Book 7 for 2016: Railsea
Last week I chose In The Heart of the Sea as my fiction pick to give myself a break from the non-fiction I had been reading, only to discover a few pages into reading that it was itself a non-fiction account of the sinking of the Essex by a sperm whale. I had assumed that as it was turned into a movie, the book itself would have been more of a historical fiction, I was wrong.
So this week I resolved to ensure I wound up with a fiction tale by picking my first ever read from the science fiction author China Mieville. It is hard, after all, for a science fiction story to end up being a non-fictional account (though some hard sci-fi can sometimes come close, I am looking at you The Martian). In an amusing turn of events I was looking over the blurb before I started to read and began noticing a few clear parallels with Railsea and Moby Dick (the book inspired by the events of last week’s book!). A ‘sea’ filled with prey, hunted by harpoonists, and lead by an obsessed captain seeking revenge on a great white animal! Seriously I didn’t plan this.
Anyhow, this year one of my goals has been to finally expose myself to a bunch of prominent speculative fiction authors whose work i have heard many good things about, but due to the breadth of their works I had always shied away from. First there had been Neal Stephenson’s Seveneves, then John Scalzi’s Old Man’s War, and now I am delving into what may be a long haul with China Mieville’s acclaimed body of works.
Well that’s enough writing for now; time to get reading!
MM
#2016inbooks #serendipity #ChinaMieville from Instagram: http://ift.tt/1TzEsYe
Book 6 for 2016: In the Heart of the Sea.
The book (recently turned into a movie) based on the real life events that inspired yet another (albeit more famous) book; Moby Dick. A lot of connecting threads going on here to entice me to read the book, but the main reason I had this book on my to read list is due to an article I read about the Essex and its crew (see link below). Then when I heard it was to become a movie, directed by the generally awesome Ron Howard, and starring Thor, I was getting pumped. My wife, being the awesome spouse that she is, managed to overhear my excitement about the upcoming (at the time) movie, and got me a copy of the book for Xmas.
I never ended up seeing the film, but seeing as it is time for a fiction read, I figured it was time to launch myself back into the 19th century whaling world (Oh I hope there are some good shanties!). For those who don’t know, the story of the Essex involves a whaling ship that is attacked by the very animal it prowled the oceans looking for. After a bull sperm whale sinks the ship the survivors were able to cling to life aboard a whaling boat (distinct from a whaling ship) and ended up resorting to cannibalism to stay alive! Sounds like a gripping read, so I’d better get to it.
MM
#2016inbooks #BooksAreAlwaysbetterThanTheFilm #PossibelExceptionFightClub #AnimalsRevenge #InTheHeartOfTheSea
http://ift.tt/1odKE3u from Instagram: http://ift.tt/1STpoFe
But is it really?
To put it into perspective, the population of Shanghai proper is around 24.5 million people. So imagine that; imagine all of Australia decided to meet up the Shire of Glenelg, (which has an area comparable to Shanghai), and then an extra Tasmania showed up. That’s Shanghai. All over the world there are metro areas that themselves have larger populations than Australia, and usually an inversely proportional land area.
Mind boggling.
24 million people; such a small nation compared to the rest of the world.
And that number increases by one person every 91 seconds, so just under a thousand new Australians arrive every day (whether they are born here, or choose to become Australian). When I was born there were only 15.5 million Aussies, and look at all the cool stuff we have managed to do in the preceding three decades: Hosting Olympics, giving the world polymer banknotes and Wi-Fi technology, letting loose Hugh Jackman on the world…. Amazing feats.
And to think people still languish in fear of a few thousand asylum seekers arriving by boat each year.
Anyhow, that was just something that came to my attention today. Will knowing that our population has increased past some arbitrary number affect me in any significant way? I can’t say it really will, but now when I hear that the odds of me winning a lottery are 1 in X million, I will have a new metric to measure it against.
MM
#Australia #australiapopulation #randomthoughts
P.s. while I was writing this post, another ten Australians got their wings; welcome! from Instagram: http://ift.tt/1KSTxBo
Book 5 for 2016: An Astronauts Guide to Life on Earth.
My Instagram feed tells me I actually bought this book 50 weeks ago, and even started reading it back then, but for some reason it didn’t really take off. No offense to the books itself, somehow it just fell by the wayside.
So I figured it was time to take this beauty off the mantle, and finish it off. I have had a lot of space related stuff piquing my interest the past year or so, whether it be the engrossing Seveneves, Kim Stanley Robinson’s fascinating Aurora, or the real life awesomeness of last year’s Pluto revelations, and SpaceX’s successful rocket landings; either way space related things really seem to be gaining a lot of momentum with me lately.
What better way than to continue my education of all things space related than by reading a book written by someone who has actually been there. What’s more Chris Hadfield’s book is supposedly a great read for those hoping to get a better understanding on how to live your life, whether it be on earth, or hurtling around it in a tin can. And I am always open for a bit of introspection and education.
#2016inbooks #ChrisHadfield #spacerocks #Iwanttoretireonmars from Instagram: http://ift.tt/1SDgqfc
I usually try to alternate between fiction and non-fiction to give my mind a bit of a break from trying to
digest facts, and after my previous book’s foray back into the paleontological lessons of the past, I figured it was time for a nice relaxing piece of make-believe. So for the next week I shall indulge in my love of sci-fi with John Scalzi’s Old Man’s War.
After reading Redshirts last year (and absolutely loving it), and hearing about Scalzi’s multi-million dollar deal with Tor Books, I figured it was time to give his more famous book a go, and see what all the fuss is about.
Sidenote: I love when a book has a great opening line, and this year two of my reads have had stellar ones (one of them nearly literally so): Seveneves – “The moon blew up with no warning and with no apparent reason.” Old Man’s War – “I did two things on my seventy-fifth birthday. I visited my wife’s grave. Then I joined the army”
I love it; they both get you hooked straight away, just like good speculative fiction should.
#2016inbooks #oldmanswar #lovemeabitofscifi from Instagram: http://ift.tt/1X1CD5w
A Moment Worth 