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graff_fuller 's review for:
Empire Builders
by Ben Bova
challenging
informative
mysterious
reflective
sad
tense
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
Writing anything that is speculative, and deals with the future in an alternate universe...is ALWAYS frought with struggles. How to predict the future? I think, especially WHEN this book series started and how long it has been ongoing, it shows that it's done some things right.
The future thinking of the problems that we are currently having (in 2025), with greenhouse gases, and how that it is effecting our climate and possible future is STILL debated hotly from both sides, but it is becoming more clear, that it IS happening, and we may not have the TEN years that is proposed in this novel. Also, the people who are holding to "this is not happening", are becoming more and more delusional. They have been lied to by politicians, and the massive amount of misinformation that is on the internet. We NOW have too much information (and you cannot prove one side or another, because the floading of wacky theories from both sides, that just muddy the water...for most honest seekers for the truth. It is becoming clear, even for them...that the greenhouse "cliff" that they represent in this story, is currently happening.
Then you have Bill Gates on the other side, that says that the ONLY way to reduce CO2...is to reduce the amount of people on the earth, and he's already introducing ways of depopulating the planet through "vaccines". Yikes!
On the other side, there are people that are refusing to believe that vaccines are important to keep humanity from devolving. Yeah, I'm not sure we are going to match the progress that is seen in this series. We might not make it.
Now, reading how Valsili Malik and his belief systems (from the Soviet Era), is funny to read about...in a future thinking story, but here we are.
BUT, on the other end, we have an Elon Musk type person...as the protagonist in Dan Hamilton Randolf. His misoginistic views and his fight for an ologarchy in the US, and in the world...gives me pause. Fact or fiction (as we see Elon Musk attached at the hip to the Orange Turd, and dismantling the country of my birth). Our own Dan, is scarier than the one on the page, but they are BOTH very dangerous.
Sadly, the women in this series (so far) are ALL tied to the male characters...and don't have agency of their own...and that's just not acceptable in this day and hour.
With all that said, and there are many more things that I find cringe in reading this book, but it still hits close enough, that I keep reading onward. It reminds me of the recent TV series, For All Mankind, and their view on the past (via an alternate history...which is obviously easier to do), than trying to predict the future. It still makes us able to compare and contrast what HAS happened (and how we feel about it), and what could happen...in our near future...to either surpass the advancements that are predicted, OR fall WAY short. Yeah.
Charles Stross had a series going, dealing with Near Future events, but the path forward kept making his next book unreadable (even though I enjoyed what he did), but he just couldn't sustain it (sadly). The series was called, The Halting State series...that ended AFTER book two. Sadly, I heard that while reading Rule 34, and it sucked the air out of my enthusiasm for the book/series...and I never finished it. I might need to pick up Halting State for a reread, and then "at least" finish Rule 34, for I am a completionist, and that has been left uncompleted (and it bugs me). Ugh.
Okay, on to Mars, the fourth book in The Grand Tour series.
The future thinking of the problems that we are currently having (in 2025), with greenhouse gases, and how that it is effecting our climate and possible future is STILL debated hotly from both sides, but it is becoming more clear, that it IS happening, and we may not have the TEN years that is proposed in this novel. Also, the people who are holding to "this is not happening", are becoming more and more delusional. They have been lied to by politicians, and the massive amount of misinformation that is on the internet. We NOW have too much information (and you cannot prove one side or another, because the floading of wacky theories from both sides, that just muddy the water...for most honest seekers for the truth. It is becoming clear, even for them...that the greenhouse "cliff" that they represent in this story, is currently happening.
Then you have Bill Gates on the other side, that says that the ONLY way to reduce CO2...is to reduce the amount of people on the earth, and he's already introducing ways of depopulating the planet through "vaccines". Yikes!
On the other side, there are people that are refusing to believe that vaccines are important to keep humanity from devolving. Yeah, I'm not sure we are going to match the progress that is seen in this series. We might not make it.
Now, reading how Valsili Malik and his belief systems (from the Soviet Era), is funny to read about...in a future thinking story, but here we are.
BUT, on the other end, we have an Elon Musk type person...as the protagonist in Dan Hamilton Randolf. His misoginistic views and his fight for an ologarchy in the US, and in the world...gives me pause. Fact or fiction (as we see Elon Musk attached at the hip to the Orange Turd, and dismantling the country of my birth). Our own Dan, is scarier than the one on the page, but they are BOTH very dangerous.
Sadly, the women in this series (so far) are ALL tied to the male characters...and don't have agency of their own...and that's just not acceptable in this day and hour.
With all that said, and there are many more things that I find cringe in reading this book, but it still hits close enough, that I keep reading onward. It reminds me of the recent TV series, For All Mankind, and their view on the past (via an alternate history...which is obviously easier to do), than trying to predict the future. It still makes us able to compare and contrast what HAS happened (and how we feel about it), and what could happen...in our near future...to either surpass the advancements that are predicted, OR fall WAY short. Yeah.
Charles Stross had a series going, dealing with Near Future events, but the path forward kept making his next book unreadable (even though I enjoyed what he did), but he just couldn't sustain it (sadly). The series was called, The Halting State series...that ended AFTER book two. Sadly, I heard that while reading Rule 34, and it sucked the air out of my enthusiasm for the book/series...and I never finished it. I might need to pick up Halting State for a reread, and then "at least" finish Rule 34, for I am a completionist, and that has been left uncompleted (and it bugs me). Ugh.
Okay, on to Mars, the fourth book in The Grand Tour series.