Planescape: Torment (2011 novelization)

This really is a novelization, a lot of effort being made to go through the game as it's played, going way beyond merely describing and attempting to make events flow more naturally. There is a lot of added writing, and much of it is actually really, really good, greatly improving an already great story. The intermissions and the multiple and fitting storytellers are also a nice touch, and successfully including that evil alternate path was quite a feat. Powerful sections follow that moment, gathered together, and later the writing improves even further. The Maze is notable, but largely fixing Curst, which was the one part of the game's story that seemed lacking to me, is even more so. And what follows is better yet, adding many more details, written and fitting so well, developing, explaining, fleshing out and, in the end, providing closure... Or perhaps not, considering the epilogue, but I'd call that a good way to end it as well, even if it may not fit with the original concept.
It's in bad need of editing, however. I'd have thought that a fan effort would have been thoroughly corrected since it was first released, but it's full of typos, missing or repeated words, places where first and second person get mixed and, worst of all, places where the idea seems to have been changed in the middle of a sentence and the old text wasn't deleted before continuing with the new. There are also moments when the one writing the descriptions of actual gameplay seemed to get bored, skipping more, which can be rather jarring, and those persuasion scenes from Curst also seem rushed. But the worst "crime" is modifying "Longing". To change what may well be the best piece of writing in a game... I guess the idea was to clean it up, maybe even "complete" it to some extent, but it just doesn't work that way, the original text being all about raw emotion and being torn in that manner. Also, don't those memories about Deionarra contradict it? Or does that section refer to another moment?

Rating: 4/5

My reading list for 2020

Today, when wanting to update my reading record, I realize I have started reading the wrong Wasteland collection first. A bigger screen made me suspicious, when I used my Kindle to get the name of the second short story I read yesterday on my phone. It was a hang on, I think that's the wrong cover moment. Now I could blame my phone, but a 6" screen is easily a good size for a book cover and reading the title. Really, I blame the idiot(s) who decided to name the three collections, and did the third one the same as the first, but different sub text. In the bright environment of the car, where I read the first short story, I mistakenly chose the ebook called Wastelands, forgetting there was two of them ... three of them really, but at least the second one is called "Wastelands 2" ... a dead giveaway that. WTF didn't they call the third one "Wastelands 3: The New Apocalypse"? All three have sub text, so "The New Apocalypse" sub text was meaningless in determining the collection was third.

A pity my memory is a bit slow sometimes, otherwise I might have recalled the name issue when I bought the third collection ... had to double check it wasn't the first book with a new cover, as that happens a lot.

Give me a break.

The Icewind Dale Trilogy is my introduction into Faerun, and I love it.

A Case of Conscience (1958) by James Blish: 4/5

The first half of this novel was published in If in 1953, and had a very nice wraparound cover:
https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/hostedimages/1461227640i/18839765._SX540_.jpg

The book cover was rather garish looking, though:

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/c/c1/ACaseOfConscience%28novel%29.jpg

In addition to being a writer, Blish was also a reviewer, and he wanted SF to be more literate. His Panoply and especially Cities in Flight stories were rather pulpy, but with A Case of Conscience he did what he preached, with better prose, more fleshed out characters and with a religious or Catholic theme, dealing with things like evolution vs creationism (a popular subject in the 1950's), Original Sin and whether Evil can Create.

I read the first half on the book a couple of years ago, and thought it was pretty good, but I enjoyed it much more when rereading it.

The protagonist is Father Ramon Ruiz-Sanchez, a Jesuit priest and biologist who is one of a four member commission sent from Earth (in 2050 ruled by the UN) to determine what is to be done with the planet Lithia, 50 light years away from Earth.
Cleaver the physicist, the stereotypical big, dumb, close minded American, on learning that the planet is rich on lithium, wants to turn it into a giant factory for nuclear weapons. But the more profound priest is deeply worried when he learns about the native sentient beings' life cycle; complete physical recapitulation (the now mostly outdated idea that the fetus goes through all the major steps of evolution before becoming fully developed), only for the Lithians it happens outside the mother's body after being hatched. Coupled with the fact that the Lithians are like perfect Christians (no sin, no deviants, no crime) except having no religion, makes the good Father very troubled, and his theories will get him into much trouble with the Vatican when returning to Earth.
And to make matters worse he receives as a gift an unhatched egg from one of the Lithians, which hatches in part two.

Part two is a bit uneven, and unlike too many SF novels with weak endings, it ends with a bang, when Blish masterfully ties up all loose ends, and even manages to make the ending ambigious and open to interpretation. Things that don't seem important at first gain importance, and I don't think the names "Cleaver" and "Lithia" (Lethe?) were chosen at random.

Nice book. Also, even within the Cities in Flight series, there is an evolution, from the Cold War era to something that anticipates future developments in SF: Earthman come home is astonishing, a tour-de-force with ideas for a dozen books of authors who were less than Blish. It pulls no punches. The story fleshes out what the cities do in order to survive, through years and vast distances.

I read the four stories of Earthman Come Home, plus The Bridge short story.
The first story was the most exciting one, action-wise.
The Bridge was the most interesting one idea-wise, developing anti-gravity on Jupiter.
But the rest felt like a throwback to the super-science stories of the early 1930's. And the flying cities never felt like cities, but just like spaceships, with their very limited cast of characters and the rather simple plots.

So overall a bit disappointing.

Do the three later books improve?

To make sure we are talking about the same book: the stories in Earthman, Come Home (1955) are "Okie", "Bindlestiff", "Sargasso of Lost Cities" and "Earthman, Come Home". I do not know, I guess that is your take from the stories. Also some reviewers have said that apparently there are not many people living in NY, NY (or Manhattan, really). They simply were not attentive. Similarly, the meeting of the Cities in the book underlines how they are cities, really, and the almost mithical status of NY, NY among them. If you could not see the powerful painting of the galactic scope, with so many degrees of civilization, or how the people of the cities are depicted in a similar way to old time roaming gipsies (or hobos, in the Great Depression), doing specialized work akin to tinkering, horse trading and the like. Pestered by the police. Or the devastating power of the last story in the book... I guess expectations may condition the reading experience. These stories have been labeled "the heady wine of SF". It is better to take them as they come, without prejudgement, then let them surprise you.

Not sure how would you enjoy the rest o the stories, but They Shall Have Stars shows echoes of the Cold War, which nowadays feels a bit dated, IMHO.

I was aware of "Okies = hobos in the Great Depression". As I wrote in my review in another thread:

"The first two stories are throwbacks to the old Super-Science space opera of the late 1920s and early 1930s of which E.E. "Doc" Smith, Edmond "World Wrecker" Hamilton, and John W. Campbell were the Big Three, with a hint of Isaac Asimov's Foundation and his home world vs colony themes. The prose is quite bad, which is ironic since Blish advocated for better literary quality in SF (and he could write much better), and the two first stories at least are like reading very old pulp SF. There's also nods to the old masters of the Super-Science space operas: The Hamiltonians of Utopia must be a nod to Edmond Hamilton and the brilliant Dr. Schloss a nod to J. Schlossel. The characters are cardboard, there's lots of pseudo science as well as some real hard science, and lots of fancy gadgets like the "spindizzies" that confer anti-gravity, mixed with hopelessly outdated things like slide rules and vacuum tubes.
And the whole premise of the book, with "Okies" - space faring cities of migratory workers (hi tech specialist) watched by the (ominpresent) Earth Police - is like the Depression era in space.
The people of the Okies use anti-agathic drugs to prevent aging, the spindizzy tech allows FTL travel, but there's no mention of time dilation and such, and it's downright comical how tenacious the Earth Police are. They will chase an Okie even to the next Galaxy over hundreds of years, for violating a Vacate order!"

But I still like James Blish. He was unpredictable and nearly always interesting. But too fond of showing off his biology and chemistry knowledge by using too technical language, which is a bit annoying.

OK, it's time to update this year's list! Book finished in January-March:

★★★ Piechotą do źródeł Orinoko / Wojciech Cejrowski
★★☆ The Plague / Albert Camus
★★★ In Conversation with God: Meditations for Each Day of the Year, Vol. 1: Advent, Christmas, Epiphany / Francisco Fernández-Carvajal
★★☆ Hubal / Jacek Komuda
★☆☆ Find Your Why: A Practical Guide to Discovering Purpose for You and Your Team / Simon Sinek
★☆☆ 15 Secrets Successful People Know About Time Management / Kevin E. Kruse
★★☆ Statistics for Dummies / Deborah J. Rumsey
★☆☆ Punkty zapalne. Dwanaście rozmów o Polsce i świecie / various
★☆☆ Polska anarchia / Paweł Jasienica
★★☆ The Willpower Instinct: How Self-Control Works, Why It Matters, and What You Can Do to Get More of It / Kelly McGonigal
★☆☆ Nowy dom na Wyrębach II / by Stefan Darda
★★☆ Remote: Office Not Required / David Heinemeier Hansson, Jason Fried

And some books finished in March-May:

★★☆ Linux. Komendy i polecenia / Lukasz Sosna
★★★ The Hobbit, or There and Back Again / J.R.R. Tolkien
– – – > Re-read with kids – it's still great story. I loved it.
★☆☆ Jak nie spieprzyć życia swojemu dziecku / Mikołaj Marcela
★★☆ Druids #1: The Ogham Sacrifice / Jean-Luc Istin, Thierry Jigourel, Jacques Lamontagne, Lannig Treseizh (comic book)
★★☆ Życie seksualne lemingów / Rafał A. Ziemkiewicz
★★★ The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe / C.S. Lewis
– – – > Re-dead with kids – same as Hobbit, still fantastic journey
★★★ Kariera Nikodema Dyzmy / Tadeusz Dołęga-Mostowicz
★★★ Układy i układanki / Grzegorz Braun
★☆☆ Lagoon / Nnedi Okorafor
★☆☆ Druids #2: City of Seduction / Jean-Luc Istin, Thierry Jigourel, Jacques Lamontagne, Lannig Treseizh
★★☆ Apprenticeship Patterns: Guidance for the Aspiring Software Craftsman / Dave Hoover, Adewale Oshineye
★★☆ Ulysses Moore #1: The Door to Time / Pierdomenico Baccalario
★★★ Modlitwa. Tajemnica spotkania człowieka z Bogiem / Anna Świderkówna
★★☆ Przerywam zmowę milczenia / Jan Paweł Lenga MIC
★☆☆ The Man Who Solved the Market: How Jim Simons Launched the Quant Revolution / Gregory Zuckerman
> It's actually a biography. If you expect some statistical/math/trading insights, detailed story of data/algorithms, fighting for The Edge etc., you will be disappointed.
★★☆ Gulliver's Travels / Jonathan Swift

Les racines du mal - Maurice G. Dantec

"The Roots of Evil" (unpublished in english, I think). I don't know how many times I've read that book - and all the books by Maurice G. Dantec - but each time, I'm hooked and can't let the book before having finished it. Which is a testimony of quality, for me.

I've certainly already talked about that book here on GOG in a "Books finished in xxx" topic. Don't remember when. I don't see the point to repeat what I wrote (and I don't remember what I wrote), but it's a very dark story about serial killers, AI, the coming of year 2000 (Les racines du mal is published in 1995), so it's also a bit of an "alternate present".

Maurice G. Dantec has always been and is always an electroshock for me. I hate many of his opinions, I love his way of writing, very dry and still very philosophical sometimes in this present book. You can almost feel how the book is changing you and, if you read Dantec's other books, how his books changed him too.

Very controversial personality, Maurice Dantec is still for me a very important French contemporary author.

So far in 2020: https://www.gog.com/forum/general/books_finished_in_2020/post9

Earth Magic by Alexei & Cory Panshin

Haldane, while hunting is 'marked' hit on the head by a witch for Libera, Goddess of the Old People. Haldane is the sole son of Black Morca, King of the Gets. Black Morca underestimates his enemies and is killed in a slaughter at Haldane's betrothal feast. Haldane fights and then flees for his life along with Oliver, the king's wizard.

The Icarus Agenda - Robert Ludlum

Strong-willed characters an amazing but in the end not to far fletched plot, world description that is still valid today. Not for the faint of heart. Still i did enjoy the read. Sometimes the strong willednes of the characters irritated me, especially the behavior of high ranked american officials behind the curtains while on the other hand thinking "could they really be like that"?which in all earnest, judging on some experience with some rich bozo's led me to belief they exactly are as described in this story... anyway back to the objective. Set in the background of the Arabic world/feud this story of an exceptional indiviual(s) manages to paint a sometimes jawbreaking image of grind and awe

The Currents of Space - Isaac Asimov

One more in the Foundation cycle.

Where Earth is not much more a mythical planet, Trantor has federed a huge amount of planets in its empire and Sark dominates Florina for the unvaluable resource of the kyrt, a good-to-everything cotton-like material that can only be found there.

Interesting, more a thriller/spy story than a pure S-F book, but still in line with the evolution of the general timeline, to make us feel the evolution of the global situation. What happens when a scientist finds that Florina is menaced and that Sark wants to hide the problem.

A good book, all in all!

So far in 2020: https://www.gog.com/forum/general/books_finished_in_2020/post9

Well my last read was a slow but enjoyable one.

ALEXANDER McCALL SMITH - THE DOUBLE COMFORT SAFARI CLUB

A book like that is never going to win any brilliance awards, but it is a nice change of pace with a feel good aspect to it.

I have really been so busy lately, that my reading amount has suffered.

Now I am about to read something different again, and to some degree a novel written for young readers, though it appeals to me on a few levels - the main idea, the thinking involved, and seemingly well written from the bit I checked before buying ... it also contains robots ... so what's not to like.

PETER BROWN - THE WILD ROBOT

https://www.amazon.com/Wild-Robot-Peter-Brown/dp/0316382000/

It also has a sequel if I really like it.

My reading list for 2020

The second in the Empire trilogy. Nice books. More colourful than the beginning of the Foundation original trilogy.