Time Travel &/or History Books

[ardeegee]

Originally Posted by pilotbob

As the Judge on The Good Wife kept pointing out...

"In your opinion".

BOb

All discussions on message forums (and in blog entries, and in articles published in major newspapers by columnists) that do not deal with objective facts are opinions. That is implicit. It neither needs to be written every time by the opinion giver that it is an opinion, nor is it necessary for someone else to point out the obvious.

[kennyc]

Originally Posted by ardeegee

All discussions on message forums (and in blog entries, and in articles published in major newspapers by columnists) that do not deal with objective facts are opinions. That is implicit. It neither needs to be written every time by the opinion giver that it is an opinion, nor is it necessary for someone else to point out the obvious.

Welllll.....I disagree to some extent as on various forums I keep running into those who believe they speak for everyone.

It's always best to be clear about what you are saying and who you claim to represent.

There is also that silly twisting of truth and fact and representing opinions as fact.

[beppe]

Originally Posted by ardeegee

All discussions on message forums (and in blog entries, and in articles published in major newspapers by columnists) that do not deal with objective facts are opinions. That is implicit. It neither needs to be written every time by the opinion giver that it is an opinion, nor is it necessary for someone else to point out the obvious.

Often, if not always, after something like "It's your opinion ... " it lingers an echo of disagreement, slightly tinted of disapproval, which I share. If it was just I do not agree with you, no disapproval. Body language of words.

I think Michel Crichton was (is because his books are read, and liked, or not) a fantastic writer, a true gift of our "modern" times.
More than in science he was interested in technology and its consequences, when its limits were extended.

Apparently with the global warming controversy he was right. See the recent Nobel Prize caper.

I started with The Andromeda Strain, when it was translated in Italian they wanted someone familiar with the computer lingo of that time to make a check and the book came to me. So I got it for free and made some dough on the side. Nothing alike before.

I read all since. Except Next and Pirate Latitudes that I have and keep for future days in bed.

Ups and downs.The one I prefer is Prey. The one I liked less is the The Great Train Robbery.

[kdf9511]

I can sum up my favorite time travel book series in two words. "Lazrous Long" aka Woodrow Wilson Smith.

[ardeegee]

Back to more positive suggestions, I've been googling (Google-- my prosthetic memory) for the name of a story and an anthology. The story I was thinking of is The Man Who Came Early-- which is in this anthology available for free on archive.org

http://www.archive.org/details/bestf...tasya008838mbp

The collection is The Best Time Travel Stories of the 20th Century:

http://www.amazon.com/Best-Time-Trav...dp/0345460944/
http://www.ebooks.com/ebooks/book_di...asp?IID=210384

Which made me think of The Flight of the Horse:

http://www.amazon.com/Flight-Horse-L...dp/0345334183/

[kennyc]

Originally Posted by ardeegee

...

Which made me think of The Flight of the Horse:

http://www.amazon.com/Flight-Horse-L...dp/0345334183/

I'd forgotten about that one. Excellent Book!

Thanks for the links! I snagged that F&SF freebie.

[ardeegee]

Originally Posted by beppe

I think Michel Crichton was (is because his books are read, and liked, or not) a fantastic writer, a true gift of our "modern" times.
More than in science he was interested in technology and its consequences, when its limits were extended.

I actually read a lot of Crichton's novels in my teens and early 20s. I grumbled about them, but still read them. Timeline was the last straw, though-- it was so transparently a (bad, Hollywood-- and too like The Doomsday Book to not be called a ripoff) screenplay and not a novel that it was my last straw and I never touched another word of his writing (so I wasn't able to complain about State of Fear.)

I found him to be profoundly and consistently anti-science and anti-scientist, and all of his books (from JP on at the least) followed the same simplistic action-adventure formula. I'm far from alone in that position-- for example a good article (opinion, of course):

http://www.mikebrotherton.com/?p=685

and the comments in these threads:

http://www.metafilter.com/76266/Mich...dead-at-age-66

http://entertainment.slashdot.org/ar.../11/06/0019253

[beppe]

Originally Posted by ardeegee

I found him to be profoundly and consistently anti-science and anti-scientist, and all of his books (from JP on at the least) followed the same simplistic action-adventure formula.

Thank you for the discussion.

I agree with you that the literary value is quite limited. To my taste, though, his books have always been quite pleasant to read.

I never (big word not to be taken literally, split infinite is mandatory here) found in the books of Crichton anything anti-science, or anti-scientist as such. Maybe there were these elements in the polemics or the interviews or whatever happened outside the books. Take f.i. Jurassic Park. The good guys are scientists and the villain is a business man. The science is not in discussion there, but the improper use of a certain imaginary technology.

Of State of Fear and of the loading of the so-called scientific data by a part (faction?) of the community I already gave in my previous post.

A common metaphor in Crichton is the dilemma of progress, that hits all of us with unexpected turns. The only way to absorb it is through time so that we have a chance to get used to it. But Crichton villains are always in a hurry, usually out of greed or ambition, so that disasters have to step in. It is not so much man playing God, but not waiting for the things to settle a little. This happens in real life all the time.

We got the cellphones with cameras. In Italy all the kids have them, even children. Per se this is neutral, but they use it to document abuses of every kind. More, they commit abuses so that they can document them and share with their peers and this has become a serious problem.

The development of the technology of transplants has generated a new trade. The trade of organs, with horrible manifestations. Like in the novel by Robin Cook, made into a movie by our M.C. In time it will reach a viable equilibrium. But I hear of people having a second child to protect the first.

It is the old myth of Pandora's jar. The violent impact, the jolt of progress. Not much to do with science. But with greed.

[konrads]

Right then. Time travel, one of my favorites.

If you don't mind a gay protagonist, the Do Over series by Dan Kirk is quite good. (link to his stories) The character(s) go back in time, each story is a different iteration. The series explore the combination of the butterfly effect and time travel quite well. Additionally, despite every story being an iteration of the same, you hardly have the feeling that you're reading the same story.

L Sprague De Camp wrote a time-travel story as well entitled Lest Darkness Fall.

[Darqref]

Originally Posted by konrads

Right then. Time travel, one of my favorites.

l[/B].

Most of Simon Hawke's work seems a bit formulaic, but you might like his Time Wars series. 12 books, with a fairly solid ending by the last one.

The first one is The Ivanhoe Gambit. Each book in the series follows a classic story (Ivanhoe, The Three Musketeers, Gunga Din, 20000 Leagues Beneath the Sea, etc.) and inserts the time travellers as if the combination of "current" history plus the time travellers ends up as the events in the classic book. The last one is about the gunfight at OK Corral, which is less of any single book than the others.

Haven't found any of them in ebook yet, but since I have them all in paper, I wasn't looking....

[konrads]

@Darqref: I have some of them laying about on my hard drive, but they're three non-chronological pdfs of the books. But I'll remember the name and the series for the next time I'm in a book store (that sells English literature).

[jonsbjons]

Originally Posted by cassidym

If you like historical fiction, I can definitely recommend The Flashman series. The author, George MacDonald Fraser plucked the character, Harry Flashman, from the book Tom Brown's School Days and wrote a whole series of historical novels around him.

Historical novels around Tom Brown's School Days?

[jonsbjons]

I'm currently reading "Оn board a whaler", Thomas W. Hammond, 1901.

A small piece about the ship's food:
"... a small wooden tub containing our breakfast.
" 'T ain't buckwheat cakes 'n' honey, exactly." he
remarked, with a leer and a tone that made it diffi-
cult for me not to hit him.
I controlled my temper and took the kid be-
low, contenting myself with suggesting to Frank.
"We'll have to punch that fellow before wc get
through."
" Sure. Nododgin' that," he assented. " Pete
Barstow told me thty had to. the time Kenney
sailed with him." In the meantime he had com-
pleted an examination of the contents of the tub.
and continued: " No, Kenney.— not by a blamed
long-short 't ain't flapjacks an' honey. Yeh told
he truth that time." he commented."

It's time machine for me

[Jadon]

Originally Posted by konrads

gay protagonist, the Do Over series by Dan Kirk is quite good. (link to his stories) The character(s) go back in time, each story is a different iteration.

I checked these out, and am about halfway through the first volume, and impressed. Yes, there's some unlikely wish fulfillment (some characters are unpleasant, but not half as bad as I suspect they'd be), but I'm interested in how things play out.

I haven't gotten to the second volume, so have yet to see another cycle, but that aspect makes me think of the Never Again series by R.J. Rummel, where characters keep going back in time to change history by trying to head off wars and make undemocratic regimes less likely.

[ImogenRose]

Some nice recommendations, thank you.