Supremacy

Bourne Supremacy is a wrap. As was the case with Identity the movie diverged from the book in major ways. What began to strike me, however, was the way that it stayed true to the theme of the book. Although Russia in the movie replaces China, the "big bad" in each case has the same MO and level of access. I still think that the movies went a wise route in cutting Jason Bourne off from the CIA and making his life one of running instead of teaching.

Partially this change was created by the age factor. In the books, Bourne starts in late middle age and runs quickly toward early old age. The switch to Matt Damon made the "old" Bourne a no-go and created a younger face for the franchise. It also helped to cut out the family man aspect of the books. This made the movies much more exciting to watch and faster paced.

The books in turn benefited from the older Bourne. Ludlum's Bourne wrote better about Bourne as he made him older and more of a family man. In Bourne Supremacy Ludlum's Bourne is altogether more readable than he was in Identity. I'll follow up on this theme in my review on Bourne Ultimatum, but briefly, as Bourne became more like Ludlum the writing of his character became more and more nuanced. As these details increased, Bourne as a character became more and more readable.

Identity

I finished up Bourne Identity two days ago. I found it a passable thriller, but not as good as Le Carre or sadly, the movie. In the long time that I've read books and seen spin off movies this has only happened once before. In that case it was The Hunt for Red October. A vastly more enjoyable movie than book. Something about the way that the submarines moved in the ocean was much clearer in the movie than it was on the printed page. Usually I prefer my own vision of what a novel's events are, and most of my favorite writers are damn good at helping me to create that vision. The submarines in Red October defied my ability to see them as well as the movie could present them to me.

In this case Identity the film was close to but not lifted straight from the source book. They moved the movie to a two sided affair instead of the three way game of intrigue in the book. This allowed the film to concentrate much more on the two things that made it stand out so well from the pack. First, it brought to the forefront the relationship between Bourne and Marie. This humanized Bourne and made him a character that was much easier to root for than the Bourne in the book.

The second focus was the real winner for the movie over the book. The flashbacks that Bourne underwent as he tried to regain his memory. In the book Ludlum rushes through these moments, concentrating on using them to push along the plot of the book. The movie humanizes these moments, they become personal experiences of Bourne that the viewer gets to share. These interactions drew me into the movie and made me relate with the characters. It also made the plot much more vivid. Bourne's unknowing was the key to the film, in the book it's discarded whenever it becomes inconvenient.

There be Dragons

I finished up the first three books in Naomi Novik's Temeraire series last week. They were enjoyable if fluff filled books that reminded me of the Dauntless series that I wrote about earlier. This is a fantasy historical adventure in the same vein. There were good books but I can't say that I'd reread them. For a book I find that worrisome. I enjoy rereading my novels. If I didn't I'd run out of books far to quickly. But I just can't find a reason to reread them. They were fun and tasty, but like a sculpture made of sugar, they melted away once I was done with them.

I also got the new Bourne books for my birthday, given the difference between the books and the movies (and there are some BIG ones) I'm thinking I need to go back and read the novels. The movies have taken up to much of my consciousness of the series and they have very little in common with the books. And while I suspect that these will be made into movies, I think that they'll only be loosely related to the titles.

Update

It's been a while, life keeps on happening. I got to my best friends wedding as best man, that went off well. I quit my old job, which is I think going to be a good thing in the long term. I also left Madison, WI at long last. I'm back in Milwaukee, looking for work and cleaning up loose ends of my life. It hasn't been the easiest time, but I'm getting better as it goes along. House Tyrell's words seem to work for me right now, "Growing Strong" is a fit way to look at this current epoch.

In book news I just finished Diamond Age by Neal Stephenson, it was a good read, and an enjoyable extrapolation from Snow Crash. I didn't really like the ending, as he clips it off once he gets bored with the part of the book that interests him, which leaves large chunks of plot sitting around uncompleted. I understand the reasoning, but I think that this shows a lack of editor's power, not a lack of ability as a writer. In his earlier works, the ending is given despite the "interesting" portion of the book having been completed earlier. As he gains a name for himself and gets more power within the process of his book writing, he has less reason to listen to an editor making suggestions.

I'll be back to talk about detective fiction later.

The System is Down

I completed System of the World and have to say that it was hugely enjoyable. Sadly I was up late to finish it, and can't put coherent sentances together, so I'll get a longer post on it later.

Also, Dark Knight was a wonderfully grown up comic book movie. I'm glad to see that directors don't feel the need to make comic book movies into cartoons or overstylized sillyness.

Not So Good Prince

It was a long trip to Origins this weekend, made worse by the Indiana, Illinois and Wisconsin DOT's. The prize for best blockage of traffic goes, however, to Indiana. We spent 2 hours going 6 miles on the way from Chicago to Indianapolis. This was parking lot, turn off your engine, have a picnic speeds of travel and reminded me of why not having a car isn't always a negative. It did however give me a chance to get some Fables out of the trunk where it had languished in my backpack.

I've been picking up the trades of Fables since I can no longer find a steady supply of comics in the downtown Madison area. I get to catch up on that exiled communities foibles and follies every six months or so. The latest edition sets up the end game for the series however, showing the preparations for conflict and the creation of a magical kingdom of peace and happiness that the Adversary can't conquer. It was smarmy.

The best of the series comes from forcing the placement of all these fables together and having them have to deal with outside grievances and amusing issues. The naming of the adversary, and the near immediate destruction of his power base was poorly executed in a series that relies much more on it's characters for readability than on its plot. And this was the issue. The Good Prince sets out to give a mystical transformation and a redemption story arc for the lowly frog prince, but all it does is alter him without showing the transformation as it happens. One second he's a confused janitor and the next he's off with Obi-wan on some damn fool idealistic crusade.

Done right it could have been done well. If we'd followed the prince as he had to make real choices or real sacrifices. Instead he's granted near invincible power, a lack of needs or conflicting desires and goes off to save the world. It's like using the bat signal to stop a shoplifting 13 year old. Yeah, batman can find out who it was, but do we really care about that pack of gum? No I didn't think we did. The interesting thing in the story arc is what was hinted at, and barely shown. How the fables in Fabletown reacted to the news. That would have been my preferred way to see this play out. The fable community watching through the magic mirror and having them deal with the issues being brought forward. Instead we focus on the dull predictable plot.

A simple example: the mirror shows what happened to everyone dropped down the wishing well. It's hellish. And we get a moment of the fables saying "that's awful, we can't do that again" but then it moves on. An interesting issue would have been seeing Fly drop down there, and then watching the news of the discovery ripple through Fabletown. How would the once again 3 bears react to their son being down there? More speculation about the no-show of Baba Yaga would have been interesting too. Those types of moments could have conveyed the events in Fly's story much more forcefully and without making the reader lose their interest in the eventual outcome.

Earthclan

I picked up the Book Club version of Earthclan in my foray into half price books. All told I think I now have 2-3 copies of these books floating around my parents and my house. I picked this one up specifically so I can hand it off to people without the trauma of having to chase down a stack of paperback books.

Brin is a wonderful author, but I think that Earthclan and it's prequel Sundiver are his best works of fiction. They aptly blend 'real' physics with futuristic space travel, and take a good look at what contact with aliens could be like. Products of the mid 1980's, they offer an interesting view of what life on Earth would be like as it evolves, and how life in the galaxy would view us. The best part is how the universe feels the same, even when alien science alters things, because Brin shows humanity's flaws and triumphs reflected in each of the races that he creates. And by the combination of all of these, he shows us ourselves.

Bonanza

I finished The Confusion last night. I can admit now to having had doubts about it when I began - mainly from worrying about the faults of it's precursor. I was pleased to see that the sophomore work dispatched with the frame story, and alternated between the two strands of the plot. This was aided by the reliance of both strands on events from the other, and the whole book felt like a single work. That feeling redeemed the series for me. I'm looking forward to grabbing the third installment shortly to find out the conclusion of the work.

As for a plot synopsis, the book follows up on "Section Three" of Quicksilver as well as following the adventures of Jack in captivity. Beyond saying that, at this point I really must recommend actually reading the books. They are worthwhile and well written, and I'm restraining myself from having the last one overnighted to me. I'm not sure that I'll be able to.

In other news, Neil's got Coraline coming to the big screen. I'm not sold on Dakota Fanning as the voice of the protagonist, but we shall see.

Keeping things Practical

I find that I can not escape from Half Price Books without spending $50+. My latest trip did, however net me some new material. I've picked up The Confusion, which should please the hza, and a lending copy of The Uplift War and Startide Rising. But at the end of the day I wonder if I'm going to end up needing a new apartment just to store books in.

While taking some time off from The Confusion I reread Practical Demon Keeping mainly because I pulled it off the shelf while putting other books up. I have an advanced readers version from my family's days running a bookstore, and I've enjoyed his books ever since. This first one sets up the story of his fictional California town, Pine Cove, and tells the story of what happens when a demon is brought by for a visit. While this isn't as refined a work as Lamb, it delights in jokes about the quirky people who make up the town and the insanity of the perfectly ordinary. Also, this is Moore's only book that doesn't reuse a character from an earlier piece. Which is saying it's his first novel.

Always an even trade.

Due to various circumstances that were entirely within my control, I've not been reading much until just recently. However I did finally sit down and peruse Reaper's Gale. And much to my chagrin, I found it lacking the level of completeness that Erikson infused into his previous volumes.

Partially this is the nature of his books. He has two competing story lines, which didn't touch each other until this book. While those stories were tied together by the same adversary, previously books dealt with one set of (mortal) protagonists and a set of deities that remained the same. The first three books Gardens of the Moon, Deadhouse Gates, and Memories of Ice all dealt with the same group of protagonists. These books felt polished and had a level of refinement in story that was easy to read. When thread split off, or new characters were introduced, there was time and effort spent on incorporating them into the story as a whole.

The second three books, House of Chains, Midnight Tides, and The Bonehunters delved into the machinations of the Crippled God, who is the main antagonist for the series to date. These books moved the protagonists from the first books into more powerful and less involved roles. Their appearance presaged a major shift in the direction of the story, or the coming to head of some major plot point. The second three books also began to introduce more characters and civilizations that had not been touched upon directly. These groups were usually within their own story lines, and developed without interaction with the main protagonists. This allowed for the creation of a similarly rich back story for the new characters.

The came Reaper's Gale. Where most of the various plot lines converged into a mess. There was easily two books worth of material here, books that could have introduced many of the characters that we learned about for 10 pages and then never heard about again. There were loose ends of plot at both ends of the book, people in places without explanation, (and often these people were not know characters, but generic.) There were also groups of people who were added at the last seconds, like a teaser for what will occur next. And throughout the entire book to many people were simply added without the character creation that marked the first books.

The book was good. It advanced the plot quite a bit. But it didn't feel like it was as well written as it could have been. And with so many other books in the series to compare it to, that's a fatal flaw.

Delicious reading material

I fear that I'll be waiting on Strange/Norrel for a bit longer, according to the good people at amazon.com I've got to read Reaper's Gale this weekend. The only question is if I'll have to purchase it in order to peruse it or if I'll be voraciously reading a friends copy prior to buying the paperback version in a few months. Regardless of outcome, it will be read this weekend.

My only problem will be talking about the book. I was considering this when I was thinking about something to read prior to picking Mutineer's Moon back up. I was thinking about rereading Neverwhere, but I couldn't figure out how to talk about a Neil Gaiman work without turning into a gushing fan-boy. I'm hoping that Reaper's Gale gives me some insight into that. I'm not at the same fan-boyish levels with Mr. Erikson, but I have to acknowledge that I'm going into this book with a prejudice, and I hope I'll be able to see problems if they exist.

Mooning over things

I was shooting to do Strange/Norrel next, but I ended up rereading (or starting to reread) a trilogy by David Weber. The wonderful thing is how quickly the read is. Enjoyment that doesn't really feel like an interruption of a longer and more ponderous work in progress. As far as the genre goes, Weber has a very nice take on a less than brand new plot. The alien menace and the extra-terrestrials who are here to help save us is a staple of the genre, but it's a staple because it makes it easy for the writer to create characters.

Mainly this comes from the lack of a time lag for the reader to overcome. "A long time ago, in a galaxy far far away..." sound cool, but getting into touch with the motivation of the characters can be dicey. All to often we never get well rounded characters because Adam Awesome is a dashing space adventurer! So there goes Adam off to save the princess. The human Id is easy enough to tap into - we all like fun and excitement, so there goes the space man finding space excitement. It's an infantile but easy method of putting together a story, and while it can be a fun distraction, it's rarely a worthwhile one.

A character worth caring about has to interact with the Ego and Superego. There have to be relationships that are dynamic and complex - and this is where a SF writer suddenly has a much harder time. What drives a sentient plant or an intelligent dolphin? How does and AI interact with and view the world? If they're all just humans with different body types then the setting loses the feel of the future.

An alien's visit nowish Earth avoids that issue by creating a modern human who can view the encounter and with whom the reader can easily bond with and support as the protagonist. Weber creates this world with an amusing twist. In Mutineer's Moon the Earth is hanging on the edge of a massive empire that is ravaged every few epochs by marauders bent on wiping out all competing life. There is a mutiny aboard one of this empire's ship, and the final stages of it play out on just post modern earth.

And the moon is a giant spaceship.

Props to the HZA

I finished Quicksilver last night, in one huge chunk. My general impressions of the book are positive, with a few rough edges that I hope are links into the second book in the series. I'll have to be getting to that one soon so I don't miss out on them.

I liked the voices used by the characters, they were almost always in period instead of creating modern characters and shoehorning them into an idealized past (Newton's Cannon we're looking at you.) The topic itself makes these characters accessible - they are all involved in the birth of modern science, so their worldview is modern enough for a reader to meet them half way. There were a few breaks in this; the mention of"gondola rage" towards the end of the book, and certain other moments. While jarring, they stood out for their rarity and can be set aside with only a mention.

The pacing of the book overcame my reservations regarding the frame story. As I mentioned back in January, I had trouble becoming involved with the characters and plot of the book until I was several hundred pages into the novel. While I appreciate that an author has to be given leeway to set up a story, I feel justified in critiquing the methods that were used. The story breaks down into four different parts - Sections one, two and three plus a frame story told out of synchronization with the rest of the book. I'll lay them out below:

The Frame Story - As the first portion of the book into which we delved, this should have been used to tie the story together. Instead it was used as a tool only for section one. This was jarring, and while I suspect that it will be resolved some time in book three, the author leaves it hanging to far out without support. A frame is a useful device to engross the reader into the story quickly. It establishes protagonists the reader knows they can follow throughout the rest of the story and usually gives the reader clues about what will become important to watch for. The frame story did this, somewhat, by introducing one of the protagonists, and setting up a conflict between Newton and Leibniz. But instead of wrapping that up and getting into the story proper, it hung around and made the first section seem dull in comparison to the swashbuckling underway.

Section One - Section one would have been better if it had lacked the frame story to interrupt it and give the reader something to compare it to within the book itself. A slow beginning to a 3 book series of novels is not a crime... yet; and much can be forgiven for an author setting up the mood of the books and bringing together the characters. The frame story interjects and shows a level of fast paced adventure that the first section of the book lacks, and this both interrupts the readers immersion into the story, and worse, makes reimmersion difficult. I found myself getting into the story, hitting a pirate bit, and then being unable to read more. This series of events usually led me to wander off to play Civ 4 for the purpose of building privateers.

Section Two - In comparison the the first portion, this read like an action/adventure/romance, and passed by quite swiftly. The characters were well drawn up, and their inability to reach a happy conclusion for their time together was a realistic portrayal of everything that led them to that point. If this section had a flaw it was the loose association that it had with Section one, and the lack of association that it had with the original frame. It felt that I was reading a separate novel with a few minor characters who transferred between the two. That said it was an enjoyable novel and one that led me happily into section three.

Section Three - This tied together the threads of the first two sections, and the characters really came into their own. Much of the characterizations were vibrant and the plot was interesting but not obtrusive. The letter writing and cryptography conceit was interesting, but not as engrossing as a reader as I suspect it was for the author. The plot was never made to feel as though it hinged on this, and so it was a method for conveying actions that sufficed as well as the more straightforward plotting of the second section. My only major complaint was the bait and switch about the events in northern France and the father of Eliza's child. It was sudden, annoying, and without any setup in the previous text. Neal is to good a writer to introduce a character so suddenly and importantly. It has a whiff of deus ex machina about it and I found it to be sloppy.

To leave this on a positive note, however, I find that I can't even look and other books dealing with the period now that have lesser pedigrees. They seem cloying and annoyingly saccharine. I'm probably going to pick up The Difference Engine, I suspect David Brin has retained his readability.

Something worth reading

Right here.

I ran into a bet linked through Penny-Arcade about the nature of art and videogames. It ended up the next day at the New Yorker reading about the decline of reading. I have to say that it was an interesting journey and certainly one that I found to be highly interesting. The basis for all this was a wager on how videogames will evolve within our culture. The threads that were followed were diverse, and created a discussion about the nature of art, entertainment and how we judge culture.

In the end, video games, TV and Movies are a different type of media than books, and they cause different types of stimulation. Reading a book allows you to populate the world and characters with your own vision of them. The act of being entertained is more participatory and imaginative. On some level video games represent a reflection of this ability, while the plot involved may be straight forward, the best games allow you to interact with it, color it and make your own choices based on it. It's not the same as reading, as the world is shaped and colored by other peoples imagination, but it's less passive than TV or a movie, where everything is following someone else's idea of what is interesting.

Personally I prefer books, I like having the time to pursue tangents and minor characters in my own imagination before continuing with the authors story. It's why I dislike movies based on books, since they tend to calcify my image of the characters and the setting. Also, they tend to be rubbish, but that's not the key point. It's interesting to note that the best horror films tend to work on the same premise - that what you can imagine is more frightening than what the film can show you. Alien used this to its great advantage and once the alien was revealed the franchise became action movies instead of horror. In the end a book requires a level of interaction and a skill set the dwarfs that of video games, it's simply a skill set that is much easier to acquire (literacy) and a type of interaction that we encourage more (imagination.)

I have a knife. We all have knives. It's 1183 and we're all barbarians!

I finished up my reread of A Game of Thrones by George RR Martin. I found that going back to reread this series was harder than I had expected it to be. The first time I read the books they were great. A fantasy series by the man who wrote the Wild Cards series? A fantasy series with little to no magic, where the real villains and heroes are all human? And it's based on the War of the Roses? There was no downside to beginning to read these books.

The writing in them is very well done. The characters act like real people. They have flaws, and merits, and often they come from the same traits. Life isn't idyllic and kind, and people die with realistic regularity. The politics of the kingdom that Martin creates is convoluted and realistically portrayed, with favors and knowledge used to usurp the throne. The characters all change, and there are few if any mono-dimensional people in this world. At times that feels like it's almost getting out of hand, but Martin does maintain the primary plot and works to limit the desire to wander, following the next interesting lead.

I have a vision of the perfect Game of Thrones experience. I doubt that it's actually possible, but I'd love to be able to see the stories in the form of the giant web that they create. With each chapter a thread, and the stories twisting together and then moving apart. It's what happens in the books, but I'd like to see it graphically, and be able to jump from one section to another or follow a story from start to finish.

There still isn't a downside to reading these books. So go out and read them. I'll wait here until you do.

Did you? Good.

A few points on rereading the books: The mysteries in the books are much more notable and I noticed peoples flaws much more than I did the first time through. I also had more trouble following characters who I knew were doing to be dead soon. This is especially difficult when the first book can be aptly subtitled "The Tragedy of House Stark." Stark also being portrayed as the "good guys."

In John Snow news I'm more convinced than ever that he's the son of Lyanna Stark and Rhaegar Targaryen, and that Lyanna went away willingly with the crown prince. When King Robert is talking about avenging Lyanna's capture at the battle of the Trident, Eddard's first thought is of the secret that Lyanna made him promise to keep. Not of pleasure in revenge, or duty to family, but Lyanna's final secret. Combined with Starks answers about John - "he's of my blood" not "he's my son" and his anger at the besmirching of anyone else’s honor with rumors that they're John's mother... because he knows who John's parents are and can't tell anyone, but can't let a harmless lie circulate either.

Ok, now I really want the next few books to come out. Argh.

Adventures in media, pt. 2

I'm still working through the land of media that aren't books. This is a land that (due to not owning a television) is populated by three kinds of media. Movies, delivered through netflix and streamed through netflix. A service that I can say has never let me down over the years and I'm hugely satisfied with. TV showes from the same source, and TV from bittorrent.

It's that last source that's consumed much of yesterday. Giant robot space battles are hard to set aside, and Heroic Age delivers them with an almost unseemly haste. Compared to my other Anime downloads (Bleach and Naruto Shipodden) things happening all over the place. And those two titles are by no means slow, nor do they suffer from what annoyed me so much about the genre in college. This is something that I'd refer to as the DBZ effect: episode after episode of characters looking back and forth "powering up" and looking like they're having a difficult time with number two for episode after episode.

That stated I did work my way through the first third of Game of Thrones last night, so look for my forgone conclusion of a review in the next few days.

Plan B is just Plan A with more explosives

I'm taking my time with Quicksilver, and so far I'm happy that I am. I fear I have developed an in book crush on Eliza. I suspect that I was meant to.

The real reason for the delay is work on a setting for my Game of Thrones RPG. It's always fun to populate a little corner of someone elses world, but I'm also trying very hard to stay in the background of the plotline of the author. I'm likely going to reread the GoT series aka Song of Ice and Fire by Martin, so you'll be seeing the books reviewed here in the next month.

Personally I'm looking forward to the foriegn service exams in March. Who doesn't like pondering what they'll be doing with their life?

NUKE THEM FROM ORBIT

I finally got through Minimum Means of Reprisal and I have to say, it was intriguing. As a primer for Chinese nuclear posture it's quite well written. I suspect that it is reasonably accessible even if you didn't get a degree in International Relations. The basic Chinese tenet appears to be that any nuclear reprisal, from one bomb to 100 million is sufficient for rational deterrence, so there isn't any need to have a massive nuclear industrial complex.

In addition, the removal of bombs from military authority, warhead and launch vehicles are separate, makes nukes a political and not a military weapon. I've argued before that nukes aren't a weapon system per se - they aren't dominant enough to make having them the only rational choice for a nation (mainly because of the side effect of their use.) These same side effects also limit their battlefield utility and the array of locations where they could be used to advantage. The colorful quote from Aliens up in the title bar "take off, nuke them from orbit. It's the only way to be sure" gives a good anecdote for this lack of utility. They're useful for making large explosions, from orbit where the explosion can't harm the attacker, and in a situation where the ground that they're being used on isn't valuable enough that reoccupying it is important.

Anyway, I'm off to ponder this while at work, and I have to recommend the book if you've any interest in Chinese deterrence policy.

331 PAGES OF QUICKSILVER

The frame story in Quicksilver is not nearly robust enough to support all the flashbacks heaped upon it. We begin with one character, who is interesting but who departs the story rather quickly. We then begin to follow Mr. Waterhouse. His frame story is interesting, but his flashbacks are pure exposition, many without wider meaning to the story. It is not until page 331 we finally begin to see the protagonist act as anything other than a cipher and the reasons for his trip in the frame story support the flashbacks.

Neal, come on. I know that you can write a fast paced novel. Snow Crash and Zodiac proved that you can write well and create interesting characters in the midst of an interesting plot. I recognize that this is going to be a long process. You've got three books, each broken into sections, but even Tolkien, king of huge three part books, made sure that plot and characters advanced together.

This problem is made worse by my suddenly renewed interest in the novel that occurred as soon as the protagonist began to act. I worry that Neal's editor no longer has enough power to make him write a good clean book. Ideally though I'll finish before I feel compelled to write another update on it.

FAR TO FAR

I'm in the midst of Quicksilver and I have to say I'm still waiting for something to happen. I'm enjoying the characters and events as they pass by, but the key focus of the first portion: "who invented calculus" was lost. This is why Mr. Waterhouse leaves Boston, this is the driving source of conflict, but there is little tension, and instead we wander through England emersed in daydream. I'm finding that the lack of a cohesive focus on the plot is making it difficult to plow through. I enjoy the bits that I read, dipping in and out of the book, but it lost the hook that it had in my and I'm worried that I'll stop caring about the characters by the time the plot advances again.