newnumber6

Because there's nothing that interests me. Nothing next week, either. So instead I'll do another Book Foo!

Finished: A For Anything, by Damon Knight
Started: Wild Cards, Vol 1, edited by George R. R. Martin (reread)

Thoughts on A for Anything (originally titled The People Maker) behind the cut. Some minor spoilers, mostly conceptual. Short version: Didn't really care for it.

The general idea of the book is that somebody started sending around a machine called a Gismo. The machine would create a perfect duplicate of anything put on one end of the machine, on the other end. Even another Gismo. So when random people get multiple Gismos, they make copies to give to their friends and relatives. Except soon someone realizes that if you can have everything, the only thing of value will be human labour, and even though the machine can duplicate people too, you need to reinstate human slavery.

Now that sounds like a decent premise for the book (leaving aside that if you had a Gismo you could soon create automatons that can do much of what you wanted, but it was written in 1959, so I can understand that not being thought of). The problem is that only a few pages are spent on the introduction of the Gismo and its effects, the part I was interested in, and then the rest of the book is set some 150 years later after society has stabilized in its new form (more or less, but not completely or there'd not be much story), of slaves and the freemen who own them and control Gismo use. It skips over much of the part that interested me, and forces me to read a story about a slave owner becoming a man. A story about a jerk in a society of jerks, pretty much, and even though there are times the main character questions the status quo, I really never get to like him or feel interested in his story. Moreover, once you reach the future part, the Gismo itself is barely seen in use - you see duplicated things (and people) but it itself plays only an occasional role in things. It's a huge McGuffin for a story about slavery, rather than an end in itself. The book does raise a few interesting questions, but on the whole I just didn't really care about the characters or story.

I'll probably read the first 2 or 3 Wild Card books if I don't get anything new before then, but figure I'll stop before kinky sex takes over the whole series. ;)

Finished: The Guns of Avalon, by Roger Zelazny (reread)
Started: Sign of the Unicorn, by Roger Zelazny (reread)

Not really much to say since GoA is part 2 of a series. Didn't like it quite as much as the first part, but still held my interest and since I'm running low on new books I'll move on to book 3. We'll see from there if I continue.

Anyway, work was annoying... not too bad, but way late, so I wound up getting home at the same time as I would if I walked to get comics after work on a normal day (about a 3 hour detour).

Edited to Add: Oh, and it looks like it's official, David Tennant's leaving Doctor Who after the five specials this year. I wonder if this means the most recent rumor about his replacement is true (the most recent I heard was Paterson Joseph, who I remember best as the Marquis de Carabas in the miniseries version of Neil Gaiman's Neverwhere... I think he could be an interesting choice). It also occurs to me I made an icon of him in that role, so if you want to know who I'm talking about, it's the guy uncomfortably trying to comfort in this: