The Caves of Steel by Isaac Asimov

The Caves of Steel by Isaac Asimov
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This is my second Asimov read (I, Robot was the first) and it again surprises me how accessible his stories actually are. My initial impression was that he was hard sci-fi that would involve A LOT of science, given his background as a professor of Biochemistry, that would be difficult to understand, or boring. Far from it! What I have read so far is full of personality and addresses questions that we would have about the interaction between humans and robots.

Caves of Steel is a murder mystery, where Elijah Baley, policeman, must work with a robotic partner in order to solve it. He has serious misgivings about working with a robot, like many people in this future time were privacy is at a premium and robots are viewed with skepticism, fear and dislike. Lije must confront his own feelings to work with R. Daneel Olivaw, and soon finds himself reassuring others that Daneel is okay, he's safe, don't be afraid.

During discussion with a robotics expert that Lije is trying to gain info from for the investigation, he asks one of the questions I've had before, why make robots in human form? Why not make them more functional to their purpose, surely it doesn't require them to look like humans, this being one of the features that causes us to feel uncomfortable around them. I won't answer that question here, but let you find it by reading the book, which I recommend!

Asimov is good at presenting these questions of ideology regarding robots and artificial intelligence succinctly, cutting to the heart of the issue presented. His robot characters are full of personality, within their laws, and there is plenty of action and food for thought. There is no doubt in my mind why he is considered to have been one of the giants in Sci-Fi, a pioneer and pillar of robot fiction.

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The Fifth Season by N. K. Jemisin

From Goodreads: THIS IS THE WAY THE WORLD ENDS. FOR THE LAST TIME. A season of endings has begun. It starts with the great red rift across the heart of the world's sole continent, from which enough ash spews to darken the sky for years. Or centuries. It starts with death, with a murdered son and a missing daughter. It starts with betrayal, and long dormant wounds rising up to fester. And it ends with you. You are the Stillness, a land long familiar with catastrophe, where orogenes wield the power of the earth as a weapon and are feared far more than the long cold night. And you will have no mercy.

This book deserves every bit of the hype it has gotten and more. Here is a list of the awards and nominations it has received:

• Hugo Award for Best Novel (2016)
• Nebula Award Nominee for Best Novel (2015)
• Locus Award Nominee for Best Fantasy Novel (2016)
• The Kitschies Nominee for Red Tentacle (Novel) (2015)
• Goodreads Choice Award Nominee for Fantasy (2015)

Did you know there was a Red Tentacle award? Me either! But now I need to go find out more about it!

I was lucky enough to be at the Hugo Awards when this book received Best Novel last year, and it was so exciting! There was so much happiness in the room that N. K. Jemisin had won. It felt like a love wins victory after the weird political divisiveness that has been going on in the Sci-Fi and Fantasy world that is such a mirror of real world politics.  I wasn't aware of that until I knew we were going to World Con and had started doing some research and ran into articles discussing the different factions.  I would have expected this genre to be the most open minded and accepting of all, considering it is based on magic and imagination and science we haven't achieved yet.  But alas it still has some ugliness to work out.  I think it's dwindling, but it is still there.

That cannot dim the greatness that is The Fifth Season.  This was such a well crafted and interesting world, story and cast of characters.  There are many messages worked in, class systems, prejudice, history being set by the winners, and rewritten to suit the regime, all woven into a story where it fits, it's not forced, it just is part of the world.  Which brings up another idea to me, acceptance of what is, because you don't know any different, and the idea that maybe you need to look further than the surface to see what's really going on.  The world itself is so intriguing to me, the "powers" that certain people have are geology based, and it is definitely a post apocalyptic world, perhaps many times post apocalypse, as is suggested  in the first line of the summary.  This has all happened many times before, they have lore which relates instructions on how to survive it, but maybe that won't be enough this time.  There are mysterious DeadCiv artifacts from long gone times, and strange floating obelisks that clearly served an important function, which has been lost over time.

Enjoy isn't the right word for this, I was fascinated and so interested to see where it was going.  I'm definitely in for the rest of the ride, and highly recommend it!  I wish I had taken notes while I was reading it, there were so many a-ha moments and "I see what you're doing there" that I'm finding difficult to relate now after the fact, universal truths and parallels to our world that make this one changed yet still recognizable to us.  Yes, I'm gushing.  I'll stop now, you should definitely check out this 5/5 book for yourself!

Lincoln's Dreams by Connie Willis

From Goodreads: For Jeff Johnston, a young historical researcher for a Civil War novelist, reality is redefined on a bitter cold night near the close of a lingering winter. He meets Annie, an intense and lovely young woman suffering from vivid, intense nightmares. Haunted by the dreamer and her unrelenting dreams, Jeff leads Annie on an emotional odyssey through the heartland of the Civil War in search of a cure. On long-silenced battlefields their relationship blossoms-two obsessed lovers linked by unbreakable chains of history, torn by a duty that could destroy them both.

Awards:
Locus Award Nominee for Best Fantasy Novel (1988)
Mythopoeic Fantasy Award Nominee (1988)
John W. Campbell Memorial Award for Best Science Fiction Novel (1988)


I didn't realize this was Connie Willis' first novel until I read the afterward! It is immediately clear that a lot of research went into this novel.  The mystery of the dreams bleeding through and trying to decide what they meant was very interesting, interwoven as it was with the events of Robert E. Lee's life during the Civil War and after.  That's right, Robert E. Lee.  To me the Lincoln's Dream part was a little misleading, as it was really a lesser part of the story and to me felt like it was included because it would seem more sensational as a draw?  The blurb also exaggerates the relationship of our two main characters, which is the weakest part of the story, but I suppose the mechanism needed to draw us through the dreams.

At any rate, while there are some definite flaws or lack of development in the characters themselves, the basic premise of the story, and the setting of the Civil War were the main draws for me, and did not disappoint. This is the second novel I have read by Willis (whom I didn't quite get to meet at Worldcon, but I did see her speak in the Grand Master's panel, yay!), the first being Doomsday Book, which was really good, but very affecting.  Lincoln's Dreams also is very affecting and its emphasis the horrors of the Civil War, along with the allure of dreams and their meanings, made it a solid and satisfying read for me.  I look forward to more of Willis' work, and expect just as much depth. 4/5 stars.

My first read of my own hosted Award Winning Science Fiction and Fantasy Challenge, and fulfills a
"Any Novel by a Grand Master" Square on the Bingo card, as she was the Grand Master for 2011, presented in 2012.