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zenandroid's reviews
205 reviews
Coulez mes larmes, dit le policier by Philip K. Dick
3.0
Don't know what to feel about this book.
On the one hand, the first half was uninteresting and boring, especially since i was expecting the mind bending tomfoolery proper to PKD (Full disclosure: i'm still not a big PKD reader (i only read two of his works (didn't finish the man in the high castle yet); Do Androids .... & Ubik), so maybe i am wrong in expecting that), and even the second half had a bit of boring-ness to it, but the stakes were well identified by then at least (i mean we always knew that losing your identification papers were bad but now we have a concrete "antagonist" to think about), and there were also some interesting character encounters and discussions and whatnot.
Then the explanation came along and that was pretty Dickian although i have to say i still dont quite understand it (partly because this isn't some Neal Stephenson novel and partly because i guess i could have been more focused during the explanation? (and partly because this is PKD we're talking about))
I mean, i guess i kinda sorta understood when it was being explained ?
Just didn't understand 'spatial unit' shenanigans.
So yeah, next thing i'm going to do is maybe scanning other reviews or posts to see if there is some interesting discussion going on about this book.
Oh and also what really raised my interest at the very last chapters were the monologue of Felix, the postface in this edition pointing to the story of how this story came to be (Philip's mescaline trip, divorce, extreme loneliness, etc), and finally the last chapter.
Anyways, i think i rambled on enough; the verdict as far as i'm concerned is that while this story was initiated by a Dickian drug overdose, it lacked a lot of the *Oomph* i associated with PKD, but it wasn't all that bad.
2.5-3/5 stars maybe ?
On the one hand, the first half was uninteresting and boring, especially since i was expecting the mind bending tomfoolery proper to PKD (Full disclosure: i'm still not a big PKD reader (i only read two of his works (didn't finish the man in the high castle yet); Do Androids .... & Ubik), so maybe i am wrong in expecting that), and even the second half had a bit of boring-ness to it, but the stakes were well identified by then at least (i mean we always knew that losing your identification papers were bad but now we have a concrete "antagonist" to think about), and there were also some interesting character encounters and discussions and whatnot.
Then the explanation came along and that was pretty Dickian although i have to say i still dont quite understand it (partly because this isn't some Neal Stephenson novel and partly because i guess i could have been more focused during the explanation? (and partly because this is PKD we're talking about))
I mean, i guess i kinda sorta understood when it was being explained ?
Just didn't understand 'spatial unit' shenanigans.
So yeah, next thing i'm going to do is maybe scanning other reviews or posts to see if there is some interesting discussion going on about this book.
Oh and also what really raised my interest at the very last chapters were the monologue of Felix, the postface in this edition pointing to the story of how this story came to be (Philip's mescaline trip, divorce, extreme loneliness, etc), and finally the last chapter.
Anyways, i think i rambled on enough; the verdict as far as i'm concerned is that while this story was initiated by a Dickian drug overdose, it lacked a lot of the *Oomph* i associated with PKD, but it wasn't all that bad.
2.5-3/5 stars maybe ?
La Part des ténèbres by Stephen King, William Olivier Desmond
2.0
Meh, ... beginning was interesting page 350 through 500 were especially bad because i had to confront the fact that this *is* a Stephen king book, so i really disliked the general fantastical explanation for the whole thing, then some things happened that made me kinda want to see how it would end.
Then the ending happened, meh, 1.5/5, pretty apathetic in general.
EDIT : I guess i just wanted to add, that it may be that i just am not in the mood for these types of books at the moment, and sadly probably ever, because they just don't do anything to me anymore (ie the gore doesn't particularly spook me at all), so yea ..
Then the ending happened, meh, 1.5/5, pretty apathetic in general.
EDIT : I guess i just wanted to add, that it may be that i just am not in the mood for these types of books at the moment, and sadly probably ever, because they just don't do anything to me anymore (ie the gore doesn't particularly spook me at all), so yea ..
Frankenstein (Collins Classics) by Mary Shelley
3.0
This novel is interesting.
The plot itself is, ambitious by the author's standards, and surely an original one too.
My issues were :
- The superfluous language and descriptions: I am just annoyed when an entire paragraph and sometimes an entire chapter could have been summarized more elegantly by using a simple word.
- I did not feel connected to the characters a lot, i can't really pinpoint why but i just didn't.
I wanted to love the book entirely, but i did not, it's not like i disliked it so much that i did not finish it, I was curious as to what happened to the characters, but the superfluous, irrelevant descriptions of the feelings of such and such character and such and such scenery, repulsed me; which is weird because when Dostoyevsky did it for instance i didn't mind that much, probably because Dostoyevsky *actually* described the mental state of his cast with relevant detail, ...
Also did i tell you about the ending, yeah i was not satisfied ..
The plot itself is, ambitious by the author's standards, and surely an original one too.
My issues were :
- The superfluous language and descriptions: I am just annoyed when an entire paragraph and sometimes an entire chapter could have been summarized more elegantly by using a simple word.
- I did not feel connected to the characters a lot, i can't really pinpoint why but i just didn't.
I wanted to love the book entirely, but i did not, it's not like i disliked it so much that i did not finish it, I was curious as to what happened to the characters, but the superfluous, irrelevant descriptions of the feelings of such and such character and such and such scenery, repulsed me; which is weird because when Dostoyevsky did it for instance i didn't mind that much, probably because Dostoyevsky *actually* described the mental state of his cast with relevant detail, ...
Also did i tell you about the ending, yeah i was not satisfied ..
The Shallows: What the Internet Is Doing to Our Brains by Nicholas Carr
3.0
Weird book, interesting book, Nicholas makes some good arguments and then some other ones i wasn't expecting that i dint exactly agree with.
Will review later !
Will review later !
The Android's Dream by John Scalzi
4.0
This book was enjoyable.
My first John Scalzi, not my last given that i already bought a copy of Lock In, which also seemed intriguing.
Let me just say that that first line paragraph was amazing.
>Dirk Moeller didn't know if he could fart his way into a diplomatic incident.
>But he was ready to find out.
I've read the start of a review here that said that this first chapter was silly, .. i don't really know about that i think it was perfect in setting the tone of the coming story.
Good scifi as well, and this is coming from a hard-SciFi fan, so while i recognize that you can stop reading this book if you're annoyed by the concept of A.I as whole brain simulations, the fact that the book wasn't taking itself seriously (or the fact that the book set the tone from the start as not really a deconstruction/nealStephenson-esque book) helps a lot.
And after the 200 pages mark i think, things stopped being purely funny and the actions/stakes started showing up and advancing the plot, which was nicely done as well i found.
Incredibly surprising (and surprisingly more realistic) how much more realistic a hacking scene is when the reason the hacker got in, isn't because they ran a series of decoders or some such nonsense, but because the company's IT team is filled with incompetents who didn't patch security holes quickly enough.
The ending didn't feel out of the blue, and that's always nice.
I liked most of the characters.
The story seemed pretty consistent to me.
My first John Scalzi, not my last given that i already bought a copy of Lock In, which also seemed intriguing.
Let me just say that that first line paragraph was amazing.
>Dirk Moeller didn't know if he could fart his way into a diplomatic incident.
>But he was ready to find out.
I've read the start of a review here that said that this first chapter was silly, .. i don't really know about that i think it was perfect in setting the tone of the coming story.
Good scifi as well, and this is coming from a hard-SciFi fan, so while i recognize that you can stop reading this book if you're annoyed by the concept of A.I as whole brain simulations, the fact that the book wasn't taking itself seriously (or the fact that the book set the tone from the start as not really a deconstruction/nealStephenson-esque book) helps a lot.
And after the 200 pages mark i think, things stopped being purely funny and the actions/stakes started showing up and advancing the plot, which was nicely done as well i found.
Incredibly surprising (and surprisingly more realistic) how much more realistic a hacking scene is when the reason the hacker got in, isn't because they ran a series of decoders or some such nonsense, but because the company's IT team is filled with incompetents who didn't patch security holes quickly enough.
The ending didn't feel out of the blue, and that's always nice.
I liked most of the characters.
The story seemed pretty consistent to me.
Warbreaker by Brandon Sanderson
5.0
This was an entertaining book!
This was an excellent book!
This was a really good book!
The world-building, the magic system, the politicking, the FRIGGING CHARACTERS.
This books really plays with your assumptions about things and events and people.
The characters are all interesting, each sisters arc was absolutely *stellar*.
Denth, Tonk Pah, Vasher, Susebron.
LIGHTSONG !!!
Lightsong was an amazing character, a reddit comment somewhere said that Lightsong's dad-jokes were lame.
Well, i respectfully disagree, I chuckled on any Lightsong chapter, he's just so love-able !
Brilliant magic system as well, Brandon Sanderson does it again!
I don't know why i see so many people say that Elantris/Warbreaker were the weaker of Brando's works, i thought they were just as brilliant, although at least for Elantris i can understand (given that Elantris was a lot more on the political-thriller side of things)
Anyways, amazing book, exceeded my expectations, made sense, enthralled me all the way through !
I continue to love any Brandon Sanderson work !
This was an excellent book!
This was a really good book!
The world-building, the magic system, the politicking, the FRIGGING CHARACTERS.
This books really plays with your assumptions about things and events and people.
The characters are all interesting, each sisters arc was absolutely *stellar*.
Denth, Tonk Pah, Vasher, Susebron.
LIGHTSONG !!!
Lightsong was an amazing character, a reddit comment somewhere said that Lightsong's dad-jokes were lame.
Well, i respectfully disagree, I chuckled on any Lightsong chapter, he's just so love-able !
Brilliant magic system as well, Brandon Sanderson does it again!
I don't know why i see so many people say that Elantris/Warbreaker were the weaker of Brando's works, i thought they were just as brilliant, although at least for Elantris i can understand (given that Elantris was a lot more on the political-thriller side of things)
Anyways, amazing book, exceeded my expectations, made sense, enthralled me all the way through !
I continue to love any Brandon Sanderson work !