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corn in the bible
Jun 5, 2004

Oh no oh god it's all true!

Darth Walrus posted:

the Vorkosigan Saga

Mark finds Miles, but is captured by Miles' old nemesis, Baron Ryoval, held prisoner, and tortured for five days. His personality fragments into four sub-personalities: Gorge the glutton, Grunt the sexual pervert, Howl the masochist, and Killer the assassin.

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thespaceinvader
Mar 30, 2011

The slightest touch from a Gol-Shogeg will result in Instant Death!

Megazver posted:

The new Humble Bundle is loving amazing. The Barry Hughart omnibus, short story collections by Harlan Ellison, Jack Vance and KJ Parker, the Ted Chiang novella? These are just the ones I've read and just these already make it a great bargain. If at least a couple more out of the other ten books in the bundle are good? If you don't want to buy this at $15 you basically don't deserve to be called a specfic fan.

Damnit I wasn't going to get it but I've been looking for Barry Hughart books for years and failed to find them.

Inspector Gesicht
Oct 26, 2012

500 Zeus a body.


I can't vouch for Barry Hughart's other work but I'll be the 19th person on this thread to tell you Bridge of Birds is a masterpiece. In 300 pages more happens than series that go on for 3000 pages. It's funny, it's witty, it's tremendously dark but heartfelt and there's never a dull moment. The second time I finished reading it was much like the first and I'll buy it again a third time because I gave the first two away. I won't spoil the ending but the last lines seal the deal.

"I shall clasp my hands together and bow to the corners of the world. May your villages remain ignorant of tax collectors, and may your sons be many and ugly and strong and willing workers, and may your daughters be few and beautiful and excellent providers of love gifts from eminent families that live very far away, and may your lives be blessed by the beauty that has touched mine. Farewell."

Slavvy
Dec 11, 2012

Venusian Weasel posted:

Perhaps the Strugatsky brothers' Roadside Picnic might be up your alley. No actual alien contact, but it deals with trying to figure out what aliens left behind during a brief visit to Earth. It's got a lot of what you're looking for.

Pohl's Gateway is good like that too. Has anyone read the sequels?

Mars4523
Feb 17, 2014

Darth Walrus posted:

Old Man's War and the Vorkosigan Saga are pretty good at mucking around with that. In the former, for instance, the necessarily evil government of benevolent fascists are giant fuckups who are putting humanity in far more danger than they're protecting it from, and the last book of the initial trilogy involves the main character teaming up with the aliens and sticking it to them good.
I was wondering where aliens came to play in the Vorkosigan saga for a bit. Yeah, Jackson's Hole is something of a shithole.

I was reading this Baen book about a team of close protection specialists and it's actually pretty drat fun in an action movie sort of way if you ignore that it's basically set in Space Mogadishu and there's a bunch of "lol liberals/bureaucrats/media" bullshit.

occamsnailfile
Nov 4, 2007



zamtrios so lonely
Grimey Drawer

Slavvy posted:

Pohl's Gateway is good like that too. Has anyone read the sequels?

I read all of them and found them satisfactory--nothing ever quite matches the sense of mystery and wonder of Gateway itself but they were solid I thought, one of the few times that the answer to a Big Question wasn't utterly disappointing.

Also hell yes that Humble Bundle is tremendous. The only downside to it for me was that it wouldn't email to my Kindle so I had to manually load the books. The very most first world of problems, indeed. The Caitlin Kiernan stuff in particular is hard as gently caress to find since she only does fancy Subterranean editions of her short collections.

occamsnailfile fucked around with this message at 01:21 on Feb 19, 2015

Hedrigall
Mar 27, 2008

by vyelkin
Basically that Use of Weapons spoiler shits all over anything any movie has ever pulled. Oh Keyser Soze was a big twist? Pfft. Got nothing on Use of Weapons.


In fact would it be too audacious to say that Use of Weapons has the biggest and most insane twist of any story ever? Because I'm wracking my brain and I can't think of anything even close to it.

ulmont
Sep 15, 2010

IF I EVER MISS VOTING IN AN ELECTION (EVEN AMERICAN IDOL) ,OR HAVE UNPAID PARKING TICKETS, PLEASE TAKE AWAY MY FRANCHISE

Hedrigall posted:

In fact would it be too audacious to say that Use of Weapons has the biggest and most insane twist of any story ever? Because I'm wracking my brain and I can't think of anything even close to it.

There's a short story by Simon R. Green that recently got collected, "Food of the Gods," that has a similarly insane twist. I'm sure there are others.

Slavvy
Dec 11, 2012

Hedrigall posted:

Basically that Use of Weapons spoiler shits all over anything any movie has ever pulled. Oh Keyser Soze was a big twist? Pfft. Got nothing on Use of Weapons.


In fact would it be too audacious to say that Use of Weapons has the biggest and most insane twist of any story ever? Because I'm wracking my brain and I can't think of anything even close to it.

There are a few that I know of that aren't coming to mind but most of them you can see coming and the author can never help themselves and always leave breadcrumbs to telegraph it from a mile away. It's definitely one of the most unexpected mind-fucks I've ever experienced in a book.

Ornamented Death
Jan 25, 2006

Pew pew!

thespaceinvader posted:

Damnit I wasn't going to get it but I've been looking for Barry Hughart books for years and failed to find them.

...How? They've been available as ebooks for years.

Prop Wash
Jun 12, 2010



Thanks for the tip on that humble bundle, what a great collection. Unfortunately I'm not in the same country as my computer and the email ebooks option doesn't seem to work, but now I get something to look forward to when I get back!

RoboCicero
Oct 22, 2009

"I'm sick and tired of reading these posts!"
Count me as the one person who disliked Bridge of Birds, but that's because I'm pretty touchy about a dude taking Chinese Mythology 101 and wrapping it up in a Indiana Jones story to sell to audiences looking for their fix of the Ancient Orient. That being said, I can totally see how it's a solid romp of a story for anyone looking for one and who doesn't have similar concerns.

General Battuta
Feb 7, 2011

This is how you communicate with a fellow intelligence: you hurt it, you keep on hurting it, until you can distinguish the posts from the screams.

RoboCicero posted:

Count me as the one person who disliked Bridge of Birds, but that's because I'm pretty touchy about a dude taking Chinese Mythology 101 and wrapping it up in a Indiana Jones story to sell to audiences looking for their fix of the Ancient Orient. That being said, I can totally see how it's a solid romp of a story for anyone looking for one and who doesn't have similar concerns.

This is a completely legitimate complaint and I think even people who adore the book will call it fair.

Slo-Tek
Jun 8, 2001

WINDOWS 98 BEAT HIS FRIEND WITH A SHOVEL

RoboCicero posted:

Count me as the one person who disliked Bridge of Birds, but that's because I'm pretty touchy about a dude taking Chinese Mythology 101 and wrapping it up in a Indiana Jones story to sell to audiences looking for their fix of the Ancient Orient. That being said, I can totally see how it's a solid romp of a story for anyone looking for one and who doesn't have similar concerns.

I'm not sure I buy that. Don't think that the background was treated with disregard or cheap exoticism, and the actual story was original. Unless we also resolve that you can't write a Viking Adventure without being a Norseman, or tell a Knights in Shining Armor story without some Frankish credentials. I feel like it probably isn't cutting into sales of the Di Gong An too much.

Not to say you have to like it.

Slo-Tek fucked around with this message at 04:32 on Feb 19, 2015

Neurosis
Jun 10, 2003
Fallen Rib
Thanks to whomever recommended Son of the Morning. I'm 4/5 of the way through it and enjoying it quite a bit. It moves along at a brisk pace after the first 1/4, and has a good sense of humour about it. The Hundred Years War is also one of the historical periods I have always found fascinating so that aspect appealed to me, as well.

For those who missed the earlier discussion, it's set in 14th century Western Europe. In this world God is very real. He ordains a rigid social structure. Angels dwell in chapels and abbeys and support the rightful king of the given demesne. This can cause issues where there are succession problems. God himself, however, is a usurper. Lucifer, who espouses an egalitarian philosophy, was the creator. He and his servants were imprisoned in Hell. God created devils and Satan (distinct from Lucifer) to watch over their prisoners. The book concerns a period where the Antichrist appears and begins to open the doors to Hell, setting up conflict between the rigid social structure of the orthodox authorities and the more liberal Luciferians. The French/English conflict and the period preceding it, with the overthrow of Charles II and the reign and downfall in turn of Isabella the Fair and Roger Mortimer, are also major aspects.

It has decent characters and, as I mentioned, is fun and funny at times, so if that setup sounds at all appealing I recommend it.

Bolverkur
Aug 9, 2012

Neurosis posted:

Thanks to whomever recommended Son of the Morning. I'm 4/5 of the way through it and enjoying it quite a bit. It moves along at a brisk pace after the first 1/4, and has a good sense of humour about it. The Hundred Years War is also one of the historical periods I have always found fascinating so that aspect appealed to me, as well.

For those who missed the earlier discussion, it's set in 14th century Western Europe. In this world God is very real. He ordains a rigid social structure. Angels dwell in chapels and abbeys and support the rightful king of the given demesne. This can cause issues where there are succession problems. God himself, however, is a usurper. Lucifer, who espouses an egalitarian philosophy, was the creator. He and his servants were imprisoned in Hell. God created devils and Satan (distinct from Lucifer) to watch over their prisoners. The book concerns a period where the Antichrist appears and begins to open the doors to Hell, setting up conflict between the rigid social structure of the orthodox authorities and the more liberal Luciferians. The French/English conflict and the period preceding it, with the overthrow of Charles II and the reign and downfall in turn of Isabella the Fair and Roger Mortimer, are also major aspects.

It has decent characters and, as I mentioned, is fun and funny at times, so if that setup sounds at all appealing I recommend it.

What - the - gently caress. This sounds amazing, I want to read this! I'm currently reading The Bone Clocks and just bought The Player of Games. I was trying to cut down on Kindle impulse buying... :negative:

I only know really basic stuff about The Hundred years War, would you recommend some light reading up on it before starting or can you just jump right in?

DACK FAYDEN
Feb 25, 2013

Bear Witness
Instantly bought this Humble Bundle. The email ebooks option doesn't seem to work for me either, but I'll just use a USB cable. Sick value, but I wish the email option worked. Is it just because it's going to the iPad Kindle app?

Ornamented Death
Jan 25, 2006

Pew pew!

DACK FAYDEN posted:

Instantly bought this Humble Bundle. The email ebooks option doesn't seem to work for me either, but I'll just use a USB cable. Sick value, but I wish the email option worked. Is it just because it's going to the iPad Kindle app?

Shouldn't matter. Did you go to Amazon and add the Humble Bundle origination address to your allowed list?

occamsnailfile
Nov 4, 2007



zamtrios so lonely
Grimey Drawer

RoboCicero posted:

Count me as the one person who disliked Bridge of Birds, but that's because I'm pretty touchy about a dude taking Chinese Mythology 101 and wrapping it up in a Indiana Jones story to sell to audiences looking for their fix of the Ancient Orient. That being said, I can totally see how it's a solid romp of a story for anyone looking for one and who doesn't have similar concerns.

I get this complaint. When my book group chose Bridge of Birds, I'd never heard of the book before and when I looked it up I groaned. Chinese mythology written by a white guy in the 80s? Sounds like a recipe for an orientalist disaster. But I was pleasantly surprised overall. It's sort of in imitation of Chinese lit like Journey to the West but I can't say how well it homages that genre. It's still a lot more carefully written than most other things dealing 'The Mysterious Orient' from the same time period--but I understand the concern and still feel it a bit myself. Just, compared to like the Chung Kuo novels or something it's amazing.

Neurosis
Jun 10, 2003
Fallen Rib

Bolverkur posted:

What - the - gently caress. This sounds amazing, I want to read this! I'm currently reading The Bone Clocks and just bought The Player of Games. I was trying to cut down on Kindle impulse buying... :negative:

I only know really basic stuff about The Hundred years War, would you recommend some light reading up on it before starting or can you just jump right in?

I think that reading about the later parts of Edward II's rule would be sufficient, since history begins to diverge in the books to a larger degree after that point. A wiki skim of everything involving Edward II, Hugh Despenser and Queen Isabella is probably enough. I don't think it's necessary to enjoy the book, but recognising the personalities and seeing them come to life is cool.

Hieronymous Alloy
Jan 30, 2009


Why! Why!! Why must you refuse to accept that Dr. Hieronymous Alloy's Genetically Enhanced Cream Corn Is Superior to the Leading Brand on the Market!?!




Morbid Hound
There's always an issue with cultural appropriation but I think the difference is Hughart has a deep love and appreciation for what he's plundering. Still, yeah, that's the major criticism of the book and I understand (and pity) those it puts off.

angel opportunity
Sep 7, 2004

Total Eclipse of the Heart
I feel like in twenty years we are going to look back on criticism of "cultural appropriation" and just groan. Having "indians" as mascots is definitely dumb, but "pulling from x culture's mythology/history/religion" is just a thing writer's should be able to do. Like with anything, you have to do it well or it's going to be poo poo, and if you just haphazardly research it and lean on it it's not going to read well. If, however, you just use the basic feel of it and kind of freestyle it to whatever you want while having a strong plot, who cares?

I'm sure there is a Chinese novel somewhere about knights in a not-quite-England setting, and they probably get all kinds of poo poo 'wrong', but if the plot is good and the world feels real, does it matter at all? If anything, seeing another culture not familiar with Christian theology inadvertently mixing it with their own cultural standards is interesting to read.

Christianity as we know it today is just cultural appropriation of a Jewish movement.

Elyv
Jun 14, 2013



Neurosis posted:

Thanks to whomever recommended Son of the Morning. I'm 4/5 of the way through it and enjoying it quite a bit. It moves along at a brisk pace after the first 1/4, and has a good sense of humour about it. The Hundred Years War is also one of the historical periods I have always found fascinating so that aspect appealed to me, as well.

For those who missed the earlier discussion, it's set in 14th century Western Europe. In this world God is very real. He ordains a rigid social structure. Angels dwell in chapels and abbeys and support the rightful king of the given demesne. This can cause issues where there are succession problems. God himself, however, is a usurper. Lucifer, who espouses an egalitarian philosophy, was the creator. He and his servants were imprisoned in Hell. God created devils and Satan (distinct from Lucifer) to watch over their prisoners. The book concerns a period where the Antichrist appears and begins to open the doors to Hell, setting up conflict between the rigid social structure of the orthodox authorities and the more liberal Luciferians. The French/English conflict and the period preceding it, with the overthrow of Charles II and the reign and downfall in turn of Isabella the Fair and Roger Mortimer, are also major aspects.

It has decent characters and, as I mentioned, is fun and funny at times, so if that setup sounds at all appealing I recommend it.

Probably worth mentioning that this is by Mark Alder; I Googled it because it sounded interesting and got confused at first because all the links are to a romance where the plot appears to be the main character time travels to the 14th century because of secrets and magic or something.

Megazver
Jan 13, 2006

systran posted:

I'm sure there is a Chinese novel somewhere about knights in a not-quite-England setting, and they probably get all kinds of poo poo 'wrong', but if the plot is good and the world feels real, does it matter at all? If anything, seeing another culture not familiar with Christian theology inadvertently mixing it with their own cultural standards is interesting to read.

That's like half of all Japanese video games. The Chinese don't have a problem with 'culturally appropriating' either, they mostly just don't give a gently caress about foreigners and their culture and make media about themselves.

Megazver fucked around with this message at 16:27 on Feb 19, 2015

Neurosis
Jun 10, 2003
Fallen Rib

Elyv posted:

Probably worth mentioning that this is by Mark Alder; I Googled it because it sounded interesting and got confused at first because all the links are to a romance where the plot appears to be the main character time travels to the 14th century because of secrets and magic or something.

Oh. Yeah. Mark Alder's that came out last year is the one I mean.

anilEhilated
Feb 17, 2014

But I say fuck the rain.

Grimey Drawer
Still, if this discussion is putting anyone who hasn't from reading Bridge of Birds: do it. I've first heard about it on this board, hesitated for a long time before picking it up exactly because I was afraid of how it treats the setting, and it's become one of my favorite books. Even if the premise doesn't exactly appeal to you, it's just that good.

anilEhilated fucked around with this message at 16:28 on Feb 19, 2015

savinhill
Mar 28, 2010

Neurosis posted:

I think that reading about the later parts of Edward II's rule would be sufficient, since history begins to diverge in the books to a larger degree after that point. A wiki skim of everything involving Edward II, Hugh Despenser and Queen Isabella is probably enough. I don't think it's necessary to enjoy the book, but recognising the personalities and seeing them come to life is cool.

Yeah, I went into this just knowing basic stuff I've absorbed from movies and other books over the years and my enjoyment didn't suffer any for it. Trying to learn too much about the period right before reading might just add confusion later cuz the intriguing and politics in this is already pretty complex without adding another layer to it. I have wikied different names while reading and have been surprised that almost every one of them was a real historical person. All the angels and mythology type stuff in this provides a ton of wiki ammo too.

Like you said earlier, there's also a ton of great humor in it, which was surprising for me considering the subject matter. Osbert is awesome, I predict that he's gonna become the most powerful person in the series, not by any real ambition, but just by struggling to survive, have plenty of wine & women, and being forced to learn poo poo by people like Despenser and the kings

computer parts
Nov 18, 2010

PLEASE CLAP

systran posted:


I'm sure there is a Chinese novel somewhere about knights in a not-quite-England setting, and they probably get all kinds of poo poo 'wrong', but if the plot is good and the world feels real, does it matter at all? If anything, seeing another culture not familiar with Christian theology inadvertently mixing it with their own cultural standards is interesting to read.

Christianity as we know it today is just cultural appropriation of a Jewish movement.

Lots of anime does this and it's really stupid and offputting.

And Christianity is a Jewish cultural appropriation in the same way that America is a European cultural appropriation (it's not, it was started by those same cultural members).

Kesper North
Nov 3, 2011

EMERGENCY POWER TO PARTY

computer parts posted:

Lots of anime does this and it's really stupid and offputting.

I watched an anime recently where they were very visibly just throwing Western culture at a wall to see what stuck. It ended up being pretty comical, but not as comical as it would have been had it been done with self-awareness and a certain amount of research.

angel opportunity
Sep 7, 2004

Total Eclipse of the Heart
Yeah it can end up really stupid, but I think if someone uses elements from another culture to write something and it ends up being bad, the consensus should be, "This wasn't a very good book, I didn't like the plot, and the Mayan imagery and mythology stuff didn't help it not be a crappy book."

Not, "This book was problematic because," or "This book gave me pause because," or "This book didn't respect its subject matter because,"

I know it's a small difference and seems like a nitpick, but I don't think well executed 'cultural appropriation' should be called "Well researched and respectful" while poorly executed 'cultural appropriation' should be flagged as 'problematic.'

To give a concrete example, China Mountain Zhang, written by white lady from Ohio, Maureen F. McHugh, is an awesome novel. It heavily borrows from Chinese culture and Chinese culture is actually a main theme of the book. The protagonist is a Latino guy whose genes were modified to make him look Chinese because it gave him societal advantages in her China-dominated near future setting. She does a good job with this across the board, but makes a few weird Chinese mistakes when characters are speaking Chinese. I speak Chinese and am heavily involved in Chinese culture in my personal and work life, so the Chinese mistakes stuck out to me pretty hard and made me briefly remember, "White lady from Ohio...she's doing the best she can here..." and it did very very little to hurt my enjoyment of the book.

Writers write about humans, and all cultures exist and are made by humans. If you are writing scifi/fantasy especially, you should be able to pull whatever the gently caress you want from all existing human culture and try to do your best with it. If you gently caress it up, you shouldn't be lambasted for being disrespectful, just for not writing well.

It reminds me of when I'm watching cooking shows and the judges get angry at a contestant for "not respecting the ingredients," which also strikes me as a dumb complaint, but it's still more valid because the "ingredient" is usually a living thing that died to create that dish.

bonds0097
Oct 23, 2010

I would cry but I don't think I can spare the moisture.
Pillbug
Sounds like you watch Chopped.

Arc Hammer
Mar 4, 2013

Got any deathsticks?
I understand that we do have a thread specifically for Black Library novels, but I'd like to ask my question here for a broader answer. So, I've been reading the Gaunt's Ghosts novels by Dan Abnett, and while I have enjoyed them, its only really been the last two books I've read, part of The Lost story arc, that have stuck out to me as legitimately great stories and not just good franchise fiction. I want to know if there's any comparable military sci-fi novels out there that can give me the same sort of vibe and world building as these lasyt two books. For the record, the books were Traitor General and His Last Command. I'm looking for some more contemporary MilSF, since my dad already has a stockpile of old classic SF and honor harrington novels.

occamsnailfile
Nov 4, 2007



zamtrios so lonely
Grimey Drawer

systran posted:


Writers write about humans, and all cultures exist and are made by humans. If you are writing scifi/fantasy especially, you should be able to pull whatever the gently caress you want from all existing human culture and try to do your best with it. If you gently caress it up, you shouldn't be lambasted for being disrespectful, just for not writing well.


This would be fine if the passing back and forth happened in a vacuum, but it doesn't. White/American (European) appropriation of other cultural elements is often disrespectful and that's the main problem, but it is also enriching and promoting authors from the privileged majority for using the arts of others. That second is a more insidious and difficult thing to evaluate. It's not just Asian stuff obviously, but things like Elvis drawing a lot of his sound and style from black blues musicians who never got that kind of fame. So you have a taking that's one-sided and gives nothing back.

Bear in mind, the disrespectful aspect IS a problem--I simply don't agree that it boils down to 'bad writing'. It's often racist, for one thing, and for another it's part of a larger context: white American artists taking stuff from a different culture (or subculture) and using it to strengthen their own cultural values rather than respecting those of another.

This isn't to say that white folks can't write about Asians. China Mountain Zhang is a good example, and so is Bridge of Birds generally. They just exist in that context and have to be taken with it.

Koesj
Aug 3, 2003
I don't follow, though I must confess that I'm really not up to speed in the appropriation debate. What do you mean by a 'taking' that gives nothing back? You mean in a monetary sense? Or in the sense that a non-equitable transaction of 'authenticity' towards marketable products is taking place?

General Battuta
Feb 7, 2011

This is how you communicate with a fellow intelligence: you hurt it, you keep on hurting it, until you can distinguish the posts from the screams.
Yeah. And you're not obliged to hurl the book down, discipline the joy out of your soul, and yell at people who like it. You can just note that, hm, this is a tricky problem we haven't quite figured out yet, and a valid reason people might decide the book isn't for them.

e: in my mind 'taking without giving back' involves grabbing content from another culture without making any effort to recognize the people and history behind it. Elvis grabbed a lot of technique from black people's music, but didn't do much to help black musicians or talk about the plight of black people in America. A movie about some white tourists being attacked by evil voodoo gods in Haiti would be lovely cultural appropriation, but a movie about voodoo gods as a way for slaves to hold on to spirituality, culture, and a sense of power in the context of Haitian slavery might not be, even if the movie is fantastic fiction in which the voodoo gods are real. I'm not very good at this topic, though, so I welcome disagreement!

General Battuta fucked around with this message at 21:04 on Feb 19, 2015

Blitter
Mar 16, 2011

PopetasticPerson posted:

I'm looking for something similar to Stanislaw Lem's Solaris. The idea of attempting to communicate with an alien that is actually alien seems to be pretty rare in SF. The alien is alien to the point that no one can agree if it is even an alien, much less communicate with it. I love that, I love the haunted house feel of the station, and the themes of claustrophobia and insanity. The characters are very well done as well. There's a real haunting and melancholy tone throughout the book that is just beautiful. Even the exposition chapters, full of made-up words for made-up concepts, manage to pull me in. It's fantastic. If you haven't read it, or if you have read it for that matter, get the audiobook. It's narrated by Lt. Gaeta in Battlestar Galactica and he does a really wonderful job.

Trouble is, I can't find any other books quite like it. I've read Lem's Fiasco but found it not nearly as satisfying as Solaris. Fiasco's characters are sort of flat and it's jam packed with technobabble. Blindsight by Peter Watts is another actual alien contact book that suffers from an over abundance of transhuman nonsense and aforementioned technobabble. Solaris did have some technobabble of its own, I'm not totally averse to that sort of thing, but I prefer it to be kept at a reasonable level.

Does the book I'm looking for exist? Basically all I want is aliens that are not humanoids (preferably with whom 'contact' is impossible, but I'd settle for just very strange), well developed characters, and at most a moderate level of technobabble and minimal transhuman nonsense.

I know this is a few pages back now, but I had a book whose name didn't come back to me until just now; Robert L. Forward's Dragon's Egg. I really enjoyed it, in that it features a very different alien culture and creature, some interesting physics and just generally some great old school Hard Sci Fi. It's a two part series (Cheela), and the second book StarQuake is nearly as good as the first. Satisfying reads both.

Koesj
Aug 3, 2003
Yeah, Dragon's Egg was the second book that came to my mind, although it doesn't really connect with horror-y themes. I though it was very sweet in its pay-off.

My first suggestion would have been Blindsight but then I read the second paragraph in PopetasticPerson's post :v:

angel opportunity
Sep 7, 2004

Total Eclipse of the Heart

occamsnailfile posted:

This would be fine if the passing back and forth happened in a vacuum, but it doesn't. White/American (European) appropriation of other cultural elements is often disrespectful and that's the main problem, but it is also enriching and promoting authors from the privileged majority for using the arts of others. That second is a more insidious and difficult thing to evaluate. It's not just Asian stuff obviously, but things like Elvis drawing a lot of his sound and style from black blues musicians who never got that kind of fame. So you have a taking that's one-sided and gives nothing back.

Bear in mind, the disrespectful aspect IS a problem--I simply don't agree that it boils down to 'bad writing'. It's often racist, for one thing, and for another it's part of a larger context: white American artists taking stuff from a different culture (or subculture) and using it to strengthen their own cultural values rather than respecting those of another.

This isn't to say that white folks can't write about Asians. China Mountain Zhang is a good example, and so is Bridge of Birds generally. They just exist in that context and have to be taken with it.

I agree it's better if the appropriation is done respectfully and gives credit to whomever the ideas/symbols/imagery is being taken from, but art styles and religions and ideas in general have always just been stolen from other cultures throughout history, and they evolve in the process. If we can develop the etiquette to see this happening, step back, and acknowledge where it's all coming from and consciously make people more aware of other cultures, then great. But I don't like the idea of writers being afraid to borrow ideas or get excited about pulling from a culture/place/identity that interests them, because cultural appropriation is suddenly this scary buzzword that gets people really upset. I think a larger problem in sci/fi fantasy has always been the super boring medieval Europe setting for fantasy, and the white dudes in spaceships for scifi.

We're finally seeing a lot more diversity in both genres, and I don't want authors to be afraid of "even going there" by writing about something that isn't in their "background" or "roots." If Maureen F. McHugh wants to write a slave in future Morocco trying to flee to the future EU or about a Latino who looks like a Chinese guy, then she should be able to do that and try to do it to the best of her ability.

Another specific example is Alistair Reynolds in his new trilogy, in this "optimistic near future world" he has it that Africa became the dominant region in the near future, and basically African culture became what most sci-fi authors think Chinese culture will be. All of the main characters are from Kenya, and a main protagonist's name is Geoffrey. The IDEA of Africa becoming the dominant region is a cool one, and it's also an idea that is almost never considered in sci-fi. China Mountain Zhang's prediction of China taking everything over was a fresh change in the early 90s, when people still thought Japan would be big (China Mountain Zhang was written and published before the economy tanked), but in the mid 2010s, China as superpower is tired and old and boring; every sci-fi author is predicting it so much that it's just standard. In the afterword to Blue Remembered Earth, Reynolds says he was listening to a lot of African music, and there was this drummer named Geoffrey something that he liked, so he named the protagonist Geoffrey and set Africa as the major player in his world.

So Reynolds had respectful reasons for doing this and didn't invoke a lot of nasty cliches or stereotyping (at least that I picked up), but here's the thing, the book kind of sucked. The Africa thing was a good idea, but it did feel rather tacked on and nonessential to the plot. Most of the characters were quite boring, so Kenyan sci-fi characters or not, it didn't matter.

Should Reynolds get poo poo for being disrespectful? Is liking an African drummer a good enough reason to make Kenya, a country you otherwise have little connection to, a major factor in your sci-fi novel? How much research does Reynolds have to do before he can write about future Kenya? Does he have to go to Kenya? Does he have to know x amount of Kenyans? I feel like the answer to all those questions should just be that he only needs to do enough research/travelling to make his Africa idea in his novel not suck, and he obviously didn't achieve that, at least in my opinion. Was it because he didn't research the region/culture/people enough, or because he just wrote a lovely novel? Maybe it was a combination of both, but I don't think it's particularly helpful or insightful to try to pick apart Reynold's whiteness and background and history to see how it influenced his imagining of a future Africa that shaped the world.

If every time a white male author tries to write about a non-white male, and they get roasted for not doing it well enough, they may just feel like they should go back to writing about white males. I won't comment on Kenya because I don't know enough about it, but in China Mountain Zhang there were some obvious errors on the Chinese stuff that clearly came from McHugh's lack of knowledge/research, but she wrote a really great novel. I am really glad she took the risk of writing about a gay Latino who looked like a Chinese guy when she herself is a straight white woman. She took big risks like writing about over-protective Chinese parents, losing face, and a bunch of stuff that--if she had flubbed it--people would have cried out that she was insensitive etc. for even touching those topics. Even if she had messed it up I don't think it's right to say she shouldn't have tried.

angel opportunity fucked around with this message at 21:42 on Feb 19, 2015

sourdough
Apr 30, 2012

systran posted:

I agree it's better if the appropriation is done respectfully and gives credit to whomever the ideas/symbols/imagery is being taken from, but art styles and religions and ideas in general have always just been stolen from other cultures throughout history, and they evolve in the process. If we can develop the etiquette to see this happening, step back, and acknowledge where it's all coming from and consciously make people more aware of other cultures, then great. But I don't like the idea of writers being afraid to borrow ideas or get excited about pulling from a culture/place/identity that interests them, because cultural appropriation is suddenly this scary buzzword that gets people really upset. I think a larger problem in sci/fi fantasy has always been the super boring medieval Europe setting for fantasy, and the white dudes in spaceships for scifi.

We're finally seeing a lot more diversity in both genres, and I don't want authors to be afraid of "even going there" by writing about something that isn't in their "background" or "roots." If Maureen F. McHugh wants to write a slave in future Morocco trying to flee to the future EU or about a Latino who looks like a Chinese guy, then she should be able to do that and try to do it to the best of her ability.

Another specific example is Alistair Reynolds in his new trilogy, in this "optimistic near future world" he has it that Africa became the dominant region in the near future, and basically African culture became what most sci-fi authors think Chinese culture will be. All of the main characters are from Kenya, and a main protagonist's name is Geoffrey. The IDEA of Africa becoming the dominant region is a cool one, and it's also an idea that is almost never considered in sci-fi. China Mountain Zhang's prediction of China taking everything over was a fresh change in the early 90s, when people still thought Japan would be big (China Mountain Zhang was written and published before the economy tanked), but in the mid 2010s, China as superpower is tired and old and boring; every sci-fi author is predicting it so much that it's just standard. In the afterword to Blue Remembered Earth, Reynolds says he was listening to a lot of African music, and there was this drummer named Geoffrey something that he liked, so he named the protagonist Geoffrey and set Africa as the major player in his world.

So Reynolds had respectful reasons for doing this and didn't invoke a lot of nasty cliches or stereotyping (at least that I picked up), but here's the thing, the book kind of sucked. The Africa thing was a good idea, but it did feel rather tacked on and nonessential to the plot. Most of the characters were quite boring, so Kenyan sci-fi characters or not, it didn't matter.

Should Reynolds get poo poo for being disrespectful? Is liking an African drummer a good enough reason to make Kenya, a country you otherwise have little connection to, a major factor in your sci-fi novel? How much research does Reynolds have to do before he can write about future Kenya? Does he have to go to Kenya? Does he have to know x amount of Kenyans? I feel like the answer to all those questions should just be that he only needs to do enough research/travelling to make his Africa idea in his novel not suck, and he obviously didn't achieve that, at least in my opinion. Was it because he didn't research the region/culture/people enough, or because he just wrote a lovely novel? Maybe it was a combination of both, but I don't think it's particularly helpful or insightful to try to pick apart Reynold's whiteness and background and history to see how it influenced his imagining of a future Africa that shaped the world.

If every time a white male author tries to write about a non-white male, and they get roasted for not doing it well enough, they may just feel like they should go back to writing about white males. I won't comment on Kenya because I don't know enough about it, but in China Mountain Zhang there were some obvious errors on the Chinese stuff that clearly came from McHugh's lack of knowledge/research, but she wrote a really great novel. I am really glad she took the risk of writing about a gay Latino who looked like a Chinese guy when she herself is a straight white woman. She took big risks like writing about over-protective Chinese parents, losing face, and a bunch of stuff that--if she had flubbed it--people would have cried out that she was insensitive etc. for even touching those topics. Even if she had messed it up I don't think it's right to say she shouldn't have tried.

Pretend I empty quoted this.

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Amberskin
Dec 22, 2013

We come in peace! Legit!

Hedrigall posted:

Basically that Use of Weapons spoiler shits all over anything any movie has ever pulled. Oh Keyser Soze was a big twist? Pfft. Got nothing on Use of Weapons.


In fact would it be too audacious to say that Use of Weapons has the biggest and most insane twist of any story ever? Because I'm wracking my brain and I can't think of anything even close to it.

All of you Zombies?

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