What are you reading in 2024?

[Nellisir]

I took a break from CJ Cherryh to read The Terraformers by Annalee Newitz and I'm desperately regretting it. For a science writer, the author appears to be totally unaware of even the most BASIC features of how a river works (which kinda matters) or the vocabulary. A river does not meet the sea at its head. A delta does not occur midway along its course. A river does not supply its tributaries with water.

I'm desperately hoping for some kind of hail mary explanation, but I'm 2/3rds of the way through and it's just a grab bag of neat concepts with not a lot (or any) science and middle school-level characters.

 

[overgeeked]

Murderbot is an it/they. They have no genitalia, no reproductive organs, and no overt (/useless) sexual characteristics. Murderbot also thinks sex is gross, touching is gross, and double triple eww the leaking.

Also, they've cast a guy as Murderbot so that's gonna mess with your headcanon. No headcannon yet.

Is this actually stated by the character as their preference? The other characters use “it” when referring to Murderbof. But I don’t remember Murderbot using “it” in reference to themself.

 

[Richards]

I finished the second book in the "spiderpocalypse" series I'm reading and am now on the third and final book, Zero Day by Ezekiel Boone, and while it's still as interesting as the other two, I'm a bit disappointed that he went into how the nuclear weapon deployment system works and...as someone whose whole career, military and post-military civilian, has been in the nuclear operations field...it's painfully wrong. But that aside, and with constantly telling myself this is a fictional universe and maybe that's how things work over there, it's still been a good read. I'm 160 pages in - over halfway - after having started it on the plane today immediately after finishing the previous book.

Johnathan

 

[trappedslider]

I finished the second book in the "spiderpocalypse" series I'm reading and am now on the third and final book, Zero Day by Ezekiel Boone, and while it's still as interesting as the other two, I'm a bit disappointed that he went into how the nuclear weapon deployment system works and...as someone whose whole career, military and post-military civilian, has been in the nuclear operations field...it's painfully wrong.

Johnathan

I totally forgot that they had a fight over using nuclear weapons to deal with the spiders lol

 

[Nellisir]

Is this actually stated by the character as their preference? The other characters use “it” when referring to Murderbof. But I don’t remember Murderbot using “it” in reference to themself.

Murderbot refers to itself as I or Murderbot or SecUnit. It is never "he" or "she". I don't think it outright "states a preference", although I might be wrong. I think the second book makes clearer how absolutely gross Murderbot finds biological functions, and people, and people's biological functions, and how deeply deeply grateful Murderbot is to not have such.

I think the second book also has a sexbot, which might be referred to as a "she".

It's never outright stated, but I think SecUnits are peak androgynous-presenting, because while they can (with much much care) present as human, they're never assigned gender.

I think it's really interesting and well-done in large part because Murderbot never questions "what" Murderbot is in that sense. Other people are male, female, straight, queer, etc., etc. within the stories, and Murderbot is Murderbot. It's a personal state, not a universal one (compare to Anne Leckies Ancillary series), and while Murderbot is very VERY fascinated by people, it doesn't want to be them in the sense that we are (IMO) somewhat conditioned to expect (others aspire to be human/human is optimal). For all very real intents and purposes, the closest thing Murderbot has to a gender is SecUnit, and its identity is Murderbot.

 

[Eyes of Nine]

Murderbot refers to itself as I or Murderbot or SecUnit. It is never "he" or "she". I don't think it outright "states a preference", although I might be wrong. I think the second book makes clearer how absolutely gross Murderbot finds biological functions, and people, and people's biological functions, and how deeply deeply grateful Murderbot is to not have such.

I think the second book also has a sexbot, which might be referred to as a "she".

It's never outright stated, but I think SecUnits are peak androgynous-presenting, because while they can (with much much care) present as human, they're never assigned gender.

I think it's really interesting and well-done in large part because Murderbot never questions "what" Murderbot is in that sense. Other people are male, female, straight, queer, etc., etc. within the stories, and Murderbot is Murderbot. It's a personal state, not a universal one (compare to Anne Leckies Ancillary series), and while Murderbot is very VERY fascinated by people, it doesn't want to be them in the sense that we are (IMO) somewhat conditioned to expect (others aspire to be human/human is optimal). For all very real intents and purposes, the closest thing Murderbot has to a gender is SecUnit, and its identity is Murderbot.

iirc there's one of the books where someone calls murderbot "it", and one of the humans corrects them? but that's the human that is anthropomorphizing murderbot - murderbot doesn't care

 

[overgeeked]

Just finished James M. Cain’s novella The Postman Always Rings Twice. I don’t remember if I’ve seen the 1946 adaptation. I was a good book. Short and weird and twisty. I can see why it’s a staple of the noir genre. I didn’t notice how little description there was until a few chapters in. My eyes usually skim most of that anyway.

 

[Richards]

I finished the "spiderpocalypse" trilogy and have now moved on to reading something a bit more down to earth: Carved in Bone by Jefferson Bass, a sort of police procedural focusing on "the Body Farm," the colloquial name for the University of Tennessee's Anthropology Research Facility, where forensic studies are performed to determine various things about dead bodies like stages of decay, how different murder weapons cause different wound patterns, and the like. The main character works at the Body Farm and is assisting the police in determining who killed a woman whose body was found deep in a cave in eastern Tennessee. It's been interesting so far (I'm several chapters in), and I hope that trend continues because I have three more in the series to follow. (At 25 cents per hardback at an "Everything Must Go!" library book sale, I figured it was worth taking the chance on an author I've never read before.)

Johnathan

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

Just finished A Master of Djinn.

I enjoyed it, although the big twist wasn't -- it relies on both the characters and the readers having a blind spot that I don't think one can count on 21st century readers having.

It also has a lot of callbacks to the short story and novella that proceed it, so read those first. It's not critical to have read them, but you will be hearing about them constantly, so you might as well have read them.

 

[overgeeked]

I finished the "spiderpocalypse" trilogy and have now moved on to reading something a bit more down to earth: Carved in Bone by Jefferson Bass, a sort of police procedural focusing on "the Body Farm," the colloquial name for the University of Tennessee's Anthropology Research Facility, where forensic studies are performed to determine various things about dead bodies like stages of decay, how different murder weapons cause different wound patterns, and the like. The main character works at the Body Farm and is assisting the police in determining who killed a woman whose body was found deep in a cave in eastern Tennessee. It's been interesting so far (I'm several chapters in), and I hope that trend continues because I have three more in the series to follow. (At 25 cents per hardback at an "Everything Must Go!" library book sale, I figured it was worth taking the chance on an author I've never read before.)

Johnathan

The Body Farm is such a fascinating place. Well worth reading up on if that’s your jam.