simonator's reviews
159 reviews

B. Chambers'  hopeful brand of sci-fi is still coming into its own here. This story, like most others of the author, centres around the interpersonal relationships of its space-diverse cast who maneuvers not only space politics but also each other's needs and wants. In this world, people have by and large all the emotional tools at hand they need to deal with the intricate mental and social challenges they encounter cooped up in their ship, and generally approach things like well-adjusted loveable adults with no bad bone in their body. With the exception of the Corbin character, everybody seems to have undergone a intense education of therapy and has their impulses under control. That's sometimes sweet to read but also just very easy - how did they obtain these competencies? Are they just more evolved socially? The same goes for the plot; obstacles are encounters, dealt with, and solved, lickity-split. Things just work out. 

However, this story is very much intended to be just that, a wholesome, cute, cozy space opera. That's not everybody's taste, but as long as its executed well, nothing wrong with it. 

What does detract from the quality is that because all characters seem to be fluent in therapy-speak, their voices sometimes become blurred. even characters conceptualised to be as distinctive as Kizzy or Lovey or Pei remain somewhat interchangeable with the rest. Equally, the priorities of the world building are  a bitt off to me; the Author's main interest seems to be the social interaction of species, how they view and tolerate each other on a personal level. Hence, the plot also mainly follows episodically each crew member's respective background. But that realm of social interaction should be structured and co-determined by economic contexts, political constellations, or sociological trends. Those latter dimensions I found a bit lackluster. ((Also, in yet another installment in the literary genre of The Author's Barely Disguised Kink, there's just a weird amount of pages dedicated to alien sex. But hey, no judging here)).
Finally, the writing style is nothing to write home about, the wonder of space travel, the loss of a crew member, and encountering alien markets and home worlds does not really penetrate the pages - even though the ideas behind each stage are sometimes interesting (the Cricket moon? Awesome). This should not worry the reader, as B. Chambers evolves to become an excellent writer of prose in later works. 

Sometimes a modern reader must smile at the elemental sci Fi building blocks of this work, but it's both an exceedingly engaging read and window into its own time.
Written in 1908, it discussed with remarkable prescience themes of industrial development, overpopulation, class struggle, and climate change. Bogdanov's perspective as an early bolshevist rival to Lenin gives him a macro insight into the class-based, economic and social dimensions of human/Martian development where modern writers too often over-focus on individuals or pieces of technology (though Bogdanov exhibits a pronounced biased fondness for the roles of engineers and doctors and scientists and the like rather than of the proletarians, as the excelllent introduction of this edition previews). A worthwhile read for fans of history, sci Fi, and communism.

It's remarkable how enjoyable of a read this was, given that it is a long, repetitive court intrigue drama which essentially just consists of a long series of the protagonist emperor granting audiences to various people. The author asks the reader to remember a lot of made-up words for people, places, titles, and concepts. Unfortunately, the immersive pay-off is somewhat small, since Elven culture remains somewhat intangible given the limitation of the setting to the imperial court. One simply cannot put this book down for a while and pick it back up later, because one would loose the rough overview over the fantasy language gained through the tedious study of the glossary.
The realm's political issues that come up are enticing and hint at great world-building, but often are dealt with only superficially (e.g. the East-West conflict or the barbarians). Generally, it always feels like much more exciting things are happening to the people that the emperor grants audiences to, rather than to himself. Similarly, the protagonist's conquest of the court is a bit of breeze, really - the few stumbling blocks are deftly dealt with and everybody seems really well-intentioned. Weirdly, this makes for a unusually fun reading experience, although sometimes some more difficulties would've helped hooking the reader in more. The ending was abrupt and some relationships, like with Csevet,  were left hanging a bit. The dialogue feels snappy though and is very economic in its use. Star of the book is the well-done tale of character drama and personal growth. 

Sowohl Zusammenfassung als auch Lukàcs eigene Reflexion der Dialektik. Nicht bekannt genug und sehr zu empfehlen.

A thought-provoking window into a specific, under-ddiscussed country context that holds many lessons for Marxists and fans of neoliberalism alike. At times, its ponderings fall prey to a mild and understandable both-sides-ism, and I wish Ypi had been more generous with her adult self's reflections on left-right politics, instead of relegating this to her academic work. Often, I could not help but feel that her childhood memories had been idealised and polished, "literature-rised", perhaps. Nonetheless, every European reader, especially leftists, should feel rightfully challenged and inspired by this educational read.

Scharfsinnig und subtil, dabei aber doch jugendlich. Die Unreife bildet dabei aber keinen Mangel, sondern spiegelt einfach die Anschauung des Protagonisten und auch das Alter des Autors damals (erst 19!) wider. Zwar bleibt beim Lesen der Novelle ein gewisser Wow-Faktor aus, aber in ihrer Kürze liegt viel Würze. 

Überraschend überzeugend, auch wenn es auf einer gewissen oberflächlichen Ebene die Schrift einer gekränkten Künstlerseele bleibt, die neuartige Kunsttechnologien nicht mag. Aber die Argumente zur Zerstreueng vs Sammlung der Gesell chaft im Angesichts der massig reproduzierbaren Kunst sind lohnenswerte Lektüre.

Düster und verstörende Erzählung aus der NS-Zeit. Die Verrohung des Geistes durch die Kriegstreiberei wird greifbar gemacht. 

It's difficult to assess the intention of this story. Especially in the first third, it feels like an indulgent and fairly superficial wallowing in a certain academic glamour that actually does not engage in serious depth with the classical material, from which it liberally and pretentiously quotes incessantly. Later, the book at some point manages to  subvert and satirise its subject to some degree and reveal some of the cruel naivety and petty stupidity of its protagonists. Somewhere buried in endless descriptions of empty stretches of time, there is a  critique of fetishised scholasticism, the hubris of self-infatuated young men, and American society, I guess. By its final third the book seemingly styles itself as some sort of modern tragedy with a set of characters whose intentions, passions, weakness, hubris and fate steers them towards disaster. But to me, the book never managed to shake off its whiff of pretentiousness, triviality, and shallowness, because it hinges on the reader's interest in the workings of these few young minds. The minds in question are, however, pretty dumb. 

That being said, Tartt evocatively paints vivid scenes, tangible characters, and sets colourful moods. The protagonist is actually fairly relatable and an apt observer of the proceedings around him. While the writing definitely has the capacity to draw you in, there are some plot elements and side-characters who are entirely unnecessary and take up way too many pages. In parts, the plot is just plain boring.