Final Thoughts and Closing Remarks

Quick question, when was the last time a display ad changed your mind Now think about the last time a friend told you about something they loved. Different feeling, right? That's how podcast advertising works. A host who's built real trust with their audience talks about your brand in their own words, in their own voice. It doesn't interrupt the experience. It's part of it. With ACast, you can access the world's largest podcast marketplace Choose the right shows, the right audiences, the right format. Then watch the data tell you it worked. You're not buying impressions You're buying influence Learn more by visiting acast d. com slash advertise It is by will alone. I set my mind to read. It is by the juice of corn that words acquire meaning, the pages acquire stains, the stains become a review. It is at patreon dot com slash sword and laser. You can provide support Hey everyone, welcome to The Sword and Laser. I'm Veronica Velmont. And I'm Tom Merritt. Sword and Lazer is a book club, but it's so much more. We bring you author interviews, news from the world of science fiction and fantasy, and awesome discussions from fans just like you. Say hey poke Mony Potasll, Veronica Wow, your Korean's getting pretty good. Ces up al Tale Uh but it's uh it's N new yearar Happy Lunar New Year. Chinese New Ye, Sola, whatever you call it It's New Year. It's the other New Year. The second N Year. Um, I think Chatroom thinks we're muted. I don't think they can hear us. Did we go live to chatroom? No I don't know why they wouldn't hear us suuddenly Here we go. to heroes. Yeah I don't know if that fixed it, but tell me if that fixed it. We're live. Oh they did the showive. Okay. We have been show out demand people are like, I hear you just fine No that freaks me out Yeah. Anyway. All right, good Yeah want to make sure we're good here. okay. Anyway we're wishing each other happppy New Year for the lunar New Year, Chinese New Year. Yeah And then on the first is in bulk which is the pagan holiday in between the equinox and the solstice. What do you doing It You do all sorts of stuff. You kind of celebrate that we are over the darkest days of of the year and it's only going to be getting springier and springier. You start thinking about like Rebirth and growth and all of those good things. As liquor says, you drink drink as you do for most holidays Yeah. What are you doing on? drink. What are you doing at Christmas? You drink? What are you do in New Year? You drink Um, Yeah, so it's it's it's a it's a big one for the for the the folks who celebrate out there because it's all about, you know, things are looking up Things are looking up. Getting warmer, getting brighter I like it. That's c. We're actually hoping hoping to get our We're getting a snowstorm tomorrow and this weekend. I'm excited It's been a little too sunny and a little too dry this year January. so I'm looking forward to some snow. We had some much welcome rain over the weekend here ourselves Oh my gosh, I was I was loving your Instagram posts about just like having a beer and walking the ro listening to it. It really n It was really nice. It was very it was very Hga. Yeah. It was very like I don't know, it was nice. I get that feeling. I actually woke up twoo nights ago And I thought I heard rain outside and I got so excited. Oh yes. It was just our heating vent. was making rarain like sounds and I was very sad. Let's too bad Oh well, but I'm happy for you. I'm glad things got a little more moist. Yeah. And now it's all Chilly and wintry. Like, you know, I mean for LA, it's chilly and wintry. I mean, it's like, oh it got to thirty eight at night. It's not that for us My brain immediately went, That's boiling hot. What are you talking? It celsius. Yeah. I was like, Oh my go. I'm sorry. it got to like five at night Oh that's that's that's quite pleasant. Yeah. That's pleasant for me All right, well, anyho, let's Oh, say hello to the chat room. Chat rooms here. Hello everybody. Glad to have you joining us live. and let's jump right into the Quick Burns. Oh really Not what are we numbing Did I skip that? I think we did sure did. What are you numbing, Tom? Soup dumplings Calongbao chicken Calong Bao and fried rice. Nice Nice. I had soup dumplings recently that did not have any soup in them and I was very sad. That happened to one of ours. We did these were ones we picked up at HMart and one of them punctured and all the soup was gone. It was just b That's kind of sad. I no was. That's like different sad. That's like an accident happened. mine was like I feel like you planned this. Oh really? It was sad. I don't know. just felt It just felt like sabotage.' I have nothing to back that up. It just it felt intentional I'm not talking about like the employees did that. I just feel like the soup dumpling itself itself was against your. I'm gonna absorb all my juices. I'm just gonna make this happen. Wow. All right, fine Well, I am also having I'm having'm not also having anything. I'm having whiskey I'm also having dumb no, just whiskey. No, not even solid food. Yeah, it's been like a relatively dry January for me in terms of like today consumption So I decided to have a little a little two finger pour here. Which which whisty are to heaven It's like the good days whiskey. It's like Nka, something days, something like It's kind of like they're slightly less expensive. I prefer the coffee, the coffee the coffee. N coffee is so good. It's not coffee like coffee, but it's good Yeah, and they they don't have it here. haven't been able to find it. We have our house because we brought it back from Japan Oh, fancy I never had trouble getting it in San Francisco, but yeah I think it's a little bit harder So I got to look around for it U But anyway, yes,'s what I'm having So my cheeks are a little pink right now. Perfect, perfect for a new yearar. cold january twenty ninth There you go All right now Now Let's jump into the quick burns Crochet Chrissy and Seth were both the folks that pointed out that bookshop. org is selling ebooks now. They have added ebooks to the library, like their print books. If you buy ebooks, it will support local booksellers. Obviously the local bookssellers aren't paging up the ebook and shipping it to you like they might with the print books, but they get a cut of thumb drive. Right. And the ebooks are available inside the bookshop app for you to read, but I think you can also do some exporting and stuff. So if you wna find out all the details on their ebooks, bookshop dot org comm slash info slash ebooks is the place to go. We'll link that in the show notes as well But yeah, along with Kobo having another place to H ebooks that isn't Amazon is a good thing. More competition is better It is a good thing. Yeahah. I would like to know if it is possible So you can download it The eBook library is accessible on their website in Android or Apple apps I see. Okaykay Yeah, you cannot W the exception of DRM free titles that can be downloaded and downl then sent to your reader of choice.. Right. And yeah once you know file. And so I guess what they're saying is not every ebook is available DRM free. So they're going to sell ebooks that the publisher requires to have DRM as the Yeah Yeah. And you also cannot buy the books in the app because of that Apple and Google. deeveloper situation because they don't want to pay thatty percent They're choosing not to do in the app because they don't want to give thirty percent of every book to Apple or Google. Which is legit. Yeah. no, it's a fair fair thing. It not It's not like they're prohibited from selling them. That's just not a good deal for them to sell them so. Uh hh All right, Mark goes on to say this one may only be of interest to sword and laser oldsters. We know who we are. The science fiction book Club may be shutting down No the science fiction book club was still in operation. But yeah, a December notice on the website warned that orders will no longer be processed after january second Um So they were trying to tell people like make sure to use your credits by then. We're telling you a little late because we're finding out a little late. But were you ever a member of the US science fiction book club? I was not I was not I'm sorry to say actually that I didn't even know it existed You're not old enough. it's fine I guess I'm not old enough. Did you ever do like Columbia House Record and Tape Club Yes. or CD Club in your era. I am familiar. I did other book things like that. There were book there was a regular book of the Yeah ye. ye. Yeah. I did I did the science fiction Book of the Month Club for a period of time. I also did the regular Book of the Month Cub as well, but the science fiction Book of theonth Club was where a lot of Philip K Dick books were put out in hard back That was the only hardback edition was the book. They would make a special hardback version for the Book of the Month Club, but it was never published in hardardback anywhere else. even though B books are often sold when I was working in used books, book club books would often be sold at a discount because they were book club bindings, not not official publisher bindings. There were certain book club books like the Philip K Dick on's that were actually worth more because it was the only hardback edition of those books Wow, that's cool. Why did they print them as hardbacks? That's so much I feel like it's so much more expensive to sell They to mail New So I'm going from memory, so I apologize if I get any of this wrong. I didn't research it today. But as I understand it, what the book cllub would do is go to a publisher and put in a specific order of a smaller version of the hard backack. A lot of times the hardbacks were slightly smaller with the guarantee that they would buy them all and sell them. No remainder or anything because the book cllub would know like we've got this many subscribers we're going to send this book out to. So you do the print run, but it'll be cheaper to do the print run because we're making a smaller version of it. and then they would send it out to all their subscribers, right? And because of that the books are a little less well made than the official editions Okay, okay, but still anyway would be heavier. They would always do hardbacks. So sometimes they'd go to a publisher who didn't find it to be worthwhile to put out a hardback of an edition and they would say, well, we want a hardback. Can you make one for us Got it That's cool. It seems like a number of folks, including Scott and Mark, as mentioned, were members for a long time So that's pretty c Well it's sad it's sad to see it's gone, but I'm surprised it lasted this long frankly. Good on you. Science for. I wonder what their subscribership was like at the end. Yeah magine it can have been too much, but yeah, I'm curious what that was Jason Reads pointed out that Skaly just finished a new book in the Old Man's War series and posted the cover art for the book, which is coming out september sixteenth The art is by John Harris, who's doing the artwork for all the books in the series. This will be one of two books that Skalzy is releasing this year with when the moon hits your eye being the other. So this old man's War book is called The Shattering Peace Awesome I didn't I read dings. Jason did put dings in his post about this because we're saying Skullzy every time we say Skullzy.'s Are we supposed to drink? I think we're supposed to drink, yeah,. There's two dings, okay. And then I said it again Okay All right Chris Kay says Via Locus are the twenty twenty five Audie Award finalists. Here are the fantasy and science fiction finalists more at the link that we'll include in the show notes As a side note, the Ministry of Time by See now I'm going to question myself about how to say her name, Coleianne. Bradley, narrated by Katie Lung and George Whiteman And from Simon Schuster Audio was a finalist in the fiction category. veryery cool For science fiction, we got Maul Goes to War by Edward Ashton, narrated by Catherine Chin and John Parala The Book of Doors by Gareth Brown, narrated by Miranda Rayson Frontier by Grace Curtis, narrated by Avan Shore Lake of Souls by Anne Lecky, narrated by Ajoa Endo. I'm laughing. I haven't and lucky story to tell you. So remind you to tell you the Anlucky story after this system collapse by Martha Wells narrated by Kevin R. Free. And for fantasy, bookshops and bone dust, written and narrated by Travis Baaldry The Bright Sword by Lev Grossman narrried by Lev Grossman and Nicholas Guy Smith Goddess of the River by Vaishnaavi Patel narrated by Shneha Mathan. Blackhield Maiden by Willow Smith and Jess Hundel, narrated by Willow Smith Someone you can Build a Nest in by John Wiswell, narrated by Carmen Rose I don't know what I would pick on fantasy mostly because I haven't read these, but I would give systemy Cllapse my vote on science fiction because I did listen to that one and Kevin R Fried does such a great job murder bot. You didn't read bookshops and bone dust. Is that the second rake? Yeah, no, I did not. Yeah. no. I did. It was cute. It was good It's cute U so my and lucky story. So a gentleman I work with who was briefly my manager, but moved on to a different group we still have regular one on ones and He asked me for some recommendations for books that I liked and he really liked James S. A. Corey, he likes Space opera, that kind of stuff. like big, big expansive space sci fi. And so I was like, oh, you should check out. if you want something a little bit different, ancillary justustice. I haven't read the whole series, but I really liked the first book And so he read it and he really loved it. And he went on good reads to go look at the reviews or something And the first review set was a one star review And the one star review said Veronica Belmont told me this was a good book, but I didn't like So I know was what a viewer Which one of you did it? It' we're not mad. We just want to know Why does this comment mention Veronica Belmont. That's hilarious. That's so funny I mean, he knows that I do a podcast, but I't think he like connected it in his mind at first and I was just, I was dying. I thought that was so funny. That is great. So now I have to go, I forgot to go check what the onene star reviews are and which one of you it was. But it's totally, I mean, I totally get it. was It wasn't their speed, they weren't into it. No, Not every is for everybody It just cracked me up. Tamahome wrote I in the chat Is that a giveaway? Was it Tamah homeomeade? No. Like Ik, do you mean like they're like Tomahome is saying like ek Oh tryke. I was trying to accuse trike. because they said troke at first and then they meant to say Tke. I see. Yeah, I'm gonna to do some sleuthing to find out that who that person islehing I was telling him, his name's Rob. I was like Objectively this is a good book, so I cannot stand by someone giving it all one star, but I will say like it's hard to argue that that's onene star and not be to everybody's taste. Not everything is, but yeah, it seems like It has a nice broad bell curve That's how I would put it Jason Reeds submitted that John Ridley, who wrote the screenplay for the Oscar winning movie Telve Years of a Slave, is slated to direct an adaptation of Isaac Asimov's nineteen fifty four novel, The Caves of Steel, a science fiction detective novel. The book is the first in Asimov's robot series and features the firstpp first disappearance. The first appearances of human Elijah Bailey and the Android R Danieel Olivov Very cool. I'm not too familiar with the caves of steel But I do love a science fiction detective novel. I mean, you're familiar with the robot series though, right? So this is the this is the first in that series. takes place in a future where People on Earth live in domed cities, AKA the caves of steel, while the spacers live out in planets. You know, I'm sure James SA, Cy were maybe slightly influenced by this. I was gonna say sppacer sounds a bit familiar. But also what else are you gonna call people who live in space? Yeah, yeah, no, it's all fair. The novel follows New York City detective Elijah Bailey, who is assigned to investigate the murder of a spacer scientist. So that's how it kicks off. So yeah kindind of a noir detective space series with robots. Love that of that. Count zero or says we could call them spaceenoids So there's that. That is an option. Thank you for that Seth says Reactor puts out a list of SFF titles from the first half of the year Just a list of them Just, you know, I'm joking qualification. It's called thirty science fiction and Fantasy titles to look forward to in twenty twenty five, thirty standouts to put on your TBR for the first half of this year. And it starts with if I could sit you down and tell you about all the books I'm excited about that are coming out this year, I would. It would take three days, several kittdles of tea and you might find me very annoying by the end That's how the article on Reactor Mag starts Well, this is going to be a good a good feeder list potentially for future picks. So that's always good. If we want something a little bit new. I'm seeing some familiar names here O Katie Martin. we hadour So there's some good G goodood names in here that I'm familiar with already. so And also new stuff, I'm always down for new authors. I struggle with that sometimes because I feel like I get fed a lot of content that is the next book of an author I already really like. Like I feel like I've tried to reick Robert Jackson Bennett like six times and had to remind myself that we've already read Robert Jackson Bennett.. So and other authors too. but that one comes to mind because just recently I was like, I think I pinged you. and I was like, wait, did we read? And you were like, Yeahah, city of stairs and I was like, o, Dang. It's okay Yeah Dang, man And then Paul sent us a Pell's bookstore list of the best twenty five books of the best twenty five years Paul says it's definitely got a lot of big names and no real surprises. But the big question potentially for a breakout discussion is what's missing These lists seem wary of picking much from the last few years, but I've had Babel on I would have had Babel on there personally. Babble came out Last year Yeah. That's what he's saying He not already. A lot of these books, this is the best twenty five of the past twenty five years. And Paul saying they shy away from stuff that came out recently. they tend to go a little farther back. Yeah. I was still locked on the last conversation which was and I was still like why looking forward now whyy would they have I see this Um, Okay.'s The liies of Lch Lamora made the list. twenty five best Sci fi and fant. Wow. Okay. the way. Let's see how many we've read. Gl the graphic novel is on here. That's interesting. stop, stop, stop, stop stop. Okay Perito Street Station, we read I think that's a fantastic book That's a that's a I feel like that's a bold choice. but an excellent book made me very physically uncomfortable American gods We're not going to go there right now Pattern recognition. Y Miss Bourne. Oh Still not read, Miss Barne I feel like people are really going to start questioning my fantasy bonafide if I don't start reading more Sanderson. You have read Brandon Sanderson, just so people know just Missbore Yeah No Les of Laklamora loved it. Three body problem, excellent. Name of the Wind, fantastic. The wind upp girl loved it Saga volume one, excellent, An Slary Justice, weird one star person who gave it a review that Jason Reeds just linked to in the chat. looved it. Annihilation, fantastic. The longong wayay to a smallall Agry planet, exxcellent. Bintty, amazing. Seven Es Okay Mm. Sure. I don't know if I would have picked that. You might have put Anathem if you're gonna to pick a Stehvenson Or the Baroque cycle maybe Maybe not a student I don't know if that one would have been my pick. Yeah Uh fifth season, but you know, maybe the last the other ones weren't within the last twenty Well, Anathem was Anathan and Brookesy a within the last twenty five years. so Okay, okay Fifth season, obviously, uprooted, excellent, All the birds in the sky Okay. I thought it was good. I don't know if and I I huge respect for Charlie Jan Anders All systems read? Yes Baron the Nightingale, haven't read that yet. There's a lot on here that I'm not familiar with. heard of it but A lot of people have recommended it recently as a potential book pick option. So that's good. Anna Sunbeam also have not read Graphic novel. Okaykay,' that makesense. Chilly Walden. Okay, that's fair. Yep. Black Lopard Red Wolf. I think we'd have a lot of people pushing back on that one, but I thought it was so new and so interesting Excehalation, I have not read this by Ted Chiang Um But I'm sure it's good. The Priory of the orrange tree. I loved that book so much. I loved that book so much. I think I need to reread it at some point because It's just it's so vast. There's just so much happening. It's such a big world. Yeah. And I think I need to go back to it at some point I feel like parts of it like click into my mind every once in a while and like top in. Yeah. Yeah, It's like become like part of my brain chemistry The Empress of Salt and Fortune, we liked that Master of Gin. Interesting. I liked it I like that. That's an interesting pck. Yeah I think it's interesting that Almost every book on here was a pick Some of the books that weren't picks are from authors where we had already picked something else by the time that book came out or we chose to pick something else like China Mieville And I think really it is other than the graph, there's two graphic novels, which we don't do graphic novels as pics Um Really the only one is the Baron the Nightingale where we haven't read anything by Catherine Arden But everybody else we most of them read the actual book that's on here or at least read another one by that. Oh actually, no, on a suunbeam is a graphic novel, That's right. Okaykay It's kind of freaky actually I mean, it's not crazy, but it's kind of weird. I mean, it just shows that if you want to be considered one of the best books of the century, you need to get us to read it Definitely not the other way around. Thatfsite we don.ar that a book is really good that wet. That's fine. like I like that universe you've created for us. Yeah, read We read M Avil Mark. we read city city. RailC? No, we did not read Railse. We've read the city in the city Are you sure I am ninety five percent. Would you bet your last bottle of Nka coffee whiskey? Oh no, now Mark is saying no We read the city and the city We re Did we not read it at all Did we not read it at all? was it Was it an alternate pick? I read Rily. In We've never had China as a pick Because we def I definitely read Railsa and we talked about it on the show, but it was not a. I remember talking about the city in the city is the two Londons where you like pass through that membrane and you can kind of see people, but it's only if you like kind of don't look at them directly and like They find a path through I mean between the you read it. They're layered on top of You don't remember talking about this No We've read alternate London books, but not from China Miievo No, I've Vicki Swab I don't think she goes by Vicky. Why I just call her that Victoria Ychwa? 'causeuse you guys are tight like that She's like, I don't know you like that girl.. This is our own instead of the Mandela effect, we have the Mierville effect on Sword and Laser How did First of all, I just want to know how Mark knew that so instantly that we have not read M Avile. He just wrote no No No, we did not read that Either he just knows our booklist by heart or he's such a big Mville fan that he like remembers Furiously that we've never read Mville ither either version is hilarious. All right, well We can read Perdita's transcriation for next time J solidify it. I don't think I can reread Perdito Street Station.. That was too intense for me. That would give you a chance to catch up on your fourth wing trilogy I think I read Ril C two Did you and I just go D deffinitely read rail see. and we definitely talked about it on the show. That's with like the flooded No Is that like That's where where you you go out like like you're going out on a boat, but you're on railroads and the railroads are all like Inc No, I haven't read that No, I haven't read that one. I'm thinking of Palo Pacialupi. I'm thinking of wind up Girl. Okay. and we also read that around the same It's about like mechanical ships out in the desert As if it's a nobody liked that Yeah, that wasn't a very good. That' why I don'tember it's by. u All right, someomeone who has the time to live mortal engines, that's it crochet Chrissie. Mortal engines. I was just gonna mumble. I was going more M, number, number, number someomeone who has time to look up Why we talked about China M Avil and didn't make it a pick, Let us know. Fedback concer Oh We did talk about he was the author pick for the video show If he was an author pick for the video show No, he Aaron did the comics. Aron did did Eron n to a comic Hh He it, Aaron Remember the guy who used to draw the comics for the video? Yeah, yeah, yeah So it was it was a topic of that of the comic or the animation. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, I thought so I'm going to go look on the You don't know how to use the internet? I don't know how to get back from where I am right now on this page. Anyway, okay, we can move on. I'm sorry But that's fascinating That's fascinating. Oh, the chat had been chatting for a long time and I hadn't moved Mortal engines. There you go Um, Okay, anyyho, we'll move on. that was eye opening and enlightening. Thank you all. Now it's time for Barrier Sword, which is our feedback from the audience. We have one. It's aboutk one house.kesays regarding my clean house, yes, we maintain strict discipline here because cleanliness is next to godliness. Vacuuming is done once a day, immediately followed by thorough dusting, then polishing the silver I'm kidding. It's falthth. You want to talk dog hair? G a pug But we just got new carpets and we have severely curtailed the dog's traffic on them, Although Zoe, the blind twenty year old Chihuahua did tinkle in the great room. However, I did receive my order of Twinkly lights Thursday and set up the first batch that has faux leaves around the plants. O Fan see Pase Well, whoever was tracking the video show on the Wiki gave up after episode three. There is not a exhaustive list here. of the people we interviewed on that on that piece of content. That's okay That's tonight All right, we have a lot to talk about for the book picks. so let's just jump into that. But I want to hear about the book I picked of the many Okay, the best thing that ever happened to me last week was I wrote the I wrote the book briefing U for your pick, The Will of the Many by James Islington That is not the funny part. I always write the book briefing, whether Veronica picks it or I pick it. but immediately, like within minutes of me publishing it, someone emailed feedback at swordenlazer. com with a link to the book briefing saying, hereere Veronica, hereere's the book briefing I didn't see it because I don't check the email. It was done a Hay, by the way. Oh yeah, I saw it on u I saw it on disiscord. thankfully, so that was good. But The Will of the Many by James Islington is a seven year long audience No, it's like twenty eight hours, which actually really for fantasy books is not ridiculously long, but we haven't read something that long in a while. So I was like, ooh, wow. Um It's about a school Um Veronica asked on text message if I was sick of schools and I said never. And then she said, great, I'm picking this book. Do you have any other I should have asked you more about how it came in front of you, but you basically just said it was on a butcher recommended list, right Yeah, was it was one of these so Discord had a very rousing discussion about what I should pick There were great options in there U Sorry, I'm forgetting who specifically I have to go back and look, but someone recommended the Will of the Many. and I had remembered that I had seen it on many, many a TikTok book list recommendation host over the past year and I I thought it was cool. I kind of wanted something like it's It's a little bit different in vibe. like we haven't done a Romanesque kind of fantasy novel in a long time. And in fact, I feel like the last one I read was like when u Oh jeez Wget U All right, Chat the u The book series that's about the Roman Lgion and also Pokemon You know, you know what I'm talking about the prompt for writing the book was a Roman Lgion, Codexilera. thank you. Code Codeer. that was fast. I loved that series And so u It liicorate, Jim Butcher. Oh, thank you. I knew it was Dresden and like all I could see was Dresden And I couldn't remember Jim Butcher or Code exlera. My brain is full of a lot of things, o. to hard to do that recall Indeed, indeed. Yeah, Xanar, I remember I feel like we talked about it back in the day. It was such a great series. Um So this has that vibe of having like a Romanesque kind of thing And as Licarish says, you know, so many people in the world just are constantly thinking about the Roman Empire. so I thought I would You thought you would force us to think about the Roman Empire every day Febrary. Thinking about the Roman Empire? Yeah. ye Islington's Damo is saying, Certain Lasers has never read Jim Butcher. That I know is not true Islington says he was influenced by the books of Rayond E. Feist and Robert Jordan growing up. and it was after reading Brandon Sanderson's Mistborn and Patrick Rock name the wind that he was inspired to start writing his own stories. Will of the Men came out in twenty twenty three. It is the first book in the hierarchy series, not his first book He is probably more well known to some as the author of the Shadow of What was Lost, which was self published in twenty fourteen but led to him signing a deal with orbit books, and he wrote two more in the Lacanius trilogy he was someomeone who ran a tech startup in Australia says he didn't enjoy that, but but that he is glad that he is now an author. Will of the Money is set in the Katenan Republic. which is kind of a very very loose analog of the Roman Empire, but it's not on Earth. It's an alternate world, fantasy world. And the magic system here is that lower classes must what's called seeding, not SEED, but CEDE. seed your will to the higher classes. So it saps you of mental and physical energy. and then higher classes can collect all of that will and do amazing things. So they have flying ships because they use the will they collect to do that. And of course thats the top top classes wield power over thousands of people. There's also an unknown cataclysm in the past nearly destroyed the world about three hundred years before the trilogy starts before the story starts. And Uh There's this technology from the before times that Not everybody knows how to make work, but with will, sometimes you can make it work. And then the main character is an orphan named V who is recruited by a prestigious upper member of the society to join the Katenan Academy. The deal is, you know, we'll let you go to the academy and improve your station in life but you need to spy on the principle of the accademy for us I love a little A little murder mystery, a little. There's a little murder mystery. people down. There's definitely a little revolution. let's have a rebellion U Yeahah, there's there's this has a secret history of his own. So I don't know if he's exactly a chosen one per se, but you know, he's sort of the Prince and the Popper kind of character As Ziden from Onk Storm likes to say, my father led a rebellion. I helped lead a revolution A I don't think his this is father led a rebellion, but saying I think M might be a spoiler. so I'll just Oh yeah, because you've already been reading, right Yes, I am eight hours into it and he hasn't gone to the school yet He's on his way dayay before the show, said you said I've read many books of the time. It's taken me to read the first half of this book or something What I will say though, because that makes it sound like the book drags, it doesn't. It moves. I am captivated. I am reading this thing a lot because I've made a lot of progress on a very long book in faster than I would normally make because I'm really enjoying it. What I like about his writing style Islton always has us doing something that feels like an important part of the story And I'm always feeling like, o, okay, I need to find out what's going to happen. There's not a lot of sitting around like, okay, I know we need to get to where we're going. So I guess, you know, I'll enjoy the entertainment on the way. Like it really does move and is really compelling and the world is really rich. So I do like that. I think world building doorway folks are really going to like this U And probably plot folks, I'm going guess, you tell me, but plot doorway folks. I think you'll probably like it. Not sure about character and writing style It doesn't mean they're bad. I'm just not sure about Si says, I laughed when I reread the book briefing because I know how long it took to get to the school part of it. That's the book jacket like stuff. It' like, it's a book about a school and that's what Veronica said. It's a book about a school. Everybody says's a book about a school. so yeah Where's the school? It's there It's we are almost forty minutes into the show and we haven't even gotten to the book wrap up yet. so we should probably spoiler rel Dive in on there spoiler, spoiler b for the Ministry of Time by Culian Bradley And I think we'll just go through it's been, you know, January has lasted approximately nine hundred days. So I feel like I read this book in a different lifetime at this point. Yeah. I've I think I've read four other books in between now and then. so it's been it is It is very long ago that I feel like these stories were bopping around in my mind. So we'll read some of these responses to the book and see where it kind of takes off from there. I think my biggest problem is just remembering everybody's names because there were a lot of A lot of names in there from Calvy of our Discord They said I hail from the future as I finished the January book in December Let me tell you that the first half of the book was really slow and really didn't give me hope. Then it switched. I didn't see the hook coming So I was totally caught off guard by the reveal I will be curious to know if others saw it coming. I guess in the end, I liked it more because of the ending But I don't think it's an Obama book, just saying I really want him to ask him What? I will be curious. I will be curious to listen to this podcast and the reviews from everyone I have to think it will have a lot of loves or hates. Now we are being spoilery. Calvy was not being spoilery, but we are going to be spoilery just to underline that. I definitely saw the hook coming Did you? Did you? Yeah. No. I was like, this is a time travel book And the first inkling, the first hint that He was like, you know, I saw that weird thing with the holographic stuff. And she's like, what are you talking about? I'm like, oh,s there's people coming from the future We're not we're not the farthest ahead in time that this technology is coming from. I bet it was invented in the future. and then that didn't ruin it for me. For some people, if they figure that stuff out, it ruins it. For me, it was like, ooh, I wonder if I'm right, right? And it turned out I was mostly right. Not one hundred percent right. But yeah, I did feel like I knew where that was going, but I was kind of excited about that. I was like, ooh, but but where in the future and who? and which which ones of them? I didn't actually know. I wasn't sure exactly which ones. I actually thought the general or the brigadier The brigadier I thought the brigier was from the past and had been recruited forward. because he was so weird. Yeah ye because he was acting all timey. Yeah. But I love that he was from the future and just like we all the time we say things about the past that are not period appropriate, right? or people make fun of old movies where they're mixing styles from like twenty different decades together because it's like, nah it's the eighteen hundreds, Wh who cares? Like he was doing that. He just missed he's like went sixties instead of nineties or I guess twenties or whatever. Yeah Totally Yeah, I didn't. I mean, obviously I think we all knew something was weird about Adeela because of her face melting h. Didn't guess that. That's the part that I didn't guess. that her like she kept getting plastic surgery and her face kept changing shape. I didn't think she would be our hero. I just thought she was from the future I just thought there was something something So you caught onto that I dont know faster than I did. Okay. that's good to Yeah. Yeah. I guess Um I'm just not realizing that the u The u main character does is nameless Technically throughout the story, though Gore calls her cat. So that's how I thought of her as her name. Um But yeah, that was a pretty big for me, that was a pretty big reveal. I was like, o, no wonder you're so mean to her ' you were like frustrated Yeah with her not getting shit right or like getting or like, you know, it's kind of like how you treat like a a younger sibling or something. Definitely. feel like you know everything and And the same mistakes I did. Yeah, yeahactly vibe Scott M. says, I've been swamped with a major transition I'm doing at work. so I just picked up the January read this evening. I'm around the halfway point now and wow, I'm blown away I will say, especially in the light of conversation this afternoon in genereral chat, that this book lands very much as literary fiction for me. So far, there hasn't been a ton of plot Though, I sense elements starting to come together. The focus has been on character development and really major themes of identity, how others perceive us, how we perceive ourselves and the power of narrative. And time and again, there has been use of language in ways that stopped me in my tracks. I've highlighted a ton, but I'll note a couple of very short and non spoilery examples. This was one of my first lessons in how to makeake the future Moment by moment, you seal the doors of possibility behind you That sent chills down my neck and I had to sit with it for a moment That distills a complex experience that is not at all easy to express. Then there's this example that I think would be easy for people to rush past, but it's worth settling into. He filled the room like a horizon What is a horizon? It's a demarcation line between two distinct states or realities. It's the distant marker of where we are journeying. It's a descriptive term for expanding our vision and experiences. It's a lot of things, but not something we typically attribute to person or describe as filling a room. And the learning to ride a bike scene reached a point where I chuckled out loud, not something I usually do And one line that probably made me smile most because I have a mother with two masters in psychology as well as various other degrees I ask both as a psychologist and a person with a normal level of empathy that a lot of these lines I remembered from the from the text and I particularly remember I remember exactly where I was when I was reading the bicycle scene And yeah, I was totally like I kind of did that like Yeah, kindind of like o you. Me too Me too. Yeah. So that was there was a lot of humor in this book. I definitely ye ye A lot of the Britishism Briticisms drywQuite funny. I liked a lot of the the comments from from Gore you know, just his like frustrations. I think we read some of Scott's or someone other the other picks from from two weeks ago where we were laughing at kind of his transition from Victorian era bachelor to having to kind of live in a feminist future and how difficult that was for him to of deal with, but not as bad as you would think. I mean he together pretty fast. So I think that was that was good on him Um But yeah thought I thought the writing was quite good. and there's more more comments on that later down the road. John Nevitt said Having thought about it a bit, I wonder if a big part of why I didn't like the first half of the story is I like my protagonist to be competent, if not experts. Interesting It's part of why I like Stevenson and Andy Weirbook so much. I don't mind if they're broken or imperfect, but I like them to be good at things. I likek the Lean Planet Fall despite her brokenness and because I could relate to it, and because she was so competent at what she did set out to do And despite our bridge seemingly being very good at knowing her history and how to describe the present I just didn't find her competent This made more sense in the second half of the book But it just didn't work for me in the first half. But I'm still trying to sort out why the story didn't work for me and others that are similar did I wonder if Kings of the Wild had been written from gabe so utterly broken point of view instead of Clays if I would have liked that book. I don't know Interesting comparison. I am speechless at John Nevittz describing her as incompetent in the first half of the book. I just don't get it. I don't see it U And I know of it'sith has been around the community for a long time. So I'm very aware that this is not just, you know, some half dashed, you know trollly thought or anything. like John really believes this. so I respect that, but I don't see it. That is really interesting. And that's an example of how this book played with a lot of people where people were like, wait, you saw that. I don't see that at all. Like there was I noticed that with other people as well. T She So I will agree with some points inso far that She did not do a very good job at being a brridge. Like she she I think she's a competent human being I think that she probably had a lot of her own issues with her own confidence, which is a different thing U But I think that She let her emotion like she shouldn't have fall in love with him for one, if this was a scientific experiment, like this is They shouldn't have put them in the house together probably eith That I agree with, but that's not her incompetence. That's a bad design of the system Uh And yeah, I mean Alfgive her falling for him because like that's the story. I fell for him. Jesus. But also but you know, like also like she's a human being. That doesn't make you incompetent It's how you deal with it. and I thought she dealt with it pretty well like walling it off, keeping it keeping it professional as long as possible. In fact in the first half of the book, she was more competent at that than in the latter half of the book. That's when she started to let her feelings get get a hold of her and say disagree with that. Yeah. I don't disagree with that. I think she definitely she was trying really hard in the beginning and then all of that kind of fell apart, but that falling apart also came in conjunction with discovering things about the situation she was in Um whichich makes sense because she was learning a lot of new crazy frickaking information as time went on Um I don't know. Everybody agrees with John Nevitt, so I'm apparently in the majority. Like Crochet Chrissy says she really felt blind to everything and it was annoying. Mantissa says I realize she was incompetent in retrospect U T trusting in bureaucracy, says Scott I don't see it at all. I think I am offended on her behalf that you think she is incompetent. L I don' show me the evidence. giveive me the They did even Licorice se me the review that tells me manager was like telling her like, this is bad, somethinghing's bad. And she was like,, it's probably fine. He disappeared, it's probably fine. I'm just gonna keep writing these reports and sending them to him over email. Now, there was a lot going on with her coworker with the ethics of what they were doing and she just kind of ignored it. That again is not incompetence That is ethics and her not questioning the ethics of the program is a different thing than competence. that to me is Kind of to me, it felt like, oh, this is what people in bureaucratic intelligence work do Right? Soes and I think that it is fair to criticize her for that, but I wouldn't call it incompetence. I don't know Thank you. Cise says, I'm not sure I would call that in confidence All right, youve got one person to agree with you Scott M. I didn't think she was incompetent, but her perspective was limited Okay. Well, I mean, we can we can argue the defination right in relation toobbody's right. Nobody's wrong. This is all just perspective. But and I'm very thankful for John for putting it so well because You know, I was like, huh, he's right from his perspective, but man, I did not see it Jan accacy says she should have known she was in a time travel mystery story. C on. C on.s Jan says I very much enjoyed the book or at least ninety percent as as I really at the big I'm reading this wrong Um Okay I love the language, the choice of words, how the characters talked, and the dry wit throughout I enjoyed this aspect in the character so much that I would have been very happy if it had just been an exploration of the characters and the environmental, cultural, political themes and allegories being presented by this very precise and witty narration The rush plot at the end was fine But for me, the star of the book was a language. Damn, it was good. This is definitely a writer's doorway, a writing style doorway for sure. There' excellent turns of phrase And then different John from John Nevz says this book presents intriguing ideas and considerable potential. Oh my gosh, this is written like an editor, you know, like writing a rejection letter. The book presents intriguing ideas and considerable potential, but feels like it needed further development to fully realize it. The lighthearted housemate relationship was engaging, and I particularly enjoyed the quirky interactions between the two main characters and the fresh perspectivive of historical figures encountering modern life However, my main criticism lies in the unclear purpose behind retrieving people from the past Whilst initially experiments are explained as a simple test of what's possible, the later suggestion that these historical figures are somehow essential to some future mission remains frustratingly unclear. Instead, the narrative largely focuses on teaching these transplanted characters modern values and terminology, an angle that could have worked well, as comedy had the author lean into it, but instead fell in a cringe inducing middle ground. The story also leaves several rich veins of narrative potential untapped. For instance, the premise that they only take people who historically disappeared raises fascinating questions Are the ministry themselves inadvertently responsible for creating these very disappearances. The expat's intellect suggest they would have grappled with such paradoxes, which could have added compelling tension to their relationships, yet this angle remains unexplored Ultimately glad I read this as reading such works serves as inspiration. While masterpieces can feel intimidatingly perfect and poor writing can be discouraging, encountering something good but unpolished motivates me to explore my own potential as an author Oh, well, you should explore that potential because I really enjoyed reading this post. It was very well written. I found the post to have excellent themes, although lacking in certain casualness and approach him no, I'm just kidding. ree with like A lot of these points obestly. I think Oh my go. record we both liked this book. We just put that So did John, by the way. He says I like this book, right? It's just yeah. Okay, so wait, I Yeah, I mean, I lik the book for what it was. I found the the The whole process of all the experiments they were doing to be very confusing. And yes, maybe that was kind of explained later. But like not really, like they just like didn't follow good scientific method like as far as I could tell, like the like the It just felt so overly bureaucratic and maybe that is how things go It was like, this is an incredible scientific discovery. and You're doing very stupid things with these people and it just doesn't make any sense. Yeah. That's so unrealistic. When ever has a government agency behaved like that Yeah. All right. No all kidding aside. like I do I thought it was a good representation of an inefficient bureaucracy playing with fire and getting burned. Yeah. so. I don't think John's giving them enough credit for having a real reason. They wanted to see if they could get people from the past and keep them healthy because then they could get other people. They could also move people back into the past. And there were some explanations and they don't come to mind right now, but there were some explanations that made sense to me of why they would want to do that He's not wrong that They went back on those and they changed them, but that's also me that that's realistic, right U Mhm I thought theyd dealt And maybe I just made it up in my head But I thought they dealt with the idea of whether they were responsible for creating the disappearances. I thought she worked through that. It's like, you know it made me wonder like if we hadn't taken them, would they have survived? Because again, am I imagining it or was there the whole thing about how Gore was so competent, mayaybe he would have survived if they didn't take him. U Yeah, and maybe John is acknowledging that and saying, yeah, but they could have done more with that and that's fair too Yeah. Um Maybe that's just the point of bureaucracy is to be to I don't I can't even answer that. I can't even finish that sentence. What is the like to conffuddle, I guess? Yeah is the best I can do Um Well, these were great points. I mean, I think I think there were a lot of people who love this book. I think I don't think there were a ton of people who hated it. I think there were just people who it wasn't for them. U And that's or they Yeah, they wanted more out of it or something they didn't get out of it. and that's that's totally fair. And I liked it and I found the premise interesting. I think I mostly liked the characters and wanted to dive into them more and wanted to have Oh, excuse me, it's past my bedtime. it's eight PM. Um And like I wanted to No like more about their experperience evolving into present, you know? it's just it's such an interesting idea That can be a frustrating thing for some readers when they because there are so many interesting concepts trotted out Yeah. Yeah. And I think it can be frustrating for some people to say I wish they would have followed that line more because there are so many of them. Maybe that is a weakness to play with too many concepts that That could be something to explore there too Yeah, it much too much good stuff and you don't get enough of it and you get frustrated. Yeah IP at beut stores What Team, that's good stuff is very slogan Is it? Yeah I learned something new every episode. Me too. Thanks, everybody