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outofrange

dylankuhn@bookwyrm.social

Joined 4 years ago

Reading for sanity, solace, meaning, meandering. Partial to mountains and desert, climate themes, balancing the heavy with the light.

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outofrange's books

Currently Reading

Renee DiResta: Invisible Rulers (EBook, 2024, PublicAffairs)

An “essential and riveting” (Jonathan Haidt) analysis of the radical shift in the dynamics of …

Influencers demystified

The clearest account I've found of how the culture wars work and why social media is such a fertile battleground. I dearly hope the decentralized future she envisions comes to pass.

reviewed Children of Ruin by Adrian Tchaikovsky (Children of Time, #2)

Adrian Tchaikovsky: Children of Ruin (Paperback, 2019, Orbit)

The astonishing sequel to Children of Time, the award-winning novel of humanity's battle for survival …

Octopus scifi should be a genre

The combination of familiar and unfamiliar life forms makes for good stories and really interesting ideas. A satisfying sequel, but I may need to give my brain a breather before stretching it further.

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Oliver K. Langmead: Calypso (2024, Titan Books Limited)

A different flavor of character scifi

I was skeptical that I'd have the patience for an epic poem, but I was immediately engaged. Each character has a distinct style, and the verse adds an emotional and metaphorical layer to the narrative. It makes for a softer, dreamier, but perhaps more penetrating story that sings its speculations.

Ray Nayler: The Mountain in the Sea (Hardcover, 2023, Weidenfeld & Nicolson)

When pioneering marine biologist Dr. Ha Nguyen is offered the chance to travel to the …

Ode to the octopus

All the things I like about scifi: interesting questions and ideas based on current knowledge, good characters enveloped in a gripping story, and a strong sense of wonder at our world despite the suffering that seems inherent in it. The speculative chronology didn't always make sense to me but didn't matter much in the scheme of ideas being explored. Perhaps one day humans will enjoy cephalopod-authored fiction.

Robert Evans: After The Revolution

After the Revolution is a novel about North America, roughly twenty years after the collapse …

A wild rush with a pleasant hangover

I almost don't know what hit me after reading this. Totally off the hook, gripping tale of dysotpian anarchical warfare. There are definitely good guys and bad guys but they're all roaringly fucked up or about to become so. Like a roller coaster that leaves you feeling a little sick but eager to get onboard again in spite of your better judgement.

Vajra Chandrasekera: The Saint of Bright Doors (Hardcover, 2023, Doherty Associates, LLC, Tom)

Fetter was raised to kill, honed as a knife to cut down his sainted father. …

Dream logic

Much is intriguing, little is certain, and events feel meaningful in ways that evade articulation. Upon waking details fade and I'm left feeling that something has shifted but I'm not sure what.