friends don't let friends post drunk
Happy St. Patrick's Day! I am both drunk and internet famous, at least for the next hour. Lost track of drinks, there was some Molston via beer pong, some Guiness-Baileys-Whiskey, a few more Molstons, some more Guiness, a lot of rum and cokes, and oh! Some vodka. I was at George's party earlier too, hanging with people who make me ashamed to be this sober. Those guys started drinking 6:30 A freaking M. Hardcore, man.
God this party is boring (well obviously, considering I am posting to livejournal). And God, I hate drunk posts. Here, have a book review, maybe it will make me feel better.
I take back every bad thing I ever said about Tripoint (book by C.J. Cherryh). No wait, that's too mild, I take back every bad thing I ever said about C.J. Cherryh. Woah. Tripoint takes forever to get going, but once it does it's gone. Even the weird fragmentary rhythm of the prose, which was tripping me up, goes quickly once you've gotten the hang of it. Definitely my favorite C.J. Cherryh book to date.
Theme of the book is merchant space ship culture. It's got all the gritty details juxtaposed with cool technology that go into my liking cyberpunk more than other types of sci fi, but it's not cyberpunk, it's speculation: technology is thus, therefore society is thus, therefore those within society are thus. So far we're par so the course, Cherryh-wise.
But this is a more character-driven book than anything else I've read by the her. To summarize: main character has mommy issues, half-brother has mommy-issues, daddy has attachment issues, meanwhile Mommy just has Issues. My initial problem with this book was that the plot hinges on Mommy being crazy, and it's implied that this is (partially) from jumping to hyperspace right after a brutal sexual assault; but how jumping causes insanity is not explained until page 116.
I get what Cherryh is doing here -- it's third person POV so tight that not only do we not get information a character wouldn't think, we don't even get information a character wouldn't think at a particular moment in time -- but if you're reading this, especially if you aren't used to Cherryh's tricks, do yourself a favor and skim page 116 before you start. The beginning will make a million times more sense.
END CANNED REVIEW, BEGIN DRUNK ANALYSIS: main character's sort of Sue-ish in that we hear about how cool he is from the other characters more than we see him being cool. But I can put up with that if it means everyone hitting on him all the time XDXDXD plus Younger Brother is flawed enough for the both of them.
There is this character. She's an older-in-realtime navigator, and she's River Tam's long-lost twin. I mean freak speech patterns, psychic powers and all. IT IS AWESOME or maybe I am just easily amused. So many of C.J.'s attempts to reach out to the audience on pure cool factor (not pure sci-fi factor) fall flat, it's great to see one that succeeds. Hard sci-fi moments like unloading crates in zero-G are just as cool. And stuff. PRETEND THERE IS A CONCLUSION HERE OKAY. And pretend I said more positive stuff, because this book is awesome like woah.
Coherancy is asking way too much right now. Right now, I just want to go to sleep.
Hey, a pole-dancing contest! NVM, got to go. Happy St. Patrick's!
God this party is boring (well obviously, considering I am posting to livejournal). And God, I hate drunk posts. Here, have a book review, maybe it will make me feel better.
I take back every bad thing I ever said about Tripoint (book by C.J. Cherryh). No wait, that's too mild, I take back every bad thing I ever said about C.J. Cherryh. Woah. Tripoint takes forever to get going, but once it does it's gone. Even the weird fragmentary rhythm of the prose, which was tripping me up, goes quickly once you've gotten the hang of it. Definitely my favorite C.J. Cherryh book to date.
Theme of the book is merchant space ship culture. It's got all the gritty details juxtaposed with cool technology that go into my liking cyberpunk more than other types of sci fi, but it's not cyberpunk, it's speculation: technology is thus, therefore society is thus, therefore those within society are thus. So far we're par so the course, Cherryh-wise.
But this is a more character-driven book than anything else I've read by the her. To summarize: main character has mommy issues, half-brother has mommy-issues, daddy has attachment issues, meanwhile Mommy just has Issues. My initial problem with this book was that the plot hinges on Mommy being crazy, and it's implied that this is (partially) from jumping to hyperspace right after a brutal sexual assault; but how jumping causes insanity is not explained until page 116.
I get what Cherryh is doing here -- it's third person POV so tight that not only do we not get information a character wouldn't think, we don't even get information a character wouldn't think at a particular moment in time -- but if you're reading this, especially if you aren't used to Cherryh's tricks, do yourself a favor and skim page 116 before you start. The beginning will make a million times more sense.
END CANNED REVIEW, BEGIN DRUNK ANALYSIS: main character's sort of Sue-ish in that we hear about how cool he is from the other characters more than we see him being cool. But I can put up with that if it means everyone hitting on him all the time XDXDXD plus Younger Brother is flawed enough for the both of them.
There is this character. She's an older-in-realtime navigator, and she's River Tam's long-lost twin. I mean freak speech patterns, psychic powers and all. IT IS AWESOME or maybe I am just easily amused. So many of C.J.'s attempts to reach out to the audience on pure cool factor (not pure sci-fi factor) fall flat, it's great to see one that succeeds. Hard sci-fi moments like unloading crates in zero-G are just as cool. And stuff. PRETEND THERE IS A CONCLUSION HERE OKAY. And pretend I said more positive stuff, because this book is awesome like woah.
Coherancy is asking way too much right now. Right now, I just want to go to sleep.
Hey, a pole-dancing contest! NVM, got to go. Happy St. Patrick's!