The Colour of Magic, by Terry Pratchett

An audio book.

Having heard of Mr. Pratchett's recent death, and having read much praise and regret from his readers and friends, and having heard of him in the past, though dimly and filed somewhere in the outer reaches of my little brain, I thought I should perhaps find out what all the buzz is about.

The first hour of listening to this book has already answered that. I have a familiar happy and comfortable feeling with this text that reminds me of the days when I read the works of Douglas Adams, another sorely missed Englishman.

Here's an interesting Guardian article in which the question is asked, is The Colour of Magic a good introduction to Terry Pratchett?

Based on this novel, I don't know how much farther I'll go with Pratchett. His reputation is such that perhaps I should give him more of a try. The novel is not bad, but it is just a little bit silly.

MaddAddam, by Margaret Atwood

This is the third part of a trilogy that began with Oryx & Crake,  and continued with The Year of the Flood. I was pleased to find that the book began with a brief recap of the first two books, as it's been quite some time since I read them. In this one, we find the surviving humans along with some modified-humans (The Crakers), and many another interesting life-form in the post-chaos world.

A lot of the book is made up of flashbacks into Zeb's life, back to the time when he and Adam were half-brothers living with their father, "The Rev." This is pre-Flood, at the height of Corporate power in Atwood's future Earth.

Atwood's writing is, as always, unintrusive, economical, precise, and entertaining.

What could be a drab indictment of the present environmental atrocities committed all about us is kept alive as a very readable story by the interesting and sympathetic characters she has created in this trilogy.

Be advised: one is not left with a warm, fuzzy view of the future.

NY Times Sunday Book Review

Margaret Atwood's Web Site

Future Dramatization of the Trilogy

Neuromancer, by William Gibson

Read maybe 1/3, couldn't finish it. It's too vague, the opposite of the book by Greg Egan that I recently tried to read, which had too much exposition. This one doesn't have enough, there's too much assumption that the reader will just figure out what's going on, and I fail to live up to this assumption. I was disappointed,  having recently very much enjoyed 3 other novels by Gibson.

Diaspora, by Greg Egan

I became bogged down in the thick swamp of exposition at the beginning of this novel. No doubt there are people who will disagree with me, but this is no way to write. I gave up in the first ten pages.