Simon Duchastel

Fun pulp sci-fi with little deep substance, a good weekend read

Gibson's writing is amazing as always, although I prefer his futuristic work to this which is contemporary. Still a phenomenal action-packed and mysterious story.

Clark gets a lot of predictions right and a lot wrong from 1960. Still pretty impressive, and overall a fun (if inconsistent) read.

Not at all what I expected. It's much more analytical and light on adventure. The premise of pre-programmed spaceships that could either make you rich or kill you is such an interesting one.

Fun read. I wish the politics were explained a bit more though. As it was it was confusing to understand the posture between the various planets and their affiliation with either the Dominion or the Unified Worlds. The last quarter of the book really picked up!

A fun sci-fi romp

Not as funny as I thought Pratchett would be, but a great read nonetheless. Heartwarming too! Highly recommend.

Bramanti brings up some interesting parallels between design and conspiracy, and how one must be careful of their own beliefs. A certain belief that you have unique insight is important, but taken too far is what leads to conspiracy theories.

A fun scifi adventure. I didn't realize it was a part of a broader series about the same character, but it was very thoughtfully done and the universe well fleshed out such that you don't need to have read any of the other books to get great value out of this one.

Excellent book if you love NYC or the subway. Warning though: reading it will make you angry. The entire story is 100+ years of malice and mismanagement for the subway, with only a single bright spot when things were turned around in the 80s. Hopefully we can get back to better management soon...

I was also very impressed with all of the first-hand accounts the author provided. Very well put together.

Compelling read. My main criticism is that it has very few (almost no) counter perspectives against the current dominant thinking in AI, as of 2024 when the book was written. That said, that's fine if you just want to read the book as a deep-dive on the scaling-hypothesis side of AI thinking (which is a perfectly fine way to frame the book). I was also a bit disappointed that the book was almost entirely snippets of Patel's existing podcast rather than entirely originally writing. They were thoughtfully curated though, and it led to a unique style.

Fun romp, much more video-game like than I expected. Not what I thought, would recommend.

Very trippy book, classic Philip K. Dick. A really gripping mystery/thriller that keeps you on the edge of your seat, reminiscent of later cyberpunk works like Gibson. Just don't read the description on the back of the book - it does the book a disservice!

Good tips for creativity and life in general

In classic Le Guin fashion, this is a deeply thought provoking book. One of many techniques Le Guin uses to build a compelling fictional society on a different world is to layer in lots of great turns of phrases. I liked “to oppose something is to maintain it”

Despite being one long story (400+ pages), it's structured as a series of 10+ sub-adventures. A unique structure!

Interesting history of silicon valley written in 1985. It's funny how much has stayed true about Silicon Valley despite all of the changes on the surface

“Everyone Hates the Auditor” was my favorite story

Utopian science fiction and grandiose world-building at its finest

“Last Meal Aboard the Awassa” by Kel Coleman was touching and mournful. “The Girlfriend Experience” by Tacks was also excellent.

I didn't realize this was an (apparently undelivered) speech by Philip K. Dick. I really liked it - shirt and punchy. It's nice to see Dick's goal of examining reality in his book to be laid out so explicitly by the author himself. Two notes: 1) I hate when intros at the beginning of the book spoil the content. If you're going to cite the content extensively, put your commentary at the end! 2) I didn't realize Philip K. Dick was so religious (a good 1/2 of this book is explicitly about Jesus and the Bible)

My favorite story was “Stone Lives” by Paul did Filippo

The first story, “Child by Chronos” by Charles L. Harness was my favorite. “The Man Who Liked Ants” by Leslie Charteris was also excellent.

Feast of Famine by Adam-Troy Castro was my favorite.

Hall inspires with a vision of a tech-forward future. However, for everything he gets right on the rate of progress we could have if we stopped limiting ourselves, he gets a lot wrong like his advocacy for everyone to have a flying car and to live in the suburbs. The book is also somewhat repetitive - he repeats the same anti-Eloi argument at least five or six times where once would have sufficed.