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tooterfish posted:loving hell, talk about damning with faint praise. Again, I really like the guy, read everything he's written in fantasy and October is in my backlog, but holy poo poo he does love sticking obscure obtuse descriptions where they don't belong. pseudanonymous posted:So he's not preachy at all and instead people don't like his writing style but rather than say that they claim he's preachy? edit: Christ, I knew I shouldn't have done the BotM. Nero Wolfe is rubbing off on me. Hopefully it's comphrehensible. anilEhilated fucked around with this message at 20:51 on Apr 10, 2019 |
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Apr 10, 2019 20:46
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Banks was a socialist IRL but his works are anything but. If you even superficially analyze his works, he’s a liberal at best, or possibly in love with militarism/fascism. Banks’ socialist utopia is devoid of human influence, ruled by benevolent but ultimately inscrutable AIs. The means of production are not human owned anymore so the only prestige one can attain is by being chosen to join the colonialist secret police. The ultimate reward for being a good member of Culture is permission granted by the AIs to commit acts of violence against alien civilizations. Plus, Banks has a weird boner for militaristic and fascist civilizations, which are always somehow portrayed as more authentic or noble than Culture.
Take the plunge! Okay! fucked around with this message at 20:53 on Apr 10, 2019 |
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Apr 10, 2019 20:50
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anilEhilated posted:I probably used the wrong word there; I find his books a curious combination of storytelling, constant expression of rather smug intellectual superiority and ideological pamphlet. That is not meant as jab at their quality; as I said, I enjoy them a lot. But it is something I can see people holding against him. I wouldn't have brought it up but I've heard a similar "preachiness" complaint before. I think sometimes his word choice seems ludicrous, using words so obscure to me seems like a non-communicative act (I wish there was/I knew of an obscure word for that). Certainly, a certain kind of socialism or workers revolt is a part of the Bas-Lag trilogy. I don't recall that being a part of his other works I'm familiar with. It just seems like a criticism that is a bit bizarre to me or to be more honest disingenuous.
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Apr 10, 2019 20:56
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Started reading Space Opera by Catherynne M. Valente, and so far it's the most try-harding-to-be--DouglasAdams-cool thing I've read since Mondo 2000's 1997 book How to Mutate & Take Over the World, which also featured a band as the heroes of the story.tooterfish posted:Iain M. Banks. The two sides of Iain Banks writing career blend together for me. The non M./non-scifi Banks novels always seemed to feature wildly privileged people coming to terms with their wildly privileged pasts/wildly privileged actions, so don't really think of Iain Banks as "socialism" style author outside of the "post-scarcity" Culture books. Totally unrelated, really wish Bank's Against a Dark Background wasn't a one-off novel. Never read KSR, never plan on reading on KSR, so have no comments to make on KSR other than "did not know that, thanks".
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Apr 10, 2019 21:11
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Take the plunge! Okay! posted:Banks was a socialist IRL but his works are anything but. If you even superficially analyze his works, he’s a liberal at best, or possibly in love with militarism/fascism. Banks’ socialist utopia is devoid of human influence, ruled by benevolent but ultimately inscrutable AIs. The means of production are not human owned anymore so the only prestige one can attain is by being chosen to join the colonialist secret police. The ultimate reward for being a good member of Culture is permission granted by the AIs to commit acts of violence against alien civilizations. Plus, Banks has a weird boner for militaristic and fascist civilizations, which are always somehow portrayed as more authentic or noble than Culture. I love Banks' writing and the Culture setting but I can't really disagree. It's a power fantasy but it's okay because the Culture are fun cool guys, right?? They're always, inevitably, the most well armed and stupendously potent, but so charmingly nonchalant about it, so it's all good, promise. I guess The Hydrogen Sonata did ultimately portray military fetishism as kind of a stupid dead end. But Banks likes to have his subtextual cake and blow it up too.
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Apr 10, 2019 21:23
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Elon Musk loving the Culture books without understanding a loving thing about Banks' beliefs is probably as damning an indictment as they'll ever get.
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Apr 10, 2019 21:23
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NoNostalgia4Grover posted:Started reading Space Opera by Catherynne M. Valente, and so far it's the most try-harding-to-be--DouglasAdams-cool thing I've read since Mondo 2000's 1997 book How to Mutate & Take Over the World, which also featured a band as the heroes of the story. I found it they'd-probably-use-this-to-torture-me-in-Guantanamo insufferable.
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Apr 10, 2019 21:41
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One thing that annoys me about Culture is how the antagonistic aliens are portrayed as cartoonishly evil. The Azad in Player of Games and Affront in Excession especially. I don't remember if the Idirans are. Excession goes out of its way to bang it into your head that the Affront truly revel in cruelty and domination! they torture and murder for fun! all sex in their society is rape! Genar-Hofoen still wanting to be made an Affront even though he clearly understands all of this is decent characterization, but the whole thing just feels so...lazy. Same with the Meatfucker chapter early in the novel when they dream murders the bad genocide guy who didn't regret doing a genocide. Some subtely would be nice.
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Apr 10, 2019 21:56
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General Battuta posted:Elon Musk loving the Culture books without understanding a loving thing about Banks' beliefs is probably as damning an indictment as they'll ever get.
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Apr 10, 2019 22:21
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my bony fealty posted:One thing that annoys me about Culture is how the antagonistic aliens are portrayed as cartoonishly evil. The Azad in Player of Games and Affront in Excession especially. I don't remember if the Idirans are. There's always the Homomda and Chelgrians
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Apr 10, 2019 23:00
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All of the Culture take place at the borders where something interesting can actually happen, of course all the aliens are cartoonishly evil, there's where the Culture likes stick its nose in to other people's business.
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Apr 10, 2019 23:11
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Reading Sam Sykes Seven Blades book, and so far it's pretty good. Not too far into it, but I was worried that Sal would end up being just a reskinned Lenk from his earlier series. So far though, that doesn't seem to be the case.
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Apr 10, 2019 23:29
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Megazver posted:I found it they'd-probably-use-this-to-torture-me-in-Guantanamo insufferable. How to Mutate & Take Over the World is definitely Guantanamo level waterboarding, however Space Opera is shaping up to be Barney I Love you song looped on infinite repeat Geneva Convention warcrimes for me. The only interesting thing in Mutate & Take over was the book design + it's use of multi-colored ink to denote the 2 or 3 levels of meta-dialogue per page by the The pain of reading Space Opera is enhanced because the other book I've been reading, Wasteland: The Great War and the origins of modern horror by W. Scott Poole, is goddamn amazing, and I could easily spend 2 months looking up/reading/watching all the references the author is throwing down. So many bookmarks in it right now, it looks like a hedgehog/Cenobite razor-edged book.
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Apr 11, 2019 02:20
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NoNostalgia4Grover posted:Totally unrelated, really wish Bank's Against a Dark Background wasn't a one-off novel. I agree, there are more stories in that poor, lonely setting. As it is, I'm very glad he wrote it.While on the one hand it is nihilistic, depressing, and full of unlikable characters it has some very interesting themes, some amazing setting details, and a ton of fantastic set-piece scenes that make for very rewarding re-reads. The saddest part is, we're in the same situation. Without some serious scientific and engineering breakthroughs, 12 light years to the next habitable planet might as well be 12,000,000.
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Apr 11, 2019 02:36
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I didn't think the Idirans were cartoonishly evil, or at least not more so than human fascist movements. They simply held a philosophy that was entirely incompatible with the Culture's and which would inevitably bring them into conflict, and had the technical acumen to make themselves a credible threat. Likewise, the bad guy in the Algebraist is terrifically awful...but not more than real figures, and he's mostly high on his own ego and the authoritarian government he was a part of had fallen so even the few checks that might have existed were gone. I haven't read all of Banks yet--it's on my list of things to do, but knowing there's no more once I finish means I parcel them out very slowly.
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Apr 11, 2019 03:01
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I’ve read a couple dozen books over the past year trying to rediscover the magic of Revelation Space but nothing has hit the spot. Anyone have any recommendations to try?
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Apr 11, 2019 03:37
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The Gay Bean posted:I’ve read a couple dozen books over the past year trying to rediscover the magic of Revelation Space but nothing has hit the spot. Anyone have any recommendations to try? What specifically did you like about RS?
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Apr 11, 2019 03:39
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it's for these reasons that Look To Windward is an important part of the Culture milieu, i'd say though for whatever reason it seems to be one of the less-read Culture books if you don't like the culture smarmily getting away with everything, that's the book where they don't or, rather, the book where they do, but only by virtue of Might making Right, with no real concessions to moral probity the book that credits the Homomda perspective of "hey, quit sticking yer dicks in primitive civilizations, Culture Minds"
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Apr 11, 2019 03:40
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Drone Jett posted:I think they would have blown her up in that case. Making sacrifices and doing your duty (especially with her dad out of contact and giving you no guidance) is the whole Laconian thing, it was only because she made it unclear whether she had authorization to go that they let her. And eventually when they had time to think they did try to kill her. That didn't work too well for Cortazar
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Apr 11, 2019 04:26
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Hieronymous Alloy posted:What specifically did you like about RS? The respect for the lightspeed barrier and the way the galaxy of RS seemed to be shaped around that. The feeling that the characters were participating in a world that was shaped by larger constraints and forces rather than the driving force behind them. A very interesting take on the discovery and coexistence with life in the galaxy.
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Apr 11, 2019 04:36
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Look to Windward is pretty good, and presents Culture Ships in a different way than normally seen in the Culture books. Most people in this thread who like Iain Banks's Culture books love Use of Weapons and disdain Consider Phlebas, which is funny. Consider Phlebas is the inverse Use of Weapons, with bigger action + ideas than Use of Weapons. Back off topic: read M John Harrison's Things that never Happen short story collection over the weekend, and it was pretty good, unshockingly. The first story of the collection starts off with: quote:With the discovery of God on the far side of the Moon, and the subsequent gigantic and hazardous towing operation that brought Him back to start His reign anew, there began on Earth, as one might assume, a period of far-reaching change.
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Apr 11, 2019 04:37
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occamsnailfile posted:Likewise, the bad guy in the Algebraist is terrifically awful...but not more than real figures Look there's a lot of awful people in human history but nobody on planet Earth has ever been able to ejaculate horsehair 
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Apr 11, 2019 04:44
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NoNostalgia4Grover posted:Look to Windward is pretty good, and presents Culture Ships in a different way than normally seen in the Culture books. Any place to read this story online? Sounds like my jam but there's not a book in print, nor an ebook option.
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Apr 11, 2019 05:31
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Take the plunge! Okay! posted:Banks was a socialist IRL but his works are anything but. If you even superficially analyze his works, he’s a liberal at best, or possibly in love with militarism/fascism. Banks’ socialist utopia is devoid of human influence, ruled by benevolent but ultimately inscrutable AIs. The means of production are not human owned anymore so the only prestige one can attain is by being chosen to join the colonialist secret police. The ultimate reward for being a good member of Culture is permission granted by the AIs to commit acts of violence against alien civilizations. Plus, Banks has a weird boner for militaristic and fascist civilizations, which are always somehow portrayed as more authentic or noble than Culture. This is a rather entertaining take on the "my imaginary socialist utopia doesn't agree with this self-acclaimed socialist's imaginary science fiction socialist utopia and therefore he is not a real socialist" purity test.
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Apr 11, 2019 06:41
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I'm about seventy pages or so into Space Opera so far and the pastiche only annoys me sometimes, mostly in the first chapter where it treats the reader like a child.
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Apr 11, 2019 08:07
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Cardiac posted:This is a rather entertaining take on the "my imaginary socialist utopia doesn't agree with this self-acclaimed socialist's imaginary science fiction socialist utopia and therefore he is not a real socialist" purity test. Its also incorrect since its implied that their are a bunch of people in the Culture famous for their art and crafts and poo poo Two of them are directly mentioned off the top of my head. And the whole miliary cultures being implied to be more authentic is a direct dig at the Cultures entire deal with Contact. Player of Games also involves the dude being loving blackmailed into working for Contact, so its not some ultimate reward. Telsa Cola fucked around with this message at 08:55 on Apr 11, 2019 |
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Apr 11, 2019 08:39
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Cardiac posted:This is a rather entertaining take on the "my imaginary socialist utopia doesn't agree with this self-acclaimed socialist's imaginary science fiction socialist utopia and therefore he is not a real socialist" purity test. if a guy writes a liberal utopia then that's not a socialist utopia by definition, even if he wears a big label on his shirt front that says socialist
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Apr 11, 2019 08:54
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in a post-scarcity society socialism is obsolete because there are no workers and means of production to seize and no reason to seize them anyway
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Apr 11, 2019 09:09
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NoNostalgia4Grover posted:How to Mutate & Take Over the World is definitely Guantanamo level waterboarding, however Space Opera is shaping up to be Barney I Love you song looped on infinite repeat Geneva Convention warcrimes for me. The only interesting thing in Mutate & Take over was the book design + it's use of multi-colored ink to denote the 2 or 3 levels of meta-dialogue per page by the It's okay to give up on a book, my friend.
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Apr 11, 2019 10:43
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Cicero posted:Was it here that someone linked to a hilarious Goodreads review of Abercrombie's books aping his style? I can't find it anymore. This is amazing and everyone should read it. Incredible.
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Apr 11, 2019 12:15
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One must ask oneself, can a society in which everyone lives like the leisure class of Edwardian era capitalism, with exceptional individuals achieving notability through art and sports, truly be called a socialist utopia?
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Apr 11, 2019 12:38
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Johnny Truant posted:Uh, so Death's End is breaking my brain in ways I didn't even think possible Semi liveposting about this some more: Yun Tianming's three fairytales  Also goddamnit Cheng Xin, just hand over your loving company to Wade, don't tell him you get the final decision in anything that hurts humanity! THAT'S WHY HE CAN DO IT AND YOU CAN'T. ARGHHHHH. So I guess my stupid predictions for the last ~200 pages are gonna be humans discovering curvature propulsion and using the "skid marks" created by accelerating to lightspeed to escape the solar system via the fourth dimension. Also somehow we'll meet up with a fourth dimensional alien. Nooo idea how, but I think that's what Prince Deep Water signified in the fairytale. Like, obviously the perspective is an analogy for the giant ring structure that Blue Space met. Buuuuuut that's all I've got. I'm gonna finish this fucker by tomorrow night, I swear 
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Apr 11, 2019 12:38
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Stupid_Sexy_Flander posted:Any place to read this story online? Sounds like my jam but there's not a book in print, nor an ebook option. That's one of the frustrations/joys of reading M John Harrison. Most of his stories aren't in ebook editions, or are out of print. Once you do manage to track down copies of his rare books/stories though...  Abebooks helped me get the two non-Viriconium M John Harrison collections I've discussed in this thread. Megazver posted:It's okay to give up on a book, my friend. Oh I just did.
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Apr 11, 2019 12:58
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Take the plunge! Okay! posted:One must ask oneself, can a society in which everyone lives like the leisure class of Edwardian era capitalism, with exceptional individuals achieving notability through art and sports, truly be called a socialist utopia? Well, yes, cause socialist utopia is about as well-defined as the Culture utopia. Come to think of it, Banks actually describes his utopia better including the actual path to it, which is more than Marx ever did. So in reality Marx was a sci-fi author and as most sci-fi authors he was unable to predict technological and sociological developments which would make his books outdated.
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Apr 11, 2019 13:06
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Apr 11, 2019 18:26
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Hardwired for negligent discharge.
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Apr 11, 2019 18:29
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tooterfish posted:Hardwired for negligent discharge. It opened with a car chase with a pair of NY cops going 90 mph in the city but the lights are busted on their car so MAX HORN'S partner DAN RIDDLE spent the ride fiddling with the lights before giving up and throwing the whole thing out a window. He then loaded his 12 gauge shotgun as they pulled up to an abandoned apartment building, and MAX HORN pulled his handgun and now the thieves have hostages and explosives and DAN RIDDLE keeps pleading to call back-up but MAX HORN is all "hell no" because it'll take 40 minutes for backup to arrive. quote:"Just how the hell do you know that?" e: Oh and when there are gasoline shortages the entire city switches their cars over to run on propane, and right now MAX HORN is relieved that they're not in a shortage because gasoline lets his car go faster StrixNebulosa fucked around with this message at 18:41 on Apr 11, 2019 |
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Apr 11, 2019 18:38
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IN A WORLD...
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Apr 11, 2019 19:01
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Before I expanded the image I thought that was a gun with rocket exhausts coming out from the back. Now im sad I shattered the illusion.
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Apr 11, 2019 19:11
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Johnny Truant posted:Semi liveposting about this some more: Annnnnnd here we go: God damnit Cheng Xin! You're out of hibernation for like a loving DAY and you manage to shut down not only curvature propulsion research, but the entirety of Halo City. You idiot, you absolute loving dunce. I'll probably eat my words later but Wade should've chucked her rear end into space.
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Apr 12, 2019 00:29
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