"The City in the Middle of the Night" by Charlie Jane Anders

This was a real treat to read! I seriously could not put this down. I loved the characters, and the worldbuilding is deep, weird, and inventive. The whole novel is an adventure—something I forget that I'm always looking for, until I find such a good example. Although there's plenty of darkness—dystopia, struggles for survival, tragedy and betrayal—the work as a whole has tons of exuberance. It's a sophisticated but unpretentious take on classic science-fictional topics, and I devoured it.

The story takes place on January, a tidally-locked planet colonized by humans. In the narrow strip between perpetual day and perpetual night, humanity has adapted to the world's challenges. Our main characters meet as a revolution is brewing, travel to a rival city, make forays into the night, encounter some of January's original inhabitants, and generally have an exciting time.

No plot recaps, but possible spoilers below:

"Infomocracy" by Malka Older

This is a fantastic read, really glad I got around to it! I've had Infomocracy on my list for a while now. The parallels with Palmer's Too Like The Lightning are surprisingly deep—Older's book is a much different read, and both the premise and time-setting more modest in comparison, but the big-idea, quasi-utopian politics, the quiet-but-huge tech advances, the slow and mostly irrational rumble of a peaceful world towards some kind of war—intriguing to put them side by side.

But that's getting ahead of myself. Infomocracy reads like a straight thriller, following two young activists/operatives in a near-future where the world has transitioned to "micro-democracy". Split into voting blocks of 100 thousand, people can now vote for a huge range of governments. Things are kept above-board by ubiquitous Information: an organization a bit like Google fused with Wikipedia and with a universal mandate. On the eve of an important election, with previous power blocs poised to tumble and rearrange, Mishima, Ken, and a handful of other characters are caught up in a complicated plot to subvert the voting process.

Chicago Nerds- Binti

For the November book discussion of the Chicago Nerd Social Club, we read Binti and Binti: Home by Nnedi Okorafor.

The first two parts of a novella trilogy, these works follow the titular character, a mathematically-gifted young woman who is the first of her people to travel off-planet for education. Along the way, she becomes a kind of unintentional liason with the warlike Meduse; Binti: Home follows her first return to Earth.

Brief notes and possible spoilers below:

Chicago Nerds- Embassytown

For the August meeting of the Chicago Nerd Social (book) Club, we discussed by Embassytown by China Miéville. His most strictly science fictional tale to date, Embassytown is all about language--a race of aliens with a very weird language, who can't lie, and a disastrous story that plays out when the humans who communicate with them screw it up.

Brief notes and possible spoilers below:

Weird & Wonderful- China Mountain Zhang

For the July meeting of City Lit's Weird & Wonderful club, we discussed China Mountain Zhang by Maureen McHugh. A fairly near-future tale, it follows its main character and a number of others through a world in which China has become the primary world power and humans are colonizing Mars, but does so in kind of a discursive, very human way.

We dug the heck out of this! Brief notes below:

Weird & Wonderful- Altered Carbon

For the June meeting of City Lit's Weird & Wonderful club, we discussed Altered Carbon by Richard K. Morgan.

A sex-and-violence-filled cyberpunk noir-ish tale, Altered Carbon is the first of Morgan's books featuring Takeshi Kovacs, P.I.-slash-cybercommando-ninja...guy. In a world where people are outfitted with devices that record their memories, allowing them to be re-implanted in another body, Kovacs is hired to solve a convuluted case involving shady politics, body-swapping, and powerful gerontocrat.

Super-brief notes after the jump:

Classic Sci-Fi- Stations of the Tide

For the June Classic Sci-Fi Meetup, we discussed Stations of the Tide (1991) by Michael Swanwick.

The Nebula-award winning novel is a bit difficult to categorize: set on a planet about inundated by massive floods, it follows a nameless bureaucrat as he attempts to recover some stolen technology. There's lots of magic (maybe), as well as chemically/spiritually/virtually altered reality, AI questions, and shape-shifting aliens.

This is a novel that is near and dear to my heart, and I always jump at the chance to hear what people think about it. At Classic, we had decidedly mixed feelings, some really liking it, others really not connecting with it—we generally agreed that it's both really quite weird and extremely well-written, however. Brief notes below!

Chicago Nerds- Ninefox Gambit

For the May meeting of the Chicago Nerds' book-club, we discussed Ninefox Gambit by Yoon Ha Lee. This was also our first meeting at our new spot—Volumes Bookcafe, just up the road from our old digs.

Ninefox Gambit is a weirdly inventive space opera, and in fact a lot of our discussion revolved around whether to think of it as science fiction or "fantasy in space". A fairly ruthless interstellar civilization, the Hexarchate, maintains its control through the use of "exotic" technologies, which in turn rely on the "calendar", a kind of consensus reality. When a group of heretics make a particularly daring secession, the Hexarchate pairs a low-ranking soldier with genius mathematical abilities—Kel Cheris—with the imprisoned immortal spirit of one of their greatest and most treacherous generals: Shuos Jedao.

This is a weird, surreal book, setting up a very bizarre world and then not explaining it very much. This is one of the things I like most about it, as I said in my review last year. At club, we had good debates about both how and whether different aspects of this novel work. Brief notes below:

Classic Sci-Fi- I, Robot

For the last Classic Sci-Fi Meetup, we discussed I, Robot (1950) by Isaac Asimov.

One of the most classic works we've read in a while, I, Robot is a fix-up novel stitching together nine of Asimov's robot-focused short stories, with a fairly flimsy frame story of a journalist interviewing robopsychologist Susan Calvin about the development of robotic technology over the decades. It's most famous for introducing the 3 Laws of Robotics.

Easily the most well-attended Classic Sci-Fi meeting I've been to! Brief dsicussion notes below.

Chicago Nerds- A Planet for Rent

For the March meeting of the Chicago Nerd book-club, we discussed A Planet for Rent (2001; English translation 2015) by Yoss.

More of a loosely-braided collection than a single-plot novel, A Planet for Rent follows a motley crew in a future where contact with extremely technologically advanced aliens has reduced Earth to a tourist attraction, with humans semi-permanently stuck as galactic second-class citizens. Drawing on a host of classic SF inspirations, Yoss creates a bitterly satiric world that we found enjoyable in its own right, made even richer by the parallels to and commentary on Cuban history.

Extremely brief notes below!

Think Galactic- Too Like The Lightning

For the March meeting of Think Galactic, we discussed Too Like the Lightning (2016) by Ada Palmer.

Too Like The Lightning's been getting a lot of attention (we reviewed it pretty glowingly just a few months ago), with the added bonus that Dr. Palmer is Chicago-based, teaching history at the University of Chicago. She'd actually given a talk at 57th Street Books the day before our meeting, speaking about Too Like The Lightning and its just-released sequel, and a couple of us were able to make that.

In brief! Too Like the Lightning is set in the 25th century, with a few big science-fictional ideas (flying cars, non-geographic political bodies) and jammed to the gills with sociological & philosophical ideas, including doing some really cool things with gender and narrative style.

We really dug this! It was a small group, however, due to unexpected schedule conflicts, and we may be working in some brief Palmer discussion at our April meeting—so I'll keep the notes below extremely brief! Spoilers unlikely but possible:

Classic Sci-Fi- Dune

For the February convocation of the Classic Sci-Fi Meetup, we discussed Frank Herbert's Dune (1965), one of the classicy-est of the classics.

Widely adapted and expanded on—films, games, sequels and spin-off novels—the original Dune is certainly a landmark. Set in a far-distant future, the novel is essentially a revenge story with a great deal of political, mystical, and ecological ideas.

Notes and probable spoilers below:

Weird & Wonderful- The Left Hand of Darkness

Art by Ratvis

January was one of those fortuitous months where some book-clubs synchronized for me: City Lit Books' Weird & Wonderful club discussed The Left Hand of Darkness, shorlty after the Chicago Nerds discussion. Winter is a good time to read "Left Hand", and it's pretty much always a good time to read Le Guin, regardless.

Well: if you're not familiar, The Left Hand of Darkness is a bedrock work of modern science fiction, exploring deep questions of gender and much beside. Set on a world where all humans are "cyclic hermaphrodites"--neuter most of the month, then briefly sexually active--the novel has as its Big Issue the question of what a truly sexually-equal human society might look like. But, as one might expect from Le Guin, it dives into tons of other ideas as well, and it's issues of betrayal and friendship that stick with me, at least, even more than the gender investigation.

Also, it's set in a society adapted for an ice age, which feels appropriate for a Chicago January read. I was so into the conversation that I didn't take the most comprehensive of notes, but you may find them, and possibly spoilers, below:

Chicago Nerds- The Left Hand of Darkness

For the first 2017 meeting of the Chicago Nerds' book club, we met to discuss Ursula Le Guin's The Left Hand of Darkness (1969).

A modern science fiction classic whose influence is hard to overstate, Le Guin's novel is set in her Hainish future, in which different branches of humanity are reconnecting after millennia spent developing on different planets. The Left Hand of Darkness follows the first official contact between the Ekumen—a loose government of many worlds—and the people of Gethen. Gethenians have developed on a world in the grip of an ice age, and differ from the rest of the Ekumen in their social and biological sexual natures.

Sex and gender exploration is kind of the big-ticket draw of The Left Hand, but it's also brilliantly-written, packed full of profundity, and unusual (for science fiction) in how much it comes down to a deeply-drawn relationship between two people.

Also, it's very appropriate for a January Chicago reading, involving as it does great treks across the ice and snow. Notes and possible spoilers below:

Above-Average Space Spiders: Tchaikovsky's "Children of Time"

Adrian Tchaikovsky's Children of Time was oddly off my radar: not a lot of discussion about it in the circles I follow, despite it winning the 2016 Clarke Award. Really glad I got around to reading it though: an immensely enjoyable, pretty light, but very science-fictional read. It's in a weirdly specific sub-genre, building heavily on the work of David Brin and, most particularly, Vernor Vinge.

Elevator pitch: Uplifted jumping spiders battle a human-crewed generation starship.

YOU HAD ME AT JUMPING SPIDERS. Slightly more of a review, and a low possibility of spoilers, below:

Think Galactic- Sisters of the Revolution

For December's meeting of Think Galactic, we discussed selections from Sister of the Revolution (2015), edited by Ann & Jeff VanderMeer.

As usual, when we discuss an anthology, we had a handful of stories that we focused on, a few bonus stories, and then of course a few of us read more/all of the collection, as well. Brief notes and possible spoilers below:

Chicago Nerds- Leviathan Wakes

For the last 2016 meeting of the Chicago Nerd book club, we discussed Leviathan Wakes (2011) by James S.A. Corey, the first book in "The Expanse", an on-going series that is also going into its second season as a SyFy television show.

Leviathan Wakes is set in a fairly-near future where humans have colonized chunks of the solar system using an extremely efficient new impulse engine, but have not yet moved on to interstellar exploration. At the book's start, there's a bit of three-way political tension between Earth, a partially-terraformed (and militarily well-equipped) Mars, and the inhabitants of the outer asteroid belts, moons, and dwarf planets. The novel alternates viewpoints between James Holden, who becomes captain and unwitting political player after his original civilian ship is destroyed, and Joe Miller, a detective on Ceres whose hunt for a missing young woman leads him to a plot that killed Holden's ship and threatens the solar system.

Notes & possible spoilers below!

Weird & Wonderful- The Island of Dr. Moreau

For the last meeting of the Weird & Wonderful club at City Lit Books, we discussed The Island of Dr. Moreau (1896) by H.G. Wells. Spoiler: it's about a mad scientist who's turning animals into human-like creatures through surgical techniques.

By a considerable margin, this is the oldest work we've discussed, and it's intriguing how well it's held up. In addition to the strengths of the writing, we talked a lot about the novel in comparison to other stories of "going wild" and animal concerns, as well as The Island as a horror story. Brief notes below:

Author Talk- Yoss @ City Lit

Last week City Lit Books in Logan Square hosted a cool author event with Yoss, a Cuban science fiction author whose work has started being translated and published in English, to some acclaim.

Despite apologies for his poor English, Yoss was actually quite a fluent speaker, and gave us some cool history on both science fiction in Cuba, and his own personal writing history. He noted that while magical realism has received a lot of attention and praise in Latin American traditions, more speculative forms like science fiction and genre fantasy have largely stayed outside the spotlight.

Volumes- The Moon Is A Harsh Mistress

Volume Book Cafe, the new joint in Wicker Park, has been killing it with events—I really liked their recent talks & readings by Fran Wilde & Ada Palmer—and they've also started a science fiction book club. I joined them last month for a discussion of Heinlein's 1966 classic, "The Moon is a Harsh Mistress".

The novel, written before the Moon landings, envisions Lunar penal colonies that have developed into their own cultures, rather like Australia. With the assistance of newly-awakened AI, a group of "Loonies" decide to lead the colonists in declaring their independence from Earth.

It remains a very readable novel, and a very influential one, albeit one with problems both glaring and covert. Discussion notes and possible spoilers below:

Chicago Nerds- The Atrocity Archives

For the September meeting of the Chicago Nerds book club, we read "The Atrocity Archives" (2004) by Charles Stross, the first novel in his ongoing "Laundry Files" series.

The novel (and most of the series), follows Bob Howard, an IT worker for the Laundry, a a covert UK agency that deals with supernatural threats. In this universe, Stross predicates a kind of information-based magic, with the result that certain kinds of math and computing can bring about reality-altering affects. However, the backdrop to this universe is a version of the Lovecraftian Cthulhu mythos—insane cosmic horrors beyond human ken wait to flood our dimension etc. etc. Oh, and the series also mixes or alternates comedy with the cosmic horror. Good stuff.

We had a very critical but ultimately positive appraisal of the book. Notes and possible spoilers below!

Classic Sci-Fi- The Drowned World

For September's Classic Sci-Fi Meetup, we discussed "The Drowned World" (1962) by J. G. Ballard.

Set in a future where the world has been radically transformed by increased solar radiation and things seem to be reverting to a dinosaur-era biome, "The Drowned World" follows a small cast of characters attempting to survive and perhaps adapt themselves to these new conditions.

An easy read, a deeply problematic book, a good discussion. Possible spoilers below!

Review- Too Like the Lightning

Usually, when people describe a work as ambitious, it's a kind of unintentionally back-handed compliment: its successes aren't substantial enough to comment on, but we'll award it consolation points for the scope of its intentions. One hears it of concept albums, of political agendas that are laudable but unlikely; one uses it for novels whose elevator pitch is in the clouds, even if the execution stumbles badly.

And then, occasionally, one happens on a work that achieves its lofty goals, whose very scope is its prime recommendation. Here, we may use "ambitious" as unqualified praise, as a straightforward descriptor.

And such a work is Ada Palmer's "Too Like The Lightning", her first novel, released earlier this year.

Possible spoilers below:

Think Galactic- Blindsight

For July's Think Galactic discussion, we talked about "Blindsight" (2006) by Peter Watts.

This book is awesome (says I) and this discussion was awesome (so say we all). So much so, in fact, that it's been a psychic block clogging up my Positron posting schedule, because I despair of trying to flesh out everything my notes record us saying without it turning into a book-length meditation. SO, without further ado, mostly unvarnished notes:

Megatext 2: Octavia Butler

Megatext 2: Octavia Butler

Thursday, August 25th, 7pm

Open Books, 651 W. Lake St.
(Facebook Event Page)

For our second Megatext discussion, we're going to be talking about Octavia E. Butler (1946-2008), who's had a powerful impact on the genre. This discussion is being supported by Open Books, who are hosting, and by Think Galactic.

The idea behind the "Megatext" book club is that we talk about an author as a whole, rather than one specific book. Feel free to come if you've read everything Butler's written, if you've only read one book, or if you're just interested!

photo via Joshua Trujillo

Chicago Nerds- Barsk: The Elephant's Graveyard

For July's Chicago Nerd Social Club book discussion, we talked about Lawrence M. Schoen's 2015 novel "Barsk: The Elephant's Graveyard".

It's a science fiction tale told tens of thousands of years in the future--after baseline humanity is extinct, in fact. Their descendants are an interstellar community of uplifted mammals. On Barsk, the only world populated by elephants, they have discovered a drug that allows telepathically-sensitive Speakers to communicate with the dead.

The plot kicks off when ancient prophecies and clandestine government interests threaten Barsk's elephants with destruction. Spoilers and brief notes after the jump:

Chicago Nerds- Central Station

For June's meeting of the Chicago Nerd Social Club, we discussed "Central Station" (2016) by Lavie Tidhar. It's a "fix-up" novel, stringing together a number of his previously-published short stories.

This should come with a disclaimer if you don't already know: there's no over-arching plot here, so don't hold your breath for one. But at the same time, it's not just an unrelated collection--Tidhar uses a series of interconnected anecdotes to sketch out a setting and his cast of characters with surprising depth.

With the exception of the "no plot" caveat, this was a really well-received book. Possible spoilers below!

Think Galactic- The Fifth Season

For our first post-Wiscon gathering, Think Galactic once more filed into the Upper Chambers of Myopic, this time to discuss N.K. Jemisin's "The Fifth Season".

Jemisin's novel has been getting a lot of well-deserved recognition (shortlisted for the Nebula & Hugo awards, among others). It's set on a world beset by cycles of cataclysmic natural events, where humanity has only survived by a combination of "prepper" culture and the magical abilities of "orogenes", who can control seismic events. Through three different storylines, "The Fifth Season" explores this world and the way the orogenes have been oppressed. Spoilers below!

Think Galactic- Get In Trouble

Way back in May, before Wiscon, Think Galactic discussed Kelly Link's short story collection "Get In Trouble" (2015). Which is just darn tootin' good, you should read it.

As is our custom with collections, we pre-selected a few for focused discussion, although in this case we did wind up talking about most all of the stories. "Summer People", "Secret Identity", "Two Houses", and "Light" were our focal stories.

Lots of questions of reality & identity, lots of interweaving of science fiction, fantasy, horror, and even superhero elements throughout this collection. All delivered in this style that's kind of Lethem crossed with O'Connor crossed with...someone who writes sexy stuff. Brief discussion sketches and possible spoilers below:

Chicago Nerds- United States of Japan

That is a pretty dope cover, though.

Another much-delayed notes-posting! In May, the Chicago Nerds discussed "United States of Japan", the 2016 novel by Peter Tieryas.

An alt-history set in the late 1980s, the novel follows two officials of the Japanese empire, which now rules the Western bits of North America following the crushing victory of the Axis powers in World War II. They uncover a collusion between highly-placed Japanese officials and the "George Washingtons", a heavily-armed guerrilla army trying to throw off Japanese rule. Also, video games are really important? Also, there are mechas.

Super-brief (and rather judgmental) notes and spoilers below:

Weird & Wonderful- We Who Are About To...

Much-delayed notes, part 1! Wiscon happened and absorbed me into its beautiful hive-mind for a while; so now I'm playing some catch-up.

Way back in the end of April, City Lit's Weird & Wonderful club discussed "We Who Are About To...", the 1976 novella by Joanna Russ.

Super-brief notes and total spoilers below:

Think Galactic- Souls

For the last meeting of Think Galactic, we discussed Joanna Russ's 1982 novella "Souls". Fairly brief notes and minor spoilers below:

Classic Sci-Fi- Her Smoke Rose Up Forever

We had a first for the April's Classic Sci-Fi Meetup, discussing a short story collection instead of a novel. And a truly classic selection: "Her Smoke Rose Up Forever", collecting many of the best short works of James Tiptree, Jr.

While published in 1990, it collects work originally printed between 1969 & 1980; something we commented on for many of the stories was how ahead of their time they feel.

Much talk of sex, gender, and death surrounding these stories. Spoilers below!

Weird & Wonderful- Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World

"Weird" and "wonderful" apply to most of Haruki Murakami's work, making his 1985 novel "Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World" a fitting selection for City Lit Books' book club of the strange & amazing.

The novel follows two very different threads in alternating chapters: in one, our narrator is a kind of cryptographer caught up in strange experiments and violent information wars. In the other, our narrator is the recently-arrived Dreamreader of a strange fantasy city, surreal and mythic. The two halves have very different styles and tones: Hard-Boiled, true to its name, has some similarities to a certain kind of crime fiction (somewhat akin to noir), while End of the World is written in a more spare, poetic style. To indicate differences in pronoun use and intimate voice not easily conveyed in English, translator Alfred Birnbaum also has the End of the World written in present tense.

We had an interesting discussion, particularly because we had a real mix of Murakami familiarity--one or two of us who'd read a good chunk of his work, a few of us having read one or two others, while this was the first Murakami novel for about half the group. Probable spoilers below!

Sulzer SF/F- A Scanner Darkly

Why would they ever use any other
cover?

For the March meeting of the Sulzer Science Fiction & Fantasy Bookclub, we discussed Philip K. Dick's “A Scanner Darkly” (1977). Among his more surreal and...pharmacological works, “Scanner” follows an undercover narcotics agent as he attempts to find the source of “Substance D” even as he becomes increasingly addicted to, and damaged by, that very drug.

The group consensus was that this was a tough read. As the book progresses, it's increasingly non-linear and non-rational, with our unreliable narrator(s) having a hard time telling reality apart from hallucination. It's also just kind of grim and sad, and we thought that Dick's closing dedication—a long list of friends who were killed or damaged by drug use—explained much of the tone of the novel.

That said, we had a great discussion. Possible spoilers below!

Chicago Nerds- All the Birds in the Sky

For the March Chicago Nerd Social Club book discussion, we read "All the Birds in the Sky", the 2016 debut novel from Charlie Jane Anders, known to many of us as the editor at influential SF/F/geeky news/media site io9.

"All the Birds" self-consciously straddles the line between science fiction and fantasy. It follows Laurence and Patricia, childhood friends who wind up on opposite sides of a war between magic-users and super-scientists.

This was one of those (exceedingly rare) Chicago Nerds selections that we almost-unanimously liked, and we had a good discussion teasing out some of our favorite parts. Anders was also kind enough to join us via videochat to talk about the book and answer some questions. Possible spoilers below!

Think Galactic- Elysium

For the March convocation of Think Galactic, we discussed "Elysium" by Jennifer Marie Brissett.

This novel is *really* difficult to describe without spoiling. And also just difficult to describe...The key feature that strikes one first is the gender-swapping of all the main characters, from chapter to chapter, sometimes from sentence to sentence. As it goes on, there are elements of dystopia, alien invasion, and AI.

Spoilerific and intriguing discussion points below:

Classic Sci-Fi- Roadside Picnic

For the March Classic Sci-Fi Meetup, we discussed Arkady & Boris Strugatsky's 1971 novel "Roadside Picnic".

I had this pretty fresh in my mind from Weird & Wonderful's discussion. It also helped our discussion that many of us had been present for Classic Sci-Fi's discussion of "Solaris" last year: Lem's novel has many resonances with this one. We also talked about "Roadside Picnic" in comparison to its film and video game adaptations.

To recap, if you're unfamiliar with the novel: a mysterious alien force briefly visits Earth, leaving behind several "zones" full of impossible-to-understand artifacts, physics-defying and often lethal abnormalities, and a wide range of strange phenomena among people who lived in or visit the Zone. Governments nominally control the Zones, but there is a brisk trade in artifacts harvested by "stalkers" who sneak in.

More discussion below:

Weird & Wonderful- Roadside Picnic

This SF Masterworks cover
presumably depicts a (full?) empty.

City Lit's most recent Weird & Wonderful discussion was "Roadside Picnic" by Boris & Arkady Strugatsky, written in 1971 but with a mildly convoluted publication/translation history.

The novel sketches out a few different characters in relation to one of the "Zones", areas that have been transmuted by an ambiguous alien visitation. The source of ineffable (but sometimes highly-profitable) technology as well as strange and deadly disasters, the Zones are studied and salvaged by government bodies as well as criminal organizations, with "Stalkers"--people who specialize in illegally entering the zone to procure artifacts--selling to both.

Short, stylish, rich in ideas, and highly weird, this was a fun novel to discuss. And we also had a delightful picnic ourselves! Possible spoilers below:

Another Dimension- Lord of Light

I was finally able to make it to Another Dimension, one of the book-clubs hosted by Bucket O'Blood Books & Records at their Avondale digs. We discussed "Lord of Light", the 1967 novel by Roger Zelazny.

The novel, which won the Hugo in 1968, is a kind of science-fictional reenactment of certain elements of Hindu and Buddhist myth. In the far future, colonists from Earth settle a distant planet, and the original settlers conquer the energy-based inhabitants (afterwards classified as "demons") and develop not-entirely-spelled out powers themselves, that seem to involve psionic/genetic mutation as well as technological enhancement. Personal immortality technology, mind transference, and these powers combine to make certain of the early humans literally godlike, and they adapt the Hindu pantheon as a mode of being, keeping most of the rest of the population at a low technological level.

"Lord of Light" follows Sam, AKA the Buddha, AKA a bunch of other names, as he foments a rebellion against the gods to allow a more egalitarian approach to technology.

We had a fun discussion, with many intriguing tangential pop-culture asides, most of them, alas, not recorded here.

Chicago Nerds- Time Salvager

For February's Chicago Nerd book discussion, we read "Time Salvager" (2015) by Wesley Chu.

To summarize: fractally dumb. Astonishingly, breath-takingly bad:

• Painful, terrible writing. Shocking to us that editors of a major publisher would sign off on this.
• Sneaky, creepy sexism. Not as blatantly bad as the puerile wish-fulfillment of "Lives of Tao", but maybe worse for that. Normalizes/excuses abusive, controlling behavior.
• Dumb, dumb, a thousand times dumb. Science, logic, continuity, common sense: leave them behind.
• The cleverest suggestion put forth is that this is actually an ironic work: a poorly-executed, derivative novel about ineptly ripping off the past. Clever! We don't buy it, though.
• Shockingly little time-travel, really.
• I would like to pass a law that when characters do/say something unnecessary purely to drive home that they are villains, they must twirl their moustaches, whether or not that makes sense.
• Despite our opinion of the book, a discussion full of laughter. And groaning.
• We are now completely cynical about blurbs and reviews.

The end! I'll waste no more brain-time on this. I took literally 100 notes on this, in order to stay sane, which I won't burden you with. Indeed, if this novel had been written a little better, I would have stopped reading: it was only a sense of editorial horror--"what basic grammar will he forget next?"--that kept me going page to page.

Next time we're reading Charlie Jane Anders' "All the Birds in the Sky", which narrowly edged out Jeff VanderMeer's "Southern Reach" trilogy. Clearly, we are craving the good stuff.

Also, a reminder: lots of Chicago Nerd stuff coming up, including C2E2-related events and Pi Day.  Keep up to date via the CNSC website and Facebook.

EPL SFF- Babel-17

I am, of course, partial to the
cover with the "Think Galactic"
tagline.

The Evanston Public Library SF/F discussion group has been going for a year now, and I got to join them for a discussion of Samuel Delany's "Babel-17" (1966).

The novel is a whirlwind of weird ideas and fantastic imagery, and is primarily fixated on language. In particular, it's an extrapolation from the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis, which is that language directly affects the perception and ability of its speakers.

This hypothesis, and the idea of a new language changing/taking over the way you think and view the world, led us to comparisons with Stephenson's "Snow Crash" (1992) and Chiang's "Story of Your Life" (2000)--both excellent and often-discussed works, I should add, and the latter contains some call-backs to key scenes in Delany. We also talked about the language use in Leckie's (also frequently-discussed) "Ancillary" books, where, like the Invaders in "Babel-17", the Radch code "civility" vs. "barbarism" into the very structure of the language--and compared that to "connotation locking" in modern political terminology, for example how "pro-life" and "anti-abortion" refer to the same stance, but code the conversation very differently.

Think Galactic- Stations of the Tide

For January's Think Galactic, we discussed Michael Swanwick's 1991 novel "Stations of the Tide".

The novel is set an indeterminate but considerable time in the future. Humans have colonized other solar systems, and our action mostly takes place in the Tidewater region of the planet Miranda, which is periodically flooded. Our protagonist, a nameless bureaucrat, has been sent from the advanced space-borne societies to track down Gregorian, a Mirandan who may have stolen some dangerous replicating technology.

On one level, it's a straightforward science-fictional riff on the noirish detective tale, flavored with some bureaucratic spook business. Despite its relative brevity, though (250ish pages), there's a surprising number of levels here, threads and allusions and alternate plot interpretations constantly seeping in.

So, as you can imagine, a nice discussion. Spoilers below!

Classic Sci-Fi Meetup- Beggars in Spain

For January's convocation of the Classic Sci-Fi Book Group, we discussed "Beggars in Spain", the 1993 novel by Nancy Kress (expanded from the novella of the same name).

"Beggars" takes place over about a hundred years, and follows the societal changes arising from genetic engineering of the human race. The biggest split comes to be between baseline humans and "Sleepless", the latter of whom have a complicated hack that allows them to live without ever needing to sleep. Besides the extra productivity this affords them, they have many other direct and indirect advantages over baseline humanity--most of them come from the upper class, who also paid to have their children's bodies and minds improved, and it also turns out that the Sleepless modification has unexpected side effects including lack of mental disease and extreme longevity.

While the surface tension in the book is thus of the hatred engendered by a superior minority, the deeper themes are sociopolitical, revolving around an Ayn Rand-like philosophy and a more communitarian one. An unusually good book to discuss. Spoilers below:

Think Galactic- Octavia's Brood

For the last Think Galactic meeting of 2015, we discussed the collection "Octavia's Brood", edited by Walidah Imarisha and adrienne maree brown.

The collection brings together writers who are active in social justice movements, many of who don't normally work in the short SF/F form, to pay tribute to the kind of "visionary fiction" embodied in the work of Octavia Butler.

We were a bit split over the collection as a whole. We all agreed that we liked the idea of the project and the ideas being engaged with. However, some of us found the execution extremely weak in many (though not all) of the stories. An interesting discussion.

We closed the discussion by making our own list of transformative or visionary fiction, and also selected books for the first half of next year.

Sulzer SF/F- Timeline

For the last meeting of the Sulzer SF/F Club, we discussed Michael Crichton's 1999 novel "Timeline".

A time travel adventure story, "Timeline" is pretty weird even for Crichton: a tech company that sorta-accidentally sorta-invents sorta-time-travel; naturally, they accidentally strand a history professor in 14th century France, and, naturally, the company's response is to send back his grad students (including one who, naturally, is fluent in multiple dead languages and proficient at period-appropriate combat techniques) to rescue him.

A great, meandering discussion ensued--we thought this feels a little rushed, even for Crichton, with some of the most intriguing bits of the book also the most confusing--there are a few major ideas and threads that he either forgot to cut or meant to develop. And, since this is time travel, we spent a lot of time just unravelling the mechanics and comparing it to other work. Spoilers below!

Windycon Chi-SF discussion- The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

Yet more Windycon notes! The Chicago Speculative Fiction Community convened to discuss the theme of the con: Douglas Adams' "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy". We primarily focused on the original novel, but with many leaps to its other incarnations.

In fact, our first point of discussion was just recapitulating it's history to date. The Guide has taken the form of:

•  Radio plays
• Novels (the 5+ "trilogy")
• Television series
• Film version
• Stage Plays
• Comics
• Video game (which you can still play online)

Windycon Phandemonium Discussion- "The Three-Body Problem"

I recently had the pleasure of attending the 42nd Windycon (appropriately, Hitchhiker-themed), and as a result I got to attend two bookclubs as well as a few fun panels.

First on deck was Cixin Liu's "The Three-Body Problem", hosted by Phandemonium, the folks who run Capricon in the spring as well as SF/F book clubs in Evanston & Elgin. It's the most recent winner of the Hugo Award for best novel; notable for being the first translated work so honored. Lots of fascinating drama around that, actually, but enough! To the book itself!

"The Three-Body Problem" is the story of Earth's contact with an advanced and (currently) distant alien race, and how that contact will inevitably bring about great change. It's also steeped in Chinese culture, particularly the fallout from the Cultural Revolution.

It's an interesting, somewhat tough read, with our most frequent questions revolving around issues of translation and culture--what was being lost with the idiom, how much was Cixin's personal style versus SF or fiction norms in its original language. A wonderful discussion. Notes in brief and possible spoilers below:

Think Galactic: Saga

For the last meeting of Think Galactic, we discussed "Saga" (2012-), the comic series by Brian K. Vaughan & Fiona Staples. We focused on the earlier volumes, but a few of us had read out as far as Volume 5/Issue 30 or so.

Fun discussion. We were pretty forthright about not being terribly versed in the current state of comics and graphic novels, which made it a little interesting. One of the more interesting parts of our discussion was looking at reading strategies when visual art is present, some of us noting that we missed details in the imagery while rushing to the next text-bubble.

We definitely mostly liked it. Definitely mostly. Much discussion of the core themes of parenthood, violence, sex, and the nature of open-ended serial works. Possible spoilers below!