finktank finished reading Princess Floralinda and the Forty-Flight Tower by Tamsyn Muir
Fun, very Tamsyn Muir
Reviews and Comments
Exploring and supporting Community Informatics and Youth Power for just futures.
Loving hard sci-fi, queer & BIPOC-authored sci-fi, abolition and abolitionist futures, Afrofuturism, Solarpunk, cooperativism, pedagogy, social change.
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finktank finished reading Bullshit Jobs by David Graeber
Bullshit Jobs: A Theory is a 2018 book by anthropologist David Graeber that argues the …
Didn't love this Graeber book. While I'm inclined to agree with the thrust of his arguments, I don't think his claims are quite accurate, and indeed empirical research questions their accuracy: www.cam.ac.uk/research/news/one-in-twenty-workers-are-in-useless-jobs-far-fewer-than-previously-thought
I think a more nuanced and less hyperbolic approach would make the argument feel more convincing and less baldly ideological.
In an original world reminiscent of Edwardian England in the shadow of a World War, …
I'm really liking C.L. Polk. Charged through this book and on to Stormsong now!
finktank finished reading October by China Miéville
"Acclaimed fantasy author China Mieville plunges us into the year the world was turned upside …
Very well-done, thorough history and storytelling of the year of the Russian Revolution (and what lead to that year, what came of it in short). An engaging way to write a history full of detail that will be foreign to many readers.
finktank finished reading Easy Life in Kamusari by Shion Miura
Yuki Hirano is just out of high school when his parents enroll him, against his …
A lovely little book about reluctantly learning to be a forester.
finktank finished reading A Gentleman in Moscow by Amor Towles
When, in 1922, thirty-year-old Count Alexander Rostov is deemed an unrepentant aristocrat by a Bolshevik …
A lovely book with the revolution as a backdrop. A calm, perfectly paced little story.
finktank finished reading A Companion to Marx’s Capital by David Harvey
“My aim is to get you to read a book by Karl Marx called Capital, …
Finished reading the 350 page companion to Volume 1 of Capital. Not sure I'll make it through Volumes 2 and 3, and definitely not now... So marking this one done too.
Brilliant, powerful fantasy story. Will look for more from thie author. More than my preferred amount of physical descriptions of violence.
finktank finished reading Lacan by Malcolm Bowie
An old but very solid and mostly comprehensible reading of Lacan's works.
finktank finished reading Capital: A Critique of Political Economy, Volume 1 by Ernest Mandel
The first volume of a political treatise that changed the world
One of the most …
Wow! A 6 month project, a little bit nearly every day, reading David Harvey's a Companion to Capital at every step of the way. Finished it today and can hardly believe it.
This book hardly needs my review. But I started reading it because I felt like I'd missed a critical part of an education I should have gotten, perhaps in high school or college. I'd read bits of it in college. Would the journey be worth it for most? I'm not really sure it is. For me though, it was a project I'd long wanted to take on and I'm glad I did and made it through. The Harvey companion book is a must for getting the most out of it.
finktank reviewed The Lost Cause by Cory Doctorow
It’s thirty years from now. We’re making progress, mitigating climate change, slowly but surely. But …
Meaningful and engaging exploration of near future climate activism
4 stars
While some sold it as "solarpunk," I'm not sure it fits this genre. Brooks, the "hero" character, is emotionally complex, but eternally falls on optimism. And his comrades generally seem to share an upbeat nature. Near future southern California is hot, plagued by fires, and dealing with the fallout of MAGA racists and their "plut", cryptocurrency allies, a broader swath of "decent people", and the leftist activists that are trying to create change in the face of climate catastrophe that leaves many internally displaced persons. A few characters add some political complexity, but there's an overall "us vs them" equation that lays the foundation for the book. It reads like a few others of Doctorow's books (Walkaway in mind), where there's a constant back and forth between positive, hopeful movement, and reactionary destruction. It shares with other solarpunk (1) a lot of talk about solar and carbon neutral or negative …
While some sold it as "solarpunk," I'm not sure it fits this genre. Brooks, the "hero" character, is emotionally complex, but eternally falls on optimism. And his comrades generally seem to share an upbeat nature. Near future southern California is hot, plagued by fires, and dealing with the fallout of MAGA racists and their "plut", cryptocurrency allies, a broader swath of "decent people", and the leftist activists that are trying to create change in the face of climate catastrophe that leaves many internally displaced persons. A few characters add some political complexity, but there's an overall "us vs them" equation that lays the foundation for the book. It reads like a few others of Doctorow's books (Walkaway in mind), where there's a constant back and forth between positive, hopeful movement, and reactionary destruction. It shares with other solarpunk (1) a lot of talk about solar and carbon neutral or negative technologies, and (2) a general optimism in the face of difficult climate situations. Unlike much other solarpunk, this isn't a further off future, where significant transformation has changed political, social and cultural grounds. It is instead a near future, where the political debates remain (realistically, I think) in relatively similar terrain. Unlike "The Ministry for the Future", Doctorow doesn't get lost in scalar storytelling ranging from micro to macro transformation. Instead, the focus is on the change that could be made at a small level, in one place, by a group of committed activists. I think the book is meant to leave you hopeful, and I can see how it could do. However, unlike The Ministry for the Future, Becky Chambers' novels, or other Solarpunk, this book feels like it lands solidly in more realistic science fiction. It was a rich romp with some fun ideas (I love the notion that AI combined with open source does something useful and makes it possible for lay people to collectively redesign neighborhoods and communities) and, I think, a decent read on near future politics. And, as I often do, I find myself appreciating Doctorow's political bent, including his thorough investigations into "plut" culture and the cryptocurrency political hellscape.
finktank finished reading Light From Uncommon Stars by Ryka Aoki
Good Omens meets The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet in this defiantly joyful …
A beautiful, lovely, sweet, musical book.
finktank finished reading System Collapse by Martha Wells
Am I making it worse? I think I'm making it worse.
Following the events in …
Loving this series... and wish there was more!
finktank finished reading Thistlefoot by GennaRose Nethercott
In the tradition of modern fairy tales like Neil Gaiman’s American Gods and Naomi Novik’s …
Still processing and don't want to give any spoilers, but a fictional exploration of intergenerational trauma as an embodied force, and an inquiry into the question: how does one heal, if healing isn't only one's own to do.
finktank finished reading Mammoths at the Gate by Nghi Vo
The wandering Cleric Chih returns home to the Singing Hills Abbey for the first time …
A lovely continuation of this series of short novellas. I continue to appreciate the evolving, sweet world of the main characters and the stories and experiences they encounter.