Just finished Gridlinked, not a bad book. Definitely a lot of stuff that I feel like I have to avoid comparing to The Culture series, as it feels significantly poorer for the comparison, but I don't doubt some of that is just my own preferences. Also, it's a style of book that I don't know Banks would have written, and I enjoyed reading it, so, you know.
Now to read Black Sun while I wait for the second book from the library
You read Against a Dark Background?
Actually, I've read Gridlinked it's less of a weird rompy thing than that.
I actually did the Spatterjay trilogy first, and then let it mellow for a while, but was looking for some fun, crunchy-ish milscifi, so I figured I'd try and start more towards the beginning.
One thing I constantly have to wrap my head around: the first Spatterjay book is set 600 years after Gridlinked. And that's perhaps a criticism of his work; I can't honestly tell much difference between the world in times 1,000 years apart (Prador Moon to Hilldiggers).
Eh, The Culture is no different. When do the latter books take place in relation to the Idirian War? Who the fuck knows. You have a super advanced civilization. Unless the book mentions a tech is new, you have no idea if its a fancy new thing or something that just didn't come up previously/hasn't penetrated well. I mean, unless you are looking at the actual dates/have spent a lot of time studying it, there are a solid ~700 odd years in European history that I only have the barest sense of order for.
"I will write your name in the ruin of them. I will paint you across history in the color of their blood."
Just finished Gridlinked, not a bad book. Definitely a lot of stuff that I feel like I have to avoid comparing to The Culture series, as it feels significantly poorer for the comparison, but I don't doubt some of that is just my own preferences. Also, it's a style of book that I don't know Banks would have written, and I enjoyed reading it, so, you know.
Now to read Black Sun while I wait for the second book from the library
You read Against a Dark Background?
Actually, I've read Gridlinked it's less of a weird rompy thing than that.
I actually did the Spatterjay trilogy first, and then let it mellow for a while, but was looking for some fun, crunchy-ish milscifi, so I figured I'd try and start more towards the beginning.
One thing I constantly have to wrap my head around: the first Spatterjay book is set 600 years after Gridlinked. And that's perhaps a criticism of his work; I can't honestly tell much difference between the world in times 1,000 years apart (Prador Moon to Hilldiggers).
Eh, The Culture is no different. When do the latter books take place in relation to the Idirian War? Who the fuck knows. You have a super advanced civilization. Unless the book mentions a tech is new, you have no idea if its a fancy new thing or something that just didn't come up previously/hasn't penetrated well. I mean, unless you are looking at the actual dates/have spent a lot of time studying it, there are a solid ~700 odd years in European history that I only have the barest sense of order for.
This is like 80% true, more on initial read. Some of the tech, especially mind transfer/storage/neural nets steadily improve over the course of the series timeline. It is pretty subtle but Banks kept a consistent timeline throughout for that. The other 10% is from the fact that the Iridian war and the impact of it on the Culture is a thing in like half the books.
Just finished Gridlinked, not a bad book. Definitely a lot of stuff that I feel like I have to avoid comparing to The Culture series, as it feels significantly poorer for the comparison, but I don't doubt some of that is just my own preferences. Also, it's a style of book that I don't know Banks would have written, and I enjoyed reading it, so, you know.
Now to read Black Sun while I wait for the second book from the library
You read Against a Dark Background?
Actually, I've read Gridlinked it's less of a weird rompy thing than that.
I actually did the Spatterjay trilogy first, and then let it mellow for a while, but was looking for some fun, crunchy-ish milscifi, so I figured I'd try and start more towards the beginning.
One thing I constantly have to wrap my head around: the first Spatterjay book is set 600 years after Gridlinked. And that's perhaps a criticism of his work; I can't honestly tell much difference between the world in times 1,000 years apart (Prador Moon to Hilldiggers).
Eh, The Culture is no different. When do the latter books take place in relation to the Idirian War? Who the fuck knows. You have a super advanced civilization. Unless the book mentions a tech is new, you have no idea if its a fancy new thing or something that just didn't come up previously/hasn't penetrated well. I mean, unless you are looking at the actual dates/have spent a lot of time studying it, there are a solid ~700 odd years in European history that I only have the barest sense of order for.
This is like 80% true, more on initial read. Some of the tech, especially mind transfer/storage/neural nets steadily improve over the course of the series timeline. It is pretty subtle but Banks kept a consistent timeline throughout for that. The other 10% is from the fact that the Iridian war and the impact of it on the Culture is a thing in like half the books.
You know time is moving forward but by how much is difficult to figure out
People are fairly close to immortal and the Minds and drones are completely immortal. Like is Player of Games 100 years after the Indrian war or 500? Could you tell the difference at all
Speaking of Asher, I can't remember if I mentioned a while back that I read The Human (the last book of his Rise of the Jain trilogy). It was on the lower end of good, making faking into "okay." This was mainly because pretty much the entire book was one single battle.
Just finished Gridlinked, not a bad book. Definitely a lot of stuff that I feel like I have to avoid comparing to The Culture series, as it feels significantly poorer for the comparison, but I don't doubt some of that is just my own preferences. Also, it's a style of book that I don't know Banks would have written, and I enjoyed reading it, so, you know.
Now to read Black Sun while I wait for the second book from the library
You read Against a Dark Background?
Actually, I've read Gridlinked it's less of a weird rompy thing than that.
I actually did the Spatterjay trilogy first, and then let it mellow for a while, but was looking for some fun, crunchy-ish milscifi, so I figured I'd try and start more towards the beginning.
One thing I constantly have to wrap my head around: the first Spatterjay book is set 600 years after Gridlinked. And that's perhaps a criticism of his work; I can't honestly tell much difference between the world in times 1,000 years apart (Prador Moon to Hilldiggers).
Eh, The Culture is no different. When do the latter books take place in relation to the Idirian War? Who the fuck knows. You have a super advanced civilization. Unless the book mentions a tech is new, you have no idea if its a fancy new thing or something that just didn't come up previously/hasn't penetrated well. I mean, unless you are looking at the actual dates/have spent a lot of time studying it, there are a solid ~700 odd years in European history that I only have the barest sense of order for.
I think the reason it feels different to me is that the Culture aren't humans. Humans are part of the Culture, but didn't start it. The Culture had formed in the 76th Century BCE and contacted humans in 2100. So they already had reached their max technical peak by that point. The books themselves are set from roughly 1267-2970 CE. About seven hundred years for a civilization that's existed for tens of thousands of years doesn't seem that significant.
The Polity, on the other hand, starts somewhere between 2050 and 2250 by humans, with the technology we have at the time. So 1000 years is kind of a big deal.
Culture "humans" are not the set earthlings, they are generic warm blooded? bipeds that are frequently mammals.
right?
Yeah, it's actually a somewhat mysterious point in the books. It's kind of "lost to the sands of time" sort of thing. No one is really 100% sure since it's been 10s of thousands of years.
The culture humanoids are much interchangeable for humans, except when using human technological/cultural progress as a milestone. In other words, you can't say "pffft, this is unrealistic because there's no way we'd have this technology in 100 years." Because it's not "us". I imagine it's probably extremely handy for the author. :biggrin:
Edit: I should point out, there isn't even one original Culture species, but multiple ones that just kind of melded together. At that point, they were masters of biology/medicine.
Earth is presumably part of the Culture, sometime after the early 22nd Century. But they're just a drop in the bucket. Once you're part of the Culture you really move beyond homeworlds and species. One dude turned himself into a sort of fractal tree, after all.
Considering Earth humans could presumably become nigh-immortal if they chose to once the Culture absorbed the planet, I wonder if the actual Earth is a holdout for ancient racist xenophobes who refuse to learn Marain a few centuries after the fact.
Considering Earth humans could presumably become nigh-immortal if they chose to once the Culture absorbed the planet, I wonder if the actual Earth is a holdout for ancient racist xenophobes who refuse to learn Marain a few centuries after the fact.
Even worse: The US is the lone veto to joining. This is not due to racism or xenophobia or any of that. They just refuse to switch to metric.
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BrodyThe WatchThe First ShoreRegistered Userregular
Spoilers for Hydrogen Sonata, kinda? I don't remember if it ultimately relates to the plot, or just is some info they drop
In Hydrogen Sonata, they discuss the formation of "The Culture" as a quasi-unified entity, which was made up of multiple species that all had relatively similar body plans. At the time, they were all genefixed in a way that made intermarriage/interspecies relationships biologically feasible(I don't think feasible is quite the right word for this, but my brain is blanking), as well as a slight mental tweak to make the various biological deviations more attractive to each other. I believe at least one is mentioned to basically be "humans with scales and a tail". Plus there are some instances where they mention actual fur (maybe not in Hydrogen Sonata?). But iirc Banks actually makes an effort throughout the series to avoid over detailing the phenotypical characteristics, so that it is always just a little vague, other than biped.
"I will write your name in the ruin of them. I will paint you across history in the color of their blood."
Spoilers for Hydrogen Sonata, kinda? I don't remember if it ultimately relates to the plot, or just is some info they drop
In Hydrogen Sonata, they discuss the formation of "The Culture" as a quasi-unified entity, which was made up of multiple species that all had relatively similar body plans. At the time, they were all genefixed in a way that made intermarriage/interspecies relationships biologically feasible(I don't think feasible is quite the right word for this, but my brain is blanking), as well as a slight mental tweak to make the various biological deviations more attractive to each other. I believe at least one is mentioned to basically be "humans with scales and a tail". Plus there are some instances where they mention actual fur (maybe not in Hydrogen Sonata?). But iirc Banks actually makes an effort throughout the series to avoid over detailing the phenotypical characteristics, so that it is always just a little vague, other than biped.
Right, kinda my point was when the novels say human, which happens a bunch, they are talking about that whole general mismash of bipeds who smash, rather than the species from earth.
Spoilers for Hydrogen Sonata, kinda? I don't remember if it ultimately relates to the plot, or just is some info they drop
In Hydrogen Sonata, they discuss the formation of "The Culture" as a quasi-unified entity, which was made up of multiple species that all had relatively similar body plans. At the time, they were all genefixed in a way that made intermarriage/interspecies relationships biologically feasible(I don't think feasible is quite the right word for this, but my brain is blanking), as well as a slight mental tweak to make the various biological deviations more attractive to each other. I believe at least one is mentioned to basically be "humans with scales and a tail". Plus there are some instances where they mention actual fur (maybe not in Hydrogen Sonata?). But iirc Banks actually makes an effort throughout the series to avoid over detailing the phenotypical characteristics, so that it is always just a little vague, other than biped.
Right, kinda my point was when the novels say human, which happens a bunch, they are talking about that whole general mismash of bipeds who smash, rather than the species from earth.
My initial reaction of "Huh, does human show up much in Culture novels?" was quickly shattered by word searching Hydrogen Sonata. It gets used a whole lot as "biological based culture person".
Spoilers for Hydrogen Sonata, kinda? I don't remember if it ultimately relates to the plot, or just is some info they drop
In Hydrogen Sonata, they discuss the formation of "The Culture" as a quasi-unified entity, which was made up of multiple species that all had relatively similar body plans. At the time, they were all genefixed in a way that made intermarriage/interspecies relationships biologically feasible(I don't think feasible is quite the right word for this, but my brain is blanking), as well as a slight mental tweak to make the various biological deviations more attractive to each other. I believe at least one is mentioned to basically be "humans with scales and a tail". Plus there are some instances where they mention actual fur (maybe not in Hydrogen Sonata?). But iirc Banks actually makes an effort throughout the series to avoid over detailing the phenotypical characteristics, so that it is always just a little vague, other than biped.
Right, kinda my point was when the novels say human, which happens a bunch, they are talking about that whole general mismash of bipeds who smash, rather than the species from earth.
My initial reaction of "Huh, does human show up much in Culture novels?" was quickly shattered by word searching Hydrogen Sonata. It gets used a whole lot as "biological based culture person".
Even Consider Phlebas uses "human"/"humanity" plenty.
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BrodyThe WatchThe First ShoreRegistered Userregular
Spoilers for Hydrogen Sonata, kinda? I don't remember if it ultimately relates to the plot, or just is some info they drop
In Hydrogen Sonata, they discuss the formation of "The Culture" as a quasi-unified entity, which was made up of multiple species that all had relatively similar body plans. At the time, they were all genefixed in a way that made intermarriage/interspecies relationships biologically feasible(I don't think feasible is quite the right word for this, but my brain is blanking), as well as a slight mental tweak to make the various biological deviations more attractive to each other. I believe at least one is mentioned to basically be "humans with scales and a tail". Plus there are some instances where they mention actual fur (maybe not in Hydrogen Sonata?). But iirc Banks actually makes an effort throughout the series to avoid over detailing the phenotypical characteristics, so that it is always just a little vague, other than biped.
Right, kinda my point was when the novels say human, which happens a bunch, they are talking about that whole general mismash of bipeds who smash, rather than the species from earth.
My initial reaction of "Huh, does human show up much in Culture novels?" was quickly shattered by word searching Hydrogen Sonata. It gets used a whole lot as "biological based culture person".
Even Consider Phlebas uses "human"/"humanity" plenty.
And in that instance, its often used explicitly as someone who isn't part of The Culture.
"I will write your name in the ruin of them. I will paint you across history in the color of their blood."
Spoilers for Hydrogen Sonata, kinda? I don't remember if it ultimately relates to the plot, or just is some info they drop
In Hydrogen Sonata, they discuss the formation of "The Culture" as a quasi-unified entity, which was made up of multiple species that all had relatively similar body plans. At the time, they were all genefixed in a way that made intermarriage/interspecies relationships biologically feasible(I don't think feasible is quite the right word for this, but my brain is blanking), as well as a slight mental tweak to make the various biological deviations more attractive to each other. I believe at least one is mentioned to basically be "humans with scales and a tail". Plus there are some instances where they mention actual fur (maybe not in Hydrogen Sonata?). But iirc Banks actually makes an effort throughout the series to avoid over detailing the phenotypical characteristics, so that it is always just a little vague, other than biped.
Right, kinda my point was when the novels say human, which happens a bunch, they are talking about that whole general mismash of bipeds who smash, rather than the species from earth.
My initial reaction of "Huh, does human show up much in Culture novels?" was quickly shattered by word searching Hydrogen Sonata. It gets used a whole lot as "biological based culture person".
Even Consider Phlebas uses "human"/"humanity" plenty.
And in that instance, its often used explicitly as someone who isn't part of The Culture.
Not sure I remember it that way. Just checked it out, and the very first lines of the novel are "The ship didn't even have a name. It had no human crew because the factory craft which constructed it had been evacuated long ago."
The ship in question was a Culture ship, so the "humans" being referred to as missing would be Culture.
As I recall, there is a mention of a truly ridiculous backwards planet where the inhabitants sometimes kill each other using an electrified chair at one point in the culture novels. I always took that as a reference to earth, implying that not only are humans as we normally refer to them not part of the culture, but that story was occuring around the present day, by our reckoning. (I think it was use of weapons, discussed between Sma and Zakalwe?) But it's been a few years
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BrodyThe WatchThe First ShoreRegistered Userregular
I'm trying to read Black Sun, but I don't know how much it's really taking. It's not awful, but also it keeps going from some semi-interesting story bits to these other boring ass bits that I can't bring myself to care about.
"I will write your name in the ruin of them. I will paint you across history in the color of their blood."
As I recall, there is a mention of a truly ridiculous backwards planet where the inhabitants sometimes kill each other using an electrified chair at one point in the culture novels. I always took that as a reference to earth, implying that not only are humans as we normally refer to them not part of the culture, but that story was occuring around the present day, by our reckoning. (I think it was use of weapons, discussed between Sma and Zakalwe?) But it's been a few years
There's a novella where Sma goes to visit Earth! It's called State of the Art and it's...kinda the worst Culture book imo, a little silly and nonserious and like lol what if the Culture meets 1970s britain. I believe the deal with Earth in that book is they are deliberately leaving it alone and observing it as part of some experiment?
Finished up my Hugo nominee for best novel read with Black Sun. It was good but wow does it feel like Book 1 of x style of thing. It really feels like they hit their page count, had gotten through the Big Event but didn't want to touch on any of the denouement or consequences. The only bit of possible consequence in the book is described in an earlier chapter in a really odd bit of sequence breaking. Ending up feeling vaguely dissatisfying. This from someone who never really flinched from Stephensons endings.
Final list ends up:
Harrow (screw you, lesbian bone sword necromancers for life.)
The City We Became (which will likely win, and maybe even have me admit that it deserves it.)
Network Effect/Relentless Moon (flip back and forth on order, both were quite good but not top tier like the above.)
Black Sun
Piranesi (Both books that were generally good but I felt didn't quite land the things they were aiming for.)
Black Sun does do a solid job of being a pre-Columbus America (the continent) epic fantasy. That was quite nice and the depiction of civilizations that were actually of the level that was in the Americas before the western plagues descended was something I really enjoyed.
The more I think on Black Sun, the more I think that it's something like a Sanderson novel. This might be damning it with faint praise, but: I thought that it had great world building, it was an easy and breezy read, it had fun and interesting characters, the plot worked, it was a solid 7/10 or 8/10. The sort of thing that I'd happily recommend to anyone, but would also find it hard to put on a "best of" sort of list. It's Hall of Very Good level stuff IMO.
Civics is not a consumer product that you can ignore because you don’t like the options presented.
I'm trying to read Black Sun, but I don't know how much it's really taking. It's not awful, but also it keeps going from some semi-interesting story bits to these other boring ass bits that I can't bring myself to care about.
I'm honestly surprised it is a Hugo nominee. I like a broad swathe of fantasy and SciFi and can tolerate a lot of stuff but I didn't even find the pre-Colombian stuff engaging. The entire book felt extremely lazy to me.
I feel like it's the worldbuilding that got it on the list. The worldbuilding was very good. The setting and history all gave the impression of verisimilitude. Which is about what I thought of Roanhorse's other Hugo work. I enjoyed both but it'd have to be a pretty barren year for it to win the Hugo. If they kept up that level of worldbuilding and worked on their structure choices a bit I think they could write something great.
I'm honestly surprised it is a Hugo nominee. I like a broad swathe of fantasy and SciFi and can tolerate a lot of stuff but I didn't even find the pre-Colombian stuff engaging. The entire book felt extremely lazy to me.
I'm not. It seems tailor-made for a lot of what the people who vote on the Hugo look for, regardless of the overall quality.
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BrodyThe WatchThe First ShoreRegistered Userregular
I just wish the Watcher plotline seemed more interesting. I'm about halfway through, and I want to finish it because I don't like not finishing books, but I'm just having such a hard time remembering to pick it back up.
"I will write your name in the ruin of them. I will paint you across history in the color of their blood."
The more I think on Black Sun, the more I think that it's something like a Sanderson novel. This might be damning it with faint praise, but: I thought that it had great world building, it was an easy and breezy read, it had fun and interesting characters, the plot worked, it was a solid 7/10 or 8/10. The sort of thing that I'd happily recommend to anyone, but would also find it hard to put on a "best of" sort of list. It's Hall of Very Good level stuff IMO.
I think I liked it exactly because it was Sanderson-esque but um somewhat more respectful of my time!
Ok I finally forced myself to finish the first book of the Expanse so that I could move on to something I like. I'm pretty disappointed in it and I am certain it's better as a TV show. There just isn't enough of anything interesting to rescue it from some big flaws in characterization (Miller's characterization becomes really schizophrenic/does not make sense; Holden is boring; no one else is much of anything) and in the general instrumentalization of women. In that, in this book, women are objects for men to achieve their goals, and have no agency of their own.
plot spoilers
At the end, Miller is rewarded for his completely unilateral obsession with a young woman he was investigating, who he never met but was envisioning as a wife substitute in a totally creepy way, both before and after he realized she was dead--when he meets her as part of this uh hive mind biomass thing, he uses this completely invented relationship to get her to do something with the biomass, saving the day. Which is NUTS. He like shows up and holds her hand and is like oh wow we've never met actually, huh, and instead of being like yeah no we haven't you middle-aged creep, this ostensibly self-assured woman is just confused and scared and wants his guidance. Grossssssss. And during that, Holden the captain who's started a relationship with the hottest/only woman on his crew has a scene where she pushes back on an order and he smiles and is like aw, she's so cute when she's angry, but you can't tell a woman she's cute when she's angry or she gets more angry, hahahaha. Also: grossssss
And like whatever, I don't demand that my novels be paragons of feminism, I am happy to read 19th century shit with all sorts of bad views in them, but generally the 19th century book also has something really good about it. Whereas Leviathan Wakes has a good setting and pretty good pacing (although actually the pacing gets weird/more monotone about 70% of the way through--the authors are mechanically good and write good action scenes, but once Holden and Miller hook up we basically just do action scene action scene action scene and it gets a bit samey, and there's no particular sense of risk cause you know they'll both improbably survive whatever it is they're doing), but that's it, really.
...once again I'm sort of mad I wasted my time reading this, although maybe not that mad about the time because now I'm sort of familiar with a popular scifi property that I wasn't before. I am mad at the authors for not doing something more interesting with a neat setting though, and I'm also mad that they clearly don't see women as people.
They had the advantage of having like the next five books and a bunch of short stories to draw on. They moved up Bobby and Avasranda from Book 2 to the start.
They had the advantage of having like the next five books and a bunch of short stories to draw on. They moved up Bobby and Avasranda from Book 2 to the start.
Yeah, I feel like the series sketches out it's various characters as time goes on and they become more important to the specific book in question.
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BrodyThe WatchThe First ShoreRegistered Userregular
Finished Black Sun. Cliffhangers into books that don't have a sequel yet are dumb.
"I will write your name in the ruin of them. I will paint you across history in the color of their blood."
...once again I'm sort of mad I wasted my time reading this, although maybe not that mad about the time because now I'm sort of familiar with a popular scifi property that I wasn't before. I am mad at the authors for not doing something more interesting with a neat setting though, and I'm also mad that they clearly don't see women as people.
This seems a bit extreme of a take on the authors' view just from poorly used secondary characters in one book.
The trouble with having an open mind, of course, is that people will insist on coming along and trying to put things in it. ~ Terry Pratchett
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That epilogue tho
Eh, The Culture is no different. When do the latter books take place in relation to the Idirian War? Who the fuck knows. You have a super advanced civilization. Unless the book mentions a tech is new, you have no idea if its a fancy new thing or something that just didn't come up previously/hasn't penetrated well. I mean, unless you are looking at the actual dates/have spent a lot of time studying it, there are a solid ~700 odd years in European history that I only have the barest sense of order for.
The Monster Baru Cormorant - Seth Dickinson
Steam: Korvalain
This is like 80% true, more on initial read. Some of the tech, especially mind transfer/storage/neural nets steadily improve over the course of the series timeline. It is pretty subtle but Banks kept a consistent timeline throughout for that. The other 10% is from the fact that the Iridian war and the impact of it on the Culture is a thing in like half the books.
You know time is moving forward but by how much is difficult to figure out
People are fairly close to immortal and the Minds and drones are completely immortal. Like is Player of Games 100 years after the Indrian war or 500? Could you tell the difference at all
And all the humans reading it just skip right over stuff.
I mean someone's probably spent the time...
https://theculture.fandom.com/wiki/Timeline#22nd_century_CE
there's a good chance that's accurate.
I think the reason it feels different to me is that the Culture aren't humans. Humans are part of the Culture, but didn't start it. The Culture had formed in the 76th Century BCE and contacted humans in 2100. So they already had reached their max technical peak by that point. The books themselves are set from roughly 1267-2970 CE. About seven hundred years for a civilization that's existed for tens of thousands of years doesn't seem that significant.
The Polity, on the other hand, starts somewhere between 2050 and 2250 by humans, with the technology we have at the time. So 1000 years is kind of a big deal.
right?
Yeah, it's actually a somewhat mysterious point in the books. It's kind of "lost to the sands of time" sort of thing. No one is really 100% sure since it's been 10s of thousands of years.
The culture humanoids are much interchangeable for humans, except when using human technological/cultural progress as a milestone. In other words, you can't say "pffft, this is unrealistic because there's no way we'd have this technology in 100 years." Because it's not "us". I imagine it's probably extremely handy for the author. :biggrin:
Edit: I should point out, there isn't even one original Culture species, but multiple ones that just kind of melded together. At that point, they were masters of biology/medicine.
Think culture baseline is mammalian though some notable Culture adjacent aren't. They are definitely not earthlings though.
Even worse: The US is the lone veto to joining. This is not due to racism or xenophobia or any of that. They just refuse to switch to metric.
The Monster Baru Cormorant - Seth Dickinson
Steam: Korvalain
Right, kinda my point was when the novels say human, which happens a bunch, they are talking about that whole general mismash of bipeds who smash, rather than the species from earth.
My initial reaction of "Huh, does human show up much in Culture novels?" was quickly shattered by word searching Hydrogen Sonata. It gets used a whole lot as "biological based culture person".
Even Consider Phlebas uses "human"/"humanity" plenty.
And in that instance, its often used explicitly as someone who isn't part of The Culture.
The Monster Baru Cormorant - Seth Dickinson
Steam: Korvalain
Not sure I remember it that way. Just checked it out, and the very first lines of the novel are "The ship didn't even have a name. It had no human crew because the factory craft which constructed it had been evacuated long ago."
The ship in question was a Culture ship, so the "humans" being referred to as missing would be Culture.
It has been a decade, though.
The Monster Baru Cormorant - Seth Dickinson
Steam: Korvalain
There's a novella where Sma goes to visit Earth! It's called State of the Art and it's...kinda the worst Culture book imo, a little silly and nonserious and like lol what if the Culture meets 1970s britain. I believe the deal with Earth in that book is they are deliberately leaving it alone and observing it as part of some experiment?
Final list ends up:
Harrow (screw you, lesbian bone sword necromancers for life.)
The City We Became (which will likely win, and maybe even have me admit that it deserves it.)
Network Effect/Relentless Moon (flip back and forth on order, both were quite good but not top tier like the above.)
Black Sun
Piranesi (Both books that were generally good but I felt didn't quite land the things they were aiming for.)
Black Sun does do a solid job of being a pre-Columbus America (the continent) epic fantasy. That was quite nice and the depiction of civilizations that were actually of the level that was in the Americas before the western plagues descended was something I really enjoyed.
The more I think on Black Sun, the more I think that it's something like a Sanderson novel. This might be damning it with faint praise, but: I thought that it had great world building, it was an easy and breezy read, it had fun and interesting characters, the plot worked, it was a solid 7/10 or 8/10. The sort of thing that I'd happily recommend to anyone, but would also find it hard to put on a "best of" sort of list. It's Hall of Very Good level stuff IMO.
I'm not. It seems tailor-made for a lot of what the people who vote on the Hugo look for, regardless of the overall quality.
The Monster Baru Cormorant - Seth Dickinson
Steam: Korvalain
I think I liked it exactly because it was Sanderson-esque but um somewhat more respectful of my time!
plot spoilers
And like whatever, I don't demand that my novels be paragons of feminism, I am happy to read 19th century shit with all sorts of bad views in them, but generally the 19th century book also has something really good about it. Whereas Leviathan Wakes has a good setting and pretty good pacing (although actually the pacing gets weird/more monotone about 70% of the way through--the authors are mechanically good and write good action scenes, but once Holden and Miller hook up we basically just do action scene action scene action scene and it gets a bit samey, and there's no particular sense of risk cause you know they'll both improbably survive whatever it is they're doing), but that's it, really.
...once again I'm sort of mad I wasted my time reading this, although maybe not that mad about the time because now I'm sort of familiar with a popular scifi property that I wasn't before. I am mad at the authors for not doing something more interesting with a neat setting though, and I'm also mad that they clearly don't see women as people.
Yeah, I feel like the series sketches out it's various characters as time goes on and they become more important to the specific book in question.
The Monster Baru Cormorant - Seth Dickinson
Steam: Korvalain
This seems a bit extreme of a take on the authors' view just from poorly used secondary characters in one book.
Hmmm.
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-Indiana Solo, runner of blades
Pogo sticks.
The Monster Baru Cormorant - Seth Dickinson
Steam: Korvalain
On that note, because there are pregnant people, the average number of skeletons inside a human body is greater than one.