Yes! His early novels lack something and so do those he wrote near the end of his life. But there was a long, long period in between where everything he wrote did have a sort of magical sparkle. Books and short fiction from that period are so very re-readable. But the later books don't have that whatever-it-was, and tend to disappoint.One of the later novels. Perfectly good fun, but lacks that magical sparkle which makes prime Wodehouse so sublime.
I read that omnibus and it is frustratingly incomplete. There is a fourth book, "Chanur's Homecoming." Great series, and one I re-read every few years.I'm reading The Chanur Saga by C. J. Cherryh, a space opera saga. The 700-page book is composed of the first three novels of the series (The Pride of Chanur, Chanur's Venture, and The Kif Strike Back). So, yes, I'm reading all of them.
Basic premise is how a feline alien race stumbles upon a political situation when a captured human, fleeing from an insidious alien group, came to them for aid. I don't know where that goes, but I'll find out soon enough.
Hm, Parson tries to get the creaky old brain to conjure up a memory. I believe I was in my early 30's and I loved them. But I haven't read them since.Yep, it might be worth re-reading this now. I read it aged 18-20 with dogged persistence but found it boring beyond belief. Most of the characters, concerns, corporate shenanigans and machinations were beyond me then - late developer. What age were people when they read & enjoyed TFT?
I first read the Foundation books in my late teens, and loved them. Re-read then in my thirties and loved them, and recently re-read them again in my fifties and found I was more discerning and judged them more dispassionately, but still enjoyed them very much. I think I marginally prefer the Elijah Bayley books. I actually think the Foundation sequels and prequels written in the 80s are possibly superior novels, though they are of course less genre-defining and ‘classic’.Yep, it might be worth re-reading this now. I read it aged 18-20 with dogged persistence but found it boring beyond belief. Most of the characters, concerns, corporate shenanigans and machinations were beyond me then - late developer. What age were people when they read & enjoyed TFT?
I think that probably describes my feelings too. Reading them in the last decades I saw their flaws, which was a little disappointing, whilst also seeing how they were so important in their day. Again re-reading the Elijah Bayley books in the last decade I also saw their flaws but also felt they were better quality SF.I first read the Foundation books in my late teens, and loved them. Re-read then in my thirties and loved them, and recently re-read them again in my fifties and found I was more discerning and judged them more dispassionately, but still enjoyed them very much. I think I marginally prefer the Elijah Bayley books. I actually think the Foundation sequels and prequels written in the 80s are possibly superior novels, though they are of course less genre-defining and ‘classic’.
I have that Mandel one coming up in my pile sometime soon and I'm looking forward to it!I read Emily St. John Mandel's Sea of Tranquillity. It's a relatively short book but does still manage to fit in half a dozen time periods ranging from early 20th Century Canada to a lunar colony several centuries in the future. Despite that I thought this had a more focused plot than her previous book, The Glass Hotel, which had plenty of good writing but I was a bit unsure about the point of it. This has a much stronger science fiction element than her previous books and although I have seen most of the ideas in here before in books by other authors I thought those elements did work well. Mandel's primary strength has always been her characters and the same is true here where they do get plenty of depth despite mostly not being in the story for very long. I think the one character that didn't really work was Gaspery, who is frustratingly passive on many occasions and is very poor at doing his job.
I think there's some clear autobiographical bits in here with one character being an author who, like Mandel, had come to fame as the author of a novel about a pandemic a few short years before an actual pandemic. Unlike Station Eleven this isn't primarily a book about a pandemic but it is a subject that comes up multiple times throughout the story, I think perhaps the author had some thoughts about the topic she wanted to get out of her system.
I think Station Eleven is still her best book out of those that I've read, but I did like this a lot.
I have now started Martha Wells' new Murderbot Diaries story, System Collapse.
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