octavia_cade's Reviews (2.64k)

This was really entertaining! A stand-off between the Federation and the Romulans, sparked by medical emergency, and war is only prevented by the actions of good people on both sides, working against the war-mongers of their own people. I can't say that it has a particularly happy ending, as it's infused with the understanding that one instance of cooperation does not a peace treaty make, and the status quo of distrust and conflict remains primarily unshaken, but it's the small moments of hope I guess. Unfortunately, the tension and really fine character work (the Romulan hero of the piece is outstanding) is hampered by a truly silly subplot, in which the computer of the Enterprise falls in love with Kirk - it's as bad as it sounds.

So I'm trawling my way through the early Star Trek books, and my goodness are the writers obsessed with Mr. Spock and Vulcans in general. They're clearly presented as superior beings here, while Kirk goes through an inferiority crisis after being relieved of command and being made to answer to Spock - the relationship between them is drawn quite well I thought. The story itself is based on that hoary old sci-fi staple of realising you're in an experiment conducted by aliens, and the authors actually do it fairly reasonably, although it's a bit heavy-handed and the phrase "Hell's Kitchen" is repeated ad nauseam. The book gets points for its determined stand against animal abuse, though, and it's genuinely disturbing when it describes (modern day, and by Kirk's time historical) experiments on such.

An interconnected series of sci-fi stories set on Titan. There's no overall arc here, and no follow-up to some of the stories, but that's something I genuinely don't mind as nearly every story is, if not contained, then possessing of its own arc, which makes for a satisfying read - or at least it does for me. As you would expect from the premise, these stories are hard sci-fi, and while I'm not an expert in the field (my own science background is in biology) Petrie is, and his introduction offers up credentials and researched sources that gives the collection a real sense of accuracy - or as accurate as one can get under the circumstances. Of course I'm mostly accepting his word here, but it seems to me that someone with Petrie's background isn't likely to stuff his stories full of flat-out wrong, which I appreciate. The stories themselves, these little interwoven narratives, are touching and sometimes uncompromising, but I think the very realistic danger of colonist life on Titan is at times over-emphasised by the very high death count. I mean, it's a difficult balance to strike and I think for the most part Petrie does it very successfully, but for me the most affecting story is the one not about death (or risk of) at all... "Emptying Roesler". Human stories remain that, whether they're on Titan or Earth, and the stakes don't have to be lethal to get me to care.

Full review to come in Strange Horizons, and I'll pop the link in here when it's up.

I had real doubts about this one after reading the blurb. Putting Kirk and Spock into a love triangle with some random woman, who would no doubt never be seen again once the book is over? Not tempting, and it's not helped by the fact that I hate love triangles at the best of times - really, genuinely loathe them. But I was pleasantly surprised... and I think this is due to the care given to the characterisation here. This is the second Star Trek book I've read by the writing team of Marshak and Culbreath - the other being The Prometheus Design - and my impressions are consistent. In neither case am I particularly enamoured of the big science fiction problem of the text (it's another old sci-fi staple here, this time the hive mind) but their understanding of character is pinpoint and rises above their liking for unoriginal concepts. Kirk and Spock are their best selves here, which is a great relief after recently reading the mangled characterisation of the execrable Abode of Life, and the relationship between the two of them is bedrock solid and unwaveringly positive. I'm not at all converted to love triangles - I still think they're horrible - but this one could have been a great deal worse. I'm a Trek fan largely because of the emphasis it places on the positive, on the reaching successfully for a better world, and that philosophy is very much in evidence here.

Interesting premise, but one that goes completely off the rails in the second half of the book. I liked the sheer difference it made to a human for that human to be raised by Martians, and it's a worthwhile thought experiment to explore nature versus nurture with a culture that is truly alien. The whole semi-religious place the story went to, however, held very little interest for me, and I was constantly put off by the oily, patronising tone of the book. (Especially when it came to women. I don't know how many infantilising nicknames Jill, in particular, was given over the course of this book, but my eyes started rolling early and didn't stop.) And for all Heinlein's obsession with free love, I note he was still pretty desperate to keep homosexuality out of this so it's nowhere near as shocking as I imagine he thought it was. I don't know, perhaps it's that I've read the extended version. This has 60,000 words that were cut from the original publication, which I haven't read and frankly will not bother with, but all I know is that this version dribbled on and on and on, and I'm mostly glad to be done with it while simultaneously feeling a bit sorry that the whole didn't live up to the premise.

I'd love to see this performed - I was cackling away just reading it, so I think it must be hilarious to watch. In truth, I wasn't as enamoured of the fairy parts as the rest. From the moment Puck is given the magic flower you can pretty much see how the confusion's going to go, and though it's mildly amusing the real entertainment here lies in the worst play ever performed, which is so very bad it's genius. Both the rehearsal of Pyramus and Thisbe and its performance were gleefully, horribly terrible, and all credit to Shakespeare because I'm absolutely certain it takes an extraordinarily talented writer to create something so wonderfully atrocious. The tradesmen roped into performing this monstrosity are utterly hopeless - even (especially!) the one who's dressed up in plaster in order to play a wall. A wall!!! (It's as bad as it sounds, and I was choking with laughter.)

Honestly, I'd have been happy to read an entire play of these awful actors and their appalled audience, who are snarking away like they're on the balcony of The Muppet Show, and cut out the fairy bit entirely. Which was unexpected, given that going into this all I knew about the play was that it had fairies in it, and Puck, and someone wearing a donkey's head. None of which matches up to the glory of the wall and the moon and the death speech of Pyramus, who murdered prose far more brutally than he murdered himself.

This has pretty much scraped a 3 star rating from me, rounding up from 2.5. It's obviously a publication designed to be in-your-face and confronting, although that's a hard character to live up to when it's taken out of its contemporary context. From the perspective of me, reading today... I can admire the conviction and still think the execution is ridiculously over-the-top. (It really is hard to take seriously something that starts with a manifesto. I'm sorry, but it is. "We set Humour at Humour's throat. Stir up Civil War among peaceful apes." Can you really blame me?)

Now in fairness, that over-the-topness is actually entertaining in most of the art and articles herein, in an I-can't-believe-I'm-reading-this-weird-shit way. In others, however, it goes so far into some sort of floral, faux-academic theorising (about vortices, no less) that my bullshit button is well and truly banged on. Basically, it's a quirky, deadly earnest little explosion of thought on Art (the capitalisation is deliberate) that manages to make sense as much as half the time. I imagine it might improve if you read it while high.

It's been ages since I've seen the episode, and this was a fun reminder. Fairly superficial as adaptations go, and it irks me slightly at the end that Picard (and Starfleet) are willing to keep working with what are essentially torturers, but I can't blame Gerrold for that, he's merely working off the script. Still it's nice to read about Troi and remember when her empathic powers were new and excitingly valuable rather than pretty much useless statements of obvious, as they so often became. Also, I do enjoy Picard and his grumpiness, especially regarding children. (You have the right idea about Wesley, mate, and I'm certain there's one happy timeline when you did indeed keep that brat off the bridge.) The best part of this, though, are the giant jellyfish who loved each other - the story ends with the accompanying sense of wonder that's so much a part of the Star Trek franchise, and I appreciate that.

This is such a depressing book: jagged and unlovely. I enjoy dark writing, but I tend to prefer it with some beauty in the language and I find beauty in short supply here. I suppose that's fair enough: it's easier for ugly things to be confronting and if a single word was used to describe this collection that might be it. Poems like "Daddy", for instance... it's the vicious honesty of the work rather than the words themselves that speaks to so many I think. As such Ariel is not really a book to like - at least for me - so the Goodreads rating system falls down a little because with the odd exception I don't actually like these poems, but I do find them strong and memorable, razor sharp in their perception of self. They're poems to admire, rather than to like; poems that arouse an odd mixture of compassion and distaste. The major exception happens to be one of my very favourite poems, "The Night Dances", which is included in here and which I love both for the language (one of the few Ariel poems I find truly lovely) and for the unflinchingly grim perspective on life: "The comets / Have such a space to cross, / Such coldness, forgetfulness. / So your gestures flake off -".

I wouldn't have ever thought of calling a memoir "rollicking" before - to me that's a word reserved for picture books and pirates - but it fits here... and fitting, too, that Bourdain often refers to his fellow kitchen workers as a pirate crew. They're variously scatological and temperamental and apparently insane in various uncouth ways, but it's all extremely entertaining to read. And really, what underlies it all is a sincere love of food. I don't think anyone would subject themselves to the high-pressure environment of a professional kitchen if they didn't love food, and Bourdain's passion for his subject comes across really well. So well, in fact, that it's honestly hard to read a lot of this book without feeling hungry. Which is no bad thing...