The discussion for Starship troopers was a good one. Heinlein is a great author, and this is one of his more unique works. The book is a platform for him to talk about his philosophical and political beliefs, which are pretty interesting. We didn’t agree with most of them, but they got us talking about all sorts of interesting topics.
This was a very contentious book. I liked what it implied in the way of technology not changing the human condition of being superstitious and irrational. The mirroring of the past and present was well done, and figuring out which bits were supposed to relate to each other was fun. This did make the characters more of caricatures in many instances, so the people who didn’t really pick up on the mirroring hated the book with a passion. To be fair I didn’t really pick up on the mirroring until the second read through. There were also a lot of characters that were supposed to be irrational and portray the worst parts of human nature. Those characters annoyed the hell out of most of the people who read the book. There were also a few that got annoyed by the main characters because of their blind spots. Another complaint was the trope of someone going unconscious just when they needed to do or say something. This was a bit overused throughout the book. The last complaint was the miss on technology, in that there were no cell phones.
We had a great time discussing Hyperion. It was in an odd spot since the 4th of July was the first Tuesday of the month. We instead did the second Wednesday, and Paul was able to join for the first time.
The book itself touched only lightly on a lot of subjects, but we were able to get some good discussions going and had a fun time about it. The individual stories weren’t as interesting to me as the overall world that was constructed by them.
I found this somewhat derivative of Small Gods, but it had enough of a twist that it was good unto itself. I really liked it. The end was a good twist, and I do wonder where the world goes after the end of that book, so it could be interesting.
The Moon is a Harsh Mistress has become one of my favorite books and I really liked being able to talk about it with a group of friends because of all the great philosophical points in it. Heinlein was really ahead of his time, and ahead of now, with all the topics he covers. Some of the tech is obviously dated, but it seems very plausible despite that, and given it was written in the 60’s it is absolutely phenomenal.
I really enjoyed the discussion on these books. We went to Redwood Coast cidery beforehand. We had a great hang out there, but the only person to make it to both cidery and discussion was Tina. We only had 7 of us for the discussion, but I actually really like that number of people. It gives a lot of viewpoints, and gives everyone a good chance to participate. I’m liking the screening books beforehand. It makes sure that we have both good books and good discussions. Many of the books I’ve been reading have been decent stories, but not great for discussions. Discussion books require a larger set of philosophical concepts compared to a suspenseful story that has twists.
This book was interesting, and I caught the main plot twist pretty early on. I was also amused by the backup systems they had, since they should have been much more rigorous, numerous, and plentiful. Computer backups now are pretty standard, and the size of the system the consciousness is stored on means that they could have lots of consciousness storage without too much issue. The story was well done, as were the characters. I liked that there were strong females, but didn’t like that the main character was the hook up, good-at-everything type.
This was a lovely book. The main character was somewhat identifiable, and his dealings with the other beings in the stories was completely believable. I liked that the aliens wanted him to come do things with them and he kept declining. The reaction to the tavern being closed was also amazing. I highly recommend this book.
This was a decent book, but didn’t have a satisfying end. I need more of this series to really understand if I like it or not. The basics of the magical system are interesting and worth reading the first book for. I’d recommend waiting for the next one to come out before starting this series.
It's an Exciting World 