Great technology thriller (think Crichton) with steadily escalating stakes as the main character goes deeper and deeper into the conspiracy. One of my favorite things about this book is the way it introduces us to a huge cast of minor characters and makes each one of them come to life, if only briefly. This is a big fat book, but it reads fast ( Read more... )

inktea asked for my science fiction favorites, and yes, I have a few ( Read more... )

• 07:46 The urge to hibernate was particularly strong this morning.
• 10:11 Because I am super-efficient, I have finished all the work at the on-site, and now have that magical thing known as "downtime." Yay!
• 10:42 My name is too long to search on Facebook and find me. I am tinyurl.com/cpnmp7
• 10:47 Translated Eastern Bloc LOLcats: rolcats.com/
• 14:02 ( Read more... )

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Palimpsest is a sexually-transmitted city.

It is a virus, an addiction, a heaven and a hell. It is a city that lives within the body: those who visit it find their flesh marked with black lines like a streetmap, a tattoo that cannot be removed.

That's yuki_onna talking about Palimpsest over on Scalzi's blog ( Read more... )

• 10:37 Phil, driving me in to work: I didn't get home until 5 AM. Me: ! Phil: It's okay, I'll drive *between* the pink elephants.
• 15:27 "Pride & Prejudice & Zombies" - Everything's better with zombies! ping.fm/gXVgt

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Note to self:
Read The Pirate Queen: In Search of Grace O'Malley and Other Legendary Women of the Sea. (The introduction can be read here.)

( Read more... )

I take sick-leave for two days and everybody's freaking out about deadlines.... Of course, they do that anyway, but this time I get the feeling that they believe I can fix everything ( Read more... )

In Rome, faults in statuary could be concealed by the use of beeswax to smooth out or correct the error. Sans cere, or "without wax," was used to refer to the honest, 'sincere' dealers ( Read more... )