Sparky's Book List
From the Quicksilver Metaweb.
Sparky Today
The spouse
Recommendations by others
The New World by Frederick Turner Future Primitive, anthology edited by Kim Stanley Robinson, containing many good authors Kim and me like Mars series by Robinson (Red Mars etc.) * I read the first two of the Mars books -- I'm looking for the others, Scarce in Japan. :( The Moon is a Harsh Mistress, Robert Heinlein * I remember having to kick myself from the book to look up 'undulate' -- Everyone misses 'Mike' -- and I got fascinated by "Sherlock Holmes" bc of that book. The Dispossessed by Ursula LeGuin (and probably all her short stories too) * Thanks to a strange series of classes given by Harlan Ellison -- I was in an elevator with Ursula, Kathryn Knight, Leigh Brackett, and Dorothy Persheria(sp?) -- and I asked her about her dad and Ishii; Though, it was her mom who wrote "Ishii, Last of his Tribe" - the last unassimilated Californian natiive. Hyperion, by Dan Simmons, most compelling portrayal of AIs anywhere * Dan used be a regular at Dangerous Visions Bookstore - the odd child of Change of Hobbit in Sherman Oaks California. Dune, by Frank Herbert, right to the end (sixth book really quite rules) * I was mystified by the Face Dancers as well. Oryx and Crake, Margaret Atwood (very new, http://www.oryxandcrake.co.uk ) * You'll have to sell me on Atwood. ANYTHING by Damon Knight, a marvellous author often unrightfully overlooked * Damon Knight is always a jolly read; his wife has written some good mysteries and SF
Explanations
BTW - It's StSparky as I live in Santa Monica when in the States; Calling myself SMSparky recieved some marked odd results.
Cryptonomicon has effortlessly now blended with Pattern Recognition. Both have blended oddly well with the Kasuo Mori detective books I've read. And it's NOW. What's really odd is I've just read Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's Sir Nigil and The White Company and the Plague of 1348 he describes helped me make sense of the events in Quicksilver.
I just finished Giles Milton's The Riddle and the Knight,Bernard Cornwell's Sharpe's Regiment and Robert Lomas's The Invisible College and Baudolino is being read now. Soon to be followed by George Dyson's Project Orion, Kim Stanley Robinson's The Years of Rice and Salt, and Dava Sobel's Galileo's Daughter.
Those are finished. Also devoured:: Dava Sobel's Longitude, Laura Joh Rowland's Mysteries, Bruce Sterling's Holy Fire, Stephen Hawking's The Theory of Everything, Thomas Disch's The Prisoner, Simon Winchester's The Professor and the Madman.
Finishing: JP Kenyon's Stuart England, HAL Fisher's The History of Europe vol.2
Bought: Claire Tomalin's Samuel Pepys: The Unequaled Self, John Gribben's Science: A History, Stephen Hawking's, On the Shoulders of Giants.
On order from Amazon Japan: Have Space Suit-Will Travel Glory Road which I want to compare to Neverwhere: A Novel (I've a theory to compare Heinlein's Podkayne of Mars / Alexei and Cory Panshin's Rite of Passage against the two. Then again - folks may not like Panshin's take on RAH). And these two: Tanner's Tiger (An Evan Tanner Suspense Thriller) and Me Tanner, You Jane because Lawrence Block is fun.
Found a copy of HG Wells World History! He's not a jingoist like HAL Fisher.
LXG
Can't find images of the volume 2 hardcover * Cover of Volume 2 # 1 * Cover of V2 # 2 * V2 # 3 * V2 # 4 * V2 #5 FC * V2 #5 BC * V2 #6
ISBN 1563898586 The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, Vol. 1 ISBN 1401201172 The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, Vol. 2 ISBN 193226504X Heroes & Monsters: The Unofficial Companion to the League of Extraordinary Gentlemen
Please visit Jess Online to see annotation at its best.
Book Links to investigate -so far- I promise more
http://www.metaweb.com/wiki/wiki.phtml?title=Stephenson:Neal:Cryptonomicon
http://www.williamgibsonbooks.com/books/pattern.asp - Pattern Recognition
http://www.thrillingdetective.com/eyes/mori.html Tokyo's 'Jim Rockford' - Mori-san!
http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/9.09/gibson.html - Tokyo as the background ...
http://www.metaweb.com/wiki/wiki.phtml?title=Stephenson:Neal:Quicksilver
http://www.rawilson.com/ - Who's here old enough to remember his Oui articles?
http://www.fanzing.com/mag/fanzing17/feature3.shtml - John Broome
http://www.njedge.net/~knapp/tenyears.htm - Cay Van Ash
http://www.davidbrin.com/index.html - That Brin guy! His dad was a prince!
http://onlinebooks.library.upenn.edu/webbin/gutbook/lookup?num=2845 - Sir Nigel
http://onlinebooks.library.upenn.edu/webbin/gutbook/lookup?num=903 - The White Company
http://www.bookrags.com/books/tosjm/index.htm - The Travels as a e-book
http://www.fsbassociates.com/fsg/riddleandknight.htm - Sir John Manddville explored
http://www.reviewsofbooks.com/baudolino/ - Your choice of reviews
http://www.perseusbooksgroup.com/perseus-cgi-bin/display/0-7382-0023-9 Einstein for the Mathphobic.
Mary Renault wrote in her Introduction to the Pan 1975 version of Sir Nigil that there was a real person with the name, which Sir Arthur does not inform us of, known as Sir Neil or Sir Nigil Loring.
Anthony Burgess makes the observation that Sir Arthur's writing might not be a literary triumph but is at least a Shakespearian one.
Odd & Ends: Google "masonspeak" and tell me if you find something different that what I did. Colin Bruce (by way of Sherlock Holmes) explores Einstein in The Strange Case of Mrs. Hudson's Cat is a help to understand the end of the Newtonian Universe; now known under a new title -- The Einstein Paradox And Other Science Mysteries Solved By Sherlock Holmes.
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