The discussion on this book was great, since we were able to talk about the world in general as well as the story. There were lots of discussions on the characters and the writing style. The disparate beginnings confused everyone, but we all agreed it came together well in the end. The Anderson character was interesting, in that you start out being able to identify with him, and he might be a little mean. In the end he ends up being a monster that gets his just deserves. We also talked about the manipulation of animals and people. I thought it wasn’t feasible for the changes to be such a step function. I would expect some people to have smaller improvements, and not fully reworked genomes. I look forward to the next discussion as well, and I’m a little surprised that people agreed to read the books on religion.
This was a great ending to the series. Since it has been a while since I listened to the previous two books I re-listened to those, then got into this. It flowed really nicely, and I really liked how the overpowered characters from the previous books got nerfed. The epicness being distributed among many characters made it a lot more real, and identifiable when there were problems. I was a little upset that all three empires didn’t get involved, but that also seemed more real. The great foe was defeated a little too easily for my taste, and he was a little too evil to be identifiable, which is hard to do with villains, but the best have it.
This was a fun bookclub week, and we had a hard time focusing on the book. Everyone brought a snack food that was either mentioned in the book, or something they liked, or something from their childhood. I brought the white cheddar cheezit’s since they fit all three categories. We all sampled the things we wanted to, including the lunchables, cheetos, and gushers. Archer kitty was very interested in the spread as well, and I had to hold him for a good bit of the discussion.
For much of the discussion he was just sitting and relaxing next to Liana.
There were a few heated points between David and Jeremy about the purpose of the book, and whether or not it should have been more harsh on the food industry in general. Everyone agreed that all the anecdotal parts were really soft on the people involved, but I can really identify with them. I’ve been feeling very much the same way as some of the people in this book about the company I work for. We had a lot of interesting follow up books to go through as well, for those more interested in the subject.
The story in this was good, but there were a number of plot devices I didn’t like. The first was the trope of the ‘Woman in the Refrigerator’. This happens all over the series, with the female characters depowered to move the story arcs. This was particularly bad when the old bard was able to choose how he died, while the woman of interest was hunted down and killed to get to him. The book also had the unimportant characters die by the thousands, with the important characters miraculously living over and over again. Many of the important characters were supernaturally powerful, so it isn’t that surprising, but it is still one of my pet peeves when going through these kinds of books. Towards the end some major characters die, and it does even out in a way. The magic system in the book was also somewhat underdeveloped. There are small explanations of how it works, but I was hoping for something a bit more in depth. I might be spoiled by some of Sanderson’s universes.
We read Replay by Ken Grimwood this month for bookclub, and it was a very interesting book. There were a few good discussions about morality of some of the actions the characters take, the Eurocentricness of the book, the way the author used the characters by focusing on their love more than the outer world, and the way the characters chose to use their extra lives. I think the idea is great, but the book could have been so much more.
This series was pretty good. I really liked the magic system, and most of the characters. At some points the magic system got a little mixed up to be convenient for the plot, but most of the time it was straightforward. There was the common issue of things that are learned and used to great effect in previous books aren’t always used again when the situation calls for it. This book was better than most about that, but still had it in a few places, mainly when dealing with the fairy. The were two other big issues I had with the book. First the main character lives were valued so much more highly than the common man, despite them valuing the ‘old law’ which should have had everyone more or less equal. Second, there was what seemed to be a false dichotomy of evil people and good people, where the good people could do no wrong, and the evil people could do no good. The only somewhat in between character had his evil doing explained away with grief, so it was really evil, just misguided.
I really enjoyed this book. It had a lot of suspense in how he deals with the environment, and he is really funny in what he does. I like the way he treats mission control, since he has nobody to really take things out on. The epicness of his ingenuity and the scrapes he gets through are fantastic. I can’t wait to see the movie.
This was an amusing, but silly series of books. The plot was very predictable most of the time, with the heroes being immune to anything serious. The amount by which they were overpowered by the end of the series was a little funny. I also was amused by how they made all the people and gods of greek myths silly personifications of their attributes. The split personalities was also amusing. I’d recommend it as a light read when you want something amusing and easy to read.
This was a fantastic book, with a very different view of time travel. I understand the guy’s first and second replays, as I would have done much the same. I don’t understand the later lives, as I would have seen what I could learn, and then progressed the world at a faster rate, made bigger changes, and been a powerful figure. I also found it interesting that the original timeline was the one they returned to, instead of any of the alternates they had created. I have to admit that I didn’t expect the way it ended.
It's an Exciting World 