Nation is a stand-alone novel byTerry Pratchett, written, I presume, for Young Adults market, but just as enjoyable for any adult young at heart.
Mau is on his way back from the Island of Boys. He will receive his tattoos, his soul, and be a man when he returns to the Nation on the main island. But on the way back a huge wall of water overtakes his canoe (can you spell Tsunami?) and when he reaches the island he finds everybody dead, the village destroyed – he is all that remains of the proud Nation. And don't get me wrong – the Nation is old, very old. With its own creation myth and pantheon of gods; and with old myths, including the story of the sailors who sailed so far that they came home again.
Daphne (real name: Ermintrude. But don't tell anyone, she hates it) is on her way to join her father, who is Governor of the Crown in Port Mercia. And, as his domineering mothers likes to point out, only 139th in line to the throne. But her ship, the Sweet Judy, is caught up in the same wave, and is shipwrecked on the Nation. Everybody on board is dead – Daphne survives by having wrapped herself in her mattress, which was not really an option for the sailors.
The Sky Road is the forth and final instalment in Ken MacLeod's Fall Revolution Series – a fitting end to the series (although there's always scope to write more into the gaps in the history) if not the best book in it in my opinion. The book starts with what comes across as pseudo-fantasy and a sex scene (no, come back, it's of survivable quality as such things go), set in a culture/community set on the Scottish West coast which is, on behalf the world at large, bootstrapping its way back into space (see Cosmonaut Keep for a re-visit of that idea). There is quite some history to that world – "The Americans fell, but their Empire lived on as the Possession, until the Deliverer roles in the East and struck it down", to give a key quote. Key protagonist are Clovis colha Gree, a student of History (a slightly suspect occupation) and Merrial, a Tinker/Engineer, both working on the 'ship' which his being built to re-start humanity's path into space after centuries of being Earth-bound,again.
Here's a book I received for review which didn't wholly convince me... The Affinity Trap is, as far as I can establish, Martin Sketchely's first published novel. It's also the first in a trilogy; usually referred to as the 'Delgado' trilogy, although other names are in use, too; apparently the (soon to be released) next book in the series is 'The Destiny Mask'.
The story plays in the mid-near future, where humanity, or at least the part that counts, lives in 'Myson Towers (named after their inventor), which are essentially sealed off environments, sealed against their surrounding constituent riff-raff, not against each other. So the upper class, military, secret service etc have luxury, virtual vacations, space travel, contact with alien cultures etc. The rest of humanity has been left behind, and lives in crumbling dystopian towns, regularly harassed by 'Purifiers' who kill everyone on sight (from the air, or course), or eke out a living in the remaining countryside, and are victimized by army training exercises. So far so classic. Inhabiting this set-up is Commander Alexander Delgado, long term officer in the 'Structure' section of the secret service. He's been there for a while, and is a left-over from the old days of benevolent General Smythe, who was ousted in some kind of coup by General William Myson (exceedingly wealthy son of the inventor of the Myson Towers), who turned Earth, its politics, science, and military into a wealth-generating behemoth. And now Delgado is tasked to fly to the Affinity Group (some strange religious conglomerate – we don't learn too much about them) and retrieve a Seriatt 'female' known as Vourniass Lycern Conosq dis fer'n'at (apostrophy alert!), with whom Myson intents to father a child, purely for political (and thus profit) reasons. Cue James-Bond style secret service shenanigans. And sex. Lots of sex, at least for the first half of the book (yes, it gets better, at least on that front, after a while). Which sets of all kinds of emotions and developments in Delgado, most of which are not desirable from his and/or his employer's perspective. Or from mine.
Toast is Charles Stross' first published work of fiction. He wrote the introduction in 2000, it hit the shelves in 2002; and in 2006 it was released into the wilds of the Interwebs on a Creative Commons license as it was out of print, and no-one was interested in re-printing it. This is a review of the electronic version – get your own, the link is below the review! And of course go buy his other books.
Toast is a collection of short stories, and it obviously is older than the current collection, Wireless, (yes, I'm reading things out of sequence yet again). It contains an introduction by the author, 10 stories (each with a short introduction, too), and a 2005 update/afterword for the re-release.
The introduction in itself is very interesting – it talks about the acceleration of the rate of change (and the associated socio-technological developments), and what this means for us, as well as for the poor SF writer: Change destroys Science Fictional futures. And accelerating change destroys futures even faster. Welcome to the brave 1st decate of the 21st Century, a decade which will destroy more SF futures than any ten year span that preceded it.
Hell's Angels was the late Hunter S. Thompson's 1st published book, although 'The Rum Diaries' (published a lot later) & 'Prince Jellyfish' (unpublished as of yet… the estate has plans, though) were written earlier. It is a straight journalistic work of research, and not in the 'Gonzo' style he became famous for later; although, with what we know today, some things foreshadow what was to come.
The book is a highly readable, interesting, and absorbing account of the time Hunter spent riding with the Hells Angels in 1965. He was never part of the group, but, after somebody introduced him to the San Francisco chapter, he asked if he could spend time with them, and write a book about; which, after much discussion, they agreed with. Hunter followed them in his car, and later on his motorbike (not a proper chopper…), including a high speed crash which took him, and his bike, off the road for a while.
Nation
The Sky Road
Hell's Angels
