Month: September 2007

_by Robert Heinlein_

Another great Heinlein book. I’ve only read three of his (_Starship Troopers_, _Stranger in a Strange Land_, and _Double Star_), but all have been great. _Double Star_ is about a down-and-out actor who’s clandestinely hired to fill in for a high-ranking political leader who’s been kidnapped — just temporarily, at first, but then various events keep putting off his leave date, and it begins to look like he might not have a chance to ever leave the role!

While I love Arthur C. Clarke’s books for the technical specificity, I love Heinlein’s for the _writing_. His writing style is very “lively,” to say the least — hell, his dialog could even be described as “hokey” sometimes, but that’s just part of what makes it so fun to read!

If you _ever_ get to read one of his books, though, please—please, please, please—please make sure it’s _Stranger in a Strange Land_. There’s a good damn reason why that book’s called by many to be the greatest science fiction novel ever written.

_by Terry Goodkind_

An enjoyable read, even if I finished it in one day. More like the _old_ Terry Goodkind, and not the haughty, _full-of-himself-after-just-having-read-Atlas-Shrugged_ Terry Goodkind.

One issue, though — for one thing, the book is richly illustrated with very nice drawings every so often dealing with the events happening on those pages. Now, if you know anything about the “Midlands” in Terry Goodkind’s world of the _Sword of Truth_, you know that it was a land where a woman’s status in society (her class) was apparent by how long she could grow her hair — the higher in class society you were, the longer you could grow your hair.

The protagonist of the story, Abby, remarks in the first few pages (after seeing the Mother Confessor with her waist-length golden hair) about how _her_ hair “covered her ears but no more.”

Then a few pages later, you see an illustration showing Abby walking into the Wizard’s Keep on her errand… *with her long hair reaching past her shoulders*.

…is it that bloody hard to coordinate some sort of communication between a writer and an artist? Did anyone even look at these pictures (however nicely drawn they were) before they went to print?

_by David Brin_

Damn good book — not at all like the movie. Very well written. Starts off as a neat post-apocalypse movie and turns into an examination of the reasons behind man’s inherent need to destroy (and how it can be stopped).

Definitely worth a read.