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You understand the networks, I haven't got to grips with Pac-Man yet
Book #5 (as recommended by ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
maviscruet: I was unkindly disposed towards this book before I started. People with the surname Stross (particularly those who already have an awkward S-sounding hiccough in their names) should not write books with Atrocity in the title. It makes it very hard for stumble-tongued people like me to say.
I think the biggest appeal of the Laundry series is that it immediately lets you in. If you're a geek, or a roleplayer, or a gamer then you know these people. You've met the characters, you've lived in their house-shares, and you get their jokes. It's cosy and familiar, and makes you feel pleasingly smug when you spot the references.
I like the series' conceit - that magic is just another, esoteric branch of applied mathematics - and the resulting use of computers is enjoyably ridiculous. The book made me laugh a lot. I do have a bit of a gripe with it, though: I'm not sure I actually like Stross' writing style all that much. I like his ideas, and plots, and characters... I just don't really get on with the writing. However, I have munched my way happily through Jennifer Morgue[*] and will be cheerfully embarking on the others[**].
(I was somewhat confused by the "shape" of the plot of The Atrocity Archives: introduction, slow build up, big climax, complete change of pace, second big climax. It was only when - stuck with a lot of train journey and no remaininng book - I decided to re-read the latter part of it that I realised I'd read straight off the end of the novella and into the short story The Concrete Jungle, treating them as one contiguous bit of writing.)
Book #5b (as recommended bywimble): This book wasn't legally on the list, but was in the bag of books Wimble brought me so I chose to intperet that as his recommendation.
It's Young Adult fiction, and I was very aware of that while reading. Some YA books I could pick up and read, and barely register that they were intended for a younger audience. This one, not so much. In a lot of ways it seems quite simplistic - our teenage hero has very passionate views on the political situation around him, but his views aren't terribly sophisticated. He dives into things without really considering the long-ranging consequences, and actually that makes it quite fun. I think in an adult novel you'd want a lot less naivety about politics, and the whole plot couldn't rattle along like it does.
What the book does fantastically well is explain, as it goes along, an awful lot of computer technology. OK, so there's a lot of vaguely improbable stuff happening as well (our hero is a hacker) but you do get reasonably coherent, very readable descriptions of (say) how DNS works and how it came about.
If you know a slightly geeky teenager, who's finding that GCSE computing contains no useful information, send 'em a copy of Little Brother for Christmas :)
[*] ChrisC has a poor memory for names, but a reasonable memory for the structure of names. Accordingly, he remembered the book as Elizabeth Death.
[**] Right now, I am positively swimming in exciting books to be getting on with reading. I have various sequels to books on the list, I have a new consignment of list-books from the library, and I have a great big stack of other new books, on which more later.
maviscruet: I was unkindly disposed towards this book before I started. People with the surname Stross (particularly those who already have an awkward S-sounding hiccough in their names) should not write books with Atrocity in the title. It makes it very hard for stumble-tongued people like me to say.I think the biggest appeal of the Laundry series is that it immediately lets you in. If you're a geek, or a roleplayer, or a gamer then you know these people. You've met the characters, you've lived in their house-shares, and you get their jokes. It's cosy and familiar, and makes you feel pleasingly smug when you spot the references.
I like the series' conceit - that magic is just another, esoteric branch of applied mathematics - and the resulting use of computers is enjoyably ridiculous. The book made me laugh a lot. I do have a bit of a gripe with it, though: I'm not sure I actually like Stross' writing style all that much. I like his ideas, and plots, and characters... I just don't really get on with the writing. However, I have munched my way happily through Jennifer Morgue[*] and will be cheerfully embarking on the others[**].
(I was somewhat confused by the "shape" of the plot of The Atrocity Archives: introduction, slow build up, big climax, complete change of pace, second big climax. It was only when - stuck with a lot of train journey and no remaininng book - I decided to re-read the latter part of it that I realised I'd read straight off the end of the novella and into the short story The Concrete Jungle, treating them as one contiguous bit of writing.)
Book #5b (as recommended by
wimble): This book wasn't legally on the list, but was in the bag of books Wimble brought me so I chose to intperet that as his recommendation.It's Young Adult fiction, and I was very aware of that while reading. Some YA books I could pick up and read, and barely register that they were intended for a younger audience. This one, not so much. In a lot of ways it seems quite simplistic - our teenage hero has very passionate views on the political situation around him, but his views aren't terribly sophisticated. He dives into things without really considering the long-ranging consequences, and actually that makes it quite fun. I think in an adult novel you'd want a lot less naivety about politics, and the whole plot couldn't rattle along like it does.
What the book does fantastically well is explain, as it goes along, an awful lot of computer technology. OK, so there's a lot of vaguely improbable stuff happening as well (our hero is a hacker) but you do get reasonably coherent, very readable descriptions of (say) how DNS works and how it came about.
If you know a slightly geeky teenager, who's finding that GCSE computing contains no useful information, send 'em a copy of Little Brother for Christmas :)
[*] ChrisC has a poor memory for names, but a reasonable memory for the structure of names. Accordingly, he remembered the book as Elizabeth Death.
[**] Right now, I am positively swimming in exciting books to be getting on with reading. I have various sequels to books on the list, I have a new consignment of list-books from the library, and I have a great big stack of other new books, on which more later.
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Oddly - I'd say I have exactly the same opinion of 'little brother' and most stuff cory Doctorow writes. It's interesting but the actual writing turns me off.
If I'm allowed to make another recommendation- 'mr penumbra 24 hour bookstore' was very enjoyable.
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I don't think I've read anything else by Mr Doctorow (though I heard him speak once, and he was pretty underwhelming). I think the style in Little Brother maybe got away with it, because it read as if written by its teenage narrator.
mr penumbra 24 hour bookstore
I spent a lot of Friday with a very nice man called Ed recommending books to me (of which more later, probably several days before I get round to writing it up), and that was one he suggested too. Sadly, the bookshop he worked for didn't have it in stock at the time.
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