Litsy

Cryoburn | Lois McMaster Bujold

pick

An excellent installment in the Vorkosigan series, in which Miles encounters the seedier side of the cryogenics industry.

#HauntedShelf #ScreamTeam
#OneSnacktoRuleThemAll #AllThingsApple
#BookSpinBingo
#ISpyBingo (orange title)
#PumpkabooHunt (large)
#AfterDarkBingo (corporate dragon)
#BodyCountBingo (meddling kids are useless)
#GottaCatchEmAllSpooky (Gimmighoul: greed)

kwmg40 @ImperfectCJ @Bookwormjillk @TheAromaofBooks @PuddleJumper 4h

Bookwormjillk 🍎 🍎 🍎 3h

13 likes2 comments

stretchkev

Sandkings | George R. R. Martin

pick

An imaginative sci-fi novella that explores the dark side of power, cruelty, and hubris. When a wealthy man acquires alien creatures that worship him and wage wars for his amusement, his sadistic games spiral out of control. Martin masterfully blends psychological horror with speculative science fiction, delivering a story that‘s both disturbing and thought-provoking.

18 likes

big.al.reads

The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy | Douglas Adams

pick

“He felt that his whole life was some kind of dream and he sometimes wondered whose it was and whether they were enjoying it.”

4 likes1 stack add

DrexEdit

Rogue Protocol | Martha Wells

pick

I am late to the Murderbot Diaries craze, but I'm tearing through them all now.

37 likes

Bookwomble

The Killing Thing | Kate Wilhelm

Ok, here's hoping this classic sci-fi novel suits better than my last book, which I bailed on.

Man versus revenge-filled robot ??? As it's Kate Wilhelm, I expect there to be some nuance and underlying message, rather than just Space Opera "pew-pew" ??

34 likes

vlwelser

The Memory Collectors: A Novel | Dete Meserve

pick

Another time travel book. This was surprisingly good. It's more mystery than anything else.

#BookSpinBingo @TheAromaofBooks

TheAromaofBooks Woohoo!!! 3d

31 likes1 comment

PaperbackPirate

Galactic Pot-Healer | Philip K. Dick

so-so

This was my second Dick (I loved Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep!). I read this one for the #ClassicLSFBC .
I liked how it started, but the second half of the book had too many unreliable narrators and characters so it got kind of confusing for me. Fortunately there were a lot of humorous moments.
🏺🏺🏺

Thank you @RamsFan1963 !

🌧️ Photo taken last Saturday morning. I got to read on the porch while it rained - such a nice fall experience!

AnnCrystal Reading to the music of rain 🌧️🤩📚😍🌧️💝. 3d

PaperbackPirate The best, right @AnnCrystal ?! 🙌💙🌧️📚 1d

AnnCrystal @PaperbackPirate absolutely 🌧️😍🌧️. 20h

34 likes3 comments

Texreader

Dawn | Octavia E. Butler

My next audiobook. I‘ve enjoyed everything I‘ve read by Octavia Butler. I‘m hoping it continues. #authoramonth @Soubhiville

Soubhiville I love this cover! 4d

52 likes1 stack add1 comment

Robotswithpersonality

The Naked Sun | Isaac Asimov

pick

Another banger! This series does not disappoint.
The mystery was twistier than first anticipated, the personal growth of the main character was authentically balanced by his own ingrained biases. The exploration of an alternate future for mankind on an alien world was absorbing in theory if somewhat disturbing in practice. 1/?

Robotswithpersonality 2/? I was surprised by how much Daneel ended up being sidelined, but this novel is much more an exploration of how humans might choose to change as a society with the aid of robots than a story of the robots themselves. 4d

Robotswithpersonality 3/? Insofar as, from a current perspective, The Caves of Steel tells of a future Earth crammed with people who live in supercities to manage resources, and under dome/underground ostensibly to protect from less hospitable elements, The Naked Sun tells of another somewhat dystopian future, where people act like they're permanently in pandemic lockdown, not because there is a physical threat, but because isolation as societal foundation has been 4d

Robotswithpersonality 4/? judged a good and is programmed into the remote raising of future generations. Speaking of the remote raising, the Solarian perspective, its coldness even revulsion towards children alongside its primacy of genetic superiority, its championing of eugenics, lends their 'alien way of life' extra creepiness. (edited) 4d

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Robotswithpersonality 5/? I love that a society so heavily dependent yet casually presumptive about the use of robots is singled out to demonstrate behaviour that feels robotic: avoiding human contact. As much as you get the easy parallel sense of the robotic nature of Solarians compared to more earthy humans from Earth, it makes for an even better contrast for Baley's final argument, the ultimate conclusion that Solarians and Earthmen both have a restrictive, 4d

Robotswithpersonality 7/? traditional way of life that threatens long-term survival, that needs changing.

The plot contains something of an inversion of the previous exploration of the limitations of the three laws seen in I, Robot, it's not about what the robot might try to do when given an order by humans that involves a unique interpretation of the three laws, but more an affirmation of the First Law and what the robot will suffer if it inadvertently is involved 4d

Robotswithpersonality 8/? in breaking it.

Is it ableist to give a robot a lisp and a limp after it suffers brain damage from accidently killing a human?
It definitely feels racist that Baley consistently calls the robots 'boy' while they are required to call him and all humans 'master'. Historically those are terms bound up in the enslavement and oppression of Black people. 4d

Robotswithpersonality 9/? Baley may be coming to more enlightened conclusions about the future of humanity in each book but his prejudice against robots remains strong.
It's interesting to see it paralleled with his fear of open sky, not to belittle agoraphobia, but he's a part of a generation of humans who have learned to live and find comfort and shelter in close quarters, scrounging for better jobs and living conditions, and the robots act upon his subconscious 4d

Robotswithpersonality 10/? in a similar manner, possible they might take his job, possible they might harm him physically. His fears are a result of his circumstances.
For all that,to the reader, there are aspects that feel like paradise, (more space, more greenery) Solaris has particular phobias developed by the way they choose to live as well: no contact and resulting revulsion for all things related to procreation or personal proximity and given the growth in 4d

Robotswithpersonality 11/? isolation, perhaps a legitimate fear around foreign contagion. They are as likely to be as repulsed by their fellow man as Baley is by robots.
Again: societal conditioning developing ignorance that quite obviously needs to be rectified. 4d

Robotswithpersonality 12/? Unsurprisingly the female characters got short shrift again: one is marked out for a displeasing physical appearance and flaw of flaws: lack of maternal instincts, another is somewhere between femme fatale and damsel in distress, gets an almost decent amount of time on page...to be objectified by the male lead. She is sensual to a degree that her society finds offensive, and makes her more sympathetic to the hetero detective. The bulk of her 4d

Robotswithpersonality 13/? actions are emotional displays of one kind or another. 🙄

I will give partial credit for her role in the painting with light scene. The aesthetic worked for me, and its moment of vulnerability and introspection, for Baley, of course, about his own mental blocks. I loved the internal made external, his wish to see a different version of himself in self-portrait than he's yet to live up to galvanizing him to take action against a fear that 4d

Robotswithpersonality 14/14 looms large.

Maybe there's hope for humanity after all.

⚠️child abuse, bigotry, racism 4d

9 likes12 comments

Kenyazero

Of Thunder & Lightning | Kimberly Wang

so-so

Two cybernetic supersoldiers battle in a hyper-sensationalized war where they are treated like pop idols. This was unsettling and I found it hard to follow. I don‘t think I got out of it what the author was going for. #comics #war #LGBTQIA

Kenyazero Used for #LGBTQIA2025 AAPI author; #GottaCatchEmAll Raticate: cute but deadly character @puddlejumper; and #OwlHouseReadathon Terra Snapdragon: characters are pitted against each other 4d

16 likes1 comment

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