Grand unified books thread

[Syt]

I've been reading Star Trek - Vanguard from 2005, first in a series set on a space station (eponymous Vanguard, Starbase 47, because of course 47) set in the 2260s.

I've enjoyed it. It has a very pulpy feel - Starfleet have built a starbase suspiciously quickly in the Taurian reach between Tholian and Klingon Empire and are engaged in clandestine operations there that involve a mysterious intelligence outpost/artifact that seems to affect the Tholians. The characters involved include the station staff, an investigative reporter, an orion crime lord, a petty thief/merchant, a Klingon spy, and more. Unshaved slovenly Cpt Decker gets a cameo in the prologue. But fanservice/memberberries are generally kept fairly limited.

It's set right after the "second pilot" (Where No Man Has Gone Before) aka the one where Gary Mitchell gets superpowers and the crew still wears the old uniforms before switching to the classic TOS uniforms (which is mentioned in the book), and the Enterprise and crew have a (small) role in the story, but won't feature in later books as I understand it.

Its pulp sensibilities also extends to some of the perspectives - almost all major point of view characters are male (the one more fleshed out female character is a lesbian rape survivor constantly reliving the trauma, because of course), women are usually described in terms emphasizing their attractiveness, and all the men love the new miniskirt uniforms while the women are embarrassed about them. Unlike TOS, though, the author allows for women in command roles (though one is killed to motivate a main character, i.e. classic "fridging").

Still, an entertaining yarn that IMO hits the tone of TOS with a dash of DS9 (the mystery and undercover stuff) and I will keep reading for now.

Side note: the petty thief's ship is called the "Rocinante" - but this came out before the first Expanse book.

Also, looking up some characters on Memory Beta, apparently a later book will feature scientists by the names of Hofstadter, Wolowitz and Koothrapali (they already had a character called Cooper).

[Savonarola]

I read a biography of Claude Shannon (father of information theory, and author of a seminal paper on digital circuitry) called "A Mind at Play" by Jimmy Soni and Rob Goodman.  He was one of the more eccentric souls at Bell Labs in the 40s.  His most famous work is called "A Mathematical Theory of Communication," once the importance of the paper was realized he was given leeway to do whatever he wanted during working hours, which included building unicycles, creating a computer which used Roman numerals and inventing a horn which doubled as a flame thrower.

Despite inventing the field, he wasn't all that interested in information theory.  When he later became a professor at MIT the projects that he was most interested in were in the fields of robotics or artificial intelligence (and juggling, he was the mentor for the MIT juggling society.)  I thought that was interesting.

[Savonarola]

I went over a textbook on Communication Engineering (Communication Engineering Essentials for Computer Scientists and Electrical Engineers) written by three professors for universities in Taiwan.  The first part of the book deals with the Fourier Transform.  Which is a mathematical process of converting between the time domain and the frequency domain.  If you ever used an oscilloscope in either physics class or in making music; the oscilloscope displays a wave form in the time domain.  The wave form is composed of a number of frequencies and the range of those frequencies is called a channel, which is what communication engineers usually want to see (a spectrum analyzer shows this information.)  The two are interchangeable and can be converted from one to another using the Fourier transform:



Conceptually this is easy, but mathematically it's rigorous and the first 80 pages of the book are nothing but formulae.  To get to the point where you can even understand something as basic as AM radio on a mathematical level you have to get through all that first.  To make matters worse, outside your first communication systems course, you'll never do a Fourier transform; human beings are only capable of doing the simplest Fourier transforms, everything is done by computers.

In any event the book was good, if a bit dated (2007).  It helped me understand some hardware concepts; which has been outside my professional experience, but I may need to explore more in the future.

[Savonarola]

I finished reading "Things Fall Apart" by Chinua Achebe.  I know Achebe really hates "Heart of Darkness", but the book remind me a bit of "Heart of Darkness" in that in "Heart of Darkness" Mr. Kurtz seems to loom large over the novel, even though he doesn't show up until almost the end.  In "Things Fall Apart", the cultural conflict between native Africans and European colonizers seems to be the major theme, even though the Europeans don't show up until the final quarter of the book.

I thought the book was well done, especially as a portrait of the flawed Okonkwo, his world and how it changed.

[Razgovory]

I read that book a few years ago, and I remember very little about it now.  I kinda remember the native African culture as not being very sympathetic.  

[Sheilbh]

It's a fantastic book and I think a direct response to Heart of Darkness.

Currently I regret to admit that I may becoming a Joycean

I read Ulysses a long time ago for university and enjoyed it a lot but just read it. I recently decided to read it again. I'm loving it. I've since become slightly obsessed with specific aspects, have bought multiple books of Joyce scholarship and have Joycean friends. I mentioned to one that I'm enjoying it so much I'm half-way thinking of reading Dubliners again and having a board tying string of characters from one text to the next - or as she put it "a Joyce murder board".

Send help.

[Jacob]

Lol

[Syt]

Checking the opening of Finnegan's Wake I think I'll lay off the Joyce.

https://www.finwake.com/ch01/ch01.htm

   

riverrun, past Eve and Adam's, from swerve of shore to bend
of bay, brings us by a commodius vicus of recirculation back to
Howth Castle and Environs.
    Sir Tristram, violer d'amores, fr'over the short sea, had passen-
core rearrived from North Armorica on this side the scraggy
isthmus of Europe Minor to wielderfight his penisolate war: nor
had topsawyer's rocks by the stream Oconee exaggerated themselse
to Laurens County's gorgios while they went doublin their mumper
all the time: nor avoice from afire bellowsed mishe mishe to
tauftauf thuartpeatrick: not yet, though venissoon after, had a
kidscad buttended a bland old isaac: not yet, though all's fair in
vanessy, were sosie sesthers wroth with twone nathandjoe. Rot a
peck of pa's malt had Jhem or Shen brewed by arclight and rory
end to the regginbrow was to be seen ringsome on the aquaface.
    The fall (bababadalgharaghtakamminarronnkonnbronntonner-
ronntuonnthunntrovarrhounawnskawntoohoohoordenenthur-
nuk!) of a once wallstrait oldparr is retaled early in bed and later
on life down through all christian minstrelsy. The great fall of the

[Bauer]

I read things fall apart in university.  I remember the yams and the fear of twins. Back in those days I think I regarded Africa as a kind of magical foreign place.

But now having married an African woman and been married in her ancestral village ive experienced their culture firsthand.

[Savonarola]

I read that book a few years ago, and I remember very little about it now.  I kinda remember the native African culture as not being very sympathetic. 

Yes, one of the things that I think gives the novel strength is that it doesn't present a romanticized view of pre-colonial Africa.

[Savonarola]

It's a fantastic book and I think a direct response to Heart of Darkness.

Currently I regret to admit that I may becoming a Joycean

I read Ulysses a long time ago for university and enjoyed it a lot but just read it. I recently decided to read it again. I'm loving it. I've since become slightly obsessed with specific aspects, have bought multiple books of Joyce scholarship and have Joycean friends. I mentioned to one that I'm enjoying it so much I'm half-way thinking of reading Dubliners again and having a board tying string of characters from one text to the next - or as she put it "a Joyce murder board".

Send help.

  You'll need "Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man" as well.

I think Dubliners is worth reading in its own right, "The Dead" is one of my favorite long short stories/short novellas.  I'm not that fond of Portrait, but it does tie closely to Ulysses.

[Savonarola]

Checking the opening of Finnegan's Wake I think I'll lay off the Joyce.

https://www.finwake.com/ch01/ch01.htm

   

riverrun, past Eve and Adam's, from swerve of shore to bend
of bay, brings us by a commodius vicus of recirculation back to
Howth Castle and Environs.
    Sir Tristram, violer d'amores, fr'over the short sea, had passen-
core rearrived from North Armorica on this side the scraggy
isthmus of Europe Minor to wielderfight his penisolate war: nor
had topsawyer's rocks by the stream Oconee exaggerated themselse
to Laurens County's gorgios while they went doublin their mumper
all the time: nor avoice from afire bellowsed mishe mishe to
tauftauf thuartpeatrick: not yet, though venissoon after, had a
kidscad buttended a bland old isaac: not yet, though all's fair in
vanessy, were sosie sesthers wroth with twone nathandjoe. Rot a
peck of pa's malt had Jhem or Shen brewed by arclight and rory
end to the regginbrow was to be seen ringsome on the aquaface.
    The fall (bababadalgharaghtakamminarronnkonnbronntonner-
ronntuonnthunntrovarrhounawnskawntoohoohoordenenthur-
nuk!) of a once wallstrait oldparr is retaled early in bed and later
on life down through all christian minstrelsy. The great fall of the

    That's definitely not the place to start with Joyce.

The introduction is the densest part of the text, but most of the rest of the novel is much like that.  I've only made it all the way through once and, even with two guidebooks, maybe understood about half.  (One trick is to read it out loud, as there are dozens of puns on every page.)

[Duque de Bragança]

Checking the opening of Finnegan's Wake I think I'll lay off the Joyce.

https://www.finwake.com/ch01/ch01.htm

   

riverrun, past Eve and Adam's, from swerve of shore to bend
of bay, brings us by a commodius vicus of recirculation back to
Howth Castle and Environs.
    Sir Tristram, violer d'amores, fr'over the short sea, had passen-
core rearrived from North Armorica on this side the scraggy
isthmus of Europe Minor to wielderfight his penisolate war: nor
had topsawyer's rocks by the stream Oconee exaggerated themselse
to Laurens County's gorgios while they went doublin their mumper
all the time: nor avoice from afire bellowsed mishe mishe to
tauftauf thuartpeatrick: not yet, though venissoon after, had a
kidscad buttended a bland old isaac: not yet, though all's fair in
vanessy, were sosie sesthers wroth with twone nathandjoe. Rot a
peck of pa's malt had Jhem or Shen brewed by arclight and rory
end to the regginbrow was to be seen ringsome on the aquaface.
    The fall (bababadalgharaghtakamminarronnkonnbronntonner-
ronntuonnthunntrovarrhounawnskawntoohoohoordenenthur-
nuk!) of a once wallstrait oldparr is retaled early in bed and later
on life down through all christian minstrelsy. The great fall of the

    That's definitely not the place to start with Joyce.

The introduction is the densest part of the text, but most of the rest of the novel is much like that.  I've only made it all the way through once and, even with two guidebooks, maybe understood about half.  (One trick is to read it out loud, as there are dozens of puns on every page.)

Unpractical for public transportation reading. Not just for Joyce, naturally. 

[Sheilbh]

You'll need "Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man" as well.

I think Dubliners is worth reading in its own right, "The Dead" is one of my favorite long short stories/short novellas.  I'm not that fond of Portrait, but it does tie closely to Ulysses.

Agreed I have very fond memories of Dubliners and think The Dead is possibly the best short story in English - I think it's fantastic.

I've read Portrait, but likewise, I wasn't a massive fan. And one o the big shifts reading Ulysses approaching 40 v as an undergraduate is how much more insufferable I find Stephen So I will at some point return to Portrait. But not yet. It is the really weird thing of wanting to go back to Dubliners - but also I'm literally half way through (in chapters, not page-count) and want to basically just start again with the new layer of this reading.

This is how people go mad

  That's definitely not the place to start with Joyce.

The introduction is the densest part of the text, but most of the rest of the novel is much like that.  I've only made it all the way through once and, even with two guidebooks, maybe understood about half.  (One trick is to read it out loud, as there are dozens of puns on every page.)

Yes. Do not start with Finnegans Wake - I think Dubliners is the place to start if you ever have any interest in Joyce because underpinning all the references and stream of consciousness and stylistic playfulness that is associated with Joyce, at the heart he's just a really good writer.

The reading aloud is a good tip for some sections of Ulysses too. There are a lot of puns and gags as you say - I mean even in that first bit of the Wake "The fall (bababadalgharaghtakamminarronnkonnbronntonnerronntuonnthunntrovarrhounawnskawntoohoohoordenenthurnuk!)" is fantastic and very funny.

I think Joyce (and Beckett for that matter) are both funny writers and there's a lot of seriousness about them because there is a lot going on but you always have to keep open to the fact that some of it is just a set of gags.

I read the Wake once as part of a Finnegans Wake reading group. I have no desperate urge to go back to it and remember almost nothing - but I'm glad I did it

Checking the opening of Finnegan's Wake I think I'll lay off the Joyce.

I don't think you can do a spoiler of Finnegans Wake but the last paragraph (the last chapter is a monologue by the main female character, Anna Livia Plurabelle - just as Molly has the last word in Ulysses) flows into the start of the novel. It's a cycle so the final sentence is the beginning and vice versa:

I am passing out. O bitter ending! I'll slip away before they're up. They'll never see. Nor know. Nor miss me. And it's old and old it's sad and old it's sad and weary I go back to you, my cold father, my cold mad father, my cold mad feary father, till the near sight of the mere size of him, the moyles and moyles of it, moananoaning, makes me seasilt saltsick and I rush, my only, into your arms. I see them rising! Save me from those therrble prongs! Two more. Onetwo moremens more. So. Avelaval. My leaves have drifted from me. All. But one clings still. I'll bear it on me. To remind me of. Lff! So soft this morning, ours. Yes. Carry me along, taddy, like you done through the toy fair! If I seen him bearing down on me now under whitespread wings like he'd come from Arkangels, I sink I'd die down over his feet, humbly dumbly, only to washup. Yes, tid. There's where. First. We pass through grass behush the bush to. Whish! A gull. Gulls. Far calls. Coming, far! End here. Us then. Finn, again! Take. Bussoftlhee, mememormee! Till thousendsthee. Lps. The keys to. Given! A way a lone a lost a last a loved a long the

...riverrun, past Adam and Eve's etc.

[Savonarola]

Unpractical for public transportation reading. Not just for Joyce, naturally. 

Just move to New York City.  No one would be alarmed, or even surprised, by a person mumbling about comodius vicus, the prankquaen, quarks, bisexcycles or peasporter on the subway.