Just keeping a record of the cool books that cross my shelves.
This link opens in a pop-up window
Keen
boosted
On Food And Cooking: The Science And Lore Of The Kitchen is a book by …
Content warning food
Cream for whipping must be sufficiently rich in fat to form a continuous skeleton of globules.
— On Food and Cooking by Harold McGee (Page 32)
"a continuous skeleton of globules" wins as the phrase that would fit just as easily in a good science book as in Gideon the Ninth
Walkaway is a 2017 science fiction novel by Cory Doctorow, published by Head of Zeus …
I'm enjoying how the Walkaway's culture is challenging my engrained biases about how a society can be run. What should a post-scarcity society look like? Well here we have a really novel example of one. I love the idea of imposing the structure of an open source software project onto a real world construction project. Forking architectural designs, needed work appearing like a bug report, but no Blame! I don't know if I could resist the call of unlimited Japanese Onsen though, I'd be a total bath bum!
The Sierra Adventure: The Story of Sierra On-Line tells the story of legendary computer game …
"Based on interviews with ex-employees, this book retells Sierra's intriguing story, from success to ultimate demise."
"This book is hovering between a number of genres in a very interesting way. Part fantasy thought piece, part non-fiction about the practicalities of lairs, and part dungeon master’s guide to crafting great lairs for TTRPG campaigns. All of it comes together to form a very serious book about a somewhat silly subject that I enjoyed quite a lot"
thequilltolive.com/2022/12/16/how-to-defend-your-lair-a-villains-guide-to-defense/
Walkaway is a 2017 science fiction novel by Cory Doctorow, published by Head of Zeus …
It's frightening to read of a society on the verge of post-scarcity being held back by it's ruling class as they grow ever more desperate to retain their power. Frightening because it feels like it's already happening in our own world. Seems apparent when you look to silicon valley and see tech-bros working so fervently to manufacture new faux scarcity in the digital space via cryptocurrency/nfts so they can be the new boot on the necks of the working class. "Money IS the problem".
Keen
boosted
Nearly twenty years after Seamus Heaney’s translation of Beowulf—and fifty years after the translation that …
I guess in two halves. This translation is 97% wonderful, with the other 3% being occasional grating patches. It is the most alive and readable version I've read, and I think the stylistic choices Headley made all make sense, from the repeated exhortations of "bro" to the ways she works to treat the women of the story--especially Grendel's mother, but not only her--better than other translations I've read. Using the techniques of heavy alliteration and kenning compounds with all modern language really brings home how driving they can be, and the originals must have been when their vocabulary was current. Sometimes "bro" and "daddy" felt over-repeated, and then started to grate, but that really is an occasional glitch in a wonderful translation (and I wonder if I'd even have felt that if I'd listened to the poem rather than reading it, or read it more slowly instead of in …
I guess in two halves. This translation is 97% wonderful, with the other 3% being occasional grating patches. It is the most alive and readable version I've read, and I think the stylistic choices Headley made all make sense, from the repeated exhortations of "bro" to the ways she works to treat the women of the story--especially Grendel's mother, but not only her--better than other translations I've read. Using the techniques of heavy alliteration and kenning compounds with all modern language really brings home how driving they can be, and the originals must have been when their vocabulary was current. Sometimes "bro" and "daddy" felt over-repeated, and then started to grate, but that really is an occasional glitch in a wonderful translation (and I wonder if I'd even have felt that if I'd listened to the poem rather than reading it, or read it more slowly instead of in just 2 sittings).
But even in this best translation yet, the story frustrates me. However much Headley tries to open it up, and pushes back on this reading in the translator's introduction, it's still a story of macho men bragging and proving themselves with violence, in which womens' main role is to be prizes and servers. And Grendel's mother still gets short shrift. She's the character whose violence is the easiest to justify, but her role in the story is still to be an enemy whose defeat we cheer for.
It's amazing to be able to read this snapshot from so long ago, and this translation is now the one that I'd recommend to people. But I'm still so ambivalent about the actual content.
Walkaway is a 2017 science fiction novel by Cory Doctorow, published by Head of Zeus …
When the book starts by introducing you to the protagonist who has TWENTY middle names you know it's going to be a wild ride.
