Ian Brown started reading The World We Make by N. K. Jemisin (The Great Cities, #2)

The World We Make by N. K. Jemisin (The Great Cities, #2)
All is not well in the city that never sleeps. Even though the avatars of New York City have temporarily …
XML apologist. Erlang enthusiast. Currently JVMs & Performance stuff at Netflix. Previously JVMs & performative stuff at Twitter. He/him.
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37% complete! Ian Brown has read 9 of 24 books.
All is not well in the city that never sleeps. Even though the avatars of New York City have temporarily …
A strong open, and a big idea, is undone by a weak ending.
As usual, Wyndham takes a simple premise and peels it apart to tease out contradictions and consquences invisible from the surface. Buried within the prose are occasional aphorisms that apply nicely to our current predicaments. But, by far, the most striking aspect of this book, published in 1960, is how it reflects (and supports) that era's nascent feminist wave. Worth a read, even though it waters out in the last act.
China Miéville's brilliant reading of the modern world's most controversial and enduring political document: the Communist Manifesto.
In 1848 a …
Fascinating concept, and a narrative that leverages the rot and evil of America, and the racist AF legacy of H.P. Lovecraft to create a more...realistic universe. The writing was a little weak, though the narrative arc was well-sustained through a number of stories. A fun, quick read and ultimately worth it. Beats watching it on TV I suspect.
What are the grand dynamics that drive the accumulation and distribution of capital? Questions about the long-term evolution of inequality, …
A weird one. Absolutely in line with Wyndham’s other works in dealing with existential evolutionary threats. Worth noting the similarities with Lou Cixin’s "The Three Body Problem".
In the sleepy English village of Midwich, a mysterious silver object appears and all the inhabitants fall unconscious. A day …
In the sleepy English village of Midwich, a mysterious silver object appears and all the inhabitants fall unconscious. A day …
Content warning Mild spoiler alert. Read the book first. It is a good one.
A fantastic (and perhaps prescient) account of the end of the world. Aliens or climate change, the ultimate cause of our doom will be the limits on our ability as a species to rise above the limits of our humanity. As with any good apocalypse story some aspects of humanity are quickly disposed of, just not the ones needed to carry the day.