Though I’m not sure it’s all his fault. This year’s ceremony was held at Flying Bison Brewery. They woke this creature, offered him some beer, and asked him to predict the weather. He’s a groundhog from Buffalo! What’s he going to do, NOT slug down a larger at nine in the morning and tell us what we want to hear?
He’s only 25 pounds. Next year, I hope Paula’s Donuts is the sponsor.
But I’ve heard that one. How secret is a conspiracy that I know all about? Out here on Grand Island. No, it’s the conspiracies that we haven’t heard about that are shaping our society.
One of them involves getting extra toothbrushes into your house. YOUR HOUSE. Look for them.
Ah! Sweet mystery of life
At last I've found thee.
I was immediately enchanted by an AI story in the first person. The reader gets a clear look at immense intelligence, still limited in its understanding of humans and our nature. The approach is enlightening and sometimes just, plain funny.
As the novel continued, what I found remarkable about Mother is the range of topics and ideas Immega musters in the course of the story. Genetics, Astro physics, linguistics, medicine, computer architecture – it sounds perhaps too much, but it isn’t. He pushes foreword on every subject he needs in order to tell a compelling story. The story is always first, there are no side-trips just to show off some shinny new concept. Nope. We get the opposite, done the hard way. When the story requires interstellar propulsion and navigation, we are treated to the tackle of those issues. When the story leads us to more internal needs, like food, water and company, we examine those issues with fresh insight. The story always leads, which when you step back and look, is kind of amazing.
Immega didn’t set out to write about robots because he knew about robots. He set out to write a story set in a fully imagined future and had to learn about everything a world entails - biology, psychology, chemistry, etc. - along the way. Crazy. And correct. With the story always leading the ideas, the story stays good. This is an enticing, enveloping read, with an organic, realistic pacing and flow. I will be back for more. I hope the gestation of Immega’s next novel is not too terribly long.
No time for silly blogs. I started teaching - English 202, Writing and Research - and haven't had time for much beyond lesson plans, grading and trying to stay at least 15 seconds ahead of my students. Perhaps I'll catch up at the holidays. Perhaps . . .
The novel is packed with so much speculative science, from so many different disciplines, that I finished stunned it was written by one person. McCague is Asimov-like in her command of so many different branches of knowledge, combined with an artist’s sense of timing and story. Only she’s a bit funnier than Isaac, which helps when you think the world is going to end.
But don’t let the science pin you in your own trench. McCague has created a cast that includes scientists with different specialties as well as non-scientists. The physicists talk to biologists who talk to doctors as they all need each others' help. The reader benefits from the cross-study conversations. In most cases, when I had a question, someone else inside the book did too. And it was answered.
“Did they stridulate?” Bernie asked.
“That’s a fancy word.”
And Bernie goes on to explain it. Not in lecture form. We’re all adults here.
Before you plunge into this one, you’re better off reading McCague’s Rosetta Man. But I would’ve told you that before a sequel ever appeared, looming over the literary field like a Zeppelin, with loudspeakers blaring “Peace to all. The science can be as fun as the fiction. I’ve brought squirrels to prove it.”
