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NeilNjae
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- NeilNjae
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Excellent photos, thanks. They really illustrate what's in the book. The palisade is different from what I imagined. The one pictured wouldn't stop arrows, but the book suggested that people could shelter safely behind a palisades, implying it was …
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(Quote) Indeed I have. (Quote) That will be for others to chime in.
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(Quote) I've finished it. I wouldn't call it "dense", so that bodes well for an interesting discussion!
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My local weekly club went to online games in early 2020. The club set up a Discord group. Games have continued, some using Discord, some Roll20, some with some other method of communication. There has been a variety of virtual tabletops used. I've t…
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(Quote) I agree with that. If "Khoush" means "not Himba", it would have been nice to acknowledge the variety of people under the "Khoush" umbrella. If "Khoush" means "neighbour of Himba" it would hav…
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I agree, it's rapid and breathless all the way through. The only time for a bit of pause and reflection is when Binti dies at the end and people start to consider the changes that happened because of her. I think the stories could have done with a …
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(Quote) I think you've nailed it. The edan is a representation of the mysteries of the universe, and more of it is revealed only when Binti grows in her understanding. Good insight!
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(Quote) Did she? Or did she just write the Himba and Khoush exactly as they are, and that comes across as alien and strange to us blinkered Western readers? I think it's a mistake to exoticise the setting, to treat it as something novel that's shown…
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Okwu spends a lot of time being a stand-in for a whole species, so there's a question of how much his personality is his as opposed to his culture's. I agree with @Apocryphal that it develops some personality by the end of the trilogy, finding it's …
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(Quote) I think this is the real reason. The first novella took off, so Okorafor had to do a whole bunch more world building that didn't really fit with the first story. We ended up with a character with lots of disparate features tacked on, when it…
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I think the aliens were different physically, but not that different intellectually. Especially in Oomza, all the staff seemed very similar in outlook. That may have been a consequence of them all being university academics. (Quote) I don't think B…
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(Quote) I like this observation. A lot of things happen to Binti, forced on her by circumstance. She shows her character by how she rises to these challenges, becoming more than she was before while still retaining her core identity. And she uses th…
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(Quote) Okorafor has stated that Binti isn't a YA book, and seems to get a little frustrated that people categorise it as such. But saying that, it certainly reads like a YA book, with characters with simple inner lives, clearly drawn conflicts, and…
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The impression I got of the technology was one of diversity. There were many different species and cultures around, and they mostly shared their technology. I don't think the living spaceships came from Earth, but I don't know where they were from.…
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I think the world is limited to Africa (specifically southern Africa) in much the same way that much American SF assumes the world is limited to the USA. It's a statement that the world doesn't revolve around the global north. I don't think it says …
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If we want to wait a bit for other formats to become available, that's fine by me.
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I've had stong recomendations for Five Decembers by James Kestrel, so let's do that in February. I think it was published in October 21. It's a hardboiled detective story set in 1941, featuring a detective from Hawaii who goes to Hong Kong just befo…
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I'm happy to join in the monthly rotation, no real preference for when.
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First off, many thanks to @Apocryphal for stepping up to lead the slow read. It was an opportunity to finally engage with an author that's been at the back of my mind for a while. I thought the Dream Archipelago was the best read of the three. The …
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It should be OK by me. Let's see how it goes. The schedule is a bit flexible anyway, so we can always slide a week or so, or even split the book over two months, if the need arises. But let's cross that bridge when we come to it.
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(Quote) I probably overstated my case. Some background and setup is necessary (and I somewhat enjoyed the account of Jevick's childhood), but did we need quite to much setup? Did we need quite so many walls of descriptive text. I was skipping throug…
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(Quote) Hindsight's wonderful. The picks seemed like a good idea at the time, so I'm happy with where we ended up. (Quote) It's the "So what?" question. Why am I spending my time reading this book? Why this, and not some other book or som…
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An observation from someone who didn't finish. Is it the case that this novel only really starts half-way through? All the questions reference things I don't think I got to. I stopped at 50%, when thingammy had just escaped the asylum. Was the first…
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And lest my post be too negative... Do I regret reading this book? No, not really. Priest is someone I've wanted to read more of for a long time. This was an opportunity to do that, and one I was keen to take up when @Apocryphal suggested it. Thank…
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(Quote) No. (Quote) I have no idea what Priest is trying to achieve. It's clear we're not meant to "think" about the book: nothing makes much sense when you think about it. The book works best when it's a collection of impressions and fee…
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I also picked up on the South-East Asia analogy, and agree it was refreshing to have a setting that was devoid of European influence.
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(Quote) (emphasis added) I wonder if this is why I didn't get on with this book, and others with similar writing style. When I'm reading a book, I'm not a listener, I'm a reader. I don't hear the words. I get nothing of rhythm or rhyme in written w…
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(Quote) "Wouldn't". It woudn't surprise me if Sandro were to become Jacj. (Quote) I could see that being the case. But I also think that Priest isn't that interested in exploring that side of the world-building any more, and wants to look…
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> @RichardAbbott said: > Also, I wonder what it signifies that the bassist Teo apparently had no idea who Cea was? Has Sandro slipped into another timeline? Probably. It would surprise me if he were to become Jacj.
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First off, the utter lack of widespread knowledge about adepts. If there was a group of people who could reverse ageing through travel, you'd think that would be something most people would know about. There are all sorts of pieces of trivia we know…