Random thoughts about science fiction book series
Elsewhere on the Internet, a friend was was talking about various particular science fiction series and sf series in general. My reply (lightly edited for readability here):
I loved the “World of Tiers” books, by Philip Jose Farmer, but I read them loooooooooong ago. There was one I did not read, about a psychologist or psychiatrist (whatever) in present-day America treating a patient who believes the World of Tiers is real. That seemed intriguing but I never got around to it.
I loved the first three of Farmer’s Riverworld novels, and enjoyed the remaining novels less and less. The ancient race that created the Riverworld is revealed, and they turn out to be a bunch of jerks with the emotional development of toddlers. I get that there is a powerful basis in mythology for that — Zeus in Greek mythology is a rapey frat-bro — but it didn’t work for me.
There was a single volume of a shared-world anthology with multiple authors based on Riverworld and that was fun; I wish they had continued it. I recall one story about Daniel Boone who learns that there was a TV show based on his life and who is trying to find someone who remembers the theme song. Everybody from the 20th Century that he encounters only remembers the other theme song, Davy Crockett.
After reading Riverworld I made the rule that when a science fiction series is about the characters trying to find the answer to a Great Cosmic Mystery, the answer is usually “aliens with godlike powers” and the answer is usually disappointing. But the journey can be enjoyable, so just go with it.
I loved the Stephen King Gunslinger books. You may be right about the second volume and follow-up volumes going nowhere. I enjoyed the ride anyway.
I loved the first “Amber” series by Roger Zelazny. I was disappointed by the second series but I have since re-read the whole thing once or twice and enjoyed it. The first series is a serious exploration of power, family, treating people like objects and Zelazny’s invented mythos. The second series plays the mythos for laughs and gimmicks, which is what disappointed me at first but on subsequent rereadings I went with it and enjoyed it.
Zelazny basically invented the genre of “high fantasy but the characters talk like they’re in noir detective novels.” There’s a straight line from Amber to Game of Thrones, and I think George RR Martin freely acknowledges it. Martin certainly has explicitly said that Zelazny was one of his most powerful influences.
Forgetting what happened between one book and the next in a series is a real problem for me. There is also the problem of just losing interest between books. That’s even more of a problem for TV shows — I sometimes lose interest between seasons, even if it’s a show I loved. I remember loving “Hijacked,” with Idris Elba, and “Slow Horses,” but I have not been motivated to catch up on the new seasons. I have seen speculation that this may be an issue for many people and a problem for the streaming industry. The regular cadence of linear TV in the 20th Century got people in the habit of picking up their favorite shows, and finding new shows, in September. Each season had a couple of dozen episodes and there was about a three-month gap between seasons. Now, each season has 8-12 episodes with gaps between seasons of a year or more. I loved “Severance,” but when it finally comes back, will I care?
Regarding controversy over Zelazny and Asimov “selling out” by continuing to write Amber books and Foundation books: Back in the distant days of the 20th Century, a creator making things just for the money was looked down on as “selling out.” It was a big deal. Now, influencers consider selling out to be a badge of honor. They’ve made the big time. I say this without judging either way.
Asimov wrote that by the 1980s he was far less interested in writing sf and preferred his science writing, but sf paid him big bucks and far from a shameful sellout, he considered writing for the bucks to be honorable, so that he could provide for his family. At the time of writing that he knew, but had not disclosed, that he was dying of AIDS.
I read the first few pages of the first Dungeon Crawler Carl and was not moved to read further. I’m glad people enjoy it though.
“Edward H. Lehner, a New York lawyer, legislator and judge who, as a state assemblyman in the 1970s, helped pass a groundbreaking ‘pooper-scooper’ law … died on Sept. 9 in Brooklyn. He was 93.” (NYTimes/Sarah Lyall)
It is wild to me that the principle that dog owners should pick up their dogs’ poop was controversial as recently as when I was a teenager.
Lehner suggested using a disposable plastic bag attached to a pole to pick up the poops. But honestly it’s not a big deal. Just wrap your hand in a plastic bag and pick up the poops. You won’t die. It’s not even gross, not really. Wash your hands when you get home and don’t handle food or a beverage until you do.
As a judge, Lehner blocked Donald Trump, then just a real estate developer, from seizing control of the Empire State Building in 1999 and denied a home buyer’s claim “that he should have been informed, before making a down payment, that the house he was purchasing was infested with poltergeists. (The decision was famously overturned when an appellate court ruled that ‘as a matter of law, the house is haunted.’)”
We are still struggling to heal Minnie’s ulcerated eye. She won’t eat with the Elizabethan collar (aka “cone of shame”) on. She has done so in the past, but she has forgotten and has now decided it’s impossible and she stands next to her food looking confused.
Until today, we took the cone off her to let her eat, but that meant she was un-coned for 60-90 minutes per day and free to scratch at her eye and rub it on the ground. No wonder it isn’t healing. It should have been obvious this was a bad idea.
I tried putting the food on a flat plate and elevating it on a footstool, about a foot of the ground. Nope.
So I took the cone off her to let her eat while I supervised her from a distance of less than three feet, to be sure she didn’t scratch at the eye.
Because she is a senior dog with kidney disease, we feed her three times a day. Also, I’m giving her eyedrops four times a day. I have gotten very good at giving the dog eyedrops. I feel pleased with myself when I do it quickly and efficiently, less so when I dribble the eyedrops on her face. Notwithstanding those feelings of pride at a job well done this is not a skill I ever wanted to acquire. This is going to be how we do things for another week, then hopefully she’ll be healed up.
This afternoon at the vet, when it was time to bring Minnie home, I just lowered the cone to face-level on the dog and she stuck her head right in it. The vet-tech was impressed. I acted nonchalant as if this was not a surprise to me.
The Interview: Chris Rock Has Been Thinking About Forgiveness [David Marchese / The New York Times]
“Rodeo Drive and Skid Row are in the same city, probably eight, 10 miles apart. In a lot of ways, America’s like that: very rich, very poor. We live in a world where either you order shit or you deliver shit], and you really don’t want to deliver [expletive], you know?”
Also:
You don’t really realize if you love somebody until you have to forgive them. I can enjoy myself with just about anybody. It’s when somebody tests you, when somebody betrays you, when somebody lets you down and you still want to be around them – that’s love. I have a friend that’s going to be nameless that might have gotten canceled. Another friend of mine was like, “How can you be friends with that person?” I was like, “If you’re only friends with your friends when they’re good, they’re not your friends.” If you’ve got a bunch of people that are only going to be there when you’re good, you have no friends. That doesn’t mean condoning abusive behavior; you can reprimand your friends. That’s also part of friendship.
Despite the headline, Rock genially but firmly cuts off questions about the Will Smith slap. He says he has said everything he is going to say about the subject, and wishes everyone well.