October 2016 archive

Arena by Holly Jennings

I requested this book from NetGalley because the premise sounded hella intriguing: in 2054, the Virtual Gaming League hosts VR gladiatorial combat tournaments, with participants feeling all the pain of their avatars, despite the injuries and deaths staying virtual. The first female team captain in the history of the combats, Kali Ling, challenges the structure …

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Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2016/10/26/arena-by-holly-jennings/

The Dark Forest by Liu Cixin

I didn’t find The Dark Forest as compelling as its predecessor, The Three-Body Problem. I think a lot of it has to do with how I disagreed with Liu Cixin as to the behavior of future humanity, particularly in terms of the outlawing of Escapism, as well as the way in which the victors of …

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Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2016/10/18/the-dark-forest-by-liu-cixin/

A Night in the Lonesome October by Roger Zelazny

By the pricking of my thumbs, something wicked this way puns. Several somethings, actually, in Roger Zelazny’s seasonal romp, A Night in the Lonesome October. Those things are not to be confused with the Things in the Mirror, the Thing in the Circle, the Thing in the Wardrobe, the Thing in the Steamer Trunk, or …

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Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2016/10/11/a-night-in-the-lonesome-october-by-roger-zelazny/

The Vanquished by Robert Gerwarth

At the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month in 1918, the guns fell silent, ending more than four years of terrible war in Europe. First as Armistice Day and later as Remembrance Day, European (and Commonwealth) countries even now commemorate the end of the First World War nearly a century after …

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Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2016/10/05/the-vanquished-by-robert-gerwarth/

Feet of Clay by Terry Pratchett

The cover gives it away, I thought. And so does the text on the back cover! Readers are being set up for a murder mystery, but whodunit, or rather whatdunit, is clear from the very beginning, if not before. I was all set to be cross at having the mystery solved before it had even …

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Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2016/10/04/feet-of-clay-by-terry-pratchett/

The Girl With All The Gifts by M. R. Carey

This is another one of those books where I saw that a movie was coming out, and the trailer looked good enough that I felt I ought to read the book before I was inadvertently spoiled as to what happens. And then I was puzzled to discover that M. R. Carey is the pseudonym of …

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Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2016/10/01/the-girl-with-all-the-gifts-by-m-r-carey/