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+--- Thread: Book Club (Feb 2018) (/showthread.php?tid=3367)
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Book Club (Feb 2018) - Rynn - 01-29-2018
Hey all
I was thinking that it might be fun to set up a book club. How it could work is that for a week people can post suggestions (perhaps limited to one each to avoid a huge list) with a small review/recommendation. I’ll then edit a poll into the thread and we can vote on what book to read in the second week. Once that’s done a spoiler thread can be made for us to all chat about. Anyone interested?I’d like to kick it off by recommending Diaspora by Greg Egan. It’s a hard-SF book with a great story. Set in the far future when the solar system is split between virtual, robotic and biological beings. After a major disruptive event reveals that established physics has some serious, dangerous, gaps in its models the various denizens set out in arc ships to seek out answers. Across thousands of years and unimaginable distances new physical models have to be built, against a backdrop of a universe that now seems as hostile and precarious as the world must have for Palaeolithic man.
The big narrative is great and the pursuit of new physics entertaining and fascinating. There’s some really hard science here, especially mathematics, but even if you feel lost the rest of the setting will have you hooked. The lives of the virtual citizens who make up the bulk of the characters are fascinating in of themselves, particularly with how different yet similar they are to ours.
RE: Book Club (Feb 2018) - Avengium - 01-29-2018
Hi. We need to suggest book we haven't read?
RE: Book Club (Feb 2018) - Rynn - 01-29-2018
Nope.
RE: Book Club (Feb 2018) - Rhea47 - 01-30-2018
Count me in. Also I'm currently reading Red Mars. I'm not finished yet but so far it seems like the best colonization book out there.
RE: Book Club (Feb 2018) - Drashner1 - 01-30-2018
I'm on board with this.
Regarding possible reading material, I'm going to suggest a couple options:
The Algebraist by Iain M. Banks - Think OA meets David Brin's Uplift Universe. An ancient galactic civilization, in which humanity is rather small potatoes. There is intrigue, adventure, looming war, and a lot of complexity and general strangeness. Works as a good read and as possible inspiration for how space opera might work within the OA setting.
Vacuum Flowers - An older work that presents an intriguing depiction of an interplanetary civilization that can rewrite people's personalities almost at will. Has a mix of transhumanist elements, gengineering, and more 'traditional' futurist ideas around space habitats, terraforming, etc.
My 2c worth,
Todd
RE: Book Club (Feb 2018) - Rynn - 02-04-2018
Tomorrow I’ll create the poll, anyone else wanna recommend another story for the book club?
RE: Book Club (Feb 2018) - Rynn - 02-05-2018
Poll is now up
After a week the winner will be selected for the book club.
RE: Book Club (Feb 2018) - stevebowers - 02-05-2018
(01-30-2018, 02:39 AM)Drashner1 Wrote: I'm on board with this.I've mentioned The Algebraist on this forum before. Banks uses as a major plot point that a wormhole can be destroyed by a relativistic mass- in this case an asteroid. Sounds to me like he read some of the same sources as Adam- either that or he read Adam's paper on the subject itself. I guess we'll never know now.
Regarding possible reading material, I'm going to suggest a couple options:
The Algebraist by Iain M. Banks - Think OA meets David Brin's Uplift Universe. An ancient galactic civilization, in which humanity is rather small potatoes. There is intrigue, adventure, looming war, and a lot of complexity and general strangeness. Works as a good read and as possible inspiration for how space opera might work within the OA setting.
Todd
RE: Book Club (Feb 2018) - Rynn - 02-08-2018
Remember to vote all
RE: Book Club (Feb 2018) - Duddy9 - 02-08-2018
Can we include non-fiction books we've been reading? If so I'd like to include a book I read a couple of months ago, New World of Mr Tompkins
https://www.amazon.co.uk/New-World-Mr-Tompkins-Paperback/dp/0521630096/ref=pd_lpo_sbs_14_t_1?_encoding=UTF8&psc=1&refRID=XBPM1028A7D83GFB926R
A popular science book written in the style of a Alice in Wonderland novel. It covers much of the 20th century revolution in physics, nicely illustrated with imaginative examples.