"Clockwork Angels: The Novel" by Kevin J. Anderson

 

Publisher: ECW Press
Copyright: 2012
ISBN: 9781770903371

This is a rather unique book in that it is the novelization of the song lyrics written by the late Neil Peart who was the drummer for the iconic Canadian rock group Rush. The story is essentially a coming of age story of a young man Owen Hardy or as he is primarily known in the book Owenhardy, an assistant orchard master from the village of Barrel Arbour in the land of Albion.

Albion is ruled by the supposedly benevolent Watchmaker who controls the entire culture with clockwork precision. Young Owen is soon to become an adult, and he is then elected to marry the love of his life, and then take over the orchard from his father, etc. The Watchmaker knows about Owen, and is watching him, however, so is the Anarchist who is the Watchmaker's opponent who wants to disrupt the society and allow people to think for themselves.

The book is set in a "steampunk" style world and Owen is exposed to the reality of world he has always believed in and accepted as normal when various circumstances force his hand.

This is an excellent book, and highly recommended.

"Venus and Aphrodite: A Biography of Desire" by Bettany Hughes

Publisher: Basic Books, New York

Copyright: 2020

ISBN: 9781541674233

This is the marvellous biography of the goddess Aphrodite, that takes the reader from her origins – which predates her appearance in classical mythology - right through to the present day.

Ms. Hughes examines the history of Aphrodite, as well as her links to the various cultures she was worshipped in. Although Aphrodite is typically considered to be a Greek goddess, who was then adopted by the Romans to become Venus her origins are much earlier than the classical Greek civilization many people are familiar with. Such as "Lady of Lemba" a statue found on the island of Cyprus and dated to approximately 5000 years ago. As most people know the history of Aphrodite revolves around sex, procreation, love, and other forms of spirituality. Therefore this book does focus on that a fair bit, but in an extremely informative and fascinating way.

Since the time of Greek and Roman dominance in the world she has been transformed, and excepted in numerous other cultures up to and including modern day. Is the fantastic book with lots of information, and Ms. Hughes obviously did a fantastic amount of research to put this together.

Highly recommended.

 

"Stories of Your Life and Others" by Ted Chiang

Publisher: Vintage Books

Copyright: 2002

ISBN: 9781101972120

My primary reason for picking up this book of short stories was after seeing the 2017 movie "Arrival" by director Denis Villeneuve, which was based on the short story "Story of Your Life", and which follows the plot fairly well. Yes, I realize I am totally destroying my record of slamming Hollywood, but in this case they did a good job. Prior to this I hadn't read anything by Mr. Chiang at all, much to my dismay.

This book is a collection of eight short stories: the Tower of Babylon, Understand, Division by Zero, Story of Your Life, Seventy-two Letters, The Evolution of Human Science, Hell is the Absence of God, and finally Liking What You See: A Documentary".

All of the stories are very well written and quite thought-provoking. Of the eight stories though the first four are definitely my favorites. I'm not sure if I can say why they are my favourites, but I think it's possibly due to the fact that the characters and the storyline are very well developed and quite interesting.

Mr. Chiang has written the second book entitled "Exhalation", which I'll definitely be looking to get my hands on to read in the near future.

Definitely recommend it.

"Outlaws of the Atlantic: Sailors, Pirates and Motley Crews in the Age of Sail" by Marcus Rediker

Publisher: Beacon Press

Copyright: 2014

ISBN: 9780807033098

This book gives a well researched introduction to the various pirate groups that operated in the Atlantic during the 17th and 18th centuries. Most people know some of characters due to the various pirate movies that have been released over the years, but for the most part these movies deal strictly with what is known as "The Golden Age of Piracy" and focuses on the Caribbean. The range of piratical activities however extends for many centuries prior to this.

Mr. Rediker also gives a great deal of information on what life was likely like onboard a pirate ship (not as bad as typically portrayed in the movies) vs. what life warlike in the Royal Navy (much worse than what is typically portrayed in the movies) - which in a number of cases led to common sailors becoming pirates.

Two examples of this are Edward Barlow and Henry Pitman. The first chose a life at sea at the tender age of 13, while Pitman was transported to Barbados as punishment. Other men were pressed into service, and never saw their families again.

A very good read.

"Neuromancer" by William Gibson

 

Publisher: Berkley Publishing Group

Copyright: 1984

ISBN: 9780441012039

Neuromancer was William Gibson's first novel, and it took the science fiction world by storm due to its realism, interesting characters, and well thought out plot.

The story tells the adventures of Case, a hacker that is being forced to complete a mission to stay alive. In his bloodstream is a toxin that will release after a certain amount of time if there's no antidote given to him. He teams up with an agent (for lack of a better term) named Molly Millions. A lady with Mirror shade implants in her eyes, and 4 cm retractable razors in her fingertips (I haven’t quite figured out how this would work, as the first knuckle on most people is an average of 1.5 cm behind the finger tip).

The story revolves around two artificial intelligences named Wintermute, and Neuromancer. The two AIs, along with Case, Molly and the rest of the crew are also up against the Turing Police, who keep an eye on the doings of AIs, and those that try to hack into them. There isn’t a lot of background information given on why the Turing Police exist, or why they have to watch the AIs, so I found this to be a little off-putting as I happen to like these world-building details.

Molly is a character that also appears in Gibson's short story Johnny Mnemonic, which takes place before Neuromancer, but was written a few years afterwards.

Gibson has also written two more novels set in the same universe entitled Count Zero, and Mona Lisa Overdrive. However, I haven't read either of these yet.

This is an excellent book with great characterization, that makes you think and feel with the characters. The plotting is also very tight and well done, and the world building excellent. It however hasn’t quite kept up with the way technology has actually developed and changes since 1984, so I think it might have been better to set it further into the future - but that just my opinion.

Highly recommended to anybody who enjoys good science fiction.