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Life has been very busy! So I haven't read a lot! But I did manage to finish one book I'd been looking forward to for months!
What I finished: A Drop of Corruption, the second book in the Shadow of the Leviathan series by Robert Jackson Bennett. Y'all, I love this series! And if anything, I loved this second book more than the first! No sophomore slump here! (Although others disagree and don't like it as much! I'll be interested to see what consensus emerges, if one does!)
For those of you who haven't read the first book: this is a traditional mystery series, except that it's set in a fantasy world of incredible worldbuilding. Instead of technology in the sense we know it, this culture manipulates plants to create everything they need. So their buildings are built of plants and they use bioengineered plants to alter human beings, giving them almost supernatural skills--memory, strength, whatever.
There are also huge sea creatures (hi kaiju!) that come ashore and wreak unbelievable havoc; the empire that dominates the series exists essentially to protect people from these creatures. And the creatures have very potent blood that can have weird effects on living organisms. All of this is connected is surprising ways.
In this world we have Din, a young soldier who has been altered so that he has perfect recall. He gets assigned to be the assistant of a very, very eccentric old lady named Ana, who works as a kind of military detective, pursuing justice throughout the empire and also just being weird and off-putting. I adore her. More weird old ladies as heroes! The story is told from Din's POV--he's essentially the Watson to Ana's Holmes.
I won't go into details about this second book except to say these things: a) the plot is so much fun, b) the worldbuilding deepens significantly from the first book, c) we get some insights into Ana's mysterious past that had me vibrating with excitement and the need for book three, and d) RJB's afterword made me very fond of him as a person. I'm picking up what you're putting down, sir, and I salute you. I definitely need to seek out his other series.
What I'm going to read next: I haven't started it yet because I just finished ADoC last night, but next up is More Than Words: How to Think About Writing in the Age of AI by John Warner. I heard him interviewed on one podcast or another, and I need to read about writing from someone who actually values it.
Book summary:
So yeah! Relevant To My Interests, as we used to say.
What I finished: A Drop of Corruption, the second book in the Shadow of the Leviathan series by Robert Jackson Bennett. Y'all, I love this series! And if anything, I loved this second book more than the first! No sophomore slump here! (Although others disagree and don't like it as much! I'll be interested to see what consensus emerges, if one does!)
For those of you who haven't read the first book: this is a traditional mystery series, except that it's set in a fantasy world of incredible worldbuilding. Instead of technology in the sense we know it, this culture manipulates plants to create everything they need. So their buildings are built of plants and they use bioengineered plants to alter human beings, giving them almost supernatural skills--memory, strength, whatever.
There are also huge sea creatures (hi kaiju!) that come ashore and wreak unbelievable havoc; the empire that dominates the series exists essentially to protect people from these creatures. And the creatures have very potent blood that can have weird effects on living organisms. All of this is connected is surprising ways.
In this world we have Din, a young soldier who has been altered so that he has perfect recall. He gets assigned to be the assistant of a very, very eccentric old lady named Ana, who works as a kind of military detective, pursuing justice throughout the empire and also just being weird and off-putting. I adore her. More weird old ladies as heroes! The story is told from Din's POV--he's essentially the Watson to Ana's Holmes.
I won't go into details about this second book except to say these things: a) the plot is so much fun, b) the worldbuilding deepens significantly from the first book, c) we get some insights into Ana's mysterious past that had me vibrating with excitement and the need for book three, and d) RJB's afterword made me very fond of him as a person. I'm picking up what you're putting down, sir, and I salute you. I definitely need to seek out his other series.
What I'm going to read next: I haven't started it yet because I just finished ADoC last night, but next up is More Than Words: How to Think About Writing in the Age of AI by John Warner. I heard him interviewed on one podcast or another, and I need to read about writing from someone who actually values it.
Book summary:
A veteran writing teacher makes a "moving" (Rick Wormeli) argument that writing is a form of thinking and feeling and shows why it can't be replaced by AI
In the age of artificial intelligence, drafting an essay is as simple as typing a prompt and pressing enter. What does this mean for the art of writing? According to longtime writing teacher John Warner: not very much.
More Than Words argues that generative AI programs like ChatGPT not only can kill the student essay but should, since these assignments don't challenge students to do the real work of writing. To Warner, writing is thinking--discovering your ideas while trying to capture them on a page--and feeling--grappling with what it fundamentally means to be human.
The fact that we ask students to complete so many assignments that a machine could do is a sign that something has gone very wrong with writing instruction. More Than Words calls for us to use AI as an opportunity to reckon with how we work with words--and how all of us should rethink our relationship with writing.
So yeah! Relevant To My Interests, as we used to say.
