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Io9 published (about a month ago, what can I say, I’m working on a backlog), an article on the novels that originated their own science fiction sub genres.  A few are obvious ones (Neuromancer and Cyberpunk, Frankenstein and Gothic Science Fiction.)   Others are a bit more obscure, at least as far as my experience.

As expected the comments are filled with suggestions on alternate books to fill the various categories.  Interesting stuff!

Worth reading is the link to the ‘cranky essay’ looking further in cyberpunk.  (Relinked here.)

I mentioned that week that I had read a book about terraforming worlds.

Very cool, very interesting, very inspiring.  I kind of want to start.    Let’s start raising the albedo of Mars.  Why can’t we get this ball rolling? Let’s do this.

It’s all very far in the future, of course and even having read the book I don’t trust myself to try to explain the process.  Instead…read the book!  It’s pretty great.

Also before I sign out: Time Dilation – Albert Einstein and the Theory of Relativity

Just something cool I found while doing a bit of research.

My interest in The Seeker came when I was looking up and down the lists of Hugo and Nebula award winners and I wanted to find a book that looked like it might be similar to my own.  The Seeker has a futuristic world set in a distant, but imaginable future (six or so thousand years out), a distinctly unmilitant protagonist, a fair amount of futuristic culture, and a pretty catchy name.  I bought it off amazon and earlier this week happened to finally take it out of the box.

The Seeker?  Good name?  I don’t know maybe.  Female protagonist, male writer?  Seem legitimate?  Maybe.  Might push it a bit.  My restaurant is cooler than that one…

There’s not much for me to really review.  I went through the story picking out bits of description I loved and ransacked it for things that my own story does better. (I hope.)  It’s a bit pompous, but I think my own writing style has more than a few similarities to Mr. McDevitts.  Probably not true, but I’ve love it if it was.

The Seeker is fairly standard science fiction fare as far as the book goes.  It’s bulky, few hundred pages, and a good chunk of that is describing the world.  It’s part of a series or shared world so a few of the characters exist already.  They’ve been described by Alex Benedict, the protagonists boss, seems to get far more a second billing than I would he maybe should in a book that caries his name as a subtitle.  The actual protagonist though, Chase Kolpath is pretty handy in a pinch and a scrappy enjoyable partner.  She seems a bit like Archie Goodwin to Nero Wolfe, except Benedict is far more personable (though quite a bit less brilliant.)

The story seems to stretch itself in a few places.  The antagonist gets discovered rather late in the book and they seem to have acted well beyond any reasonable motivation, but the actual search, (It is named the Seeker afterall) is plausible and enthralling.

Will I read another Jack McDevitt book, another Alex Benedict book?  Maybe, but not soon.  My own writing is too similar for me.  I’ve got too much of my own book to work through, but I wouldn’t pass that along as a slight.  If I can get my book together half as well as The Seeker, I’ll have done rather well.

I’m plowing through my stack of books pretty quickly.  I’m almost done with The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaimon, but I’ll probably hold off reviewing it until next week.