Reawakening: The Side Step Trilogy, Book 2

Reawakening: The Side Step Trilogy, Book 2 by Orson Scott Card

A couple (Laz and Ivy) wake up and try to find their purpose. They are clones of an elite scientist and his assistant. They have their past memories and try to discover their purpose of being revived as clones. The scientist has the ability to "sidestep" to different time streams. The assistant has the ability to identify time portals. In their life as clones they have developed a romantic relationship. (However, it is not until the end that the original join together. They had connected, but felt reluctant due to age and business relationship.) 

In the story, they try to figure out their purpose. They meet with some of their other clones. There is also a mysterious message from a portal. One of their attempts to open a portal leads to some people going in and destroying a school. They send an army back in the portal to crush these people.. They also run into their children. They have some bizarre powers to appear and disappear. The son has a habbit of showing up naked and intimidating. Laz punches him as he is materializing which results in all sorts of internal damage. They then find an appropriate time stream that allows him to be healed, but still remember his bad behavior so that he reforms. In the end they discover the original Laz has traveled in time and feels "stuck". He eventually connects with the real Ivy and they can live happily ever after. 

The book has a number of streams that seem only tangentially connected. The premise is a bit like Mickey7, but explores some different areas of time travel and multiverse.

Benito Cereno

Benito Cereno by Herman Melville 

Benito Cereno seems like it should have been a good book, but I had trouble getting into it. An American comes across a ship in distress. Benito Cereno, the captain is always accompanied by his servant.  He explains that many of the Spaniards had been taken by a fever. Only at the end does he jump away from the ship and let the Americans know that a slave revolt occurred and that the blacks controlled everything.

The Last of the Mohicans

The Last of the Mohicans by James Fenimore Cooper

I tried listening to the 1992 movie soundtrack as I was listening to this audiobook. It is a great soundtrack. The movie itself? Well, it had great music, but I can't remember any of the plot. The same goes for the book. There is Hawkeye and Cora. There are settlers and natives. The French have an important role and have some leaders. There is discussion of loyalties. I had trouble figuring out who was on each side of the conflict.

Overlay

Overlay by Barry N. Malzberg

Some aliens decide to destroy the earth by focussing on a certain group - those that bet on horses. What follows is more of analysis of people that bet on horses than science fiction. One guy is pretty much of a loser, and likes to bet on horses. He loses a lot, and doesn't really win because that would force him to make decisions on move on with his life. It seemed like an interesting concept, but was not well executed.

Laddertop 3

Laddertop 3: The Laddertop Series, Book 3 by Emily Janice Card and Orson Scott Card

Laddertop concludes with us discovering that there are "noble colonists" come to inhabit the earth. They are sending a giant colonizing mission that will involve wiping out humans and making earth fit for themselves. A few of the aliens have sympathy for the humans and hatch a plan to preserve them. They planted the laddertops and gave them the technology. The plan was to send a small group of humans off to another planet so that they could continue their society there. This would involve the destruction of the rest of humanity. However, this is better than complete annihilation. Nevertheless, humans are not fond of that. They discover a way to work together and use the technology to wipe out the colonization ship. They also communicate with some of the kind aliens and decide to work together It seems like an interesting parallel to colonial endeavors. What if a few Europeans had helped the Native Americans to use gunpowder to destroy European ships and then worked together to share technology? Well, disease would have still wiped out most of the native population. Fiction has the ability to ignore those messy details.

Laddertop 2

Laddertop 2: The Laddertop Series, Book 2 by Emily Janice Card and Orson Scott Card

The second Laddertop book ramps up the drama. There are "rebels" that are concerned about the unknowns of laddertop. They recruit a few kids and other scientists for their space mission. There is also some more information found about the special symbol. A space object is approaching the earth. Is it benevolent? Or is it bent on destruction? The book ends on a cliffhanger... That was not resolved for a decade. While these were first released as graphic novels, they have recently been moved to audiobooks, with the final book only as audiobook. There was a big cast for this, so some needed to be left off to get under the label limit.

Laddertop, Volume 1

Laddertop by Emily Janice Card and Orson Scott Card

In this world, tweens seek to be admitted to "Laddertop". This is a special academy that trains them to travel up into space station. The technology in the station was given years ago by benevolent aliens and portions can only be accessed by children. The book follows a couple 11 year old girls who are selected to laddertop. Things get a little bit weird. The best children are selected by a technology that only the aliens understand. There are also a few kids that get special marking. Perhaps the aliens are not as benevolent as we thought.

Speak Memory: An Autobiography Revisited

Speak Memory: An Autobiography Revisited by Vladimir Nabokov

Nabokov's desired view of himself comes through in this autobiography. Instead of a strict narrative, it is a collection of essays, usually focussing on different activities or places in his life. He came from a well-to-do Russian family. He was not fond of the Czar and had some sympathy for the revolution. However, that faded as the Lenin/Stalin dictatorship came to be. He likes to point out that his nostalgia is not for the lost wealth, but for the missed homeland. The essays cover some of his childhood actions and friends as well as hobbies. It ends up being a fairly well done autobiography.

The Story of Russia

The Story of Russia by Orlando Figes

Stafan Rudniki narrates many of Orson Scott Card's science fiction works. Hearing his voice on a historical audiobook was an interesting experience. I half expected an alien invasion to suddenly occur.

This comprehensive history of Russia starts at prehistoric times and goes to Putin and the current days. For today, a thesis is that Russians look back with positive nostalgia at the communist times. Putin has been able to use that experience to help build his support. It is also clear that Russia has long had a chip on it's shoulder. It has felt inferior to other European countries. The Asian portion of the country is more "colony" than anything else. Ukraine has an interesting history that is claimed by Russia as part of the "birth" of the culture. Despite many political systems coming and going, Russians seem to always find themselves ruled by a dominant boss.

The Tusks of Extinction

The Tusks of Extinction

the setting is Jurassic Park, but with wooly mammoths. There are Russians that helped bring back the animals,  but also go about hunting them. Then there is a girl who has loved elephants for most of her life. She dies and ends up becoming one with the herd. There is an anti-poaching message here along with some science fiction elements. It gets a little jumbled, but it is a quick read.

The Box: Tales from the Darkroom

 The Box: Tales from the Darkroom by Günter Grass

Box is a fictionalized autobiography of the author told as reminiscences from his children.  The "box" is a normal camera that takes "magic" pictures. The picture may show events how they would like to have occurred. It may show the future. It shows a form of "truth" that is different from the actual reality viewed. This bit of fantasy allows for some interesting exploration of life during World War II and post-war Germany.

Chokepoint Capitalism: How to Beat Big Tech, Tame Big Content, and Get Artists Paid

Chokepoints in the economy have had a devastating impact on various creating occupations. The internet has caused changes in the chokepoints, but have often just moved the money from one rich corporation to another, with little real benefit to the actual creators.

Music is a key case study. Major labels have had a control on getting artists notists. However, they often require them to sign difficult contracts that leave little to the artist. The industry has further consolidated with companies owning venues and ticketing, and others owning publishing and distribution. There is little competition, and the companies are notoriously bad at their accounting. Digital music lead to additional chokepoints. Apple was able to dominate in digital downloads in part due to the lock in with digital rights. (The DMCIA law did not allow anybody to strip copy protection.) By the time Apple opened DRM-free downloads, the world was moving towards streaming. In streaming, the streamers need the major labels, and thus negotiate deals, which often do not provide much benefit to artists. (Artists still get old, low royalties, even though distribution costs are now much lower. Labels also user accounting tricks to limit those royalties.)

Book publishing repeated the same problem by letting Amazon dominate the book market with DRM books. Amazon also has audiobooks with DRM. Publishers thought that the protections of DRM would help them prevent copying of books. But all it has really done is allow the big vendors to control the market. At least the big publishers negotiate from a position of relative strength. The small publishers are even more worse off.

In both cases, there was unintended consequences of laws to protect content producers. Copyright is another case where the law provides extremely long terms and protection, with the result being more power to big companies and less cultural benefit.

The authors propose some solutions, such as a cultural guardian that seeks royalties and payments for orphaned works. This seems a little too dreamy. There will be some way for big companies to milk it also. Perhaps we just need to limit the copyright terms altogether. Perhaps we should just have things drift into the public domain if they are no longer publicly available. Alas, with digital distribution, a company could just put it out for a day and say it is in "limited release". It makes things difficult. Copyright as it exists is much too long to provide society benefit, and servers more to enrich big companies. Getting the proper incentives to help the "little guy" is a huge challenge, with risks of continuing to empower bigger companies. The more we depend on big business to provide revenue and "benefits" for us, the more we risk being held hostage.

Wakers

Laz has the ability to "side-step" to a different time stream. This enables him to change the stream of life to choose the best outcome. He can do things such as find the combinations for locks. He simply goes to the time stream where he guessed the proper combination. He can also do this to correct "mistakes" he made. He may needs to check multiple to find the time stream where the correction doesn't make things worse.

Laz wakes up in a mysterious area. He doesn't see any people around. He does find the remnants of a civilization. Eventually, he befriends some dogs and manages to subsist on old canned food from an abandoned supermarket. He realizes he is a clone and that there is one more clone that can be wakened, Ivy.  She has the ability to see different time streams. The original versions of them were important scientists that had helped create a portal to evacuate the earth. (The planet is destined to be destroyed due to celestial object that disrupts the solar system.)

Most of the book is conversations among the characters as they try to figure out how the side stepping works and what their mission is. Are they the only hope to save the earth?  This could almost be a scientific book exploring how "time travel" without traveling in time could work. There are character relationships and a whole "saving the world" thing going on. However, it all plays second-fiddle to the "science". What happens if somebody moves to a time stream where they were not present? How can people "change" outcomes by knowing the possible results of their actions. The book presents an interesting situation with plenty of questions and some possible solutions.

The Last Jew of Treblinka: A Survivor’s Memory, 1942-1943

This is a brief first-hand account of the atrocities of a concentration camp. There were people that had to endure horrendous situations. Some of the prisoners would have jobs that were parts of the process (such as hair cutting.) It is horrible to hear what has happened.

Duplex: A Micropowers Novel

Duplex is Orson Scott Card's second micropower novel. The novel feels much more fresh than the recent Ender novel he wrote. It appears this is where is where his interest lies now. In this book, a girl has the ability to change her face so that it is exceptionally beautiful. A boy can defend others from attacks. There is also the ability to sense cats, make people yawn and all sorts of other smaller powers.

The plot centers around a boy who has a rough home life. His parents have separated, his little sister gets on his nerves and his social life is lacking. One day a new girl from Slovenia shows up at school. He befriends her and then discovers she lives next door. He struggles figuring out how to manage the social situation. He figures he needs a car, so asks his dad for a job. His dad encourages him to show responsibility first. He starts by taking out the trash and being nice to his sister.

He later discovers that there is a gang from Slovenia that is after his friend and his mother. He also learns that she can put on her "Helen of Troy" face - and that this is part of a curse that her mother put on her. Luckily, through an incident with a bee, he discovers his defense abilities. They meet up with others that have micropowers, and later have many incidents with the Slovene gang.

Dealing with social cues and hormones can be challenge enough as as awkward teenager. Life or death situations are just the icing on the cake. (Though having the external threats may make the "girl things" easier to deal with.)

The Last Shadow

I had gone through most of the original Ender's Game series pretty close together. I wasn't super engaged with the first book, but I really liked were things went with the end and into the other books in the series. The post-formic wars exploration of the universe made for great stories. I also enjoyed the Ender's Shadow. Recently, I've listened to the new Formic Wars novels. However, it has been a while since I've listened to the core series. These events were not very familiar to me. I had some trouble getting engaged with this novel.

In this book, humanity, despite being spread across multiple planets, finds itself in danger of extinction. There is a virus that can do bad things. The progeny of the original heroes are here to save humanity. A computer version of the former battle school leader is also here to help. They travel to a planet with sentient birds and underground humans. Eventually they discover more about the virus and with the help of the hive queen's slugs, are able to recover from it. 

I had trouble getting engaged with how all the plot points tied together. On one hand, it was said to be something of universal importance. But on the other hand, there only seemed to be a small number of people that cared about what was going on. I was most interested in the relationship with the different sentient beings on the planet that they were visiting. My favorite part of the book was Card's afterward. I love his behind the scenes look at how and why he wrote it and what interested him. The audio production of the audiobook was also excellent.

Hamlet’s Father

Card tells the story of Hamlet from a different perspective. It seems to have a lot of the things that I remember from the Shakespeare version. Though, honestly, I cannot remember the actual details. In this version, Hamlet's father is engaged in some sort of misbehaviour with the other characters. Plenty of people were killed in the process. Then the tragedy ends.

Zanna's Gift: A Life in Christmases

Zanna's older brother is a hard working teenager who seems to understand Zanna's work better than others. Unfortunately, he passes away suddenly in his sleep. Zanna later learns that she had a twin sister that died at birth. She made a picture for him for Christmas that she continues to bring out every Christmas in memory of her lost brother. The novel continues the many Christmases from the great depression to the modern times. New members join the family. Many people die of various causes, but the "gift" continues.

Lost and Found

Lost and Found centers on a lonely North Carolina high-schooler, Ezekiel Blast. People avoid him because he has a reputation of stealing things. However, what he does is "find things". He has a "micropower" that leads him to the owner of lost objects. However, he has often been accused of stealing these things that he has found, thus giving him the reputation of a thief. One day, a "grade school kid" attempts to join him on his walk. She sees that people avoid him and wants to join in the bubble. It turns out she is actually a high school student with proportional drawfism. They become friends and she helps him discover more about himself.
One day a cop asks him to help out on a missing-child case. He is not able to find "people" because they are not "lost". (He is offended when people talk about his mom being "lost". She isn't lost. She died in a car crash.) However, he can use the "lost" objects of people to find the owner. Through this involvement he helps bring down a child pornography ring that also sought his friend.
There is not a lot of heavy drama in this book. The events tend to just unfold quickly as you would like. However, the story an exploration of powers makes it something difficult to put down. The micropower support group is especially fun. It is led by a researcher who has the power to determine if somebody has an "innie" or "outie" belly button. There are also participants who can mask smells and make people yawn. These powers are difficult to control, and even more challenging to utilize positively. They all provide a lot of fun to explore. What would be the positive use of a bizarre power? Do these "micropowers" really differ very much from the "powers" that people have today. Isn't being naturually good at basketball or math also a form of micropower? It just doesn't stand out because it is normal.

Eye For Eye

In Eye for Eye, Mick Winger learns that he has special powers. He can cause people that anger to die from cancer. This results in him eventually harming many of the people that loved him when growing up in an orphanage. He eventually discovers his family. They have been inbread to carry on their powers. However, he has much greater power than any of the others. He eventually breaks free. It is an interesting exploration of a "super power" that takes time to impact others.