Tau Zero by Poul Anderson

Posted by melydia on October 23, 2012 1 comment

Tau Zero by Poul Anderson: A group of scientists are in a spaceship bound for a far planet, some thirty light-years away. And while they cannot travel faster than the speed of light, the time dilation considerably shortens their trip. Due to the mechanism driving their speed, separate engines are required for deceleration. When these decelerators are broken after a collision with a rogue nebula, the crew find themselves accelerating faster and faster, while the time difference between them and the rest of the universe continues to grow. This is my first time reading a science fiction novel that really deals with the relativistic effects of space travel, and I found that part of it fascinating. The interactions between crew members, on the other hand, were far less interesting. I did notice, however, that when someone in a relationship was unfaithful, it was always the woman. Funny, that. But hey, if you can get past the often dated gender roles, it’s a pretty decent story of survival.

Also posted on BookCrossing.

ATC Sunday

Posted by melydia on October 21, 2012 No comment


Yes, I know she’s way too dark, but my purple options were limited at the time.

A Study in Scarlet by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

Posted by melydia on October 19, 2012 1 comment

A Study in Scarlet by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (unabridged audiobook read by David Timson; 4 hrs 45 min on 4 discs): I confess, I was mostly interested in reading this after seeing the episode of the new BBC series Sherlock inspired by it, “A Study in Pink”. (And then I promptly re-watched the episode and understood a whole bunch more of the jokes.) The first part is fairly straightforward, starting with the meeting of Holmes and Watson and following through a couple of murder investigations that appear to be linked. Once they’ve caught the criminal, there’s a huge shift in narrative and suddenly we’re in Utah with evil Mormons. It was almost too random to be offensive, really. This turns out to be the backstory and motive of the killer, but it takes a while before that’s evident. I am hesitant to offer this up as a good introduction to Sherlock Holmes, since it is so dated, but the mystery part of it is actually quite fun. Definitely going to have to pick up some more of Holmes’s adventures.

Surely You’re Joking, Mr. Feynman! by Richard P. Feynman

Posted by melydia on October 16, 2012 No comment

Surely You’re Joking, Mr. Feynman! by Richard P. Feynman (unabridged audiobook read by Raymond Todd; 11.5 hrs on 10 discs): From his early days fixing radios by thinking to safecracking while working on the Manhattan Project to playing bongos in Brazil, Richard Feynman is certainly never short of a good story. I was especially amused by his attempt to enlist in the military. My only real complaint was how short the whole thing was on his main passion, science. Then again, that could be something to recommend it, since you are pretty much guaranteed to understand what’s going on. If you are easily shocked, you might want to skip this one – he’s pretty frank about his feelings about pretty girls, for example – but all in all I was quite entertained by his antics.

Also posted on BookCrossing.

ATC Sunday

Posted by melydia on October 14, 2012 No comment

Marly’s Ghost by David Levithan and Brian Selznick

Posted by melydia on October 12, 2012 No comment

Marly’s Ghost by David Levithan, illustrated by Brian Selznick: In this “remix” of Dickens’s classic Christmas Carol, teenaged Ben must cope with his girlfriend’s death by being visited by the spirits of love past, present, and future. The idea was clever, and it was fun picking out which characters were which from the original story, but the re-used dialogue was out of place, coming across as stilted and meaningless. If Levithan had either always had the characters speaking like Dickens or paraphrased the original lines, it would have been smoother. All the same, I enjoyed this short book, and the illustrations were nice.

Also posted on BookCrossing.

A Swiftly Tilting Planet by Madeleine L’Engle

Posted by melydia on October 9, 2012 No comment

A Swiftly Tilting Planet by Madeleine L’Engle (unabridged audiobook read by the author; 7 hrs 19 min on 6 discs): Years have passed since the last books; now Charles Wallace is in high school and Meg is married and pregnant. When the President calls with concerns about nuclear war with the (fictional) South American country of Vespugia, Meg’s mother-in-law gives Charles Wallace an ancient rune that seems to control weather, and charges him to stop the war. Charles ends up traveling through time, following the lineage of ancient Welsh settlers. This was probably my favorite of the series so far. I got a little sick of hearing the rune over and over, but all in all I enjoyed the unweaving of the legend. Recommended for fans of time travel fiction, and I don’t think one needs to have read the previous books to appreciate this one.

A note on the audio: L’Engle has a strange way of pronouncing “nothing.” She separates the syllables: nuth-thing. It’s just a little odd.

Also posted on BookCrossing.

ATC Sunday

Posted by melydia on October 7, 2012 1 comment

Help Support Markeroni!

Posted by melydia on October 6, 2012 No comment

As you may know, Markeroni is one of my favorite hobbies. Because of it I’ve visited some fascinating new places and learned so much (not least of which how the Civil War was really the beards vs. the mustaches). I love hunting for historical markers. I even wrote a Squidoo article about it. Well, what you may not know is that this great site is run by two people on truly ancient computers, and they need your help to bring the site into the 21st century! Every little bit helps, even just spreading the word. Click here to learn more.

The Suspicions of Mr. Whicher by Kate Summerscale

Posted by melydia on October 5, 2012 No comment

The Suspicions of Mr. Whicher by Kate Summerscale: In 1860, a child was murdered in a grisly fashion and the case more or less inspired all of detective fiction. Mr. Whicher was the detective on the case, whose unorthodox and – by Victorian standards – extremely intrusive investigative style ruffled many feathers and caused a nationwide sensation. The details and public reactions were fascinating, as were the quotes from various detective novels of the day, most of which were clearly based on Mr. Whicher and this case. Not something I normally would have picked up, not being a mystery or true crime buff, but this was truly interesting. Recommended.

Also posted on BookCrossing.

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