Culturally speaking

[andrewducker]

[Poll #1634488]

Comments

[ashfae.livejournal.com]

*PlayerofGamesisaninferiorknockoffofEnder'sGamerantrantrant*

...I'll spare you the real rant. *wry gryn* I did like Excession, though I imagine it would've made more sense if I read more Culture novels. I really should.

[andrewducker]

I can't see any way in which Player Of Games is an inferior knock off of Ender's Game. The two plots are entirely different.

Spoilers ahoy for those who mind.

[ashfae.livejournal.com]

The main plot twist is the same; main character thinks he's playing a game when in actually he's the focal point of a war.

[andrewducker]

Oh, and I haven't read any of the Vorkosigan books, but I've heard people rave about them. I'll add them to the list! Where should I start?

[makyo.livejournal.com]

Where should I start?
This is a slightly tricky question: the books were written in a different order to their internal chronology. I've only read three of them so far, but found that reading Komarr and A Civil Campaign in that order made sense; a while later I read Memory, which is set before Komarr, so that's probably also a good place to start. People who've read more of them (something which I intend to do) tell me that they're reasonably self-contained and reading them out of chronological sequence doesn't detract noticeably from the enjoyment.

[fjm.livejournal.com]

With Shards of Honour. Cordelia and Aral are wonderful and if you don't read Shards of Honour you have to skip Barraryar and that would be a tragedy.

[autopope.livejournal.com]

"Player of Games" is not a knock-off of "Ender's Game".

It's worth looking at the copyright dates. PoG was published in 1988 in hardcover, but will have been written earlier, so we're talking a submission date in 1987 and written pre-1987 -- according to interviews, based off an earlier version written in 1979.

EG was published in book length in 1985.

You can argue that Iain might have read EG in short (novelette) form as it was first published in Analog in 1977, but let's note that Analog's circulation in Scotland in the 1970s was approximately zero. Subsequently it won the Hugo and Nebula in 1978, but unless I'm very much mistaken its first UK publication was in "Unaccompanied Sonata and other stories" which was published in the US in 1981 and, I think, a year or two later in the UK. (I had a copy; not sure where it is right now, so I can't check.)

Anyway, unless Iain had a source of exotic imported magazines in 1977, he almost certainly hadn't read "Ender's Game" when he first wrote "The Player of Games". By the time the novel-length version came out it's another matter, but the game plot in PoG is so central that I doubt it was a late addition.

[burkesworks.livejournal.com]

Much prefer Banksy's literary fiction, though that comes as no surprise to those who know me and my famous indifference towards sf.

[andrewducker]

Remind me next week and I'll do a staight-fic one then.

I suspect it'll show that everyone loves The Wasp Factory->Complicity and then it's all downhill. But we'll see!

[naath.livejournal.com]

Playing favourites is TOO HARD :-) I think use of weapons narrowly wins out because I <3 Sma.

[the-gardener.livejournal.com]

So I'm now four Culture novels behind. Heigh-ho!

[andrewducker]

Inversions is fun, but not a strongly Culture-based book (you could read it and not know it's a Culture novel if you weren't paying attention).

I really enjoyed both Look To Windwards and Surface Detail. Matter was good, but never quite grabbed me in the same way.

[cartesiandaemon.livejournal.com]

I've read several, but can never remember which title goes with which book... :)

[andrewducker]

That's why I left a link in the first question!

[ninebelow.livejournal.com]

So Inversions and Matter are both the least read and least liked. I'm unsurprised. I am a bit surprised that Excession is winning though.

Argh, and why has LJ changed the stats on checkbox polls? So irritating.

[andrewducker]

Yeah, I thought Player Of Games would take it. I mean, I love Excession, but PoG always seemed to have a broader appeal.

[andrewducker]

And yes, complete stats fail. I'll wait until people stop filling them in and then produce a table myself.

[momentsmusicaux.livejournal.com]

Inversions I thought was dull. Matter was okay, though perhaps I liked it better than I would have simply because I was refreshed to not be disappointed by it!

Excession I don't like much.

[matgb]

Huh.

I checked Wiki just to remind myself of plots, and find tow Culture books I hadn't read. How have I managed that?

Time to logon to the library website then.

[andrewducker]

I think gained them in the last Time War. Lost a couple of Shakespearian sonnets at the same time, but that seems like a fair exchange to me.

[draconid.livejournal.com]

I'm in the middle of my first (but not THE first) culture novel. I'm loving it so far. Just wish it hadn't taken me so long to discover them!

[holyoutlaw.livejournal.com]

Can't pick a favorite out of the first three, but Excession is definitely my least favorite of them all. Inversions started the climb back up, with Look To Windward being better than Matter. Haven't read Surface Detail yet, might during the quarter break.

Blurb for Of The City Of The Saved...

[andrewhickey.livejournal.com]

THE DEAD SHALL BE RAISED – INCORRUPTIBLE?

Beyond the end of time humanity lives on, its every member resurrected by unknown and unfathomable technologies. Its new domain – a single urban sprawl whose street-plan is as broad as a spiral galaxy – has been provocatively dubbed “The City of the Saved”. Back in the Universe a history-collapsing War may rage between inhuman cultures; but here the dead of every human species, from tool-wielding australopithecines to posthuman philosopher-gods, live afterlives of perfect serenity.

Now, nearly three centuries have passed since Resurrection Day. Few Citizens give any thought to the City’s Founders, the so-called “Secret Architects”, and their inscrutable motives – certainly not Laura Tobin, a private investigator from one of the more embarrassing Districts. Tobin has been contracted by Godfather Avatar, an antlered and sardonic elder statesman of Faction Paradox, to investigate the inexplicable murder of Councillor Ved Mostyn – an event which ought, within the City’s bounds, to have been strictly impossible.

Meanwhile, a City-born Neanderthal named Julian White Mammoth Tusk has been charged with locating the Lost Planet of Erath, thought to lie in one of the City’s larger Parks; the eminent comparative humanologist Dr Melicia Clutterbuck finds herself organising a guerilla war within the secessionist District of Manfold; and Urbanus Ignotus, a junior accountant in his family’s lucrative gladiatorial business, will soon become embroiled in the disorienting world of industrial espionage.

Featuring political conspiracy, space combat, nameless creeping horror and a cast of undecillions, Of the City of the Saved... is the second in the series of original Faction Paradox novels.

Re: Blurb for Of The City Of The Saved...

[andrewducker]

I shouldn't start with book one?

[avatar.livejournal.com]

Good on you for adding the none of the above/I haven't read any options for people like me who can't resist clicking through polls!