Pulped fiction · 1:09am May 15th, 2014
On my phone, I have a picture two weeks old of a stack of books. I took it planning to share it online, but I'm beginning to think that's not going to end up happening. I had a reason to share besides showing off my finds[1]: I realized that evening that I don't 'self-medicate' with brain-state-altering chemicals. I use fiction instead. [3]
Since then I've found more. The D&D books were a completely different weakness, but I've discovered the paperback sci-fi shelf at the library. It's an interesting place, with names I've heard of and names I haven't: Mercedes Lackey, Larry Niven, Charles Sheffield, Lyda Morehouse. And honestly it makes me think of Fimfiction-- an earlier, pre-internet cousin, where the name of the game was writing lots and publish lots to get your name out there, and from the inside it felt like everyone knew or at least knew of everyone even though it only took one semi-outsider to blow that to smithereens. The big difference being turnaround time, no comments, and stuff had to hit dead trees before anybody would see it.
(Although the editor/publishing house effect seems interesting. I may decide to take a few pokes at something like that.)
I do get a vague trashy vibe from it all though, so I's got a question: Should I read Niven before Ann Rand? [4] Or does it not matter?
[1] Which were:
- The Archangel protocol (read and 'reviewed'), cyberpunk crossover with the book of Revelations;
- How to Disappear, nonfiction but promises to be an interesting read;
- The Algebraist (unread), Iain Bank's Culture I believe;
- The Player of Games (read and 'reviewed'), Iain Bank's Culture, which together with the algebraist sounds rather like quite a pair of characters;
- the first "hardback" volume[2] of DC's 'Earth-2' series, I've yet to write the review for it but you guys'll probably be interested in it.
[2] How do you call that, anyways? It's a bunch of regular issues reprinted all together in a fancy book format.
[3] Great whopping heaps of it. Doesn't have to be other's, other's are just easier to work with.
[4] Bradel, I would appreciate especially your opinion on this.
1. I think a pile of comics bound in that manner is (somewhat inaccurately) called a 'trade paperback.'
2. You should certainly read Niven before Rand. In fact, what you need to do with Ayn Rand is follow the timeless, if sadly apocryphal, advice of Dorothy Parker: "It's not a book to be tossed aside lightly; it's to be thrown with great force."
3. The Algebraist is a standalone book and not part of the Culture proper.
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Honestly, I was hoping to re-create Bradel's experience with Rand :/ (That's why I called him out.) There is, after all, a difference between "this is trash" and "this is trash, and I need to do x, y, and z differently".
I'm not sure I can get sufficient force, though. Maybe a cannon...
I was mildly worried about Niven, looking at the paperbacks, but I take it that's unfounded.
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Why not have a taste of the Randian style by way of this serveries of articles? If it sounds like something you might think is useful to read, go for it. But as far as I'm concerned, life is too short to subject yourself to Randian ravings.