The short story "Waldo", follows James Stevens and the circumstances which lead to his meeting with Waldo.
Waldo is a reclusive genius who is contracted to discover why a piece of standard technology continues to fail. In his research he discovers that the source of magic is another dimension. Upon this discovery he repairs the technology, creates access to clean and free energy and heals his body of its genetic muscle weakness.
Upside
The descriptions of technology are very vivid, especially the waldoes and Freehold
The description of the science and the analogies used to describe it are easy to grasp
Downside
The beginning is confusing
For some reason I found it hard to keep the names straight for quite a while
Saturday, 18 February 2017
Tuesday, 7 February 2017
Nightfall - Isaac Asimov & Robert Silverberg
"Nightfall" is based on a popular short story of the same name published in 1941. The novel is broken into three parts: Twilight, Nightfall, Daybreak.
Twilight begins introducing all the main characters separately and their individual discoveries. Slowly the characters begin to meet and share information at the University which leads them to believe that their world of Kalgash with six suns will experience darkness on a global scale. This understanding leads the characters to Nightfall a year later and together for the event that will change the planet's understanding of the world. Never having experienced night the planet had never seen stars. In the darkness people panicked but the appearance of stars brought the population to madness. Daybreak is the experience of the characters as they regain sanity and move about the planet in a new society governed by crazies.
Upside
The premise of a whole planet experiencing night for the first time together and discovering the existence of stars
Sheerin is just an enjoyable character
It is really fascinating Sci-Fi as there isn't any Science that doesn't already exist on Earth
The forward by Asimov and Silverberg explaining that it is an alien planet but the translated to English terms so it would be easier for the reader to understand
Downside
Nightfall section lost momentum when it jumped nearly a year in time
The names are so different it really took me a while to get the characters straight
The reveal about Mondior at the end didn't have as much punch as I am sure it was supposed to just based on the fact I have read other similar reveals recently
Twilight begins introducing all the main characters separately and their individual discoveries. Slowly the characters begin to meet and share information at the University which leads them to believe that their world of Kalgash with six suns will experience darkness on a global scale. This understanding leads the characters to Nightfall a year later and together for the event that will change the planet's understanding of the world. Never having experienced night the planet had never seen stars. In the darkness people panicked but the appearance of stars brought the population to madness. Daybreak is the experience of the characters as they regain sanity and move about the planet in a new society governed by crazies.
Upside
The premise of a whole planet experiencing night for the first time together and discovering the existence of stars
Sheerin is just an enjoyable character
It is really fascinating Sci-Fi as there isn't any Science that doesn't already exist on Earth
The forward by Asimov and Silverberg explaining that it is an alien planet but the translated to English terms so it would be easier for the reader to understand
Downside
Nightfall section lost momentum when it jumped nearly a year in time
The names are so different it really took me a while to get the characters straight
The reveal about Mondior at the end didn't have as much punch as I am sure it was supposed to just based on the fact I have read other similar reveals recently
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