Dune Messiah (Dune Saga #2) by Herbert

I read this book quickly and it didn't give me any reason to think deeply about anything.

I will say, though, that it was much better than I thought it would be.  It doesn't have the same depth as the first book, but it's still on OK read.  After reading Dune I saw a quote from Herbert: "The bottom line of the Dune trilogy is: beware of heroes."  The second book makes a little more sense if you keep that in mind.

The Ghost in Love by Carroll

This is a weird novel.

I guess you could say it's two stories at the same time - the story of a breakup and the story of man's interactions with his own self and life cycle.

It's hard to describe much without spoilers, because it is one heck of a weird story.  There are ghosts, talking dogs, time travel, near-death experiences, and all manner of odd and cheesy-sounding characters and plots.  But, for the most part it works.

The best reason I can give to recommend this book is that this is the type of book I usually hate but I finished it in an evening and was quite moved by it.  The plot is kinda stupid, and the last 10% of the book feels utterly ridiculous while reading it.  However, the way Carroll describes small things about people, the way they choose to express sadness and the way they store and talk about their memories, was great.  I really felt like I could feel the heartbreak or joy of the characters.  For that reason alone it's worth a read, as long as one isn't expecting anything else.

Dune by Herbert

I read this book before, maybe ten years ago, and have counted it among my favorites ever since.  Reading through a second time, I realized how many things I missed in my first reading and that this book is a lot more interesting than I thought.  In my younger years, my skills as a reader and a thinker were not as good, and rereading Dune reminds me of my desire to reread many of the books I read in my teen years.  Also, it supports my belief that young people shouldn't be urged to ingest literature before they are capable of getting something out of it. (Even better example: The Scarlet Letter.)

One thing that is done very well in this book is the balance between plot and description.  This is one of my personal pet peeves about so many writers, that they provide so many details to set a scene or establish a mood but I as a reader don't feel convinced that they are worth my time and energy to take in.  Also I feel that the reader should be given the freedom of a little wiggle room for the imagination; if the details are not relevant, then the author does the reader a disservice by fixing them.  In many books I skip/skim a paragraph if I realize that it's describing a character looking at a fence, or describing the room in which a meeting takes place, or some other stupid little thing.  In Dune, I really felt like I received a rich setting, and I could easily imagine in my mind the places and people in the novel, but I wasn't bogged down.  Somehow the writer earned my trust that each paragraph was worth reading, and I did very little skimming.

I also enjoyed the subtle politics and relationships that are a central part of this book.  What does it take to deceive someone?  What does it take to inspire perfect loyalty? When does logical reaction to the odds turn into treachery? When does a man stop being a son, lover, warrior and start being his own legend?

A couple negative things: the book is very heavy on its internal system of religion, legend, and prophecy, which can be a bit tedious at times.  The end was not satisfying, it seems clear that Herbert had the sequels in mind when he finished this book.  I haven't read the sequels before, but I will, even though I'm always a little afraid of reading sequels.  If I like the first book enough to want to read the second, I don't want to have my experience of it ruined by a crappy follow-up.

A small note: I noticed he took some things from real existing religions of course, but I wonder how my reaction to his using the word jihad for something in the book is different from the reaction he intended back in the 60s?

Don Quixote by Cervantes

This is the first book I purchased with my new audible.com subscription.  I thought it would be a good choice for audio because I've already tried to read it and found it way too long-winded to hold my attention.  I always wanted to read it though, because of its reputation and importance in the history of literature.

Don Quixote was originally published in two parts in the 1600s.  It tells the story of Don Quixote, a dude who decides to be a knight, and his squire Sancho Panza, and all the wacky situations they get themselves into.

The narrator (the reader of the audiobook) actually brings a lot to this - DQ is really funny at times, a fact which was less apparent to me in reading it, and I think it had a lot to do with the voices he chose for the characters and his own accent.  It had me feeling like I was listening to a 40-hour episode of Monty Python.  Also, I was able to focus on the humor of the story since I didn't feel like I was wasting my life reading unnecessary flowery phrases.

So, once I got into it I realized that DQ is really entertaining.  Some of the jokes seemed a bit old and cheesy but this book is about 400 years old and had a huge influence over subsequent media, so of course I wasn't going to see something new.

Beyond the comedy, I really enjoyed the relationship between DQ and Sancho and the way it changes over time.  These two characters are very well developed and we see both their goodness and asshattery.

The end was a little disappointing, somehow I expected a little better end for such a well-crafted story, but considering that it's about 2% of the book I can easily forgive it.

All in all I'm glad I finally finished the book, but it's definitely not for the faint of heart, and I won't be reading it again.

Brave New World by Huxley

(Blog note: I'm trying to write more meaningful posts from here on out for the following reasons: to force me to think more about what I'm reading, to get a little writing practice, and just in case anyone else reads this blog in the future.  Considering this, posts may not be in order of finishing, and may get edited a bunch - I haven't written non-technical pieces in a long time!)

This classic by Huxley was published in 1931.  It's made multiple "best novels" lists and judging by my experience working at a bookstore, it must be typical reading for some college courses (we always had this book in stock, in higher quantities than many others in the same category).  Surely it's well-studied and excessively analyzed by experts.  My goal here is not academic, but to give an outline of how this casual reader experienced the novel.

Brave New World falls into the genre of dystopian novels since it describes a future world which Huxley must have assumed the reader would find undesirable, if not alarming.  People live in a drug-soaked haze of total comfort, with no unmet desires.  Originality, individuality, emotional attachment, frugality, and nature itself are among the things vocally despised by the citizens of this future London.  The pleasure of sex has been severed from emotion and reproduction (which is taken care of in giant factories), and people are encouraged to have sex frequently and swap partners frequently.  The baby factories are just the beginning of a mass-produced life cycle; dozens of identical humans are bred to perform their function perfectly, then conditioned chemically and through sleep-learning to be happily conformist.  Even though higher-level persons are well aware of this conditioning, they do not fight it but rather embrace it.

Into this world comes John the Savage, who is found in the uncivilized zone by slightly rebellious Bernard and brought back to London.  John's reaction to the society around him is the main focus of the second half of the book.

I think the main point of this book is to show us the future setting that Huxley envisioned.  We often imagine how a catastrophic war or environmental disaster could bring an end to happiness as we know it, but there is more than one way to skin a cat, as they say.  Huxley shows us how the complete opposite - lack of any struggle whatsoever - could also bring about our downfall.

Personally I didn't particularly enjoy reading this, although I truly wanted to because I liked the premise. The writing style just didn't click with me, it really felt like I was reading something for english class.  If you want to read about depressing things happening in the future (here I am lumping together dystopian and post-apocalyptic novels) then I can attest to more enjoyable options.

Cryptonomicon by Stephenson

World War II spy activity, modern-day (ok, ten-year-old) tech excitement, wacky characters and some wacky math thrown in for good measure. This pretty much sums up Cryptonomicon, written by Neal Stephenson in 1999.

I have to say that for the first 20% or so of the book I wasn't particularly interested in any of the characters or plotlines. The beginning is a bit tedious for my taste*, and quite honestly most of the characters aren't immediately likable. It's more of an ensemble cast but perhaps the main character is Randy Waterhouse, an educated computer guy who lives in California with an academic girlfriend, some really geeky friends, and the kind of "whatever" attitude so common to middle-class white dudes living in California, and I never really connected with him. However, the episodic nature of this book (it flips back and forth between WWII and 1990s) made it easy reading for public transport so I stuck with it.

Later on I found myself almost missing my stops and reading at other times too. The plot is really cool and some of the characters are a lot more interesting than they first seem. Of course some plot twists are a little ridiculous but on the whole I found this to be an exciting and interesting read.

This is the first Stephenson novel I've read, and I am surprised how much I liked it.  Usually, I can't stand long-winded authors and this man definitely likes to write long books.  I'm planning to check out others of his in the future.

*I must fess up to uncomfortability when authors try to sneak popularized mathematics into otherwise fine novels - and I am a mathematical cryptographer so it's not a matter of understanding.

The Mists of Avalon by Bradley

Reading this book is a very personal and heart-wrenching experience for me. It's my second time through this story, and it was just as powerful as the first time. I see so much of myself and the people in my life in the characters, and I can't help but get really into it. The religious themes mimic my own personal journey on that topic. I cannot even consider this book on a literary level because the content is just too personal.

Anna Karenina by Tolstoy

(finished Oct 2009)

I read this book very quickly, and at the time I felt that I couldn't wait to finish it.  But now having finished it, I miss it very much.  Tolstoy's style is unobtrusive, just the way I like it.  I still don't know how to feel about any of the characters, and I like that very much too.  Also, I have absolutely no desire to get married after reading this book.  Every wife is nagging and annoying, every husband a bit of a sissy.

The Alchemist by Coelho

(finished August 2009)

I can see why this is such a popular book.  Written like an old legend or something, it's like the literary equivalent of a warm blanket on a cold night.  Very uplifting.