The frightening consequences of electroshock therapy
I'm a middle aged government attorney living in a rural section of the northeast U.S. I'm unmarried and come from a very large family. When not preoccupied with family and my job, I read enormous amounts, toy with evolutionary theory, and scratch various parts on my body.
This journal is filled with an enormous number of half-truths and outright lies, including this sentence.
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Short Reads, Long Reads
A few weeks ago, Joshua Palmitier did a book signing for his first novel, the fantasy The Skewed Throne. On impulse I picked up the book at lunch the day of the signing, and by the time his signing I had made it through about 80 pages. I finished the 338 page book by the next morning. It is a light but fun read. The plot is absorbing, the main character sympathetic and compelling. It is the story of an orphan teen girl who lives in a slummy section of a large medievil city. The city is run by a specially annointed queen who has magical powers that allow her to determine what is right. The orphan girl, who has subtle magic powers of her own, is befriended by a bounty hunter employed by the queen to slay people who the queen's powers have determined are a threat to the city. For some reason though, recently the queen's powers have been less accurate, and some innocent people are being slain and some guilty people are going free.
So a quick read, and a nice talk given by the author, who I think is about a decade younger than I am. He talked about the importance of finding the right writing group, and about the four other novels he had written before this one was finally published. He also talked about how he had learned to make every scene in his book work towards advancing the plot, which I think was a very strong element in the book.
He also discussed the non-linear path his book took. The book alternates between an event later in the main character's career, and the start of where she first met the bounty hunter who set her life on its path. There is also a backstory explaining how this girl ended up in the slums and orphaned that slowly comes out over the course of things.
By contrast to the "The Skewed Throne", which I chomped down in a night, I finally finished "The Baroque Cycle" by Neal Stephenson, which has taken me six months to finish. Of course, it's at least 10 times the length of the "The Skewed Throne". As I guess what would be a marketing decision, "The Baroque Cycle" is written in smaller, closer spaced print than "The Skewed Throne". If the "Skewed Throne" had been printed in the same print as "The Baroque Cycle" it probably would been less than 200 pages instead of the 300 and some it turned out. By contrast, even the most ambitious people might get imtimidated by the Baroque Cycle if it had gone over 5000 pages.
Unlike "The Skewed Throne", the "Baroque Cycle" is weak on plot. There are interesting subplots, but no real coherent story arc that ties them together. It is however, an amazing read. The "Baroque Cycle" is set in the late 1600s and early 1700s and follows the course of three very different individuals of English descent. The first is Daniel Waterhouse, a scientist and the son of a puritan revolutionary. Through Daniel's eyes we see the politics, religion and science of England. The second is Vagabond Jack, an illiterate swashbuckling hero, who despite having had half his penis cut off in an unfortunate accident, gets the girl in the end. Through Jack we see the seedier side of England and take a tour of the world, visiting the Turkish Empire, India, and New Spain. The girl Jack ends up with is Eliza, who Jack rescued from a Turkish harem, although they separate and are not re-united until much later. Eliza uses her considerable intelligence and physical charms to control a finanicial empire and end up a member of both the French and English nobility. Through Eliza, we see the world of European commerce and explore the courts of France and Hanover. Also making a cameo at various points is Enoch Root, an apparently immortal wanderer who also shows up in Stephenson's more modern "Cryptonomicon".
After finishing the three 1000 page books that compromise this series (although apparently they are stretching it to eight books for the paperback version), I feel like I have fairly good picture of Europe in the late 1600s and early 1700s. It's an amazing tour. Stephenson spent seven years writing and researching this monster, and we see it all: the politics of Kings and Queens, the invention of great minds like Isaac Newton and Robert Hooke, pirate ships, prisons, mines, vignettes about how soap was used to poison people, clothing, disease, slavery - all at an exacting level of detail. Too exacting for some, I'm certain.
It was a brutal world. The English regime and the regimes of all nations at that time, would have made the Taliban seem tame. For counterfeiting alone you could be half hung, disemboweled and then pulled into four pieces by teams of horses while you were still alive and screaming. As a child Vagabond Jack survived by getting payments from people condemned to death by hanging. For their cash, he would jump on their legs and pull them down, so that they died quickly from hanging instead of slowly strangling to death. We see the harshness of lives everywhere.
For all of it's brutality, this period was also a time of remarkable progress. The people may have been brutal, they may have lived in horrible conditions, but they were brilliant. If there is any underlying theme of the series, it is the importance of the progress that was taking place. Stephenson focuses a lot of attention on scientific advances, and changes in commerce, especially commerce.
In this series commerce is as important as the movement of armies, and the succession of kings. Stephenson even makes it appear that England's success in the 18th and 19th centuries was due in large part to its establishment of a stable currency in the late 17th and 18th. It seems reasonable that the greatest mind of that time or perhaps of any time, Sir Isaac Newton, ended up the Master of the Mint of England.
There are so many things to talk about in "The Baroque Cycle" that I could go on for pages and pages. I was not overwhelmed by it though. There are great sections in the book: pieces where Stephenson is just brilliant. It also very tedious at times. The brilliant sections make it worth it, and the historical information is wonderful. It's like taking a course in the period. I recommend it, but I warn people to be patient.
Comparing "The Skewed Throne" and "The Baroque Cycle" is a bit like comparing apples and oranges. "The Skewed Throne" is a tasty tidbit that I whipped through in a single evening. "The Baroque Cycle" took countless hours of my time, extending baths and lunch hours on numerous occasions. Both are worth reading though.
So a quick read, and a nice talk given by the author, who I think is about a decade younger than I am. He talked about the importance of finding the right writing group, and about the four other novels he had written before this one was finally published. He also talked about how he had learned to make every scene in his book work towards advancing the plot, which I think was a very strong element in the book.
He also discussed the non-linear path his book took. The book alternates between an event later in the main character's career, and the start of where she first met the bounty hunter who set her life on its path. There is also a backstory explaining how this girl ended up in the slums and orphaned that slowly comes out over the course of things.
By contrast to the "The Skewed Throne", which I chomped down in a night, I finally finished "The Baroque Cycle" by Neal Stephenson, which has taken me six months to finish. Of course, it's at least 10 times the length of the "The Skewed Throne". As I guess what would be a marketing decision, "The Baroque Cycle" is written in smaller, closer spaced print than "The Skewed Throne". If the "Skewed Throne" had been printed in the same print as "The Baroque Cycle" it probably would been less than 200 pages instead of the 300 and some it turned out. By contrast, even the most ambitious people might get imtimidated by the Baroque Cycle if it had gone over 5000 pages.
Unlike "The Skewed Throne", the "Baroque Cycle" is weak on plot. There are interesting subplots, but no real coherent story arc that ties them together. It is however, an amazing read. The "Baroque Cycle" is set in the late 1600s and early 1700s and follows the course of three very different individuals of English descent. The first is Daniel Waterhouse, a scientist and the son of a puritan revolutionary. Through Daniel's eyes we see the politics, religion and science of England. The second is Vagabond Jack, an illiterate swashbuckling hero, who despite having had half his penis cut off in an unfortunate accident, gets the girl in the end. Through Jack we see the seedier side of England and take a tour of the world, visiting the Turkish Empire, India, and New Spain. The girl Jack ends up with is Eliza, who Jack rescued from a Turkish harem, although they separate and are not re-united until much later. Eliza uses her considerable intelligence and physical charms to control a finanicial empire and end up a member of both the French and English nobility. Through Eliza, we see the world of European commerce and explore the courts of France and Hanover. Also making a cameo at various points is Enoch Root, an apparently immortal wanderer who also shows up in Stephenson's more modern "Cryptonomicon".
After finishing the three 1000 page books that compromise this series (although apparently they are stretching it to eight books for the paperback version), I feel like I have fairly good picture of Europe in the late 1600s and early 1700s. It's an amazing tour. Stephenson spent seven years writing and researching this monster, and we see it all: the politics of Kings and Queens, the invention of great minds like Isaac Newton and Robert Hooke, pirate ships, prisons, mines, vignettes about how soap was used to poison people, clothing, disease, slavery - all at an exacting level of detail. Too exacting for some, I'm certain.
It was a brutal world. The English regime and the regimes of all nations at that time, would have made the Taliban seem tame. For counterfeiting alone you could be half hung, disemboweled and then pulled into four pieces by teams of horses while you were still alive and screaming. As a child Vagabond Jack survived by getting payments from people condemned to death by hanging. For their cash, he would jump on their legs and pull them down, so that they died quickly from hanging instead of slowly strangling to death. We see the harshness of lives everywhere.
For all of it's brutality, this period was also a time of remarkable progress. The people may have been brutal, they may have lived in horrible conditions, but they were brilliant. If there is any underlying theme of the series, it is the importance of the progress that was taking place. Stephenson focuses a lot of attention on scientific advances, and changes in commerce, especially commerce.
In this series commerce is as important as the movement of armies, and the succession of kings. Stephenson even makes it appear that England's success in the 18th and 19th centuries was due in large part to its establishment of a stable currency in the late 17th and 18th. It seems reasonable that the greatest mind of that time or perhaps of any time, Sir Isaac Newton, ended up the Master of the Mint of England.
There are so many things to talk about in "The Baroque Cycle" that I could go on for pages and pages. I was not overwhelmed by it though. There are great sections in the book: pieces where Stephenson is just brilliant. It also very tedious at times. The brilliant sections make it worth it, and the historical information is wonderful. It's like taking a course in the period. I recommend it, but I warn people to be patient.
Comparing "The Skewed Throne" and "The Baroque Cycle" is a bit like comparing apples and oranges. "The Skewed Throne" is a tasty tidbit that I whipped through in a single evening. "The Baroque Cycle" took countless hours of my time, extending baths and lunch hours on numerous occasions. Both are worth reading though.
| Definitely.
You scored 34% Cold and 56% Level-Headed! |
| You can kill. But the question "Why would you?" arises.
Out of safety or cruelty? |
 |
My test tracked 2 variables How you compared to other people your age and gender:
|
| Link: The Can You Kill a Man? Test written by notmarkflynn on OkCupid Free Online Dating, home of the 32-Type Dating Test |
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