Recent Reads

I read quite a bit. I was asked last night 'what did you get from those books?'. I get entertainment from them. It was suggested that I write a report on the books I read. After this I will write an essay "What I did on my summer vacation."

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I just finished The Footprints of God by Greg Iles
It's a thriller. Basic plot: a billionaire genius computer designer (his computers have replaced Crays in many places) gets secret government backing to create a super duper computer. An Artificial Intelligence. The plan is to use a new super duper MRI scanner to take images of people's brains and then put upload those images into the super duper computer where they will reside and yada yada yada...

Anyways. The main protagonist is a medical doctor who has written a book on ethics whose (now dead) brother was a good friend of the man who is now president of the US. So, this guy gets assigned to be the ethical oversight person for this project. Most of the people who work on the project are seriously lacking in morals and are the bad guys in this book. The one other guy who isn't a bad guy starts the book already killed by the bad guys. The hero starts having wierd dreams (he has narcolepsy due to having his mind scanned by the super MRI thingie) in which he relives parts of Jesus' life. Yah, that's what I said.

So, he realizes that the bad guys are Bad Guys, just like they are in most movies (have the CIA or NSA ever not been bad guys in a movie?) and takes off across the country to avoid the villains. He takes along the requisite love interest, his beautiful (but recently single) Jungian analyst he has been seeing to have his odd dreams analyzed. They have several narrow escapes from the professional psychos and end up going to Israel, because the hero's visions tell him to go there. Once there they manage to get to the spot where Christ was crucified and he touches the spot where the cross was and goes into a coma where he basically is told the secrets of life or some such stuff. It involves Tao and other brain hurting concepts.

Then the plucky twosome dodge more badguys, make a deal with the Mossad to get back to America and arrive just in time for the Grand Awakening of the super duper computer. It is very smart (they copied the super billionaire computer dude's brain into it) and it realizes us humans are really fucking things up and tells us all to chill out or the missiles will be launched (it, of course, is connected to the internet, where, due to it's super duperness, it easily breaks any encryption and has total access to all computers, including those that launch ICBMs and host LiveJournal. Yes, it is reading your private posts right this minute)

The hero arrives in time to Stop the Madness. He has to deal with the Evil Military Dude and the Sneaky Government Dude and the Evil Military Dude's Equally Evil Daughter. Then, with the missiles in the air, coming right at them, the clock is ticking down, he has to convince the super duper computer that it should shut itself off and not kill or enslave the human race.

He manages to do that, cause he's been given those visions by God (or has he...a comment is made near the end that implies all that stuff was really just hallucinations of some sort) In the end everything works out. The bad guys get their comeuppance (mostly) and the good guys get the girl and all that.

Rating: I dunno. Maybe a 6/10. It was 50 cents at the library book sale and it gave me several hours of entertainment, so that's ok. Not a great book by any means, but the author does manage to drag you along pretty good and, really, that's all I really want, usually.

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Another recent read was There Will Be Dragons by John Ringo I actually bought this one new (rather, Dorothea bought it for me), which is kinda rare for me these days. I got this one though because I have really enjoyed Ringo's earlier books. This one though, is my least favorite of his. I'm not sure why.

There is considerable setup time for this book. It is set something like 2000 years in the future, when tech that is equivalent to magic (nanites and teleporting) make the world a place of luxury and ease. People Change themselves into just about anything they want. Live where they like. Do what they want. A super duper computer named Mother runs the everything, mostly. There are some humans that are basically the goverment and they have a falling out. One group (the bad guys) thinks that people have it too easy and wants to cut off the energy and make people work a bit more for stuff. The other group is the group that says STFU to this moron. Unfortunately, the bad guy has other bad people that join him and then you get the big conflict. The big fight is actually not what the book is about, mainly cause the fight is just the two groups trying to use their energy against each other. The result of the fight is that no energy is left to run the world, so all the nanites quit working and the telporters don't teleport anymore and all that.

I'm getting tired of writing this review.

To wrap it up: A bunch of people are Recreationists (think SCA 2000 years from now) and they are all set when all the 'magic' goes away. They are the ones the book is about. They get to fight bad guys and teach all the soft people who to work and cut trees and farm and stuff. And fight.

I think this book put me off a bit because some things about it made me go Huh? Stuff that didn't ring very true to me and broke my suspension of belief. For instance, nanites and hyper tech have eliminated the menstrual cycle in the future. However, when all that fails, women's cycles begin again. Ok, I can see that. However, several pages of the book go on about how the women (including a female doctor) are mystified when the first woman starts bleeding. "Did somebody hit you? Did you eat poison?" That kind of crap. I just find it hard to believe that they would be that clueless.

WhenI finished the book I knew that there would be a sequel (I don't think John Ringo has written a stand alone book yet) and sure enough, I see on Amazon that they have the next book listed already. I'll probably read it, if it turns up at the library for 50 cents or so. He's not getting my (or Doro's) 8 bucks again though.

Recent Reads

I read quite a bit. I was asked last night 'what did you get from those books?'. I get entertainment from them. It was suggested that I write a report on the books I read. After this I will write an essay "What I did on my summer vacation."

-----------
I just finished The Footprints of God by Greg Iles
It's a thriller. Basic plot: a billionaire genius computer designer (his computers have replaced Crays in many places) gets secret government backing to create a super duper computer. An Artificial Intelligence. The plan is to use a new super duper MRI scanner to take images of people's brains and then put upload those images into the super duper computer where they will reside and yada yada yada...

Anyways. The main protagonist is a medical doctor who has written a book on ethics whose (now dead) brother was a good friend of the man who is now president of the US. So, this guy gets assigned to be the ethical oversight person for this project. Most of the people who work on the project are seriously lacking in morals and are the bad guys in this book. The one other guy who isn't a bad guy starts the book already killed by the bad guys. The hero starts having wierd dreams (he has narcolepsy due to having his mind scanned by the super MRI thingie) in which he relives parts of Jesus' life. Yah, that's what I said.

So, he realizes that the bad guys are Bad Guys, just like they are in most movies (have the CIA or NSA ever not been bad guys in a movie?) and takes off across the country to avoid the villains. He takes along the requisite love interest, his beautiful (but recently single) Jungian analyst he has been seeing to have his odd dreams analyzed. They have several narrow escapes from the professional psychos and end up going to Israel, because the hero's visions tell him to go there. Once there they manage to get to the spot where Christ was crucified and he touches the spot where the cross was and goes into a coma where he basically is told the secrets of life or some such stuff. It involves Tao and other brain hurting concepts.

Then the plucky twosome dodge more badguys, make a deal with the Mossad to get back to America and arrive just in time for the Grand Awakening of the super duper computer. It is very smart (they copied the super billionaire computer dude's brain into it) and it realizes us humans are really fucking things up and tells us all to chill out or the missiles will be launched (it, of course, is connected to the internet, where, due to it's super duperness, it easily breaks any encryption and has total access to all computers, including those that launch ICBMs and host LiveJournal. Yes, it is reading your private posts right this minute)

The hero arrives in time to Stop the Madness. He has to deal with the Evil Military Dude and the Sneaky Government Dude and the Evil Military Dude's Equally Evil Daughter. Then, with the missiles in the air, coming right at them, the clock is ticking down, he has to convince the super duper computer that it should shut itself off and not kill or enslave the human race.

He manages to do that, cause he's been given those visions by God (or has he...a comment is made near the end that implies all that stuff was really just hallucinations of some sort) In the end everything works out. The bad guys get their comeuppance (mostly) and the good guys get the girl and all that.

Rating: I dunno. Maybe a 6/10. It was 50 cents at the library book sale and it gave me several hours of entertainment, so that's ok. Not a great book by any means, but the author does manage to drag you along pretty good and, really, that's all I really want, usually.

-----------

Another recent read was There Will Be Dragons by John Ringo I actually bought this one new (rather, Dorothea bought it for me), which is kinda rare for me these days. I got this one though because I have really enjoyed Ringo's earlier books. This one though, is my least favorite of his. I'm not sure why.

There is considerable setup time for this book. It is set something like 2000 years in the future, when tech that is equivalent to magic (nanites and teleporting) make the world a place of luxury and ease. People Change themselves into just about anything they want. Live where they like. Do what they want. A super duper computer named Mother runs the everything, mostly. There are some humans that are basically the goverment and they have a falling out. One group (the bad guys) thinks that people have it too easy and wants to cut off the energy and make people work a bit more for stuff. The other group is the group that says STFU to this moron. Unfortunately, the bad guy has other bad people that join him and then you get the big conflict. The big fight is actually not what the book is about, mainly cause the fight is just the two groups trying to use their energy against each other. The result of the fight is that no energy is left to run the world, so all the nanites quit working and the telporters don't teleport anymore and all that.

I'm getting tired of writing this review.

To wrap it up: A bunch of people are Recreationists (think SCA 2000 years from now) and they are all set when all the 'magic' goes away. They are the ones the book is about. They get to fight bad guys and teach all the soft people who to work and cut trees and farm and stuff. And fight.

I think this book put me off a bit because some things about it made me go Huh? Stuff that didn't ring very true to me and broke my suspension of belief. For instance, nanites and hyper tech have eliminated the menstrual cycle in the future. However, when all that fails, women's cycles begin again. Ok, I can see that. However, several pages of the book go on about how the women (including a female doctor) are mystified when the first woman starts bleeding. "Did somebody hit you? Did you eat poison?" That kind of crap. I just find it hard to believe that they would be that clueless.

WhenI finished the book I knew that there would be a sequel (I don't think John Ringo has written a stand alone book yet) and sure enough, I see on Amazon that they have the next book listed already. I'll probably read it, if it turns up at the library for 50 cents or so. He's not getting my (or Doro's) 8 bucks again though.