Montgomery Webster
This marks the completion of Edgar Rice Burroughs' John Carter of Mars (Barsoom) 12-book series. I have now read more books by him than any other author. Thus, will not return to Burroughs other books for many years to come. Nevertheless, still wholly recommend them.
As for a review of this John Carter of Mars series, I would say only the first book is absolutely necessary. They are all incredibly similar action adventure books. They are certainly fun, but not the conceptual and exploratory science fiction I am looking for.
Story: 6 / 10
Characters: 8
Setting: 7
Prose: 4
An incredibly strong start, but irrelevancies detracted from the story. In the end, the book is a bit obscure.
Tags: Technological death, teleportation, masculinity
Story: 4.5 / 10
Characters: 6.0
Setting: 10.0
Prose: 5.0
Probably the most influential book I read as a young teenager. Sadly, it doesn't not hold up well 20 years later. Not recommended.
Definitely the best non-fiction book I have read so far. It did not however teach me anything about meeting women and is certainly not meant it. The book had a very solid structure and never felt directionless. Though the book ended properly, I still fear that most of the books in this genre cannot have reasonable endings (because “life goes on”), so I will still steer clear of non-fiction.
I wasn't taken with my first Iain Banks book, The Wasp Factory. We read it for book club, so I did not plan on reading him again. However, someone mentioned that his science fiction was markedly different and I should give Consider Phlebas a try.
It didn't turned out well. The writing style is not terribly strong and the story is substantially worse. The problem with the plot seems to be the same as The Wasp Factory: pacing. There isn't really a lot of structure and too much time is spent on irrelevant side stories. I was never actually engaged in the book.
It wasn't all bad though. The author invented an interesting futuristic game (eg, The Glass Bead Game) and the war setting was reasonable. Nevertheless, this is the type of useless action novel that really ruins the name of science fiction for the public.
Definitely one of the top 5 science fiction books I've encountered. The author did jump back and forth a lot between the three different plotlines, but it eventually became comprehensible.
Story: 3 / 10
Characters: 4
Setting: 8
Prose: 8
Revelation Space made my top 10 scifi book list. However, Reynolds next book is nothing more than a simple action story, a complete disappointment. Even the main character is not terribly interested in the direction of the story. A couple of interesting themes were explored though: Immortality, leisure studies, body modification, bodily computer viruses, and genetically modified animals.
I'm really not sure if I should bother with the rest of the Revelation Space series.
Surprised that the book was not very good. Prose is solid, but the boring story is solely about survival. It is interesting that the content largely differs from the movies and Jeff Wayne's musical version. Will still read a few more Wells books though, but his success is down to 2/3.
Story: 3 / 10
Characters: 4
Setting: 7
Prose: 8
In many ways, this book is an anthology of short stories. Since the main character is the same throughout, the collection some cohesion and is a much more enjoyable read. None of the stories are terribly good though.
The worst science fiction book I have read so far. The prose is far too dense, with unfamiliar words and concepts, to even understand what may be happening.
Not recommended.
The Alchemist was definitely not the Full Metal Alchemy (FMA) adventure I was looking for. Still, it did reveal which parts of FMA were actually alchemy folklore that I had simply never heard before.
A profound and complex story, but not as good as Speaker for the Dead. There seemed to be some noticeable weakening in the writing style between the two books or maybe the repetition of some large-scale themes explains the difference. Also, though the people of the Path invention was clever, it was not fun to read and a bit too critical of religious people. Either way, still a very strong science-fiction novel and I am eager to continue with the series.
It finally happens! and it was altogether marvelous. Besides Ender's Shadow, Shadow of the Giant is the best book of the Shadow series so far. Still emotional and cleverly political. Not too sure where it could really go from here since so much was resolved in the conclusion, but I am eager to find out.
This book officially makes OSC my favorite scifi author. He has 4 amazing books, of which Ender's Game is not included, while Frank Herbert only really had 3 Dune books I loved. Thank you again, Card.
A worthless adventure parody. Not much else to say really. The prose is sufficient, but the story has absolutely no value. Trust me.
Be aware that this book does not end.
Nevertheless, it is thoroughly enjoyable. A bit more action than the first book, but still emotional and insightful. Here the Atheism is quite apparent as the truth behind the Therns and Issus are revealed. Hopefully the rest of the series is as good.
Serious waste of my time. I did love The Design of Everyday Things though, but generally do not like these practical books. They always seem to have a few pages of useful information that are then expanded to fill the book. Emotional Design does not have exactly the same problem. Instead, there is only one line of information, then a lot of small useless stories and ideas. In some ways that is better, but either way is not worth my time.
Here is what you need to know:
There are three levels of design: visceral (objective look), behavioral (touch and performance), and reflective (thoughts or feelings).
Story: 3 / 10
Characters: 6
Setting: 5
Prose: 4
Snow Crash and Neuromancer (Gibson) are well known as the two more famous Cyberpunk novels ever written. Neither really work though (1 / 5). Gibson's novel takes place almost exclusively online and is extremely difficult to follow. Thankfully, Stephenson's virtual world is interesting and significantly more straightforward. Snow Crash's problem is really that the prose is obscure and the action story is worthless. Despite the minute value the book had for me...
...I can recommend it to readers interested in linguistics and analytic philosophy.
Tags: rat things, burbclaves, Mafia, franchises, Fedland, lawlessness, corporate anarchy
Story: 3.0 / 10
Characters: 8.5
Setting: 7.5
Prose: 7.5
Tags: Comfort women, Japan, Korea, missionaries, possession, spirits, Hawaii, mothers
