reviews

WIJFR: Little Brother

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Seventeen-year-old techno-geek “w1n5t0n” (aka Marcus) bypasses the school’s gait-recognition system by placing pebbles in his shoes, chats secretly with friends on his IMParanoid messaging program, and routinely evades school security with his laptop, cell, WifFnder, and ingenuity. While skipping school, Marcus is caught near the site of a terrorist attack on San Francisco and held by the Department of Homeland Security for six days of intensive interrogation. After his release, he vows to use his skills to fight back against an increasingly frightening system of surveillance.

I always keep something to read on my Treo for those times I have a few spare minutes and need something to do (shopping with the wife, stuck in traffic, etc.). The latest book I was e-reading (and just finished) was Cory Doctorow’s “Little Brother.” While touted as a “young adult/teen” novel I think it’s a good read for anyone with an interest in technology, security, privacy, and the role of the government in those areas in these post 9-11 times.

If you want to read a bit more about Doctorow and “Little Brother” check out this Guardian article from last year.

I just put Cory’s short story collection “A Place So Foreign and Eight More” on my Treo so I’ll have some more to read going forward.

WIJFR: The Gripping Hand

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25 years have passed since humanity quarantined the mysterious aliens known as Moties within the confines of their own solar system. They have spent a quarter century analyzing and agonizing over the deadly threat posed by the only aliens mankind has ever encountered, doomed by millions of years of evolution to an inescapable fate. For the Moties must breed– or die. And now the fragile wall separating them and the galaxy beyond is beginning to crumble.

On my flight to Phoenix last week I finally polished off the last hundred pages of Larry Niven’s and Jerry Pournelle’s “The Gripping Hand.” Written about 20 years after “The Mote in God’s Eye,” the sequel picks up the story of Kevin Renner, Horace Bury, Rod and Sally Blaine, and, of course, the Moties.

It’s been 25 years since the Empire established the Crazy Eddie blockade fleet to prevent the Moties from escaping out of their home system. The aliens have tried different methods of getting through the blockade, but none have succeeded. Bury and Renner, who have been working as undercover agents for Naval Intelligence, think they’ve discovered evidence that the Moties might have found a way out. Bury, who is frightened of Moties and what they represent (due to his experience in the first book), demands to survey the Crazy Eddie fleet to ensure it continues to be effective. What if the Moties have found another way out of their system? Can the Empire possibly hope to contain them?

The first half of the book goes very fast, and since I had just finished the first novel a few months ago, it was easy for me to slip back into that universe of characters and locations. It’s a, pardon the pun, gripping first half of the story. Once the characters (and I don’t think this is a spoiler) get back into the Mote system, however, it becomes a confusing mess of names, characters, and factions: Medina, East India, Crimean Tartars, the Khanate … the list goes on. Whereas the first book dealt only with the Moties on Mote Prime (the main planet), “Gripping Hand” involves all of the different asteroid civilizations … and there are a lot of them to keep straight.

Overall I enjoyed the book mainly because I liked being back with the characters from the first novel and seeing what they were like 25 years after their first expedition to the Mote. But like “Publishers Weekly” said, “Gripping Hand” is an “adequate but inconsequential sequel.”

WIJFR: Martin the Warrior

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Badrang the Stoat has his evil eyes set on ruling over his own empire, and will do anything to make sure that his ultimate fantasy is fulfilled. But little does he realize that the quiet, nameless mouse he is holding captive will one day turn out to be the heroic and fearless Martin the Warrior.

“Martin the Warrior” is the sixth book of Brian Jacques’ Redwall series. The opening sequence takes place shortly after “Mariel of Redwall” but the actual story of Martin is the earliest so far in the series, placing it sequentially before “Mossflower.” The book also takes place in the far north lands, a new area of Jacques’ world.

Badrang the Tyrant, the ruler of Fort Marshank on the shores of the Eastern Sea, has captured a young mouse named Martin. Martin eventually escapes with Brome (another mouse) and Felldoh (a squirrel) from the fort and meets up with Brome’s sister Rose and her companion Grumm (a mole) who have come from Noonvale.

Separated during their escape, the remainder of the book follows the two parties in their respective quests: Martin, Rose, and Grumm attempt to return to Noonvale and raise an army to attack Marshank; Brome and Felldoh meet up with a travelling troupe of entertainers known as the Rosehip Players (which include a Badger named Rowanoak and a hare called Ballaw) and plan a series of missions to free the remaining Marshank slaves. Meanwhile, Badrang has to deal with both the outside attacks and inside subterfuge caused by an old “friend” (Tramun Clogg, a sea-faring stoat pirate) paying an unexpected visit.

As usual, the characters are varied, colorful, and entertaining and the story is easy to read. This volume, however, has the most sad and tragic turn of events in any of the books so far in the series. Suffice it to say that the ending plays an important role for the Martin we see at the beginning of “Mossflower” and explains his actions that carry on in the later Redwall novels.

WIJFR: World War Z

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We survived the zombie apocalypse, but how many of us are still haunted by that terrible time? We have (temporarily?) defeated the living dead, but at what cost? Told in the haunting and riveting voices of the men and women who witnessed the horror firsthand, World War Z is the only record of the plague years.

I first heard about Max Brooks’ (son of Mel Brooks) “World War Z” in the same way I’ve heard about a lot of the books I’ve read recently: on a podcast. This time it was Tom Merritt who mentioned the book, and I think it was back in episode #114 of “East Meets West.”

“World War Z” touts itself as “an oral history of the zombie war.” It takes place an unspecified amount of time in the future and is written as a series of first-person interviews by the author with the survivors of the war against the undead, which ended approximately 10 years ago. Think “Band of Brothers” with a George Romero twist.

This was a really entertaining read, and very imaginative. You’ve got your typical zombie lore (being bit means your infected, the only way to kill a zombie is to destroy the brain, etc.) mixed in with modern warfare and things I’ve never seen addressed before. For example: when winter comes to the northern areas of the world, the zombies freeze. They don’t die, however, just thaw out in spring and pick up where they left off. The same goes for out at sea … they’ll just float around forever until they wash up on a beach somewhere, or get caught in a fishing net. Really scary stuff: how do you know you’ve wiped every zombie off the planet, purged the infection? How do you wage war against an enemy that never gets discouraged? As a character in the book says: how do you “shock and awe” something that can’t be shocked or awed, mentally or biologically?

The book is sequential, for the most part, but jumps around between the different people being interviewed, in different countries and locations (there’s even a section of what the crew of the international space station was doing during the war). There are interviews with military personnel, government leaders, and regular people.

It’s really a riveting book. I’ve read that someone’s already purchased the movie rights so it could be an interesting film if it’s done right.

WIJFR: Protector

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Phssthpok the Pak had been traveling for most of his thirty-two thousand years. His mission: save, develop, and protect the group of Pak breeders sent out into space some two and a half million years before …

Brennan was a Belter, the product of a fiercely independent, somewhat anarchic society living in, on, and around an outer asteroid belt. The Belters were rebels, one and all, and Brennan was a smuggler. The Belt worlds had been tracking the Pak ship for days – Brennan figured to meet that ship first …

He was never seen again — at least not by those alive at the time.

While flying to LA and back for Christmas, I finished Larry Niven’s “Protector.” This Known Space novel was a quick, easy, and enjoyable read at just over 200 pages.

“Protector” introduces us to the Pak, a long-lived species with three distinct phases: Child, Breeder, and Protector. The Tree-of-Life plant controls the transformation of Breeders into Protectors, whose sole purpose is to protect its descendants. If a Protector becomes childless, it loses the will to continue eating Tree-of-Life and eventually dies unless it can find a cause to keep it going.

In the first half of the book, Phssthpok, a childless Protector, has been travelling for some 33,000 years in search of a colony of Pak who set out on their own over 2.5 million years previously. He enters the Sol system and encounters Jack Brennan, a Belter who accidentally eats Tree-of-Life and turns into a Protector (as you can guess, humans are the descendants of the original Pak colony that settled on Earth millions of years ago).

The second half of the novel takes place some 220 years later. Brennan the Protector has learned of a Pak fleet on its way to Earth and is determined to protect his “descendants” (i.e., the human race) from possible extinction.

As with the other Niven novels I’ve read so far (i.e., the “Ringworld” series), the scale of time and distance takes some getting used to. I mean, we’re talking about events crossing millions of years (time) and light years (space). This book takes place a long time before the Ringworld books as well so there is no faster-than-light (i.e., hyperspace) travel … it takes a loooong time to get from place to place (like, years). The hard science is sometimes hard to follow as well, but that’s what I like about Niven’s stuff … it seems practical the way he describes it in such detail.

I’ve got one more Niven book on my schedule to read. For Christmas I got “The Gripping Hand” which is a sequel to “The Mote in God’s Eye” (written with Jerry Pournelle). First, though, I’ve got to brush up on my zombie war history. More on that later …

WIJFR: The Ringworld Engineers

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20 years have passed since Louis Wu’s escape from the Ringworld. Now, kidnapped by the mate of Nessus, their two-headed alien companion of the previous voyage, Louis and his catlike ally Chmeee are transported back to the Ringworld – now spinning dangerously off-center – in an attempt to discover the cause of the aberrant rotation before the world grazes its sun. Searching for clues to the design of the structure’s long-vanished original engineers, they encounter various hominid and other races before finding the barely feasible, wholly appalling solution hidden beneath the “Map of Mars.”

After finishing Larry Niven’s SF classic “Ringworld” last month, I moved on to the sequel, “The Ringworld Engineers.”

“Engineers” was written 10 years after the original and was mainly a result of the popularity of the first book and fan support. It picks up 20 years after Louis Wu’s escape from the Ringworld and attempts to address some of the engineering/technical issues introduced in the first novel.

The Hindmost (leader) of the Pierson’s Puppeteers has determined that the Ringworld has wobbled off-center from its sun. In a year or so, it will brush against the star and be destroyed. The Hindmost wants to salvage any available technology left on the Ringworld before this happens, so he kidnaps Louis Wu and Chmeee (Speaker-to-Animals) and forces them to once again explore the Ringworld looking for the rumored transmutation machine. With their lives depending on the results of their mission (the Puppeteer would leave them stranded on the world and save himself, if necessary), Louis and the Kzin begin their seach for the Ringworld’s repair center. Can they save the entire world and the trillions upon trillions of its inhabitants?

I enjoyed this book just as much as the first one. The sheer scale of the Ringworld and the technology required to keep it “running” are both mind-boggling and intriguing. Niven does a decent job of answering some of the questions raised in the earlier book (how does the meteor defense work? how did the superconductor-eating virus that caused the Fall of Cities come to the Ringworld? why are there “maps” of other known worlds in the Great Ocean?) along with describing a whole new set of problems and their engineering solutions. Of course, the biggest surprise (to me anyway) was who actually built the Ringworld and why (hint: my next read will be Niven’s “Protector.”).

This marks the end of my journeys to the Ringworld. There are two more books in the series (“The Ringworld Throne” and “Ringworld’s Children” but the reviews I’ve read say they’re really two half-books each that Niven really didn’t put as much effort into. So, I’m going to go back to some of Niven’s older “Known Space” works instead.

WIJFR: Salamandastron

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As the inhabitants of Redwall relax in the haze of the long, hot summer, they are unaware that the neighboring stronghold of Salamandastron lies besieged by the evil weasel army of Ferhago the Assassin. Nor do they realize that Mara, beloved daughter of Urthstripe, Badger Lord of the Fire Mountain, is in terrible danger. But when a lightning bolt uncovers the sword of Martin the Warrior, young Samkin embarks on adventure that leads him to Mara, and their lives become inextricably entwined.

Book 5 of Brian Jacques’ Redwall series is “Salamandastron.” As before, my daughter and I started reading this together, but only got a few chapters in before she decided to go on without me, so once again I ended up reading this one on my own after she finished.

Despite following the now-familiar formulaic approach (which I detailed in my previous Redwall-related post), “Salamandastron” was a quick and fun read. If I had to pick, the badgers would be my favorite characters in the Redwall mythos, and there are quite a few of them in this book. Here’s the breakdown:

  • Ferhago the Assassin and his son Klitch, along with the horde of Corpsemakers are beseiging the mountain stronghold of the badger lord Urthstripe. Mara, a young orphan badger under the care of Urthstripe, runs away with Pikkle (a hare).
  • all is peaceful at Redwall as they prepare for their seasonal Nameday celebration until the sword of Martin the Warrior is stolen by two weasels; they are pursued by Samkin (a squirrel) and Arula (a mole maid).
  • shortly after they leave Redwall, an outbreak of Dryditch Fever spreads through the Abbey; Thrugg (an otter) and Dumble (a baby mouse) strike out north seeking the Icetor flowers, the only known cure for the disease.

Some more familiar groups make an appearance, like the guerilla shrews (another personal favorite), along with some new characters, like the hawks and eagles of the North (with their highland accents). Jacques does a nice job of establishing the three storylines and then weaving them together, tying the whole thing up in a neat package by the final chapters.

Chronologically, this book comes after “Mariel of Redwall” but before “Redwall.” Just like before, my daughter enjoyed being able to tie some of the characters and plotlines of “Salamandastron” into the other books. I’m amazed by her retention of characters, events, and details … she remembers the little things much better than I do. That could be because she is constantly re-reading these books. I told her that once we read all of the books (which could take a while, I think there are over 20!), she should re-read them in chronological order. 🙂

Next up: “Martin the Warrior.”

Graduation at East High

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I took my daughter to see “High School Musical 3: Senior Year” this afternoon. I guess everyone who wanted to see this saw it opening weekend, because this was only the third weekend of its release and the theater was pretty empty … and all the kids were girls under 10, as I expected.

“Senior Year” follows the now-familiar (to anyone with a young daughter) characters of Troy, Gabriella, Sharpay, Ryan, Chad, Taylor, and Kelsi as they finish their last year at East High and face graduation and moving on to college.

Like the first two films, this one has some snappy song-and-dance routines but is a little light on story/plot (but I guess HSM is about the music after all, right?). My daughter’s favorite song was “The Boys are Back,” sung by Troy and Chad in a junk yard scene where they reminisce about being kids pretending to be ninjas, superheroes, etc. My daughter particularly liked the part where they turned into 8-year old versions of themselves. I didn’t really see anything “big budget” about this movie compared to the originals which aired directly on the Disney Channel. I guess doing a full theater release was just one more way for Disney to rake in the cash before the end of the franchise (like they won’t make a ton on merchandising and tie-ins anyway!).

It’s an amazing world our kids are growing up in: when we got home after the movie, I purchased the HSM3 soundtrack from the Amazon MP3 store (for $4 less than the DRMed version on iTunes) and then burned it onto CD so she had it for her bedtime listening enjoyment. Incredible.

If you’re a parent who’s seen HSM3 (or any of the HSM movies for that matter), you owe it to yourself to check out the “Night School Musical: Senior Year Equivalent” sketch from Saturday Night Live.

WIJFR: Ringworld

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Four travelers come to the Ringworld: Louis Wu – human and old; bored with having lived too fully for far too many years. Seeking a challenge, and all too capable of handling it. Nessus – a trembling coward, a puppeteer with a built-in survival pattern of nonviolence. Except that this particular puppeteer is insane. Teela Brown – human; a wide-eyed youngster with no allegiances, no experiences, no abilities. And all the luck in the world. Speaker-to-Animals – kzin; large, orange-furred, and carnivorous. And one of the most savage life-forms found in the galaxy. Why did these disparate individuals come together? How could they possibly function together? And where, in the name of anything sane, were they headed?

My latest read was the Hugo and Nebula award-winning novel by Larry Niven, “Ringworld.”

Two humans and two aliens are brought together to investigate an amazing artifact: the Ringworld is a ring (duh!) built around a sun. At six hundred million miles long and a million miles wide, it has roughly 3 million times the area of Earth. It’s spinning around the sun at 770 miles per second, so it has gravity. The air is held in by thousand foot high walls on either side. A series of shadow squares also orbiting the sun give it night and day (but when the sun is out, it’s always high noon). Niven does a great job of visualizing the Ringworld and what it would be like to stand on the surface (I loved the Arch of heaven).

As usual in these posts, I’ll refrain from major plot summaries or spoilers and just make some general comments. It took me a while (just like Louis Wu) to wrap my mind around the scale of Ringworld. It’s HUGE. But Niven makes it seem plausible. The characters were fun (Speaker-to-Animals reminded me of the Kilrathi Hobbes from the old Wing Commander games) and the plot really moves … it was a hard book to put down. Unfortunately, it seemed to wrap up too quickly, almost as if Niven was in a rush to finish and just stopped. The ending left me wanting, so I guess I’ll have to read “The Ringworld Engineers” next (although I’ll probably stop after that because I’ve heard the last two books in the series are not that great).

One thing to consider: is it possible to be so lucky that you’re unlucky to the others around you? Think about that. If you read the book, you’ll understand what I’m talking about.

WIJFR: Boiling Point

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When the US goes broke, the states break loose and people across the country get caught in the chaos. The Lakota rise up in the north and Texas breaks free in the south. Meanwhile, Steve just wants to get back to Illinois with his love life intact. Mack, an Ozark militia member doesn’t want his friend to sign up but knows they can’t succeed without him. And a Texas Congressman struggles with his conscience and a manipulative Governor. Can the country stay together? Can the people?

“Boiling Point” is a novel written by CNET’s Tom Merrit. I listen to Tom on the Buzz Out Loud and East Meets West podcasts (and occasionally TWiT) where he’s mentioned the book quite a few times, so I decided I should check it out. I grabbed the PDF version and converted it via iSiloX so I could read it on my Treo in my spare moments.

The premise was interesting: North and South Dakota break off from the U.S. under the leadership of the Lakota Nation, which prompts Texas to seceed as well. From there it’s a series of falling dominoes as other parts of the United States join together and break off into separate countries. The book follows the path of several characters in different parts of the deteriorating United States of America and their experiences as the country changes around them.

I didn’t really enjoy this book, however. Maybe it was because I read it in spurts on my Treo when I had the time, which made it a bit disjointed. Maybe it was the multiple first-person narratives which I found made it difficult to track who was doing what and where. Maybe it was the premise which I found unrealistic (I know, I know, it’s fantasy but I still didn’t “buy” it). Maybe it was because the book seemed over-heavy on dialog (a lot of the backstory is told via transcripts of NPR-like radio broadcasts). Maybe it was all of those things.

It reminded me a bit of “The Man in the High Castle” by Philip K. Dick, in terms of an alternate history story, but I didn’t find it as gripping. If you’re a politics or history buff, it might be worth the read but overall I just found the whole experience mediocre.