007

Hi,

I rarely read short stories at all and the very short format may be unmoving as you say. I just thought it was a most unusual book. I'm kind of assuming each story gives some science-based vision of the future and probably is merely intended as conjecture about the form the future will take rather than a story with well-painted characters, etc. Normally the characters are far more important to me than somebody's unlikely imagined vision, but I thought Futures from Nature might be a large and widely varied solidly-based collection of visions of which a few may actually come to pass. Hence, I expect it will be more interesting to me than the typical hard SF story. I'll see how it goes. Since you see the stories regularly in the magazine, I can see why you don't get the book.

If your company gets Nature, then perhaps you work for a life science-based company. Yes? The most remarkable SF I ever read based on life sciences was Darwin's Radio by Greg Bear a few years ago. Have you read it? Probably, but if not, give it a try. It won the Nebula and was a finalist for the Hugo. I thought the science was mind-blowing. I don't know how a "mere author" can understand science deeply enough to put together a story like that. I was deeply impressed and, best of all, the characters were very real so it made an excellent fiction.

By the way, my thoughts about Tricia Sullivan's 'Sound Mind' abruptly changed for the better when I suddenly figured out what the book is about a couple of pages ago and things came much more strongly in focus. It helps tremendously. It did take me about half the book, but unlike Maul it's quite clear what's going on now. I'm not much past that yet, but I'll write a review when I'm done. If you read it, the key to keep in mind for understanding as you read it is that it's about how our technologies, as used by marketing and business in our society, have a way of making everybody think alike. Everybody is directed to like the same music, like the same books and movies, perform the same activites, etc.

Lähettänyt: bibliojim 7:46 pm (EST) Dec 15, 2007

Hi,

I went to the bookstore tonight and found an incredible book it just occurred to me you'd probably LOVE. Title is 'Futures From Nature', published Nov 2007 by TOR. It is 100 short SF stories that were published in Nature science journal from 1999 to 2006. The list of authors reads like a who's who of modern science fiction. Every story is 800 words or less, only 320 pages in the book, but to give you and idea who's in it, if you look at your author cloud, about 1/3 of the highly visible names have stories in the book. The front cover lists: Arthur C. Clarke, Bruce Sterling, Nalo Hopkinson, Vernor Vinge, Cory Doctorow, Vonda N. McIntyre, Dan Simmons, Joe Haldeman, Nancy Kress, and Charles Stross. But there are 90 others. Names like Greg Bear, Kenneth MacLeod, Gregory Benford, Kim Stanley Robinson, Steven Baxter, Robert Charles Wilson, and Robert J. Sawyer were too "small" to even make the front cover! It's an incredible list of authors who have contributed to this collection. And having been published in Nature, I think it is safe to say there isn't a hare-brained idea of science to be found anywhere in these stories! I normally don't like hard SF, but I really can hardly wait to start this book. I bet the book is not going to get a lot of attention just because it doesn't sound exciting from the title and the cover isn't even remotely flashy, but once one understands what's actually in it, it's a different matter. I wanted to be sure to share its existence with somebody else who might be as fascinated as I...

Lähettänyt: bibliojim 12:54 am (EST) Dec 12, 2007

Hi,
I'm reading her most recent book Sound Mind first. I don't like it quite as much as Maul, but I'm only a third through it. Maybe it will get better. I read somewhere that Double Vision was perhaps her best book. Maul did win an award, though, Double Vision didn't. I don't really have an opinion on which is best! Whichever you read, hope you enjoy it!

Lähettänyt: bibliojim 2:15 am (EST) Dec 9, 2007

Hi,

I read your review on In War Times by Kathleen Ann Goonan. I have the book in my ever-growing stack of books to read, and your review moves it right to the top. The review was very well done! Thank you for posting it. Otherwise I might never have read it - too many books!

I see you also have a copy of Tricia Sullivan's Maul. Not all that many people do. If you haven't read it yet, I just finished it last week, and wrote a review maybe you'd find interesting.

Have a great holiday season!

Lähettänyt: bibliojim 8:03 pm (EST) Dec 1, 2007