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The life and times of David Geisert

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Book Club: The Practice Effect

This book was very light, and the story itself wasn’t that involved.  The major concept of the book ‘the practice effect’ was fun to think about.

Stephanie had some really good points in the discussion, mainly that any civilization that has such a strong value of man-hours would have incredibly large families.  They would also have spread out and settled pretty much all the land in order to have the most number of people possible.

I thought that there wasn’t nearly enough sharing and offering of services to keep tools practiced.

The discussion was really great and the food was taken pretty well (it disappeared pretty quickly).  I made some of the Vegetable Kofta, which was a lot more involved from the start than I was expecting.  The prep that the teaching chef had done was a good deal of the time that was needed, even if it wasn’t the skill part of the cooking.

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The Pirates of Pacta Servanda

I’m really enjoying this series.  It’s reading level and story complexity is clearly for a much younger group, but I still really like it.  The book has an amazing mix of humor, magic, and light science.  The political environment, and the people in charge being foiled over and over is written so well.

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Year of living Danishly

This book was nice, but a little too anecdotal.  The points she makes about happiness are good, but the backing she gives to them isn’t all that great.  I understand that this book was meant for a different audience from myself, and it does point in a great direction for getting more information.  I just wish there were a book or paper on happiness that was deeply involved, and well backed by scientific studies.

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Daemon

This book was great.  The second book was good as well.

The story is really interesting in that the augmented reality is helping people become more potent as individuals.  They can be good or bad, but they become more potent.  They can also choose to be less involved in things that they do, or more involved.  The whole thing being run by a millionaire game developer was pretty cool as well.

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The Divide: American Injustice in the Age of the Wealth Gap

This was a fascinating book.  The duplicity of the law was made starkly clear, with a decent backstory to how that duplicity came about in such contrast.  The biggest thing I don’t like about the book is that is says nothing about what can be done.

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The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up: The Japanese Art of Decluttering and Organizing

This book had a lot of really good points, many of which I’m already implementing.  The book does go a little to a strange place when it starts talking about your belongings having feelings.  I think the why of much of the later part of the book is wrong, but the how and what make sense.  I don’t think my backpack feels left out if it doesn’t have a home. I do think that the backpack will survive longer and be more useful if there is a designated place for it in my home and at the office.

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Shadows of Self

This was a fantastic book, and I’m really glad to see some characters from the original Mistborn series coming back into story.  The action was just as good, although there were some points that didn’t flow terribly well, mostly for setup in the next parts of the story.  I also thought that it was interesting how the twist at the end played out.  The cliffhanger at the end was also interesting, and small enough of a cliffhanger that I’m not upset about it and still looking forward to the third book in the second Mistborn series.

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Ship Breaker

This was set in the same universe as Windup Girl, but a little earlier and in the Southern US.  The book was a lot lighter hearted than the Windup Girl with a nicer ending by far.  I also don’t think it made me think nearly as hard.  The themes were underdogs vs. big bad company and not too much else mixed in.

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3 Novellas

I read three novellas, ‘A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms’ by George R. R. Martin, ‘Perfect State’ by Sanderson, and ‘Shadows for Silence in the Forests of Hell’ by Sanderson.

A Knight of the seven Kingdoms was really nice, with a bit of a lighter side to the seven kingdoms, and a good look at their recent history for the primary series of Song and Ice and Fire.  The characters were delightfully odd, and not homicidal maniacs like most of the characters in Song of Ice and Fire.

Perfect State had a wonderful premise, and amazing execution, as is expected from Sanderson.  I really enjoyed the interplay of the characters with the world around them.  I also liked the philosophical questions of whether the AI should be considered human.  There is also the natural born to natural born interaction part of that philosophical bent, with class systems for them.  The final philosophical piece that is interesting is the futility and fatalism of the premade worlds each person is put into.  I hope he does something else in this universe.

Shadows for Silence in the Forest of Hell was a great universe, but not as likable as many of his other universes.  The limitations were great, the characters identifiable, but the world was too bleak.  The twist at the end was fantastic.

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