drowned cities

Apparently, The Drowned Cities is part of a trilogy, and as luck would have it, this is book two. The front matter in this book indicates that it is a 'companion book' to Ship Breaker, and it doesn't talk about a trilogy. But maybe this is one of those things where the third book just grew out of the success of the first two. Ship Breaker won a couple of awards; Drowned Cities was nominated for a few as well. The Ship Breaker Trilogy is rounded out by Tool of War. So, I guess I'll stick that on the list as well.

The Drowned Cities is listed as teen or young adult science fiction, so it is a little simpler in its overall story arc than either The Water Knife or The Windup Girl, which I have to say, I enjoyed more. That said, I did enjoy this, and it was a welcome break from the crime/spy novels I've been reading.

A quick look at the cover art will tell you that this story takes place in a time in the not too distant future when society has broken down. That post-apocalyptic world is Paolo Bacigalupi's playground, based on the stories I've read thus far. I assume the stories share the same universe, and therefor the same apocalypse, but that isn't touched on specifically in this book. The world does seem hotter however, so... there is no such thing as global warming. note: this sarcastic remark is posted in the color of smog. see, that's art

This story goes together like a kit of parts. Its fast moving, not overly complicated, has some compelling characters, and an interesting backstory that seems to drive the background narrative. Easy, right? I burned through this pretty quickly, and not just because its written in an easy-to-read manner, but because its engaging. I have ordered book 1 (Ship Breaker) from the library; our local library is doing self-service holds, so I can just put them on hold on the interwebs, and then trot down and pick them up.

An interesting aside from our local library. When I picked this book up, along with the Charles Yu book, about 3 weeks ago, a sign on the door read "Masks Welcome." Now the sign on the library door says "Masks Required." My city went to masks required in all public buildings in the middle of August, sometime. I assume its in advance of school starting up, and the Commonwealth's DESE (Department of Elementary and Secondary Education) decision to not allow remote learning in public schools this year.

science fictional universe

How to Live Safely in a Science Fictional Universe by Charles Yu was pretty popular when it came out in 2010 if I remember correctly. I added to my reading list then, but I haven't gotten around to it until now. I get a kick out of the cover art, which appears to be a study in old school ray gun design, along with a Star Trek font for the text. A closer look at the ray guns shows that they aren't all different--which is slightly disappointing--and one of them isn't a ray gun at all.

What is great about this story is that it reads a little like an autobiography (written in first person, and the protagonist's name is Charles Yu) and a little like the diary of an emotionally damaged man, and a little like the service manual for a futuristic device that isn't really well explained, and a little like a letter to one's future self about how to be better, and a little like wholly metaphoric construct created to path to reckoning with regret and time wasted.

I think that amorphous quality of the story may be what makes it so popular. It has the ability, like a good fortune teller does, to spin a tale charged enough to latch onto our shared experiences, and vague enough to allow us to bring more of ourselves to the story as readers. In the end, it looks like Yu has told us a story of himself, and ourselves, and maybe hasn't told a science fiction story at all.

Read this book.

book of treasures

was scrolling through LinkedIn today, as I normally do not do, and I found a video post from the American Library Association which offered a glimpse at the Book of Treasures, or in the original old French "Li livres dou tresor," a medieval illuminated manuscript by Brunetto Latini, politician, historian, poet, philosopher, and teacher (and friend) of Dante Alighieri. Ooo, I thought, a glimpse at a great old tome from the National Library of Russia, count me in.

My first thoughts when the video starts: Wow, that book looks great for its age. Wow, that's not the book that's a box. A box? Wow, that book looks great for its age. Why does that guy opening it have his bare hands on it? Wow (now looking inside at the illustrated manuscript pages on vellum) that book looks great for its age. Well... [spoiler] its a copy. Limited? sure. Less than a thousand copies? yep. Handmade? no doubt. For sale, and this is the glam video for all those patrons of book porn? you got it. The LinkedIn poster: Victor Moliero. The Company: M. Moliero. to be fair, Vic is proly a member of the ALA. whatever.

Its a nice copy, I'm sure. I would have preferred to ogle the original however.*

Also known as Tesoro or Trésor (the treasure) the encyclopedia was written in French during Latini's exile to France between 1260 and 1267. There is a copy of the manuscript in the Biblioteca Medicea Laurenziana in Florence, where it is labeled as Ashburnham 125, which may or may not be the very volume from his old teacher that Dante read. The encyclopedia contains three books: biblical, Troy, troyian? Roman, and Middle Ages histories, and natural history, including astronomy, geography and animalia, the second book is about ethics, vices, and virtues, and the third book concerns political science as seen, and in the opinion of, the author. 

The National Library of Russia manuscript is rife with decorated initials, borders, and miniature illustrations including many "arabesques and drolleries" according to the Moliero video, which is why they chose this version to reproduce. Arabesques are ornate designs of interwoven geometric, floral, foliate figures. Drolleries are comedic images, designed to be oddly amusing, whimsical, or jesting. Examples of drolleries in this book include: deer-riding arrow-shooting monkeys, children jousting while riding piggyback on their parents, and a sword swallower. Many of the illuminations are gilded. Other versions are not as illuminated.

More about M. Moliero and what they do can be found on their website if you're interested in, what I assume, is an expensive copy of an awesome old book.

* I tried to find images of the original the Moliero folks copied on line so I could check it out--and share it here--but no luck. If you find it let me know in a comment.

english assassin

Gabriel Allon book two, The English Assassin, was a good installment in the series and a fun read. Given what our man Allon has had to go through its surprising he stays in the game. I guess that is maybe what makes the difference between a storybook hero and a real one; storybook heroes are what we expect heroes to be, real heroes aren't. They are just folks doing their job, doing what's right, doing what needs to be done. 

When folks call other folks heroes, it usually pisses them off. Being compared to something dreamed up, isn't always flattering I guess, when viewed from the receiving end. Calling someone a hero, is like saying "you aren't real, your accomplishments are imaginary, fanciful." I guess I may not like it either, but then, we all do these tiny thought experiments in our heads; ask others "what would you do if..." questions, but none of us really knows how to answer truthfully. Or maybe accurately is a better term. When we think about these hypothetical situations, how we would react is just how we hope we'd react. None of us really knows, I'm sure. We're just guessing. 

Thought experiments like this, strung together into a narrative, is what a story is. Silva has created a character in Allon that he uses to test these thought experiments, and create a dreamworld where Israel works secretly through their clandestine services to right the wrongs done to the Jews for centuries, and we we cheer yearning for justice as we follow along. Justice is what heroes do after all.

What does all that have to do with an English assassin, or Switzerland, or Venice? You'll have to catch up and read this thing! I'll give you some time, I have another few books I'll be reading in the meantime, and I'm sure I'll get back to Gabriel Allon at some point.

kill artist

Daniel Silva's first Gabriel Allon book is called The Kill Artist. As I mentioned in my last post, my wife has decided to go back and read all of Daniel Silva's works, and has collected them in paperback from a variety of sources. A quick look through 'The Books' page here on the blog tells me that the first one I read was in 2013, which I bought in a tiny English language section of a bookstore in Sulmona, Italy. there's my blog, doing its job as intended. thank me very much

After reading this one, I read a second, which I just finished. I'll write about that one in a little while, but I am going to hold off on the Silva books for a while as my library has re-opened--a little while ago actually, but has just recently returned to regular hours so I can go over there after work. Which I have now done, and I now have a few books lined up that don't have Silva's name on them.

Allon is a great character for a variety of reasons, including his reluctance to do what he knows needs to be done, his haunted past, his professionalism, his humanity (in spite of what he does) and his weaknesses and fallibility. When I spell it out like that, it sounds a lot like the advice the give writers on what makes up a good hero, so I guess Silva has been listening. I thought that going back to book one would be like an origin story, but it isn't. I hope that's not too much of a spoiler, but its seems to me that that story hasn't been told yet, except as background. But who knows, maybe it in one of the others I haven't read yet.

mark of the assassin

My wife decided that she needed to go back and read the rest of Daniel Silva's earlier books, so she did an online search and purchased them in paperback, used. Packages started to arrive from all over; there must be a dozen of them. So I took a quick look into the order of them and found the answer in the frequently asked questions section of Silva's website.

The Mark of the Assassin is the first of two books written about CIA agent Michael Osbourne. As far as I know, there are only two, but on the same FAQ page linked above, there is a question about whether Osbourne will be back or not, and the answer is left open. you know, like when you asked for ice cream, or to go bowling, when you were eight, and one of your parents said "we'll see" and your eight-year-old brain was like; that means no The second Osbourne book does not appear to be in the stack of books recently sourced by my wife.

This book was written in 1998, so its dated, and the technology is dated as well. But not so dated as to be old timey, like an Ian Fleming novel or something. There are cell phones in this book, for example, they are just fixed in vehicles--with handsets on them. Just reading about them weighs about 2 pounds. There are some glimmers of modernity, and the women aren't all helpless damsels, altho Osbourne's wife does seem a little clingy for a high-powered lawyer. They're all like: "I don't know what I'd do if somethin' happened to you Michael, I jus' love you so much! I'd trow myself in a wood chipper or sumfin!" -gush- "I know baby." -smolder-  those aren't quotes from the book, no spoilers. little syrupy tho, no?

This story is tightly written, and other than a few things that probably read fine in '98, it hands together pretty well and came to a fine, if expected, climax. Silva has a style, and this is a great example of the early formation of that style. Its fun to see him working things out, that seem to be a easy for him now. It will be interesting to read the follow up to this if and when I run into it. Next up is the first Gabriel Allon book in that series. For folks that are only interested in Allon, it appears to me that this Osbourne story seems to be written in the same universe that Allon has his adventures.

while justice sleeps

While Justice Sleeps is written by Stacey Abrams, who served for eleven years in the Georgia House of Representatives, seven of those years as Democratic Leader. Then in 2018, Abrams was the Democratic nominee for Governor of Georgia, which she might have won if not for alleged irregularities in the polling. Those irregularities became the impetus for Abrams to create her Fair Fight organization.

According to her Abrams for Governor website, which is still up, she has also authored eight romantic suspense novels under the pen name Selena Montgomery. In the front matter of Justice lists only two books by Abrams, and they don't sound like romance novels. Justice has a little boy-girl tension, but its not a romance novel. By contrast, take this line from the description of Secrets and Lies on the Harper Collins website: "She just witnessed her uncle’s murder, she’s running for her life, and now Dr. Katelyn Lyda is face-to-face with a breathtaking man who could be her salvation. It’s too bad [he] is one of the bad guys." cue heavy breathing

So you get the idea. nom de plume indeed.

This book had a nice pace, and the characters were nicely developed, and how they reacted to the things around them was mostly on point. Every now and again, and author needs to ask us to suspend disbelieve more than they normally would. Typically its with more outlandish stuff, fantasy and SciFi, but when it happens in a modern day set crime drama, it needs to be reasonable. A current day novel is essentially a 'what if?' scenario; if the the response to that what if, is a resounding 'never in a million years,' then the author has asked for too much. Abrams didn't go that far, but some things were a stretch. I also think there may be a plot hole. I'm not the most careful reader, but at one point our protagonist, Avery Keene contacted a mystery person who gave a false name. A chapter or so later, Avery knew who that mysterious person was, but how she figured that out, I don't think was covered in the text. if you've read this, and I missed it, let me know in the comments below

That said, While Justice Sleeps was a fun read, and an original plot line. I read this in just a few days, so that's always an indicator of a fun read. I'm under the impression we may not have seen the last of Ms. Keene either. Nice work Ms. Abrams, and go get 'em.

atlas of middle earth

When you create a reference book about a fictional place is your reference book fiction, or non-fiction?

Given that Middle Earth has almost no reliable  empirical data, I guess Karen Wynn Fonstad had to take some creative license in order to produce the maps and plans she did.  That said, I think she did consult with Christopher Tolkien; I’m pretty sure I read something he wrote indicating the he had worked with her on something. Not sure what that was, but it may have been a forward in one of the History of Middle Earth books. Speaking of which, I haven’t read all of those yet. Fonstad also consulted drawings and maps done by Tolkien, and his son, which were used in earlier published works, as well as unpublished drawings and sketches form the professor’s notes, the text of the books, and further information from the Histories, published by Christopher Tolkien which provided additional information and was the impetus for the revisions Fonstad made in the updated Atlas. 

By tying the maps and the landforms they represent to the distance data provided in the various texts, Fonstad has created maps that can be scaled and therefor, in many cases, actually differ from the maps published in versions of The Lord of the Rings. That takes some getting used to. btw, I’m not used to it, and I may not get there

Any serious fan of the world building accomplished by Tolkien will recognize the dedication and joy expressed by Fonstad in her work. The Atlas is clearly a labor of love undertaken by a cartographer who really just wanted a more complete picture of the lands she followed our mutual friends through on their adventures. Are there problems? Sure. Do I hate that all of her hills, mountains, and downs end in the same elephant toenail roundness? Sure. Am I grouchy that the publisher (or some other bean counter) decided that two colors was plenty to adequately express the level of detail included in all of the maps in the Atlas. You bet. And finally, is it—and has it been, over the years I’ve had this book—aggravating to consult the maps it contains while reading The Silmarillion or The Lord of the Rings and find that they are so different (for the sake of scale accuracy?) that they confuse more than clarify. Ya, you betcha. But that doesn’t mean I’m a hater. 

 

Karen Wynn Fonstad has done an admirable job of researching and providing insight many of us would never otherwise have access to. It’s the same issue diehard fans have when someone makes a movie of a book like The Lord of the Rings, it’s bound to contradict our individual visions of what happens in the stories we read. Our internal visions are a dialog with the author’s written word. Seeing someone else's vision of that material is always jarring, but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t have value. I went to see all of the movies, and they were great. They just weren’t how I would do it. 

And neither is The Atlas of Middle Earth. But I keep going back to it. And so should you.

 

 

Silmarillion

Sweet, sad, Silmarillion. 

The Wikipedia entry refers to The Silmarillion as a mythopoetic collection of stories. I had to look that one up; and I kind of like it. The tone the stories are told in is a little reserved. Some of the early ones, chronologically speaking, read like bible entries. But when you’re talking about the birth of the Earth—or Ea, Tolkien calls it—then I guess biblese seems appropriate. 

As I understand it, Tolkien felt the absence of a traditional English mythology beyond the tall tales of Arthur Pendragon and his ilk. Something of the scope and depth of the kind the Greeks, Romans, and Norse cultures have; stories that underlay their culture and belief systems, and tie them to their spiritual past. A careful look at what Tolkien has done shows that. From his proto-nursery rhymes, to the linguistic underpinnings of English, present in the early languages of the Quendi, the Elves. 

The Silmarillion is Tolkien’s unfinished backstory, the framework of his world building upon which he built the Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings. But it’s more than that; it’s his notes on dozens of other stories that he didn’t get the chance to finish. Christopher Tolkien did a great job, organizing, editing and releasing many of these work in the decades after his father’s death. Working, as he says he did when his father was alive, as a kind of amanuensis. One can only imagine what kind of works Tolkien may have produced had he had access to modern word processing or even speech-to-text technology. 

Tolkien described the creation of the world as the first collective music of the Ainur, made manifest by the one god Illuvatar, with all of the good, the bad, and the ugly of a first run, still in there. It’s like a proud papa pasting his kid’s first crayon drawing on the fridge... and then asking us all to live there for eons. augh, I don't wanna live in a first draft. Melkor is licking his finger and touching me! But don’t worry, says Eru, the big man, this is like a dry run. We’ll work out the bugs then bang out a fresh one all fixed up!*

What? Yeah, this ones probly gonna suck, for you guys and everyone else down there, but screw it, right? You guys made it, let’s see what happens!**

In here we find everything from the beginning of the world to the creation myths of the sun, the moon, and the stars; from the origins of elves, dwarves, and men, to the flat world theory; from the flood story to the making of dragons; and from the invention of war, to the making of rings. That last one was inspired, by the way, by the same fables and myths that inspired Wagner and his Der Ring des Nibelungen, "The Ring of the Nibelung," often referred to as the Ring Cycle. Tolkien was also inspired by the Edda, as was Wagner. 

 

This isn't the first time I've read this book, and it won't be the last. My last time through was nearly ten years ago. That review is maybe better than this one. If you want to know why you should read The Silmarillion, or even some pointers on how to read it, check out my earlier review.

Either way, read this book.

 

* I'm paraphrasing, nerds

** Yep, paraphrasing again