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This
is one of those books I read as a teen, then a 20something, then a
30something now as a 40something. I loved this book, I loved it a
lot. This time, not so much. This is a much younger man’s book and
it is time for me to acknowledge that fact.
I
desperately wanted to give this 5stars, like all my previous times
but I’m honest enough with myself to know I can’t. This is a
vanity project by the author about Zen Buddhism wrapped inside a
science fiction story that is actually a swords and sorcery story.
Ahhhh,
another youthful book that I’ve finally outgrown. That’s not a
good or bad thing, it just is. While that makes a part of me sad,
another part acknowledges that is just how it is, like aching joints
and reduced energy levels. Well, if I managed to push off growing up
for 48 years, I’d say that was a good run.
Ok
cranky old man stage, here I come!!!
★★✬☆☆
From
the Publisher
According
to every reading it was a paradise planet—a warm and fecund world
far more desirable than the teeming, polluted warrens of the
planet-city that Earth had become. Yet when the last of the one-way
transports had landed its cargo of Pilgrims, the men of Earth were to
learn of a danger that no machine could detect, and against which no
machine could defend them—the Mushin, mental entities that
stimulate and amplify the dark streak of violence that lies near the
core of every human being.Seven generations would pass before a
descendant of the scattered remnant of the original colonists would
be ready to face the power of the Mushin. But first he would have to
learn to wield the weapon that is no weapon—and that only where
there is no Will, is there a Way…His name is Jerome. This is his
story. He is the WAY-FARER.
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Title:
Lords and Ladies Series: Discworld
#14 Author: Terry Pratchett Rating:
3.5 of 5 Stars Genre: Fantasy Pages:
260 Words: 89K Publish: 1992
My
goodness, Pratchett just can’t keep himself from spouting off and
preaching at his readers. This could easily have been a 4star read,
or higher, as the story is wonderful and I thoroughly enjoyed it. But
yeah, I’m not reading a fantasy series to get preached at by some
wacko who only gives lip service to such things as logic and
theology.
Sigh...
★★★✬☆
From
Wikipedia.org
Granny
Weatherwax, Nanny Ogg, and Magrat Garlick return
to Lancre after their recent adventure in Genua.
Magrat is stunned when King Verence proclaims their
imminent marriage, having already made all the arrangements in her
absence. The sudden appearance of crop circles reveals to
Nanny and Granny that it is now "circle time", a
convergence of parallel universes when the Discworld is
susceptible to incursions from the "parasite universe" of
the Elves. Elves are capricious and amoral creatures that enter the
minds of animals and sentient beings in a more destructive way than
witches do, using "glamour" to alter human's perceptions of
them. They are normally kept away by a circle
of magnetized iron standing stones known as the
Dancers. When Nanny and Granny refuse to explain the situation to
Magrat, she leaves the coven, disavows witchcraft, and moves into an
apartment in Lancre Castle. She soon becomes bored with the courtly
lifestyle and unsure of her place.
Mustrum
Ridcully, Archchancellor of Unseen University, leads a small
group of faculty to attend the wedding. Along the way, they are
joined by the Dwarfish lothario Casanunda.
Granny
and Nanny discover that a group of local girls, led by Diamanda
Tockley and including Agnes Nitt, have formed a new coven
whose activities include dancing naked at the Dancers. The two
elderly witches try to convince them to stop, with Granny ultimately
besting Diamanda in a public witchcraft contest and discrediting the
new coven. But a defiant Diamanda later runs through the Dancers into
the land of the Elves, where she is knocked unconscious by a poisoned
Elven arrow before being rescued by Granny. Nanny subdues an Elf that
pursues them back into Lancre, using an iron fireplace poker; Elves
and their powers are severely weakened by iron. The witches bring
Diamanda and the Elf to Lancre Castle, where Magrat treats Diamanda
and Verence agrees to imprison the Elf (though Magrat inadvertently
frees it later). Meanwhile, Granny has begun to experience memories
of other paths her life has taken in parallel worlds, as well as a
growing sense of her own impending death.
Jason
Ogg and the other Lancre Morris Men plan a play to be performed
for the wedding guests. When they rehearse near the Dancers, the
Elves influence them to include Elvish elements in the play. As a
result, when the play is performed at the Dancers, it causes
sufficient belief—a powerful force on the Discworld—that the
Elves are able to make the guests dismantle the stone circle. The
Elves arrive, and the Elf Queen plans to legitimize her rule of
Lancre by marrying Verence. None of the members of the Lancre coven
are present at this time: Magrat has locked herself in her room due
to perceived insults in a letter she has discovered, written by
Granny to Verence, advising him to plan the wedding; Nanny is being
romanced by Casanunda; and Granny has been magically whisked away by
Ridcully, who hopes to resume a romantic connection they had when
much younger. The women only become aware of what has happened once
the Elves begin to wreak havoc in Lancre. Aided only by general
dogsbody Shawn Ogg, Magrat fights her way through the
infiltrated castle. She discovers a portrait of Queen Ynci, one of
the kingdom's legendary founders. Suddenly inspired by the idea of
becoming a warrior queen, Magrat finds and dons
Ynci's armour. Feeling influenced by Ynci's spirit (and unaware
that Ynci is a fiction, the armour constructed from cookware only a
few generations previously), she rescues a captured Shawn and sets
out for the Dancers. While Granny and Ridcully make their way through
the woods, resulting in Granny's capture by the Elves, Nanny and
Casanunda travel through a gateway to the abode of the Elf King, who
opposes the Elf Queen despite being her spouse.
At
the Dancers, Magrat arrives to confront the Elf Queen at the same
time as the people of Lancre, rallied by Shawn and Nanny. But the Elf
Queen quickly subdues Magrat with glamour. The captive Granny
mentally combats the Elf Queen and releases Magrat from the glamour
before succumbing to the Elf Queen's attack, her prone body being
covered by the bees from her hive, which have swarmed at the Dancers.
When the Elf Queen turns her powers on Magrat, attempting to stop her
resistance by dismantling her identity, she exposes the unexpectedly
valorous core of Magrat's being – something which Granny had
deliberately been stoking, aggravating and provoking all along for
just this very outcome. Magrat attacks and subdues the Elf Queen just
in time for a projection of the Elf King to arrive and send the Elves
back to their world.
Granny
appears to be dead, but then Nanny and Magrat learn that she has
actually borrowed her bees' hive mind, a feat thought impossible.
They break open a window in the castle, where Ridcully has reverently
laid Granny's body, enabling the bees to get close enough for her to
regain consciousness. Nanny points out to Magrat that Granny's letter
to Verence has had a great positive impact on Magrat's life, as well
as giving her the strength to fight the Elf Queen. Magrat and Verence
are married by Ridcully. Later, Granny and Ridcully make peace with
their past and their place in the universe. The growing sense of
impending death she had been feeling had been due to the impending
deaths of some of her parallel-selves.
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Title:
Small Gods Series: Discworld #13 Author:
Terry Pratchett Rating: 2 of 5 Stars Genre:
Fantasy Pages: 227 Words: 91K Publish:
1992
I
originally read this back in 2004 and for the most part, the
humanistic belief system was brand new to me and thus it came across
as “profound”. Twenty years later, with much more experience
under my belt, this was complete garbage.
The
basic idea, and Pratchett carries this through all his books, is that
Man is the center of the universe and everything springs from him. It
is a very “mushy” philosophy and thus is used by people like
Pratchett who don’t want to get down to the nuts and bolts of
theology. It allows for everyone to feel pretty good about themselves
while being totally self-contradicting and also completely illogical.
Pratchett’s
humor is still here in the story, but man, I could not overlook such
shoddy theology. It is just plain bad.
The
more I re-read of Discworld, the less inclined I am to ever re-read
it again. There are individual books that are standing out as very
well done, but overall, the underpinnings are slop and this makes the
books themselves slop. Like this one.
★★☆☆☆
From
Wikipedia.org
The
Great God Om tries to manifest himself once more in the world, as the
time of his Eighth Prophet is nigh. He finds himself in the body of a
tortoise, stripped of his divine powers except for the ability to
singe eyebrows with tiny thunderbolts. In the gardens of Omnia's
capital of Kom, he addresses the novice Brutha, the only one able to
hear his voice. Om has a hard time convincing the boy of his
godliness as Brutha is convinced that Om can do anything he wants and
would not want to appear as a tortoise.
Brutha
is gifted with an eidetic memory and is therefore chosen by
Vorbis, the head of the Quisition, to accompany him on a
diplomatic mission to Ephebe as his secretary. Despite his
amazing memory, Brutha is illiterate and rarely thinks for himself.
This begins to change after Brutha discovers Ephebe's philosophers;
the idea of people entertaining ideas they are not certain they
believe or even understand is an entirely new concept to him.
With
the help of Ephebe's Great Library and the
philosophers Didactylos and his nephew Urn, Om learns that
Brutha is his only genuine believer. All others either just fear the
Quisition's wrath or go along with the church out of habit. After
learning that Vorbis had facilitated the death of the missionary
Brother Murduck to cover up his being mocked by Ephebian citizenry
and to provide a reason for war against Ephebe, Brutha uses his
memory to reluctantly aid an Omnian raid through
the Labyrinth guarding the Tyrant's palace. Because of his
authorship of De Chelonian Mobile (The Turtle Moves), which
contradicts Omnian dogma about the shape of the Discworld, Didactylos
is brought before Vorbis to face reprisal. Seemingly conceding his
previous views about the shape of the world and willing to write a
retraction extolling Omnian interpretations, Didactylos escapes after
hitting Vorbis with his lantern. Ordered by Vorbis to burn down the
Library, Brutha memorizes many scrolls in order to protect Ephebian
knowledge as Didactylos sets fire to the building to stop Vorbis
reading its scrolls. Completely unrelated to the story, the Librarian
of the Unseen University travels through L-Space to rescue several of
the abandoned scrolls.
Fleeing
the ensuing struggle in Urn's steam-powered boat, which is destroyed
as the price for an earlier deal made between Om and the Sea Queen,
Brutha and Om end up washed up on the desert coast. Trekking home to
Omnia with a catatonic Vorbis, they encounter ruined temples
dedicated to long-dead, long-forgotten gods, the faint ghost-like
small gods yearning to be believed in to become powerful, the
small-god-worshipping anchorite St Ungulant, and the human
cost of Vorbis's plan of leaving caches of water in the
desert to attack Ephebe. Realising his 'mortality' and how
important his believers are to him, Om begins to care about them for
the first time.
While
Brutha, Vorbis, and Om are in the desert, the Tyrant of Ephebe
manages to regain control of the city and contacts other nations who
have been troubled by Omnia's imperialistic ambitions. Sergeant
Simony, whose native Istanzia had been conquered by Omnia in his
youth, brings Didactylos and Urn to Omnia to lead the Turtle Movement
in a rebellion against the Church.
On
the desert's edge, a recovered Vorbis attempts to finish off Om's
tortoise form, knocks out and abducts Brutha, and proclaims himself
as the Eighth Prophet, elevating Brutha to archbishop to buy his
silence. After Urn accidentally activates the hydraulic system
which secretly operates the doors of the Great Temple, Brutha
interrupts Vorbis's ordainment. As a result, Brutha is to be publicly
burned for heresy but Om comes to the rescue, dropping from an
eagle's claws onto Vorbis' head, killing him. The great crowd
witnesses this miracle and comes to believe in Om, making him
powerful again. In the ethereal desert, Vorbis learns to his horror
that what he thought was the voice of Om was in fact his own voice
echoing inside of his own head, plunging him into despair and leaving
him unable to cross the desert and face judgement.
Om
manifests himself over the citadel and attempts to grant Brutha the
honour of establishing the Church's new doctrines. However, Brutha
wishes to establish a 'constitutional religion' whereby Om Himself
obeys Omnianism's new commandments and answers some of the prayers of
his followers in exchange for a steady source of belief, believing
that Om will lose his power again otherwise.
Ephebe
has allied with several other nations along the Klatchian coast and
has sent an army against Omnia, establishing a beachhead near the
citadel. Brutha attempts to establish diplomatic contact with the
generals of the opposing army, wishing to stop the war before it
starts by surrendering. Despite trusting Brutha, the leaders state
they do not trust Omnia and that bloodshed is necessary. At the same
time, Simony leads the Omnian military including Urn's 'Iron
Turtle' war engine to the beachhead in order to fight the
anti-Omnian alliance.
Om
attempts to physically intervene in the battle, but Brutha demands he
does not interfere with the actions of humans. Om is infuriated but
obeys Brutha, and instead travels to Dunmanifestin, where gods gamble
on the lives of humans in order to gain or lose belief. Om unleashes
his fury on the other gods and causing a storm that disrupts the
battle. Eventually he compels all other gods of the forces at the
battle to tell their soldiers to stop fighting and make peace.
In
the aftermath Brutha becomes the Eighth Prophet, ending the
Quisition's practice of torture and reforming the church to be more
open-minded and humanist, with the citadel becoming home to the
largest non-magical library on the Discworld. Om also agrees to
forsake the smiting of Omnian citizens for at least a hundred years.
A hundred years to the day after Om's return to power Brutha dies. In
the afterlife he finds the spirit of Vorbis and, taking pity on him,
guides him to his judgement. It is revealed that this century of
peace was originally meant to be a century of war and bloodshed which
the History Monk Lu-Tze changed to something he liked
better.
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review is written with a GPL 4.0 license and the rights contained
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copying and sharing without proper authorization and permissions.
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Title:
Reaper Man Series: Discworld #11 Author:
Terry Pratchett Rating: 3.5 of 5 Stars Genre:
Fantasy Pages: 204 Words: 79K
Pratchett
writes some really funny and light stuff, about serious subjects. I
was ok with that 20 years ago, but now, not so much. Mainly because I
vehemently disagree with Pratchett’s starting point, his foundation
as it were. So everything built up on that is more and more off.
Ideas might take a long time (ie, multi-generational) to foment, but
they do affect us, no matter how small and those changes affect how
we raise the next generation. And the more I read of Pratchett, the
more I am convinced he knew this, that Ideas Are Powerful, and wasn’t
just writing for the fun of it.
So
if you don’t think about Eternity, or some of the Big Questions,
you’ll have a blast like I did 20 years ago. If you do take this
seriously, you’ll still enjoy the story and find some really funny
bits but it will be like eating creampuff when you already know
you’re overweight and at risk for a heart attack.
And
on THAT cheery note, I’m wrapping this up. Because I have a feeling
my reviews of Pratchett are going to go along these lines unless I
can find some way to turn off my inner philosophical voice. Not sure
that is possible though.
While
every other species creates a new Death for themselves, humans need
more time for their Death to be completed. As a result, the life
force of dead humans starts to build up; this results
in poltergeist activity, ghosts, and other paranormal
phenomena. Most notable is the return of the recently deceased wizard
Windle Poons, who was really looking forward to reincarnation. After
several misadventures, including being accosted by his oldest
friends, he finds himself attending the Fresh Start club, an
undead-rights group led by Reg Shoe. The Fresh Start club and the
wizards of Unseen University discover that the city
of Ankh-Morpork is being invaded by a parasitic lifeform
that feeds on cities and hatches from eggs that resemble snow
globes. Tracking its middle form, shopping trolleys, the Fresh Start
club and the wizards invade and destroy the third form, a shopping
mall.
When
humankind finally thinks of a New Death, one with a crown and
without any humanity or human face, it comes to take Bill Door.
Death/Door, having planned for this moment for some time, outwits and
destroys it. Having defeated the New Death, Death absorbs the other
Deaths back into him, with the exception of the Death of Rats (and
ultimately, the Death of Fleas). Death confronts Azrael, the Death of
the Universe, and states that the Deaths have to care or they do not
exist and there is nothing but Oblivion, which must also end some
time.
Death
asks for and receives some time. He meets up with Miss Flitworth
again and offers her unlimited dreams. She asks to go to the local
Harvest Dance. They prepare and join the townspeople for a full night
of dancing.
Returning
to the city of Ankh-Morpork, Death meets up with Windle Poons,
finally taking him to his afterlife. At the end there is also a
discussion between Death and the Death of Rats over what the Death of
Rats should "ride", Death suggests a dog while the Death of
Rats suggests a cat.
This review is written with a GPL 4.0 license and the rights contained therein shall supersede all TOS by any and all websites in regards to copying and sharing without proper authorization and permissions. Crossposted at WordPress & Blogspot by Bookstooge’s Exalted Permission
Title: Mostly Harmless Series: THGttG #5 Author: Douglas Adams Rating: 1 of 5 Stars Genre: SF Pages: 148 Words: 64K
In the first book, I stated that the philosophy of Hedonistic Nihilism portrayed by Adams disturbed me. That got some good comments going.
Well, I feel flipping vindicated. The book ends with the Vogons destroying every version of Earth on every possible space/time continuum. And Arthur just sits back and enjoys the thought of the coming total nonexistence coming his way.
I cannot state strongly enough how abhorrent I find that attitude.
★☆☆☆☆
ps,
Two sub-2star books in a row is a REALLY BAD WAY TO START THE MONTH!!! Just saying…
From Wikipedia
Synopsis – click to open
Arthur Dent plans to sightsee across the Galaxy with his girlfriend Fenchurch, but she disappears during a hyperspace jump, a result of being from an unstable sector of the Galaxy. Depressed, Arthur continues to travel the galaxy using samples of his bodily tissues/fluids to fund his travels, assured of his safety until he visits Stavromula Beta, having killed an incarnation of Agrajag at some point in the future at said planet. During one trip, he ends up stranded on the homely planet Lamuella, and decides to stay to become a sandwich maker for the local population.
Meanwhile, Ford Prefect has returned to the offices of the Hitchhiker’s Guide, and is annoyed to find out the original publishing company, Megadodo Publications, has been taken over by InfiniDim Enterprises, which are run by the Vogons. Fearing for his life, he escapes the building, along the way stealing the yet-unpublished, seemingly sentient Hitchhiker’s Guide Mk. II. He goes into hiding after sending the Guide to himself, care of Arthur, for safekeeping.
On Lamuella, Arthur is surprised by the appearance of Trillian with a teenage daughter, Random Dent. Trillian explains that she wanted a child, and used the only human DNA she could find, thus claiming that Arthur is Random’s father. She leaves Random with Arthur to allow her to better pursue her career as an intergalactic reporter. Random is frustrated with Arthur and life on Lamuella; when Ford’s package to Arthur arrives, she takes it and discovers the Guide. The Guide helps her to escape the planet on Ford’s ship after Ford arrives on the planet looking for Arthur. Discovering Random, the Guide, and Ford’s ship missing, the two manage to find a way to leave Lamuella and head for Earth, where they suspect Random is also heading to find Trillian. Ford expresses concern at the Guide’s manipulation of events, noting its “Unfiltered Perception” and fearing its potence and ultimate objective.
Reporter Tricia McMillan is a version of Trillian living on an alternate Earth who never took Zaphod Beeblebrox’s offer to travel in space. She is approached by an extraterrestrial species, the Grebulons, who have created a base of operations on the planet Rupert, a recently discovered tenth planet in the Solar System. However, due to damage to their ship in arriving, they have lost most of their computer core and their memories, with the only salvageable instructions being to observe something interesting with Earth. They ask Tricia’s help to adapt astrology charts for Rupert in exchange for allowing her to interview them. She fulfills their request and conducts the interview, but the resulting footage looks so fake that she fears it will destroy her reputation if broadcast. She is called away from editing the footage to report on a spaceship landing in the middle of London.
As Tricia arrives at the scene, Random steps off the ship and begins to yell at her, mistaking Tricia for her mother. Arthur, Ford, and Trillian arrive and help Tricia to calm Random. They remove her from the chaos surrounding the spacecraft and take her to a bar. Trillian tries to warn the group that the Grebulons, having become bored with their mission, are about to destroy the Earth. Random disrupts the discussion by producing a laser gun she took from her ship. Arthur, still believing he cannot die, tries to calm Random, but a distraction causes her to fire the weapon, sending the bar into a panic. Arthur tends to a man hit by the blast, who drops a matchbook with the name of the bar – “Stavro Mueller – Beta” – and Arthur realizes that this is the scene of Agrajag’s final death. He sees Ford laughing wildly at this turn of events and experiences a “tremendous feeling of peace”.[1]
The Grebulons destroy the Earth, believing that their horoscopes will improve if it is removed from their astrological charts. It is revealed that the Vogons designed the Guide Mk. II to achieve their desired outcome by manipulating temporal events. As a result, every version of the Earth in all realities is obliterated, fulfilling the demolition order that was issued in the first novel. Its mission complete, the Guide collapses into nothingness.
This review is written with a GPL 4.0 license and the rights contained therein shall supersede all TOS by any and all websites in regards to copying and sharing without proper authorization and permissions. Crossposted at WordPress & Blogspot by Bookstooge’s Exalted Permission
Title: The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy Series: THGttG #1 Author: Douglas Adams Rating: 3.5 of 5 Stars Genre: SF Pages: 184 Words: 50K
I first read these in the late 90’s and laughed my head off. I can still remember how my stomach and sides hurt from laughing so much. It was gloriously ridiculous and in the midst of all the stresses of going through Bibleschool (and all of the attendant growing up I had to do), it was exactly what I needed. When I read the series again in ‘09, I had just gotten married, life was good (but hard due to the recession of ‘08 being in full swing) and I didn’t need any silliness in my life. Hence my “feelingometer” swung over to the “This is Stupid” side of things and I was not impressed at all. Quite the change. Which brings us to the present.
I am now fully mature, wise, sagacious, totally even keeled emotionally and generally in control of every aspect of my life. HAHAHAHAHAHAAHAHAHAHAHAA! ~wipes tears from eyes~ Ahhh, good one Bookstooge, good one.
I definitely enjoyed this more than my time in ‘09 and yet at the same time, I found this very disturbing.
Most of that is due to Adam’s philosophy of Hedonistic Nihilism. It boils down to taking as much pleasure from your existence because you’re going to die and then that’s that. It is a horrible, horrible way to go through life and while Adams covers things up with lots of humor and silliness, that dark thought is there through the whole book. As a Christian, what Adams assumes is completely antithetical to my entire world view. After thinking about it for a bit, I realized it wasn’t so much that the inclusion of such a philosophy bothered me, but that Adams seemed to truly enjoy rubbing the readers’ faces into it. Time after time he has a character expound on just how insignificant and pointless life is. That kind of thinking is how you break someone down psychologically. It is, simply put, evil. With Resurrection Sunday just past, it’s very apropos to speak the truth to the lie of what Adams spouts here: Humans, as individuals, have value and are valuable because they are created in the image of God and Jesus Himself died and then rose from the dead for each person in existence. If God Himself thinks we are valuable enough to make that kind of sacrifice for, well, you won’t hear me deny it or claim otherwise.
Storywise, this is just plain bonkers. Things happen. Quickly. Outrageously. Continuously. Arthur, the main character, goes from finding out his house is going to be bulldozed for a bypass to having the Earth blownup, to getting thrown out an airlock by aliens, to meeting the two-headed President of the Universe to finding out that two mice want his brain for Scyenze. And it all ends with everyone going for a bite to eat at a restaurant. Crazy man, just plain craaaaaaazy.
If you want a short, madcap adventure, this is the series for you. Chaos and silliness abound on every page.
★★★✬☆
From Wikipedia
Synopsis – Click to Open
The novel opens with an introduction describing the human race as a primitive and deeply unhappy species, while also introducing an electronic encyclopedia called the Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy which provides information on every planet in the galaxy. Earthman and Englishman Arthur Dent awakens in his home in the West Country to discover that the local planning council is trying to demolish his house to build a bypass, and lies down in front of the bulldozer to stop it. His friend Ford Prefect convinces the lead bureaucrat to lie down in Arthur’s stead so that he can take Arthur to the local pub. The construction crew begin demolishing the house anyway, but are interrupted by the sudden arrival of a fleet of spaceships. The Vogons, the callous race of civil servants running the fleet, announce that they have come to demolish Earth to make way for a hyperspace expressway, and promptly destroy the planet. Ford and Arthur survive by hitching a ride on the spaceship, much to Arthur’s amazement. Ford reveals to Arthur he is an alien researcher for the Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, from a small planet in the vicinity of Betelgeuse who has been posing as an out-of-work actor from Guildford for 15 years, and this was why they were able to hitch a ride on the alien ship. They are quickly discovered by the Vogons, who torture them by forcing them to listen to their poetry and then toss them out of an airlock.
Meanwhile Zaphod Beeblebrox, Ford’s “semi-cousin” and the President of the Galaxy, steals the spaceship Heart of Gold at its unveiling with his human companion, Trillian. The Heart of Gold is equipped with an “Infinite Improbability Drive” that allows it to travel instantaneously to any point in space by simultaneously passing through every point in the universe at once. However, the Infinite Improbability Drive has a side effect of causing impossible coincidences to occur in the physical universe. One of these improbable events occurs when Arthur and Ford are rescued by the Heart of Gold as it travels using the Infinite Improbability Drive. Zaphod takes his passengers — Arthur, Ford, a depressed robot named Marvin, and Trillian — to a legendary planet named Magrathea. Its inhabitants were said to have specialized in custom-building planets for others and to have vanished after becoming so rich that the rest of the galaxy became poor. Although Ford initially doubts that the planet is Magrathea, the planet’s computers send them warning messages to leave before firing two nuclear missiles at the Heart of Gold. Arthur inadvertently saves them by activating the Infinite Improbability Drive improperly, which also opens an underground passage. As the ship lands, Trillian’s pet mice Frankie and Benjy escape.
On Magrathea, Zaphod, Ford, and Trillian venture down to the planet’s interior while leaving Arthur and Marvin outside. In the tunnels, Zaphod reveals that his actions are not a result of his own decisions, but instead motivated by neural programming that he was seemingly involved in but has no memory of. As Zaphod explains how he discovered this, the trio are trapped and knocked out with sleeping gas. On the surface, Arthur is met by a resident of Magrathea, a man named Slartibartfast, who explains that the Magratheans have been in stasis to wait out an economic recession. They have temporarily reawakened to reconstruct a second version of Earth commissioned by mice, who were in fact the most intelligent species on Earth. Slartibartfast brings Arthur to Magrathea’s planet construction facility, and shows Arthur that in the distant past, a race of “hyperintelligent, pan-dimensional beings” created a supercomputer named Deep Thought to determine the answer to the “Ultimate Question to Life, the Universe, and Everything.” Deep Thought eventually found the answer to be 42, an answer that made no sense because the Ultimate Question itself was not known. Because determining the Ultimate Question was too difficult even for Deep Thought, an even more advanced supercomputer was constructed for this purpose. This computer was the planet Earth, which was constructed by the Magratheans, and was five minutes away from finishing its task and figuring out the Ultimate Question when the Vogons destroyed it. The hyperintelligent superbeings participated in the program as mice, performing experiments on humans while pretending to be experimented on.
Slartibartfast takes Arthur to see his friends, who are at a feast hosted by Trillian’s pet mice. The mice reject as unnecessary the idea of building a new Earth to start the process over, deciding that Arthur’s brain likely contains the Ultimate Question. They offer to buy Arthur’s brain, leading to a fight when he declines. The group manages to escape when the planet’s security system goes off unexpectedly, but immediately run into the culprits: police in pursuit of Zaphod. The police corner Zaphod, Arthur, Ford and Trillian, and the situation seems desperate as they are trapped behind a computer bank that is about to explode from the officers’ weapons firing. However, the police officers suddenly die when their life-support systems short-circuit. Suspicious, Ford discovers on the surface that Marvin became bored and explained his view of the universe to the police officers’ spaceship, causing it to commit suicide. The five leave Magrathea and decide to go to The Restaurant at the End of the Universe.
This review is written with a GPL 4.0 license and the rights contained therein shall supersede all TOS by any and all websites in regards to copying and sharing without proper authorization and permissions. Crossposted at WordPress & Blogspot by Bookstooge’s Exalted Permission
Title: Notes from Underground Series: (The Russians) Author: Fyodor Dostoyevsky Translator: Garnett Rating: 1 of 5 Stars / DNF@10% Genre: Fiction Pages: 186/19 Words: 50K/5K
I cannot stand when authors write nonsense and expect the readers to parse sense out of it. Dostoyevsky was writing this novel in response to some other popular philosophy book/idea at the time but he couched it in a way that I hated.
So I’m not going to waste my time wading through deliberate nonsense when he could have just stated “Reason X because of reasons 1, 2 and 3”. I dnf’d this at the 10% mark when it became evident what a sham this was. If you would like to waste your time deciphering this, be my guest.
★☆☆☆☆
From Wikipedia.org
The novella is divided into two parts. The title of the first part—”Underground”—is itself given a footnoted introduction by Dostoevsky in which the character of the ‘author’ of the Notes and the nature of the ‘excerpts’ are discussed.
Part 1: “Underground”
The first part of Notes from Underground has eleven sections:
Section I propounds a number of riddles whose meanings are further developed as the narration continues.
Sections 2, 3, & 4 deal with suffering and the irrational pleasure of suffering.
Sections 5 & 6 discuss the moral and intellectual fluctuation that the narrator feels along with his conscious insecurities regarding “inertia”—inaction.
Sections 7, 8, & 9 cover theories of reason and logic, closing with the last two sections as a summary and transition into Part 2.
The narrator observes that utopian society removes suffering and pain, but man desires both things and needs them in order to be happy. He argues that removing pain and suffering in society takes away a man’s freedom. He says that the cruelty of society makes human beings moan about pain only to spread their suffering to others.
Unlike most people, who typically act out of revenge because they believe justice is the end, the Underground Man is conscious of his problems and feels the desire for revenge, but he does not find it virtuous; the incongruity leads to spite towards the act itself with its concomitant circumstances. He feels that others like him exist, but he continuously concentrates on his spitefulness instead of on actions that would help him avoid the problems that torment him. The main issue for the Underground Man is that he has reached a point of ennui[7] (boredom) and inactivity.[8] He even admits that he would rather be inactive out of laziness.
The first part also gives a harsh criticism of determinism, as well as of intellectual attempts at dictating human action and behavior by logic, which the Underground Man discusses in terms of the simple math problem: two times two makes four (cf. necessitarianism). He argues that despite humanity’s attempt to create a utopia where everyone lives in harmony (symbolized by The Crystal Palace in Nikolai Chernyshevsky’s What Is to Be Done?), one cannot avoid the simple fact that anyone, at any time, can decide to act in a way that might not be considered to be in their own self-interest; some will do so simply to validate their existence and to protest and confirm that they exist as individuals. The Underground Man ridicules the type of enlightened self-interest that Chernyshevsky proposes as the foundation of Utopian society. The idea of cultural and legislative systems relying on this rational egoism is what the protagonist despises. The Underground Man embraces this ideal in praxis, and seems to blame it for his current state of unhappiness.[9]
Part 2: “Apropos of the Wet Snow”[edit]
The title of Part 2 is an allusion to the critic Pavel Annenkov’s observation that “damp showers and wet snow” were indispensable to writers of the Natural School in Petersburg.[10] Following the title there is an epigraph containing the opening lines from Nekrasov’s poem “When from the darkness of delusion…” about a woman driven to prostitution by poverty. The quotation is interrupted by an ellipsis and the words “Etc., etc., etc.”[10]
Part 2 consists of ten sections covering some events from the narrator’s life. While he continues in his self-conscious, polemical style, the themes of his confession are now developed anecdotally.
The first section tells of the Underground Man’s obsession with an officer who once insulted him in a pub. This officer frequently passes him by on the street, seemingly without noticing his existence. He sees the officer on the street and thinks of ways to take revenge, eventually borrowing money to buy an expensive overcoat and intentionally bumping into the officer to assert his equality. To the Underground Man’s surprise, however, the officer does not seem to notice that it even happened.
Sections II to V focus on a going-away dinner party with some old school friends to bid farewell to one of these friends—Zverkov—who is being transferred out of the city. The Underground Man hated them when he was younger, but after a random visit to Simonov’s, he decides to meet them at the appointed location. They fail to tell him that the time has been changed to six instead of five, so he arrives early. He gets into an argument with the four of them after a short time, declaring to all his hatred of society and using them as the symbol of it. At the end, they go off without him to a secret brothel, and, in his rage, the underground man follows them there to confront Zverkov once and for all, regardless if he is beaten or not. He arrives at the brothel to find Zverkov and the others already retired with prostitutes to other rooms. He then encounters Liza, a young prostitute.
The remaining sections deal with his encounter with Liza and its repercussions. The story cuts to Liza and the Underground Man lying silently in the dark together. The Underground Man confronts Liza with an image of her future, by which she is unmoved at first, but after challenging her individual utopian dreams (similar to his ridicule of the Crystal Palace in Part 1), she eventually realizes the plight of her position and how she will slowly become useless and will descend more and more, until she is no longer wanted by anyone. The thought of dying such a terribly disgraceful death brings her to realize her position, and she then finds herself enthralled by the Underground Man’s seemingly poignant grasp of the destructive nature of society. He gives her his address and leaves.
He is subsequently overcome by the fear of her actually arriving at his dilapidated apartment after appearing such a “hero” to her and, in the middle of an argument with his servant, she arrives. He then curses her and takes back everything he said to her, saying he was, in fact, laughing at her and reiterates the truth of her miserable position. Near the end of his painful rage he wells up in tears after saying that he was only seeking to have power over her and a desire to humiliate her. He begins to criticize himself and states that he is in fact horrified by his own poverty and embarrassed by his situation. Liza realizes how pitiful he is and tenderly embraces him. The Underground Man cries out “They—they won’t let me—I—I can’t be good!”
After all this, he still acts terribly toward her, and, before she leaves, he stuffs a five ruble note into her hand, which she throws onto the table (it is implied that the Underground Man had sex with Liza and that the note is payment). He tries to catch her as she goes out to the street, but he cannot find her and never hears from her again. He tries to stop the pain in his heart by “fantasizing.”
And isn’t it better, won’t it be better?… Insult—after all, it’s a purification; it’s the most caustic, painful consciousness! Only tomorrow I would have defiled her soul and wearied her heart. But now the insult will never ever die within her, and however repulsive the filth that awaits her, the insult will elevate her, it will cleanse her…
He recalls this moment as making him unhappy whenever he thinks of it, yet again proving the fact from the first section that his spite for society and his inability to act makes him no better than those he supposedly despises.
The concluding sentences recall some of the themes explored in the first part, and he tells the reader directly, “I have merely carried to an extreme in my life what you have not dared to carry even halfway.”
At the end of Part 2, a further editorial note is added by Dostoevsky, indicating that the ‘author’ couldn’t help himself and kept writing, but that “it seems to us that we might as well stop here”.
This review is written with a GPL 4.0 license and the rights contained therein shall supersede all TOS by any and all websites in regards to copying and sharing without proper authorization and permissions. Crossposted at WordPress, Blogspot, & Librarything by Bookstooge’s Exalted Permission
Title: The Napoleon of Notting Hill Series: ———- Author: G.K. Chesterton Rating: 3 of 5 Stars Genre: Absurdist Fantasy Pages: 203 Words: 55K
Synopsis:
From Wikipedia & Me
The dreary succession of randomly selected Kings of England is broken up when Auberon Quin, who cares for nothing but a good joke, is chosen. To amuse himself, he institutes elaborate costumes for the provosts of the districts of London. All are bored by the King’s antics except for one earnest young man who takes the cry for regional pride seriously – Adam Wayne, the eponymous Napoleon of Notting Hill.
The books ends many years later after Wayne initiates a city wide war and has changed how people view their countries again. The king finally realizes Wayne was taking his little joke as serious as sin and is both appalled and astounded.
My Thoughts:
When I read this back in ’01 I read it as simply a funny story devoid of all external meaning or even internal meaning. I enjoyed it tremendously back then.
This time around, having read more of Chesterton and having more life experience, it was obvious that Chesterton was writing his ideas into the story. Unfortunately for me, they all went sailing right over my head. Nothing written here held any deeper meaning for me and whenever it was obvious that Chesterton was talking through his characters, what was actually said was so convoluted, so “artistic” (I say that with a sneer, not in a good way), so papered over with his own cleverness that any meaning was lost to me.
If you’re going to tell a story, tell a story. If you’re going to preach, write a non-fiction book. I am one of those people who can look at a great painting and all I see is a collection of paint blobs, no artistic merit or something transcendent that moves the soul. If I was a Dickens story, I’d be the villain who cuts down the beautiful forest to put up housing for 100 people while the hero, a drug addled, wife abusing, useless scum of an artist waxes poetical about the loss of his muse.
It comes down to me simply not understanding one bit what Chesterton was trying to say with this story. I would consider this a better book if he’d just told a story about a crazy king and someone who took him seriously, and the hijinks that ensued. Instead there is war, death and a return to tribalism.
I am not hating my time with Chesterton but I have to admit, I was really hoping for a bit more enjoyment out of my time with him. Well, I’ll keep on chugging on.
