Books!

_Crooked Little Vein_, Warren Ellis
_Helix_, Eric Brown
_Walking to Babylon_, Kate Orman (as yet unread)

as yet unread Okay, Brain, what does that mean? Why are you listing a book if you haven't read it yet?

Way back at the dawn of time, or at least in 2005, I was reading Usenet from a guest account a friend had bartered to me in exchange for some sysadminly duties. I saved an article thread from rec.arts.sf.written, but never followed up on it. The articles were discussing Ben Aaronovitch's Doctor Who novel _The Also People_, which is a borrowing (or theft, whatever) of Iain Banks's Culture as a setting for the Doctor. I acquired a copy; it's good. Then Kate Orman, one of the other authors, mentioned that she had also set a book there, and she had some copies available.

A month or two ago I revisited that guest account and reviewed $HOME for anything I might want to keep. Came across the article thread and decided that it wouldn't cost me anything to inquire, so... I asked Ms. Orman if she still had some copies available. Today I hear that she does. So, I'll be reviewing it in a while...


Speaking nearly of books not read, _Helix_ is a Big Dumb Object novel that broke my WSOD several times, and I don't like it much, either. The warning signs were on the cover, in retrospect: when Stephen Baxter, reknowned for miserable settings, blurbs "Very nearly perfect", one ought to suspect that the perfect extinction of the human race is what he had in mind.

Apalling physics 1: the first and last human starship is launched from Earth orbit carrying 5000 passengers in coldsleep. After a thousand years of travel, it is nearly 500 ly out, and travelling at "just under the speed of light". Both engines are destroyed, possibly by accident, possibly by terrorists. The ship crashes into a planet "a parsec away" from the explosion event.

Bonus question for physicists: assuming a 20000 ton payload moving at 99% C, what fraction of an Earth-like world would not be vaporized by the impact?

Appalling physics 2: the planet turns out to be a helical mega-engineered object wrapped around a G-class star. Each cylindrical section of the helix is a planetary ecosphere separated from the next by a 1000 km wide ocean. They independently rotate on their long axes to generate day/night cycles. One end of the helix receives insolation enough to maintain super-Arctic conditions -- temperature fluctuating around -35C.

Ignoring material stress and strain, how long can this structure retain an Earth-like atmosphere given the gravitic gradients experienced?

Appalling WSOD n: the surviving crew includes an Italian cyborg lady. (Previously, no mention of cyborging has been made, not in 300 pages of a 500 page book.) Her advanced neural networks can translate a completely alien language within minutes after first exposure.

OK, on to something better.

Why did Warren Ellis write a novel? Because as a comic book/graphic novel, it would have been commercially unpublishable. I think. His protagonist is an unlucky weirdness magnet in the modern world -- if everything that happened around Spider Jerusalem happened accidentally to this guy, he would consider it a normally unpleasant week.
Fun, crude, rude, disgusting, and occasionally horrifying with the merest hint of satire. Recommended (enthusiastically) only if you know you like that sort of thing.

Books!

_Crooked Little Vein_, Warren Ellis
_Helix_, Eric Brown
_Walking to Babylon_, Kate Orman (as yet unread)

as yet unread Okay, Brain, what does that mean? Why are you listing a book if you haven't read it yet?

Way back at the dawn of time, or at least in 2005, I was reading Usenet from a guest account a friend had bartered to me in exchange for some sysadminly duties. I saved an article thread from rec.arts.sf.written, but never followed up on it. The articles were discussing Ben Aaronovitch's Doctor Who novel _The Also People_, which is a borrowing (or theft, whatever) of Iain Banks's Culture as a setting for the Doctor. I acquired a copy; it's good. Then Kate Orman, one of the other authors, mentioned that she had also set a book there, and she had some copies available.

A month or two ago I revisited that guest account and reviewed $HOME for anything I might want to keep. Came across the article thread and decided that it wouldn't cost me anything to inquire, so... I asked Ms. Orman if she still had some copies available. Today I hear that she does. So, I'll be reviewing it in a while...


Speaking nearly of books not read, _Helix_ is a Big Dumb Object novel that broke my WSOD several times, and I don't like it much, either. The warning signs were on the cover, in retrospect: when Stephen Baxter, reknowned for miserable settings, blurbs "Very nearly perfect", one ought to suspect that the perfect extinction of the human race is what he had in mind.

Apalling physics 1: the first and last human starship is launched from Earth orbit carrying 5000 passengers in coldsleep. After a thousand years of travel, it is nearly 500 ly out, and travelling at "just under the speed of light". Both engines are destroyed, possibly by accident, possibly by terrorists. The ship crashes into a planet "a parsec away" from the explosion event.

Bonus question for physicists: assuming a 20000 ton payload moving at 99% C, what fraction of an Earth-like world would not be vaporized by the impact?

Appalling physics 2: the planet turns out to be a helical mega-engineered object wrapped around a G-class star. Each cylindrical section of the helix is a planetary ecosphere separated from the next by a 1000 km wide ocean. They independently rotate on their long axes to generate day/night cycles. One end of the helix receives insolation enough to maintain super-Arctic conditions -- temperature fluctuating around -35C.

Ignoring material stress and strain, how long can this structure retain an Earth-like atmosphere given the gravitic gradients experienced?

Appalling WSOD n: the surviving crew includes an Italian cyborg lady. (Previously, no mention of cyborging has been made, not in 300 pages of a 500 page book.) Her advanced neural networks can translate a completely alien language within minutes after first exposure.

OK, on to something better.

Why did Warren Ellis write a novel? Because as a comic book/graphic novel, it would have been commercially unpublishable. I think. His protagonist is an unlucky weirdness magnet in the modern world -- if everything that happened around Spider Jerusalem happened accidentally to this guy, he would consider it a normally unpleasant week.
Fun, crude, rude, disgusting, and occasionally horrifying with the merest hint of satire. Recommended (enthusiastically) only if you know you like that sort of thing.