Picks and Shovels

"Picks and Shovels", by Cory Doctorow, 2025, 419 pages, 129k words.

The 3rd (and final?) Martin Hench novel. These have been told in reverse chronological order.

Here's my post on the 1st "Red Team Blues".

Here's my post on the 2nd "The Bezzle".

This installment is the secret origin story of our superhero forensic accountant. Martin Hench is entering MIT in 1979 as a 17 YO freshman (11 years after I did). He's supposed to follow his dad as an engineer, but once he encounters computing, he is hooked. He winds up in early Silicon Valley on the west coast, where he helps an unlikely group of founders fighting a totally crappy, abusive, lockin computer company. Lots of action, but, the characters are what make the book. They all have so much heart.

I was working for DEC (mentioned) 1977-1980 installing & programming PDP-11s (mentioned), hooking up Okidata printers (mentioned), twiddling pins on RS-232 connectors (mentioned). So lots of old memories for me.

It's definitely a page turner, I was up til 1am finishing it, I very rarely do that anymore. Doctorow continues to be the Bard of the Revolution.

Oops

It looks like I should have done this post last month. Oh well, better late than never, for now ...

1. "My Brother's Keeper", by Tim Powers, 2023, 327 pages, 101k words. This book reads totally like vintage Powers. The "Brother" in question is Branwell Brontë, brother of the Brontë sisters, who are courageously battling werewolves. Enjoyable.

2. "Terminal Boredom", by Izumi Suzuki, 2021, 203 pages, 55k words, 7 stories. These stories were recommended as being quirky and out there. The title of the collection is a good choice. The characters in the stories are mostly very tired (unless they're old boomers). Not bad, but not great.

3. "The Tyrant Baru Cormorant", by Seth Dickinson, 2020, 953 pages, 251k words. The Masquerade #3, definitely a tome. I read the 1st 2 of the series, blogged here, The Masquerade #1 in 2016, and here, The Masquerade #2 in 2018. I'm not sure how I missed this one coming out. I got triggered to check on it by the release of a new, unrelated novel by Dickinson.

   Trying to remember what the series was about, I read my posts on the 1st 2 books - I am not crazy about the series. Nobody is very likable. Everybody seems to enjoy betraying everybody else. I said in reviewing the 1st book, "Characters with nothing but bad choices." From the ending of the book, this may be the end of the series, but ... Better put some garlic up.

4. "House of Open Wounds", by Adrian Tchaikovsky, 2023, 602 pages, 186k words. Sequel to "City of Last Chances", and as such book 2 of "The Tyrant Philosophers" series. The 1st book I characterized as:

   A really rich tapestry of politics, refugees, demons, intrigue, revolution, very well plotted. A most excellent read.

   This 1 is even more of the same, with a greatly expanded tapestry of theories of magic and religion. Tchaikovsky has a writing style where he subtly shows you the big hammer that is going to smite someone, gives you plenty of time to forget about it, and then finally does some totally unsubtle smiting.

   It was a fun read, but I noticed something. The main premise of the plot is that a country becomes scientific and creates technology to harvest and reuse magical and godly power. They then want to have their memes conquer the world - kind of like "The Masquerade" in the just reviewed Dickinson book! Well, the 1st Baru Cormorant book came out in 2016, so Dickinson definitely got there 1st. But, who cares, memes just want to be free. [FREE THE MEMES!!!]

5. "The Imposition of Unnecessary Obstacles", by Malka Older, 2024, 140 pages, 43k words. Book 2 of The Investigations of Mossa and Pleiti series. Book 1 was fairly recent, 2023, blogged here.

   I like the setting for these stories: loops built around Jupiter with settlements attached, with the society, particularly their academia, highly dedicated to figuring how to restore the Earth's ecosystem. This story includes a trip to an early settlement on Io - who in their right mind would settle Io? This is again a missing persons story and a whodunnit. Like the last one, fairly mundane.

   But, the 1st 1, I wrongly gendered Plieti as male. Short as these stories are, I did not feel like going back for a reread and determining if Older ever gendered Plieti. And, of course, I did not remember this before I started reading #2, to where I could pay close attention. [Dammit, Jim, I should always go check my exocortex for context in a situation like this.]

   But, regardless, I am pretty sure that Malka never genders Plieti in Book #2. I presume this is by design. But, here's some of the (seriously gendered) blurb for the book on Kobo:

   But Pleiti’s faith in her life’s work as a scholar of the past has grown precarious, and this new case threatens to further destabilize her dreams for humanity’s future, as well as her own.

   Admittedly, Plieti has more stereotypical feminine traits than masculine, but, so what? Is Older making a statement here, or what? Did I just miss the gendering?

   LOL, speaking of "stereotypical feminine traits": a heavy dependence on long hot baths and a variety of teas; and getting "the vapors" to where this at times seems like a Victorian novel.

   Also, academia as portrayed by Doctora Older (an academic) totally convinces me I dodged a bullet when I decided in 1974 NOT to go into academia. I could never have done it.

6. "The Bezzle", by Cory Doctorow, 2024, 221 pages, 68k words. Book #2 of The Martin Hench Novels. Doctorow is The Bard Of The Revolution.

   "Follow the money." Forensic accountant Martin Hench is the perfect person to do this, and expose the corruption and depravity of late-stage capitalism. Doctorow shines an arc lamp on MLM, the prison-industrial-complex, 3-strike laws, LA Sheriff Department deputy gangs, and the cancer that will devour everything if we don't stop it: Venture Capital, VC - the apex predator of late-stage capitalism. And what is its prey? Small businesses, mom-and-pop operations, the backbone of the middle class, hoovered up to be converted into the maximum amount of capital possible, with their survival totally optional. Late-stage capitalism is not pretty.

   Ooh, I spotted a slight inaccuracy in some geek stuff that I used to be a Level XII Software Wizard on. I emailed it to Cory, he thanked me the next day & said that the book was already a bestseller so it would be getting reprinted shortly, so he would get a fix in. Yay! I love living in the future!

   I have this in my eBook app as Mystery?!?!? I'm not sure what genre this is, possibly a new one? Techno-exposè? Any suggestions?

A lot of my processes seem to be winding down. I've kept the subscriptions, but I've quit reading Scientific American and Technology Review after many decades of doing so. I am subscribed to their RSS feeds, as well as Futurism and other sources of scientific and technical articles, so I no longer feel too compelled to read the magazines per se. So, after 4 decades, no magazine stack! Just call me "Mr. Spontaneous". ;-P

In Which I Finally Quit Stalling

I finally started Neal Stephenson's latest, "Termination Shock" a few days ago. An excellent read so far.

But I did do a bit more procrastinating before I began.

1st, "Lex Talionis", by R.S.A. Garcia, 2014, 440 pages, 119k words. The author is from Trinidad & Tobago, this is her 1st novel. It opens with a time-honored SF trope: terribly injured (but recovering miraculously quickly) hero wakes up in a hospital with total amnesia. Could they be The One?

Usually they break out of the hospital and start tracking themselves down in the 1st chapter or so. In this one, she doesn't get out of the hospital until ~40% of the way in. Then the next 40% is all flashback backstory, with some very obtuse side plots.

Then jump forward a couple years in the future. Some hints of what The One had been up to claiming her legacy. A couple of the major characters who had heretofore been ciphers reappear and remain ciphers.

Definitely read like a 1st novel, but, it was surprisingly fun and enjoyable?!?!?

Next up, "The Case of the Seven Sneezes", by Anthony Boucher, 1942, 227 pages, 75k words. The 3rd of the series the 1st 2 of which I blogged last time. Stranded on an island replaces a locked room for the murder scene. I think the common theme of these is that our cheap detective always almost gets the cases solved.

Back to science fiction, "All Systems Red", by Martha Wells, 2017, 116 pages, 31k words. The 1st book of the Murderbot series, which has been winning some awards lately. A good novella, in which a manufactured cyborg explores its humanity. Expanding the definition of personhood seems to me to be a recurring theme in science fiction in the LGBTQAZ era - a laudable thing. It was good read, I was going to get some more in the series, but they were like $10.99 for 30k word novellas, which stuck me as a little high. Well, maybe I'll revisit the decision when the Kobo Unread stack on my iPad is a lot below its current 90 books.

Variety again! "The Daughter of Odred", by Ursula K. LeGuin, 2014, 36 pages, 10k words. Supertitled "A new short story from Earthsea". Being an Earthsea fan from many decades ago, I had to check it out. A dark tale of adultery, betrayal, and revenge. Nice to be reading LeGuin again. I also purchased 3 YA novels of hers I had never heard of before.

Finally, "The Divine Invasion", by Philip K. Dick, 1980, 277 pages, 75k words. I didn't remember reading this, and it was like $1.99. It was his 3rd to last (ooh, semipenultimate) novel, and was the 2nd book in the VALIS trilogy.

********************** Spoiler Alert **********************

So, when Jebus died, Yah was chased from Earth by Belial to an extraterresterial planet where he now makes contact with colonists from Earth. He does the "impregnate a virgin" trick again, plus gives the poor woman MS so she has to return to Earth for treatment. Her son Manny (Emmanuel) confounds their enemies and makes it to earth to grow up - and recover his lost memories of how to be god. Zina the fairy - actually the embodiment of the torah - helps him recover his memory. Elijah the prophet is also a character.

Sci fi based on xtian mythology and hebrew kaballah. It was tough getting through at times. Totally inconclusive ending - existential I guess.

Back to the Stephenson.

Variety!

As threatened, I did go for something different and read a mystery - in fact 2 of them.

1st, "The Case of the Crumpled Knave" by Anthony Boucher, 1939, 244 pages, 66k words. The Fergus O'Breen Mysteries #1. Fergus O'Breen is a likable enough young cheap detective.

I think this was on sale for $0.99 or $1.99. Anthony Boucher was also a science fiction author, and was the editor of the 1959 2 volume "A Treasury of Great Science Fiction" which was maybe the 2nd or 3rd sci fi book I read Back In The Day - from the Jeffersonville Public Library.

It's not a bad mystery, and an easy read. It's set in LA, with Hollywood connections. It was a pleasant diversion. It was weird how it was pre-WWII.

Next up, "A Spindle Splintered" by Alix E. Harrow, 2021, 109 pages, 29k words. That length would make this a novelette? This looks to be the 1st book of the Fractured Fables series.

A very fun read: Sleeping Beauty in the Spidey-verse. Proud to see a neighbor - Harrow lives ~40 miles from Lexington in Berea, I think - writing such great stuff.

OK, maybe time for some easy science fiction: "The Galaxy, and the Ground Within" by Becky Chambers, 2021, 324 pages, 88k pages. Wayfarer #4. So, aliens from 5 races are stuck together in an inn by a communications system failure. Different species learn about each other. It is tied to the other books in that 1 of the aliens is the lover of the captain of the Wayfarer. There is a little bit of excitement - a medical emergency, and the doctor who comes is human, yay us! Still, I guess these are character/personality stories in this series. This novel has the least action yet.

Penultimately, our 2nd mystery, "The Case of the Solid Key" by Anthony Boucher, 1941, 298 pages, 81k words. The Fergus O'Breen Mysteries #2. Another diverting tale, with some mistaken identity stuff and more Hollywood tie-in. There is a locked room murder, and, despite going back and rereading Chapter 18 (of 20), I still didn't quite get the point of the solid key.

Finally, "Leviathan Falls", by James S.A. Corey, 2021, 589 pages, 160k words. The 9th and final novel of The Expanse. A well done conclusion, some good symmetry with the beginning.

I was also current on the TV version of The Expanse. It's very well done. But in the last season, the actor playing Alex, the pilot of the Rocincante, got hit with several accusations of sexual harassment. So he was fired, but not before an episode in which Alex dies of a stroke during a hard burn.

I understand that the actor had to go, but Alex and the other 3 core Rocincante crew members - Jim, Naomi, and Amos - are pretty much a family throughout the whole series. So I was relieved that Alex is still alive and figures with a normal prominence in this novel. After all, the actor was the problem, not the character.

The TV Expanse I think got through the 1st 3-4 novels. They could come back and pick with the next big plot pivot and get the rest someday if they choose to.

The magazine stack is cleared, not sure what I want to read next. A good problem.

Slacking?

I finished reading a book a couple nights ago, I figured I had enough (4) to blog. I was surprised to see that the last time I blogged on books read was Dec 5. So only 4 books in just over 2 months? Where does the time go?

Well, lately, I sleep til 8-9am, out walking/biking by 10-11. Generally 2ish is the earliest that I am finished with the morning walk/bike ride, chores, showering, and lunching. I was up to practicing guitar & singing 3-4 hours a day. Some reading. I've started doing crossword puzzles again. If I'm cooking, I generally start 6-6:30. After supper, more reading, then lately 2-3 hours of TV/movies. starting 10ish. Finished bingeing "Lucifer" - surprisingly fun, although at times as trite as you would expect of a multi-year series. Then binged the end of "Vikings". Next up "The Expanse".

I've decided I'm only going to binge things. I still have 1/2 a season of "Peter Gunn" to watch and harvest jazz standards from. But Amazon has decided to start charging me $0.99/episode, which seems like too much for 1/2 hour episodes. Oh well, only like 15 to go, when I'm done working up the 60-70 songs currently in the queue and need more I'll cough up the dough.

I had an abfab couple of weeks Jan 16-29: my youngest daughter visited me here in Naples, FL with her husband and 3 sons aged 6, 3, and 1 YO. They were going to stay a week, I told them early on they could stay as long as they wanted, so they stayed an extra week. Her husband worked remote Mon-Fri, and the 6 YO did remote classwork Mon-Fri. They went to the beach 4x, the IslandWalk pool 3x, Vineyards Community Park splash park 2x, a nice walk in a rookery (alligators!), and on their last day the very nice little Naples zoo (more alligators! - and dozens of Lego animals?!?!?).

It was great getting to cook 9 days in a row. Normally I cook 2 nights in a row, 4 servings a night (or sometimes only 2 of protein), so I then eat (alternating) leftovers for the next 6 days. Their last night in Naples we ordered out for pizza; the 2 nights before that my son-in-law acquited himself most excellently in the kitchen, making fish tacos the 1st night and chicken kabobs with homemade tzatziki sauce the 2nd night.

My daughter (and her sons) worked a 300 piece jigsaw puzzle, and she started a 1000 piecer, and left it for me. So I've been spending some time on that too.

Well, not like it really matters. I am in my 9th year of being gloriously and happily retired, FTW!

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1st book read: "Fleet Elements", by Walter Jon Williams, 2020, 454 pages, 123k words. The 2nd book in the 2nd trilogy in the Praxis meta-series, which also includes 2-3 short stories. Williams' writing is like an old friend to me. Good space battles, I guess. More plot regarding our star-crossed lovers. Slightly annoying cliff-hanger ending.

2nd book read: "Machine", by Elizabeth Bear, 2020, 495 pages. The 2nd book in her new "White Space" series. I was really psyched by the 1st book in this series, which seemed to have appointed itself the successor to Iain Banks' Culture series. So I was excited to get this 1. I don't think it is as good as the 1st, but still a page-turner. Characters include humans, aliens, and AIs, what's not to like?

3rd book read: "Perfidia", by James Ellroy, 2014, 705 pages, 204k words. This is the 1st book of "The Second L.A. Quartet" by Ellroy. I read several of his books decades ago, and have watched "L.A. Confidential" a few times. I think I got the 2nd book of the new quartet ("This Storm") on sale at Bookbub, and bought this 1 when I realized this fact. Ellroy considers himself the king of True Crime, there's plenty of that. The book starts the day before Pearl Harbor, after which things get pretty crazy in L.A. Most of the characters are cops or informants. Everyone stops sleeping, instead working all the time, doing drugs, and having sex with movie stars. I really wondered about that. Are Bette Davis and Joan Crawford in the public domain? Don't they have descendants or estates who might take exception to their being protrayed as lascivious individuals? Somewhat off-putting to me. I think I'm kind of over this genre, I think it will be a while before I read the 2nd one.

4th book read: "Some of the Best of Tor.com: 2020 Edition", various authors, 2020, 789 pages, 214k words. Tor publishes new stories online, a few a month, and at the end of the year creates a compilation of the best 30 or so stories and publishes them as a free eBook - yay! Generally a pretty good collection, and this year is no exception. This year's collection seems to skew heavily towards fantasy and horror, with very little science fiction. The collection was not as totally dominated by LGBTQA stories as I expected.

I totally forgot to clear the magazine stack in January, so I need to get that and February next.

I Made It As Far As “Major Characters”

I was going to read the new Nancy Kress novel, "The Eleventh Gate". I made it as far as "Major Characters"; closed the book and marked it "Read"; rated it 1 star and posted this review to Kobo:

I had not read any of her work in years, I used to enjoy it. Moved this book to the front of the 75 unread books on my iPad. I got as far as the Major Characters and decided not to go further. 1 of the 2 rival clans lives on the planet Galt & are members of the Libertarian League & teach at Galt U. etc.

As the years have passed, I have become ever more convinced of the complete and utter worthlessness of Libertarianism. It is a political philosophy for privileged white people - period.

Very unusual for me, I can’t remember the last time I didn’t finish a book I started. But after 5 months of COVID-19 lockdown, I am totally not in the mood for Libertarian BS.

I thought I had written a post where I ranted about how much I hated Libertarianiasm, with a list of "I don't want to discuss ..." topics. I couldn't find it. I did enjoy reading some old posts. I'm not going to waste my time writing such a post. Libertarianism - the "I got mine, fuck you" philosophy. Life is too short.

---

Well, this failure to launch put me in the mood for something different. Someone on twitter was raving about the noir cheap detective series by Joseph Knox. So I got the 1st novel of that series, "Sirens", 2018, 360 pages, 98k words. It had good pacing, plenty of action, a highly flawed hero. It was set in Manchester, England, home of the Manchester Capitalism book series, of which the most recently reviewed/summarized economics book "Foundational Economy" is book #6, yay! I tagged this as "mystery", it's actually much more like "true crime".

This was a good read, but I'm not going to continue with the series. This was falsely advertised as a cheap detective series. The protagonist is an undercover cop in the War on Drugs. Ugh. Given #BlackLivesMatter and #DefundThePolice and our increasing understanding of how the War on Drugs started as a way to put hippies and blacks in jail and now serves the additional purpose of lining the pockets of private prison fat cats, I cannot support a novel set in this environment with my $$$ or attention.

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Finally, I felt like it was time for some short stories. I decided on "The Paper Menagerie and Other Stories" by Ken Liu, 2016, 521 pages, 141k words. This was a really excellent collection. A lot of variety: transcendent humans traveling the cosmos; a timely story of living in the panopticon; a Chinese god in the Old West; 15 stories total.

Hah! Close to one of my deep theories of meaning, from the story "An Advanced Readers' Picture Book of Comparative Cognition":

It has been argued that thinking is a form of compression.

Many of the stories provide interesting contrasts between the American and the Chinese mindset, in a way that is not always complimentary to the American mindset - nice! A few stories repackage events in Chinese history, complete with footnotes, etc.

The last story, 'The Man Who Ended History: A Documentary" uses a time machine of a sort to examine the Josef Mengele type of war crimes committed by the Japanese in China in World War II at Unit 731. It goes into excruciating detail. It is a good story with important information, but it seemed a bit heavy handed. But you know, just like the Confederate statues here, sometimes you just got to do what it takes to get the right thing done.

This is a great collection, I highly recommend it.

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Next up, the 4 book sci-fi series "the Eden Paradox" by Barry Kirwan, recommended by my son. Kobo had only books 3 & 4, so I had to go to Amazon where a 4 book compendium was $5.99. Fingers crossed, I don't know when the last time was that I read something my son recommended. It will be a bonding experience regardless. He finally did watch "Iron Sky" on Netflix and enjoyed it grudgingly. Joe Bob sez, check it out!

Transitioning?

Strangely enough, the coronavirus is actually giving me hope. Looks like we might soon be giving some serious helicopter $$$ a try. So after 3 books of the escapist fare which is all I have been reading for the last year, I read a couple of mysteries to transition back to the real world. Next up, "Modern Money Theory"!!!

1st I read the "Tor.com 2019 Debut Sampler", 10 authors, 2019, 195 pages. Basically TOR publishes the 1st chapter or 3 of the novels by their new authors of last year and makes it a free eBook. So I got to read the 1st chapter of "Gideon the Ninth", which has gotten a lot of press, and which I will not be continuing. The only 1 in which I was interested enough to buy and finish reading was ...

"Your Favorite Band Cannot Save You", by Scotto Moore, 2019, 88 pages. There was no way I could not see how this tale of using incredible music to open dimensional portals turned out. A fun and quick (novella length?) read.

The 3rd SFF I read was "Some of the Best from Tor.com, 2019 Edition", 25 authors, 2019, 602 pages. Another free eBook. Some decent stories, but nothing that really made me want to start following the author. 2 or 3 of these I had read before. I was again annoyed by the Annalee Newitz story set in her future universe that includes slavery. I really hate to be made to imagine such a future. On the other hand, the story that involved historical slavery in the US "Blood is Another Word for Hunger", by Rivers Solomon, was moving.

Transitioning back to the real world with some 1930's detective stories: "Return of the Thin Man", by Dashiell Hammett, additional material by Richard Layman and Julie M. Rivett, 2012, 274 pages. This is Hammett's screen plays for the 1st 2 sequels to "The Thin Man": "After the Thin Man" and "Another Thin Man". There is also a short treatment that never went anywhere. Rivett is Hammett's granddaughter, and provides narrative around the creation of these works. It was fun to read these, but now I want to watch the movies.

Mal de Debarquement

Hopefully I don't have it. I am tho in my 6th day of landsickness after cruising. Last cruise it lasted 5 days after. Hopefully I'm about done. Googling informed me that Mal de Debarquement is landsickness that goes on indefinitely (shudder).

Cruise was nice. Sunshine, blue skies and water, horizon to horizon views, green islands are definitely a nice break from our winter grays. Snorkeled off St. Thomas, better than last time I tried, sea turtles and huge schools of little fishies were cool. St. Kitts seemed pretty run down, and Granada was still seriously torn up from hurricane Ivan of 5 months ago. Reminded me of the thoughts I had on our 1st cruise: not much to build economies from on these islands, the poverty is depressing, but they say at least there is always plenty of food to eat. Aruba was really pretty -- flat and very developed. High point of the trip was my wife water-skiing off of Palm Beach. Good boat, twin motors, pulled her right up on a slalom ski. She snuck the rope over head before I could have the driver cut the motor and skied a while with the rope behind her neck, which she hadn't done in 20 years, and of course with the rope between her legs. The 20 year old Dutch kid driving us thought she was totally the bomb. He would drive her past catamarans full of people to show her off. And, she is so happy when skiing, with a big grin on her face like a little kid on Xmas morning.

Got some good trash reading in, of course, including 2 1st novels. "Clade", by Mark Budz was a good effort. Post-ecocaust where custom biotech keeps what's left of the ecosphere functioning. Sort of kinder and gentler, a major plot element is when the protagonist and his girlfriend break up with 40 pages to go.

Stronger and edgier was "Spin State", by Chris Moriarity. Genetically engineered humans and AIs (discriminated against, of course) and Einstein-Bose condensate miners. A very good read.

Read another Stephen Baxter, "Coalescent". It was a decent read, but I think I got where it was going too quickly from my evolutionary readings. Basically, a 1600 year old cult/society follows the social insect breeding model and begins to evolve away from mainstream humanity -- actually very possible.

I also read an old David Drake, "Killer". I think this was an old used-bookstore purchase. Good, quick trash reading. Also 2 Elmore Leonard's, "Tishomingo Blues" and "Be Cool" (purchased in San Juan airport for the flight home). His dialogue is always great and the characters always cool, but the plots seem to be getting sketchier and sketchier. At the end of "Tishomingo Blues", I was seriously wondering, so how was this supposed to have ended? I had the same reaction recently to the movie version of "The Big Bounce".

I got to use 2 fun facts in random conversations on the trip that I think are generally useful for just kind of saying "Evolution is real, here's evidence":

1. Dogs and humans have been hanging out together for ~150,000 years, based on when dog DNA diverges from wolf DNA. What a great hunting pair, us with the eyes and dogs with the nose. You can always bring this up in conversations with dog-lovers.
2. Lactose intolerance is the natural state of affairs for all mammals but humans. It makes total sense that mammals quit manufacturing enzymes to digest lactose after the age of weening -- to continue to do so would be a total waste of effort. Lactose tolerance in human adults has only evolved in the last 10,000 years since humans domesticated cows and goats and harvested their milk -- evolution in action, in the brief period of time covered by human history. You can always bring this up in conversations with lactose intolerant people (who are apparently slight "throwbacks").

Downloaded two more albums from iTunes. It's bad tho, Amazon suggests these, I go to iTunes to get them ($9.99 instead of $14). I then immediately put on CD for listening to in the car. Problem is, amazon is going to lose track of my history and I will miss the recommendations of Amazon's canny data-mining software. Anyway, got Jack Johnson "On and On". Kind of like John Mayer, but more folky/acoustic, and some of the lyrics seem weak. Still, easy to listen to, 3 stars. Also got another Death Cab For Cutie "The Photo Album". Just listening to that now.

And Time Goes By ...

... so slowly. Re last post, did read "Beyond Infinity", by Gregory Benford. Didn't really do much for me. 3rd thing I have read lately with humans surviving 1 billion years -- clearly a little too long to extrapolate for me. If we can make 1 million years as a species (the hope), I think that would be crazy enough.

Overall, I can't think of Benford I really like, except for "Great Sky River" and its 1st sequel, "Tides of Light". Good man/machine and machine/man merger thoughts.

Just finished "Freedom Evolves", by Daniel C. Dennett. His "Darwin's Dangerous Idea" is I think one of the best books written on evolution (cranes vs. skyhooks); his "Consciousness Explained" is a nice finger in the eye of those still wanting to believe in a soul or suchlike. I have read 3 or 4 other of his books. This latest one is a look at free will (vs. determinism, what an unworthy stalking horse) from an evolutionary viewpoint. All his writing displays his annoying insistence on explaining why he is right and everyone else is wrong. At the start of this one, he accuses Pinker of "mysterianism" -- has he no allies? In the last chapter, he actually apologizes for not doing more of this -- a philosopher's sacred duty, in his opinion. Blagh.

Anyway, overall not a bad read. Interesting stuff about how the various parts of the mind have trouble synching up, leading to weird experimental results where we do things before we decide to do them. Very valid, the conscious mind is always trying to take credit for stuff it doesn't do (most mentation). Often it just kind of gets notified as an afterthought. Good commonsense arguments for the natural development of morality and ethics in our social species.

Much new music lately. 1st off, the best guitarist in the world lives right here in Lexington! I saw Ben Lacy at Natasha's a couple of weeks ago when my oldest daughter was in town for a wedding. I've seen him twice since then, at High on Rose, Fridays 6:30 - 9:00. Plays bass, rhythm, lead at the same time, or a rhythm machine if he so chooses, incredibly fast and clean. I have yet to see him miss a note.

Of new CDs, "Good News for People Who Love Bad News", by Modest Mouse, has really made an impression on me. I played it in my car for 2 weeks to burn it in. Great songs, quirky lyrics.

Also liked Elvis Costello's latest, "The Delivery Man". Elvis continues to turn out nice, tight, nasty rock & roll.

This kind of reminds me of "11 Tracks of Whack", by Walter Becker. I was a big Steely Dan fan, had all their stuff on vinyl (haven't yet got the CD versions). When they split up, Donald Fagen did 2 solo CDs, Becker did just this one, in 1994. It was like when Lennon & McCartney split, McCartney too sweet, Lennon too sour, with Fagen too sweet and Becker much more sour. "11 Tracks of Whack" is nice, tight, tasty songs, not a vaguely weak one til track 8 or so. BTW, I have the 2 Steely Dan CDs they have put out since getting back together a couple of years ago, they're OK.

Other new CDs:

• "Antics", by Interpol. Pretty much like their last one, 3 stars.
• "The Libertines", eponymous. Pretty much like their last one, 3 stars. I have trouble telling these 2 apart, one has a lead singer who kind of reminds me of Jim Morrison.
• "Electric Version", by The New Pornographers. Some of the songs are OK, but the peppy (preppy?) knob is up a little high, like "That Thing You Do" or the Friends theme song.
• "Medulla", by Bjork. I am of course a great fan of Ms. Guttmunsdottir. This is a very ambitious concept album. It took me 3 or 4 listens to get past the vocal textures and listen to the songs. Kind of like the 1st time I heard symphonic music (the Boston Symphony, on a $1.50 student ticket in 1969) -- I was so blown away by the texture of the sound (who knew all those fiddles together sounded so amazing?), that I don't think I heard the music at all. Still, "Medulla" does have good tunes, and the vocal textures are amazing.
• "Smile", by Brian Wilson. Brian Wilson was one of the greatest composers of rock & roll, a true genius. So, I saw this, the long-awaited cult album and had to get it. Then, kind of disappointing, I had already heard most of these on various other Beach Boy albums.

One final piece of media. My wife and I occasionally would talk about how much we liked the Philip Marlowe's done by HBO in the mid-80's, with Powers Boothe as Marlowe. So, go to Amazon, there they are, boxed set of 11 episodes, $54. So, we got them, fun to see again, of course not as good as we remembered. As a reviewer on Amazon put it, Powers Boothe is perfect as Marlowe, but most of the supporting characters are pretty weak.

Oh, I have overcome my natural Luddism and started ripping my CDs to MP3s. Got a 160GB Maxtor USB external drive for $160 (crazy) and even a subwoofer. Currently at: 660 songs, 1.8 days, 3.6 GB.

This posting composed while giving out candy to trick-or-treaters. Ahh, Halloween, always my favorite as a kid, the one pagan holiday.

Insert Snappy Title Here

Had a very nice vacation 2/16-2/23. We were in St. Martin, French West Indies, at the Grand Case Beach Club. Mid 80's, light rain twice for 10 minutes, color and life, surf crashing 15 feet from the door of our room. It was a 10 minute walk to Boulevard de Grand Case, "the Gourmet Capital of the Caribean". Restaurant after restaurant, mostly French, some Italian, Indian, Creole -- no Chinese or Sushi. Every meal we had was excellent, but, man, after the 3rd rich French meal, I had to give it a rest. The Lolo was also fantastic -- sidewalk cafes, half oil drums charcoal grilling ribs, chicken, fish, shrimp, lobster -- sides of red beans and rice, curry rice, cole slaw, potato salad, corn-on-the-cob, johnny cake, fantastic conch chowder -- and $10 for a slab of ribs, 1/4 chicken, and 3 sides, and Carib beer for $1.50. The money was weird, they would take dollars straight up for euros. I couldn't figure out that model.

My wife got to water-ski twice (no-hands, rope between the legs and everything, cheers from the watching boats) so she was happy. We also took a speed boat to the reef north of Anguilla and snorkeled. My 1st time, it was OK but I swallowed about a pint too much seawater, and looking at the pretty fishies got kind of dull after a while. I got to speak some French, I love the way it tickles my brain to get that 2nd language thread running. Had a fun evening our last night there. Had a very nice dinner at Il Neptune (Italian). They had a guy playing guitar and singing. I sang harmony to "Happy Birthday" at the next table (family tradition), so he came over after and I sang harmony with him on "Ai, Yi Yi Yi (I am the frito bandito)" and "Santa Lucia". At the end of both, he held a note a long time and bent it down to the step below. I had a good column of air going so I stayed right with him -- boo-ya! Then we found another place with a singer and we finally got to do some dancing.

So, on the trip I read:

• "Dune: Butlerian Jihad" -- guilty as charged. I read the other three Dune followups, they are competently done. But, I realized that they are lacking the thing I really liked about a lot of Herbert, which was stories that really are about evolution. The followups seem mostly concerned with checking off "that was in Dune, now we've done the secret origin".
• "The Other Wind" and "The Telling" by Ursula K. LeGuin. She still writes very well, simple tales with a lot of heart. But, no surprises, kind of dull.
• "Black Cherry Blues" by James Lee Burke. A David Robichaux Cajun detective novel. I saw a new one of his books and decided I'd try him -- this was the oldest David Robichaux book I could find. I was reading the jacket material and was afraid I'd already read these. But, starting it, I realized that this was the character from the movie "Heaven's Prisoners", with Alec Baldwin and the Teri Hatcher fully-nekkid scene. It was OK, I may try some others.
• "Picoverse", by Robert A. Metzger. Nothing new, creating pocket universes with particle accelerators. like the one by Steven Gould and lots of others.
• "Vectors" by Michael Kube-McDowell. Ugh. I thought I had liked some of his stuff in the past, this was really crap. Scientist takes pictures of brainwaves, unique as fingertips, discovers identical ones from an old man and a kid born after the old man's death. His Wiccan, video game genius new girlfriend is killed by gang-bangers after he has scoffed at her suggestion that this is proof of reincarnation, so he goes on a mission to prove her theory. After a bunch of plot, he kills himself so he can be reincarnated soon after she is, so he can hook up with her again -- good plan.

The "mind is magic" crowd just won't go away. They just don't get it. I go see my dad who now has basically no short-term memory, and it is recognizably my dad, but at about a 60% level. On the snorkeling trip, there was another couple with us. The guy was a 6th grade teacher and I had thought it was odd that he would search for words or form odd malapropisms. Then both he and his wife told us how he had had 5 brain surgeries and gamma-ray treatment for brain tumors, the largest of which was cue ball size. Ahh, now it makes sense. One of the contentions of Descartes, the pappy of Dualism, was that the mind/spirit was indivisible. But, it just ain't. You can lose one or more of thousands of pieces, or just degrade horizontally, vertically, diagonally, or however. But, are you still yourself? What self? There is no self.

Before the trip, I read "The Crystal City", by Orson Scott Card, the 6th Alvin Maker book. Card writes well, but he lost all edge years ago. Still, I empathize with the guy, he has 5 kids to try to feed and raise. His stories are always strong because they are about the moral decisions the characters must make. In this one tho, they build "The Crystal City", actually "The Crystal Building", where you can go and get weird visions and reflect on them -- and the women decide they should call it "the Tabernacle" rather than "the Observatory". Card seems to be downward spiraling into his Mormon roots -- ugh. Well, at least we probably don't have to worry about him getting DOM (Dirty Old Man) syndrome in his declining years.

No links to any of the above books. Not enough edge to really recommend any of them.

Finally, Some Non-Fiction

Well, my boss lent me 4 non-fiction books after I lent him the Wolfram, and I've felt compelled to read them so I can get them back into his book collection.

The 1st was a pretty astonomy picture book -- but no pictures I hadn't seen already.

I read the 2nd, "The Universe in a Nutshell", by Stephen Hawking in a couple of hours. Pretty pictures, more stuff on brane cosmological theories. The Theory of Everything (TOE) will have to involve multiple universes cause ours just doesn't balance by itself. Two interesting non-physics ideas:

1. People like Star Trek because the people are so much like us -- not very likely for 400 years in the future.
2. When we can grow infinks in artifical wombs, we can give them great big heads with great big brains. All the sci-fi I have read, I don't remember this one. I guess Hawking definitely values mind over body more than most, who I think would find this somewhat gross.

3nd book I really enjoyed: "Genome" by Matt Ridley, 1999. The autobiography of a species in 23 chapters (one per chromosome). He picks a gene or two off of each chromosome and uses it to explore many aspects of current genetic and evolutionary theory. Dozens of FFTKAT. Examples:

• Continous evolutionary war in the genome itself. Junk DNA full of deprecated sequences, sequences inserted by viruses, sequences designed to fight specific diseases.
• Only a few percent of the genome actually codes proteins. Large percent of junk DNA.
• Warfare between X and Y chromosome. 3 times as many X's as Y's, they're winning: Y chromosome has only 1 gene.
• Genome can change rapidly. All infinks loose their ability to digest lactose when weaned, i.e., lactose intolerance is the default condition in adults. Herding milk-producing domestic animals in the last 10,000 years has provided 70% of some human populations with the ability to digest lactose as adults.
• Nature vs nurture: heredity is 50%, peer groups 50%, parents 0% ?!?!?
• AB blood type provides immunity against cholera.
• Imprinted genes in which the mother or father dominates: maternal genes grow the cortex, paternal genes grow the limbic region. The placenta comes mostly from paternal genes -- it helps the baby successfully invade the mother's body, suppresses her immune system, moderates her hormone levels.
• Prions seem to be non-digital -- basically different from the rest of life.

and many, may others. I was only sorry when I read this that it is 4 years old. A 2e published more recently would probably have lots of things corrected and lots of new things right. My wife the pharmacist was actively disagreeing with lots of these, she's supposed to read and give me the overall FOS (full of shit) rating. Still, a really fun book to read.

Also read the 2nd Dan Simmons hard-boiled detective novel "Hard Freeze". I liked it a lot better than the 1st ("Hardcase"). The 1st had this annoying return to a minor subplot after the main plot had concluded -- kind of like the trite "no the monster isn't dead" at the end of a scary movie.