Hi BookTube! I'm Jonathan and I enjoy reading sci-fi. I upload regularly and share reviews, recommendations, collaborations and rankings. I look forward to discussing sci-fi books with you!
I don't currently have time to read additional books for reviews on request.
I've been working on reading Hyperion and it's been tough. It's like reading Canterbury tales and war and peace in space. I'll probably keep going because now it's a challenge, but someone who has read Sci fi for 50 years, not caring for it.
📬 The little aside on “Electric Forest” was great! The lengths we bookish types go 😆 I believe I’ve seen this one on Secret Sauce of Storycraft and Shades of Orange, but it wasn’t me that scored a copy when you were looking for a replacement 🥹 Absolutely splendidly smooth nudge towards the Patreon! I proper-LOL-ed at that 😃 Really delighted you enjoyed “…Harry August.” I enjoyed that one a whole bunch and have read some of her other work too.
I'm about 200 pages into this at the moment. The book feels a bit bloated out with information and "stuff". An analogy I'd use is, it's like bringing two suitcases with you for a day trip somewhere.
Electric Forest! That is a bit of a unicorn in QLD, it is on my wish list. Tanith Lee is a unique author by any standards and her books are never straightforward, which can be highly addictive or off-putting depending on the reader. The other two are ones I would definitely like to get to one day. Thanks for the reviews.
@@WordsinTime Well do I have a recommendation or two! Me and my sister both adore Drinking Sapphire Wine and Don't Bite The Sun. They have aged a bit tbh but are still pretty wild. I personally think that The Silver Metal Lover is one of her best pieces of writing and very accessible to a modern reader so that is often one I recommend.
It's relieving to hear that someone else didn’t love Inverted World either. It didn’t really work for me for the same reasons you outlined, as well as another which I'm not sure if you were implying when you mentioned characters withholding information from each other. It sort of has to do with that romantic sub-plot and bit of "drama" between 2 characters in the middle of the book. Found it infuriating and derailed (yes, pun intended) the story for me. This is why I tend to veer away from SF with romance in it.
Hey Jonathan! Such an amazing channel you have (came across it today). Have you reviewed Nyxia Trilogy by Scott Reintgen, would like to hear your view about it.
Glad you got your copy of Electric Forest! I stumbled upon that same Daw edition at a new bookstore (with a used section) for $2.50 in Like New condish like a solid 2 years ago. And honestly I only bought it because of the beautiful cover and the title. We have a locally famous music festival in Michigan called electric forest. And now this year guys like you and bookpilled are reviewing it! I read it a few months back and enjoyed it pretty well. Beautiful prose. I rated it a strong/positive 3 stars out of 5!
Loved the Revelation Space series for the first two and saw Redemption Arc as a great sequel. Absolution Gap was a little bit more iffy but still pretty good. Inhibitor Phase was a real let down for me though, just went a bit odd.
@@WordsinTime I mean, its not necessarily bad per-se (might just be my tastes) but definitely very different from the others. It's a shame he didn't use the book to answer some more questions on how the war plays out or make a book on the fall of the glitter band! In either case, worth a read but with caveats aha
🤔 I personally think that both 'Dark Forest' and the mathematical calculations of the probability of Ferni (He concluded with mathematical equations: "by a series of calculations about the probability of planets similar to the earth, the probability of life on Earth, the probability of people getting life, the probable increase and duration of high technology, and so on further. He concluded on the basis of such calculations that we should have been visited long ago and many times'') are correct ... the paradox does not exist, but the appearance and falsity is in effect, like almost all systems on Earth ...
I think you’ll enjoy Dawn. It’s creepy and reads like a thriller. I couldn’t put it down. I just finished the series last Sunday. I’ll be reading more Butler in the next 2-3 months.
The great thing about BookTube is how often your discover new things (or new perspectives on things). If you have asked me over a year ago about any of the four titles you've talked about, I would have known nothing. In the past eight months, I've read three of them (Dawn was good, didn't click with Electric Forest, LOVED Inverted World) and I own First Fifteen Lives. Thanks to you and your fellow booktubers for helping me keep my TBR long!
There's no Fermi Paradox, it's a misunderstanding. Number of planets that could support life is 50 sextillion (10 to the power of 21). That's the part of the equation we know today pretty well. What we still don't know is what is the probability for the intelligent life appearing on a planet (what are the exact conditions -- geological, astronomical, chemical, etc) If this probability turns out to be equal to (or smaller than) 10 to the power of minus 21, the result is 1. One planet per Universe. It seems extremely counter intuitive, because people are not used to think in mathematical probabilities but it's completely rational. We don't know answer to this question yet but all available evidence seems to support the hypothesis that this number (probability of intelligent life appearing) is indeed very low. In which case, there's no mystery, it's all very simple and straightforward. It's boring thou, so people don't like it.
I don’t think it’s currently possible for us to calculate possibilities to the accuracy of 10 to the power of minus 21, so we can only speculate one way or the other for now.
@@WordsinTime It is possible to calculate many many times smaller probabilities. How do we know this? Because we have done it countless times, we are doing it every day in our scientific studies and we can prove it really works with empirical evidence. Math simply works. What we don't have is data to feed into the equation. That's quite a different problem than math not working because "numbers are too small".
@@vmasing1965 Yes, obviously we can calculate numbers that small theoretically or with fixed variables. But it’s impossible to calculate something with that many variables to that degree of accuracy. We can barely predict the weather let alone calculate the possibility of life developing on a planet to the degree of 10 to the minus 21.
i have Inverted World sitting in my e-reader as one of a dozen TBR. This is the first time I've heard anyone give any criticism of it, thanks for balancing out all the love I've heard. And I raced through Harry August. What a great story and told by a master. I keep track of my reading on Hardcover and there I gave it five stars. Ironically, the next book I read was The Lathe of Heaven, another story of somebody with the capacity to change history but on a totally different scale. They were a good pairing for me. It was funny to find that in each book the character comes across a woman to whom he was married in another existence and has to think through how to relate to her this time.
Inverted World and Harry August are both bangers in my opinion, especially the latter. I'm a sucker for time loop stories and I found the sci-fi thriller narrative in Harry August utterly compelling.
I haven't read Inverted World for yonks but I recall that it was a quite challenging read; But I do vaguely remember the opening line which was something like: "I was born at the age of 650 miles..." That is enough to hook most readers, I think.
Thanks for your reviews which are once again very interesting and not ones I've considered before. I have now added Inverted World and The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August to my reading list. Your review of Inverted World also reminded me of Cities in Flight by James Blish which I had originally read in the 80's. I do recall being totally enthralled with them at the time which had whole cities that were able to leave Earth and fly through space. From what I can recall these cities would compete with each other and on the plants they landed for work and resources. I also recall being a bit disappointed with the ending however I am now tempted to re-read to refresh my memory and to see how it now compares with modern Sci-Fi books. Is Cities in Flight a book you have read? If so, if you haven't already reviewed it, what are your thoughts on it?
I think the science ideas in Inverted World warped my little brain, which is why I liked it so much. Not sure if you watch much television, but I loved the Netflix series Bodies.
Dawn was amazing, as was the entire Xenogenesis / Lilith's Brood trilogy. It barely missed the mark for a 5/5 read for me (but then again I tend to be very very strict with 5 star ratings.)
Two suggestions I have for anyone interested in reading more obscure works by well-known authors are: Now Wait For Next Year by Philip K. Dick and A Fall of Moondust by Arthur C. Clark.
I don't know, I tend to agree with the minority of people who say Dune is more fantasy than sci-fi. The only reason I think it gets classified as sci-fi is that it involves a universe that spans beyond a single planet. Other than that, there really isn't any more "science" present in the story. Don't get me wrong, I thought it was a great book, just heavier on the lore and world-building that one typically finds in a fantasy novel rather than a sci-fi one.
I think there are stylistic differences between sci-fi and fantasy and there are also technical differences between sci-fi and fantasy. I think stylistic differences affect the reading experience, but the technical differences are what define the genres because they’re slightly less subjective. Something that focuses more on characters and world building and lore might read more like fantasy, but if all of the speculative aspects of the book are explained through technology as opposed to magic, then I think it would technically be sci-fi. I think Dune lands somewhere in the middle haha
Starship Troopers is the one you should read. Very different than the movie and very misunderstood because people always think the book and the movie are the same.
Is it even possible to interact with aliens in real time? Wouldn't any signals detected be from the past of the civilization? Is it just assumed aliens would have some way to scan the galaxy in real time? If an alien civilization, 100 light years away, was looking at the Earth right now, wouldn't they be seeing it as it was 100 years ago?
I can’t remember the exact length, but in this particular example, initially it took something like 10 years for the message to travel, therefore 20 years to receive a message back. There were also ideas about using the sun to amplify the message to reduce this time. I can’t remember the specifics, but I remember finding them intriguing.
@@WordsinTimeAre you talking about the book? If so, I'm not familiar with the story. I was talking about real life. I've heard quantum computers might be able to ignore Space-Time when sending/receiving data but, wouldn't the aliens need a quantum computer too? I'm not trying to be argumentative. Fermi Paradox/Dark Forest? Isn't the answer, EVERYTHING is too far away? Nobody is living in the same...time? Wouldn't aliens 5 billion light years away only see a swirl of gas/rocks if they were looking at our 'solar system' right now? They would probably be excited to see a star actually being born, right? I was just seriously wondering if it's even physically possible to "meet" aliens.
@@sonpacho I was talking about the book. And yes, you are right, there would be a time lag unless there is a way to change or circumvent that communication lag.
Hyperion : I'm totally on Team Original here. And actually, not even because I compare the two, but because this first book is at the same time a standalone. A collection of absolutely brilliant sf novellas, but organized in a consistent way that calls for the sequel. Note : comparing Hyperions and Endymions could have been an option... Dune : I didn't like much Messiah, even when I re-read it recently (the desert mystique and the coming-of-age story of the first book make it a more memorable reading experience imho), and I am a bit struggling through Children now. Question : wouldn't it make sense too, to compare rather "Paul's books" and "Leto's books" ?
Agreed with Fall of Hyperion. I don't know how anyone could read the first book and then just be satisfied with the ending. The sequel is batshit insane and sooo much fun.
“It’s a little dry… that was an Arrakis joke” 😂 I did actually need that explainer because I didn’t catch it the first time 😆 I’m often a book two boy because I’m more comfortable in the setting, I know who’s who, and what’s what. I’m currently reading a book with new made up words that I’m having to figure out from context. But today I discovered there’s a Glossary in the back of the book. That sort of thing is easier in later books for me. I’m already in and invested. But sure, it can vary.
Pun intended, haha I like glossaries, but I think they should be at the front of the book as I’m always afraid to flip to the back of the book and accidentally see a spoiler 🤦♂️
At about 20. I had a DNF on Stranger in a Strange Land. I think it is interesting to put it in historical context, but the book itself goes off the rails in a way I did not enjoy. I'm looking forward to reading Jeff VanderMeer's Annihilation. He's definitely my current favorite author. I love his type of weird. I didn't see it on the list but I will recommend Embassytown by China Mieville. He's another of my favorite authors. While it's his only science fiction novel, it's wonderfully weird, like his other works. And you can feel the LeGuin influence in this one.
the most interesting thing for me the books reveals not matter how advanced aliens civilizations don't have warp technology but empty space drones without life inside they can achieve high speeds and sub atomic weapons is used to annihilate planets from far way without the necessity of them going to colonize others solar systems
The dark forest theory is based on the childish notion of scarcity. Because any civilization with sufficient technology to travel between stars has advanced beyond scarcity. In fact, they may be mired in the paradox of plenty... I would think trade in knowledge would be the paradigm in a filled universe. I reckon the Fermi Paradox is due to the phosphorous problem, we're among the first, or UFOs are real.
There also seems to be an assumption that every civilization is technological. Some civilizations may never make it that far. Remaining in a stone age or slightly later age.
