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Apocryphal
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- Apocryphal
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I’m not quite sure why the Arabian Nights tales are popular in the west - might just be an accident of preservation, or it might be the compelling framing element of Shahrazad having to tell a story each night to save her life, which is definitely m…
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My previous exposure to the 1001 Nights were via Children’s stories, and especially via record albums with childrens stories, which I listen to a lot while playing with Lego. As an adult, but still at least 20 years ago, I read a Penguin Classics…
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Hope to be finished by next weekend.
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Sounds like an intriguing one.
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Yes, sounds like fun. What are the ports?
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@BarnerCobblewood ’s 1st three paragraphs describe the nature of kingship in ancient Babylon, too. There, kings were eager to show that they were ‘good kings’, by which they meant that they upheld the social order ordained by the gods. The famous la…
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Yeah, true. What did Charis struggle with (apart from Jedao)?
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Seems fine to me.
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I don't think any part of this really says 'gaming' to me. I'm not very interested in the setting. The events were not interesting enough (or specific enough) to steal, nor were the characters. Themes like conformity/loyalty/discipline are timeless,…
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Is it a Korean book? Yoon Ha Lee is a Texan, near as I can figure. Sadly I don't know enough about Korean culture to spot aspects of it in this book, though obviously the asian quality came through in the foods mentioned, and the whole thing felt li…
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They're very different treatments, for sure, with very different features. Come Looking For Me was really about characters, and not much about warfare. It's main flaw, I felt, was that some of the motives/behaviours were not very convincing, and als…
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The characters were fine, but their context was really lacking. Formation Instinct is something I also flagged this in my notes as a 'what is it'? - I never learned. Is it 'instinct derived from training? I never really knew was 'formation' meant in…
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List most of it. this was impressionistic. It did create a colourful (if confusing) image in my mind, so mission accomplished there, but there wasn't really enough detail to nail down the military aspects of the book. It felt like military SF, but i…
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At first I thought the author was intentionally taking the long way to writing the story. Some of the writing was very wordy at the beginning. For example: "Charis opened the relay and said to the recalcitrant sergeant, with great leniency, &qu…
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It was very impressionistic. I clued into this about 4 chapters in and decided not to let it bother me too much. I made notes of all kinds of things I thought could have done with proper descriptions, but it was obvious the author was trying to give…
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I also couldn't figure out what the 'calendar' had to do with anything. I did clue into the idea that a multi-world hegemony like this would probably have worlds of different calendars, but it still didn't make sense with respect to what all the fus…
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I didn't know. It might have helped, though I looked up 'ninefox' and what I mainly got was references to this novel, so that wasn't too helpful. It does seem to fit the character.
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Good review!
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I think I did see it once, while accessing the site from my phone when I was in a different town. But mostly it seems to recognize my machines/locations and I don't see it.
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It’s slow for me, largely because distracted by other things. But this is a long weekend here so I hope to make good progress.
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We’ve definitely never read Fforde before.
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So, we’re still on for Ninefox Gambit this month, right? And what’s on tap for September? Continuing monthly picks, or just tackle the slow read for a while?
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:D
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All my typos courtesy of iPhone, btw 😠
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@clash_bowley That’s a really nice touch!
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There were a number of small elements I chafed against. One was accents. We’re Mrs Kettle and Biscuit supposed to be cockneys, or from the west country? Why the double e on ‘Thee’? And why did the Scottish character also say ‘there’ instead of ‘the’…
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I’ve addressed some of this in my Q1 response. Overall, I thought it was decent, but could have been much richer. Mrs Kettle was the most interesting ‘villain’, followed by Lindsay. The American captain isn’t on screen enough, and his motives are no…
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I think in general I agree with everything you guys have said, even where you differ, because I’m conflicted on many matters. I really liked the below-decks perspective, but I wish it had been broken up a little. I found the pacing to be really even…
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I finished this today. I know richard is finished. How's everyone else doing? Regardless, I'll likely post the questions tomorrow, given it's Sunday and I'll have time, whereas next week I wont. Of course if you aren't done yet, I assume you'll feel…
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I just read this myself. My review from Goodreads: This is the second Joe Haldeman I've read, the other being his most famous book, The Forever War. Where The Forever War had a lot of amazing mind-bending stuff, mostly revolving around the idea of…