The Dark Side of the Sun

[lproven]

I am somehow gratified that so many people commented that they'd read and indeed loved this book. I thought it was a relatively obscure bit of Pratchett. I had planned to use the First Sirian Bank's lovely phrase of half-praise as my description of the Secret History book on my recent spot on BBC Radio London: "I praise it as imaginative thinking

Comments

[ffutures]

I meant to add my own vote of liking Dark Side, with the caveat that Strata is actually more of a favourite and in my view a slightly better book.

[lproven]

Fair call. I think Strata is probably a bit better structured as a novel, and again, it's bursting with ideas. I liked the suicidal madness of the probe pilots, the bottomless purse, the red line in thin air indicating the control panel of the invisibility cloak, flying through repeated teleportation and much more besides.

However, I'm a sucker for a good picaresque novel of interstellar travel, so for me, TDSOTS pushes more buttons. I appreciated the /hommages/ to Asimov and Niven, but I missed the Fredric Brown one completely. (Charles Sub Lunar's "The Lights in the Sky are Photofloods" is a reference to Brown's short "The Lights in the Sky are Stars".) I also missed the reference to Aristophanes' "The Frogs". ("Brekexexex co-ax co-axial.")

I do so wish that he'd do some more non-Discworld SF. Just a few, for grins and giggles.

[andrewducker]

Of course, Strata is Ringworld with even more incompetent people in it, but I still love it to bits.

[lproven]

:¬D

The inspiration is clearly there, tho' it's not alone - as the APF points out, TDSOTS's Joker Institute is not unlike Known Space's Slaver Institute.

In Ringworld, though, the gimmick is the Ringworld. In Strata, the big plot device is that the disc world is god's easter egg, proof that the universe is artificial. A rather bigger /deus ex machina/!

[madmosh_uk]

Just to be different, I think I struggled to the end of DSotS and gave up on Strata many, many years ago. It was due to these that I didn't go neat a Discworld novel until Guards! Guards! or thereabouts was the current one.

Horses, course, etc.

[lproven]

(!)

[natural20]

Again with the should have said this yesterday... DSotS is one of my favourite books of all time, really. I know that it has rough edges, but there are so many fantastic ideas in there. Love it to bits.

I think the bomb can be explained by the Institute being too damn clever. The rest of the questions... well, I suspect I'd need my copy of the book to check through them.

[lproven]

> there are so many fantastic ideas in there

Googoo remains one of my all-time favourite SFnal gadgets in all fiction. :¬)

And sod bloody light-sabers, meaningless impossibility that they are from a jerk-off who couldn't write his way out of a wet paper bag. I'll take a shamsword any day.

[darth_tigger]

I never got round to mentioning it yesterday either, but I love DSotS. It has flaws, sure, but some excellent bits. And I think the One Commandment is a splendid one that should get rather more publicity and thought in general.

My copy upset Josh Kirby when he and TP were doing a talk and signing, on the grounds that it wasn't his cover. (TP suggested he sign it with the inscription "this wouldn't have been second-hand if I'd drawn the cover, but he declined).

It's probably about time I re-read it and Strata.

[lproven]

> I think the One Commandment is a splendid one

Absolutely, yes. It's high time for Sadhimism to be made to come true. With some strong teachings about how unplanned births are wasteful.

[peteyoung]

If I'd have caught your original post I'd have chimed in aswell... DSotS is actually one of my favourite SF novels, probably read it half a dozen times. Strata on the other hand, simply doesn't hold together for me at all, I found it to be just a rather silly rough outline for Discworld.

[lproven]

(!)

Well, one outta two ain't bad, I suppose... ;¬)