Archive for the ‘Scifi’ Category

INFINITE JEST by David Foster Wallace

I’ve thought a great deal about this review, since beginning the book, in fact. (I wonder if even the word “review” is the right one. A review implies more than I think I can deliver.) This is no ordinary book and writing about it is not a normal experience. This book is big and thick and juicy and full of complexities, ripe with humor and allusion, digressions and insights. For this reader, it is the book of a dream. I mean that in two ways…

May 12, 2010 · Judi Clark · No Comments
Tags: ,  Â· Posted in: Allegory/Fable, Classic, Contemporary, Humorous, Reading Guide, Scifi, Unique Narrative

WWW : WATCH by Robert J. Sawyer

In Robert J. Sawyer’s WWW : WAKE, the first book of this trilogy, Caitlin Dector acquired sight through an optical implant that communicates with a device she calls her Eye-pod, which decodes the scrambled signals going to her brain from her eye. But before that she became the first person to “see” the World Wide Web, as a byproduct of the Eye-pod along with her own acquired ability to conceptualize Web connections. Caitlin encountered something else in the background of the Web: an emerging intelligence she dubbed Webmind. Caitlin adjusts to seeing the world around her for the first time, while Webmind began to see it through her.

May 8, 2010 · Judi Clark · No Comments
Tags:  Â· Posted in: 2010 Favorites, Scifi

CITY AT THE END OF TIME by Greg Bear

Throughout the first half of Greg Bear’s CITY AT THE END OF TIME, the reader checks in on half a dozen characters all have a part to play in either the saving or the resetting of the universe. Two of the characters, Jack Rohmer and Virginia Carol (Ginny), dream about the city at the end of time, the Kalpa, and for brief periods, their consciousnesses inhabit their counterparts there.

April 29, 2010 · Judi Clark · No Comments
Posted in: Scifi, y Award Winning Author

THE BOY WHO COULDN’T SLEEP by DC Pierson

Darren Bennett likes to draw. This hobby makes him insecure 1) because he’s a sophomore in high school and he’s insecure about everything, and 2) because he knows that whatever he draws will result in a false label: “If you’re drawing the female figure, you’re a pervert. If you’re drawing the male figure, you’re gay. If you’re drawing superheroes and haven’t gotten around to drawing the masks or capes or whatever yet, you’re gay.” Nevertheless, it provides a fantastical escape from his increasing isolationism in an unremarkable Arizona suburb where he lives with his good-natured but neglectful father and complete hooligan of a brother, an arrangement that resulted when his “mom kind of went haywire.” When fellow outcast Eric Lederer compliments one of Darren’s drawings after class, a friendship forms that leads to “the biggest mistake of [his] life” and perhaps the worst false label of all. From a perfectly executed prologue to a thrilling sci-fi finish, DC Pierson’s debut novel will undoubtedly captivate readers and remind them of the limitless potential of the coming-of-age novel.

February 6, 2010 · Judi Clark · 2 Comments
Tags: , ,  Â· Posted in: 2010 Favorites, Coming-of-Age, Debut Novel, Humorous, Literary, Scifi, US Southwest

IN THE COURTS OF THE SUN by Brian D’Amato

The world-building in this speculative fiction novel set on Earth is staggering. Over half the book takes place in Guatemala and Central Mexico at the height of the Mayan empire. The detail D’Amato puts into the pageantry, customs, sights, sounds, smells and tastes truly transport the reader to a seemingly alien world. The story is told by a Mayan descendent with his share of neuroses, gifts and curses. The first person, conversational narration was fresh and often humorous.

December 11, 2009 · Judi Clark · No Comments
Tags: , ,  Â· Posted in: Facing History, Latin America, Latin American/Caribbean, Mexico, Scifi, Speculative (Beyond Reality)

THE YEAR OF THE FLOOD by Margaret Atwood

In THE YEAR OF THE FLOOD, two women, separately isolated, watch as a gene-engineered plague wipes out humanity in a stand-alone novel set in the same dystopian world Atwood first created in 2003’s ORYX AND CRAKE.

Both women – Ren and Toby – are former members of God’s Garderners, a vegan, pacifist eco-cult who long predicted the “waterless flood” which destroys humanity….

December 2, 2009 · Judi Clark · No Comments
Tags: ,  Â· Posted in: Character Driven, Scifi, y Award Winning Author