Patternmaster
Patternmaster (1976) by
Octavia Butler is a science fiction tale of telepaths in the race to suceed their aging leader. Butler
is (was) one of
my favorite SF writers. I have
posted on her books before.
Others love her too. Her books are always interesting and sometimes plainly weird. I love them. I saw her speak a couple of times and am richer for her words.
The Patternmaster is the leader of the Patternists, the telepaths, and he is getting up there in years. In addition to the Patternists, there are the Mutes, people like you and I who are not telepathic (I am not telepathic, but perhaps, dear reader, you are), and there are the Clayarks, who are part human, and part lion, and have great speed and strength. None of the types of beings gets along especially well with any of the others. Two of the Patternmaster's sons, Coransee and Teray find that they cannot both be alive and live in peace and so they struggle to find which of them will take over from the Patternmaster when he dies.
This is a fun and quick read that challenges assumptions about our daily life while entertaining. No shocking surprises here.
Butler writes so that her fictional world is easy to accept, but then you realize that, hey, this is making me think about my world.
Labels: Butler, fiction, sciencefiction, struggle
Something Rotten
Something Rotten (2004) is
Jasper Fforde’s fourth book in the Thursday Next series. As you know, I
love Jasper Fforde’s books. I have read every one I can get my hands on.
In this installment,
Thursday and her son Friday attempt to get her husband Landen un-eradicated, bring renegade character Yorrick Kaine back to his fictional world – away from the real world of politics, and keep
Hamlet (yes that Hamlet) from wreaking havoc in the real world.
This book is so funny. There is a big surprise (a couple of surprises, actually) right at the end. There are many great details and the story line is handled with a healthy dose of humor throughout. I cannot wait to read the
next book in the series. It came out earlier this year so keep your eyes peeled for a post on it.
Labels: Fforde, fiction, nursery
Organic, INC.
The way we farm our land is a great part of how we interact with our environment. Organic farming practices may be a way we can better live in harmony with the world in which we live. Here is a post in honor of Blog Action Day.
Samuel Fromartz writes about the mainlining of organic foods in
Organic, INC: Natural Foods and How they Grew (2006). This book is great as an initial
mainstream look at organics and how the industry has changed in recent times.
Fromartz approaches the subject from the viewpoint of a consumer initially lured to organic produce due to visual aesthetics. Through interviews with leaders of organizations such as
Organic Valley,
CROPP,
White Wave (Silk brand), and
Earthbound, he strives to show how organic farming has grown into the Organic Food Industrial Complex and how much is lost (ideals, locality), while much is gained (audiences).
This book might be a sort of primer for someone who would like an overview of the organic industry at present day and its roots.
Labels: environment, Fromartz, nonfiction, organic
Death by Pad Thai
Congratulations to Doris Lessing, winner of the 2007 Nobel Prize for Literature.
Death by Pad Thai and Other Unforgettable Meals (2006), a compilation of essays on memorable meals edited by
Douglas Bauer, was a fun light read. There are twenty stories that are brought together by the common themes of food, and great life moments. The stories are not really about the food as much as they are about the life happenings that mixed with the memories of foods or meals.
In one of the essays,
Michelle Huneven’s The Handsome Tutor at Lunch, where the parents meet their daughter’s serious boyfriend for the first time, food is central, but at the same time it is the character’s reactions to the food that takes center stage. The parents make a judgment call (not positive) on the boyfriend (later husband) by his ordering methods, quantity judgments, and gregarious consumption habits. This book is not about the quality of the finely sliced vegetables in a beautiful spring roll, and it is refreshing to escape that book model, fine as it may be.
This book is really about important moments in people’s lives and how
food connects to those memories. It is funny, sad, warming, and weird.
Labels: bauer, fiction, food, nobel
The Big Over Easy
Jasper Fforde is an author who I keep coming back to because I invariably love his work. In
The Big Over Easy, (2005) Fforde begins his new Jack Spratt Investigates series. This is a truly funny book.
Spratt and his new partner Mary Mary investigate the death (by falling off the wall) of
Mr. Humperdink Jehoshaphat Aloysius Stuyvesant van Dumpty, better known as
Humpty Dumpty. They encounter eminently readable rival detectives, members of an insane asylum community, and frightening foot-care conglomerate owners. In the tiny
Nursery Crimes Division, Spratt and Mary work to find the answers behind Humpty Dumpty's suspicious death.
This book has so many references to
nursery rhymes and
tales that every chapter made me laugh for a different reason.
I enjoyed this enough that there will be a few more Jasper Fforde book reviews in coming posts.
Labels: Fforde, fiction, literature, mystery, nursery
