Books, books,books...

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Curious that one of my favourite literary genres is shall we suggest, the slightly dystopian. I would never have figured that I would find myself, if not stage front, but at least third spear-chucker from the right in the very real and potentially very dark scenario that life's Theatre of the Absurd has dumped on us recently. Existential threat has been an over-used and much abused term of late - but I think we might be close to appreciating the fact that we are now facing just such a threat. It's like the best wake-up call you could possibly get - there is no ignoring it - there is nowhere to run to hide from it - even if you're a billionare skulking on a superyacht or hiding on a private island somewhere; if the world's economy dies because of this shit, then you die. Sorry, can't help myself...



I started this post with the intention of talking about books, so let's do that -
Books I have recently read/started:

Robert Harris - The Second Sleep: Dystopian - good read, typical Harris; superficially deep, but not in a bad way - page turner...

David Stubbs - Mars by 1980, The Story of Electronic Music - so far, so good...factual but entertaining history of what it says...will maybe write more when done...

Maja Lunde - The History of Bees: Dystopian - just started this one: no idea where it will end, but it's set in the near future in a world without bees: anyone who knows their ecology knows what this implies...

Adam Higgingbotham  - Midnight in Chernobyl - been reading this for a while - anyone who saw the series on Netflix(?) - whatever - will relate to this account. It's academically and historically on the money. The only downside is the very, very dense dramatis personae. Like Tolstoy, trying to keep track of all the characters is not easy...a good read though that highlights the idiocy of command/control and target/ideology structures...

Still to get underway with Neal Stephenson's Seveneves - like all of his books, I buy them and then sit girding my loins to start reading them for a couple of years or more. His books are BIG. In every sense of the word. BIG. But once you dive into those deep, deep waters, the reward is some of the most involving and complex storytelling in modern fiction. I'm-not-kidding. As a starter I would recommend "Cryptonomicon" because this led to the most expansive prequel imaginable: "The Baroque Trilogy" which beggars belief in its scope. It might take weeks or months to get through (and God knows I think we might all have the time to put in at the moment,) but these books are reward in themselves: you feel altered after reading them. In a good way.

Time for bed, said Zebedee - Boing, Boing, Boing...

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