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antishurtugal_rebornDoes anyone here remember staring at fish in a tank until even homework was exciting by comparison? Me either. No idea why I brought it up.
Section 1: Why do these chapters have subsections? Why don’t these subsections contain anything?
Well section 2 does. So that’s something. Neghar dies in the least Klingon way possible. She gets eaten from the inside out by alien goo. It’s kinda gross and wrong. Not wrong in that unnatural way lovecraftian monsters exude a sense of wrongness. It’s wrong in the way that 2+2=3 is wrong. Just, I see what you were trying to do. But, you missed an important step in there. I might get back to it later. First I want to watch this lump of liquid metal twitch. I could do with a Portal 2 speed run right now.
Section 3. For only a moment there was the illusion that Kira might have an emotional response to someone else’s suffering. That is killed off in an instant. Kira is only permitted to care about Kira. Otherwise how could she be the villain, I mean hero, of this story.
Huh. So I learned something new and interesting here. This scene is clearly designed to be extremely emotional. It is, unfortunately, incredibly stupid and nonsensical. And therefore my response is along the lines of I bet he felt something when he wrote this.
Anyway this chapter kills off all the red shirts and frees Kira up to explore the galaxy leaving nothing behind but death and sadness in her wake.
I’m going to ignore that and instead sing about nanobots.
Because nanobots are fun and interesting. Much more so than this book.
In previous chapters Kira and Neghar had been tested very thoroughly by med bay during Kira’s four week, four week? Four week. Four week… nap. If this had happened in a modern hospital the nanobots would have caused her to test positive for several different kinds of cancer. It really doesn’t matter if this stuff is nanotechnology or the less plausible but still maybe possible picotech. What matters is, it has mass, and interacts with light. Which means it absolutely will show up on x-rays as a general vague dark mass. Any med techs or doctor that sees that is not going to say “oh yes, that is normal” and carry on. There’s not many things out there that make your blood look heavy and none of them are good for you. What do you think her doctor is going to say when she looks exactly the same but gained 10 kg in an hour?
This stuff may be small. But, you know what else is hella small? Your cells and the things in them. Small is not the same thing as invisible. It creates a bunch of big metal spikes that kill everyone in the room. This is going to require enough volume to make those things. Some sort of pressure or power system to send them out there. A nanite might be pretty small. But, the mass here is larger than a soccer ball. It’s not going to hide under her fingernails. Not without ballooning the finger in a way that is going to get a reaction out of her doctor. Unless he’s the worst doctor in history.
Someone is probably going to argue that the stuff is trying to hide from the doctor. Here’s the thing. You can not hide an elephant in a small room. You can not hide nanotechnology in the human body. That’s like trying to hide a cow on a putting green. You might, might, with a lot of work hide it from a cursory glance. You are not going to hide it from experts searching carefully for a month. The moment the cow moves everyone is going to see it. This is not subtle or sneaky. It’s just stupid. It’s pure stupid of the sort that only happens when you don’t know what any of the words mean and assume that if you don’t know something than no one else could possibly know that thing either. It’s not even theoretical. We know how this stuff has to work because, while we can’t build it, nature uses it all the time. You are made of nanotech. Your body is exactly how nanotechnology works because it is exactly the end goal of super advanced nanotechnology. That is what this stuff is. You know what it can do because you are doing it right now. Look at you, sitting in a chair, eating cheese? listening to human music?
She is a xenobiologist who works exclusively on lifeless rocks studying microbiology which is not in the realm of her expertise. The doctor may very well be Zoidberg.
Kira ends the chapter asleep again. I’m going to do a quick poll here on the people in this room.
Does napping through the chapter breaks decrease or increase dramatic tension?
Decrease: ----------------------- 100%
Increase: 0 %
That would be pretty damning if it wasn’t just me in the room. Feel free to put a vote in the comments. If you do, I will not be able to edit this entry.
It’s not so much that this is hack writing. It’s that he seems to have put effort into it. Like he’s challenged himself to write the worst possible book, learned the tricks and secrets of great novel writing then done the opposite. Like the author feels nothing but contempt for the reader and wants to punish you for having the audacity to pick up his book.
Section 1: Why do these chapters have subsections? Why don’t these subsections contain anything?
Well section 2 does. So that’s something. Neghar dies in the least Klingon way possible. She gets eaten from the inside out by alien goo. It’s kinda gross and wrong. Not wrong in that unnatural way lovecraftian monsters exude a sense of wrongness. It’s wrong in the way that 2+2=3 is wrong. Just, I see what you were trying to do. But, you missed an important step in there. I might get back to it later. First I want to watch this lump of liquid metal twitch. I could do with a Portal 2 speed run right now.
Section 3. For only a moment there was the illusion that Kira might have an emotional response to someone else’s suffering. That is killed off in an instant. Kira is only permitted to care about Kira. Otherwise how could she be the villain, I mean hero, of this story.
Huh. So I learned something new and interesting here. This scene is clearly designed to be extremely emotional. It is, unfortunately, incredibly stupid and nonsensical. And therefore my response is along the lines of I bet he felt something when he wrote this.
Anyway this chapter kills off all the red shirts and frees Kira up to explore the galaxy leaving nothing behind but death and sadness in her wake.
I’m going to ignore that and instead sing about nanobots.
Because nanobots are fun and interesting. Much more so than this book.
In previous chapters Kira and Neghar had been tested very thoroughly by med bay during Kira’s four week, four week? Four week. Four week… nap. If this had happened in a modern hospital the nanobots would have caused her to test positive for several different kinds of cancer. It really doesn’t matter if this stuff is nanotechnology or the less plausible but still maybe possible picotech. What matters is, it has mass, and interacts with light. Which means it absolutely will show up on x-rays as a general vague dark mass. Any med techs or doctor that sees that is not going to say “oh yes, that is normal” and carry on. There’s not many things out there that make your blood look heavy and none of them are good for you. What do you think her doctor is going to say when she looks exactly the same but gained 10 kg in an hour?
This stuff may be small. But, you know what else is hella small? Your cells and the things in them. Small is not the same thing as invisible. It creates a bunch of big metal spikes that kill everyone in the room. This is going to require enough volume to make those things. Some sort of pressure or power system to send them out there. A nanite might be pretty small. But, the mass here is larger than a soccer ball. It’s not going to hide under her fingernails. Not without ballooning the finger in a way that is going to get a reaction out of her doctor. Unless he’s the worst doctor in history.
Someone is probably going to argue that the stuff is trying to hide from the doctor. Here’s the thing. You can not hide an elephant in a small room. You can not hide nanotechnology in the human body. That’s like trying to hide a cow on a putting green. You might, might, with a lot of work hide it from a cursory glance. You are not going to hide it from experts searching carefully for a month. The moment the cow moves everyone is going to see it. This is not subtle or sneaky. It’s just stupid. It’s pure stupid of the sort that only happens when you don’t know what any of the words mean and assume that if you don’t know something than no one else could possibly know that thing either. It’s not even theoretical. We know how this stuff has to work because, while we can’t build it, nature uses it all the time. You are made of nanotech. Your body is exactly how nanotechnology works because it is exactly the end goal of super advanced nanotechnology. That is what this stuff is. You know what it can do because you are doing it right now. Look at you, sitting in a chair, eating cheese? listening to human music?
She is a xenobiologist who works exclusively on lifeless rocks studying microbiology which is not in the realm of her expertise. The doctor may very well be Zoidberg.
Kira ends the chapter asleep again. I’m going to do a quick poll here on the people in this room.
Does napping through the chapter breaks decrease or increase dramatic tension?
Decrease: ----------------------- 100%
Increase: 0 %
That would be pretty damning if it wasn’t just me in the room. Feel free to put a vote in the comments. If you do, I will not be able to edit this entry.
It’s not so much that this is hack writing. It’s that he seems to have put effort into it. Like he’s challenged himself to write the worst possible book, learned the tricks and secrets of great novel writing then done the opposite. Like the author feels nothing but contempt for the reader and wants to punish you for having the audacity to pick up his book.
no subject
Date: 2020-07-19 01:17 am (UTC)This is less tasty and less filling than gruel.
no subject
Date: 2020-07-19 01:27 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2020-07-19 01:37 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2020-07-19 03:34 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2020-07-19 03:04 am (UTC)Truly a classic. *eyeroll*
no subject
Date: 2020-07-19 04:23 am (UTC)I know we asked how to pronounce this name and speculate why out of the other dozens of Persian names he could've picked he zeroed in on this name. In Persian it means like sweetheart, idol, or beloved. It can also mean pattern and painting. I found that out with a couple of seconds using google and bugging a friend.
I dunno, in English to my ears it sounds inappropriate like someone is trying to get around that they didn't say an offensive word.
So, how long in the book until Kira shrugs off a .75 calibre assault weapon, grins and says, "Nanomachines, son. They harden in response to physical trauma."
no subject
Date: 2020-07-19 04:28 am (UTC)I posted a quote from To Sleep in a Sea of Stars about how Paolini said the diaphragm relaxed and air rushed in. I explained how this is the opposite of what happens and how just taking a deep breath will demonstrate this. Epistler said:
"Paolini never seems to know what the hell he's talking about, even if it's something that basic. It's almost impressive in a weird way."
To which I responded:
"You called it. It is impressive in a weird way. Who is that consistently wrong? The laws of chance would seem to require he have a higher rate of being right if he were randomly guessing. I sometimes wonder if he is doing it deliberately. His way of giving the finger to anyone who thinks literature should do more than make money. I doubt his fans would notice or care. People on this site would notice and be upset about it. "
This is basically the same conclusion you came to with chapter four. Do you think he is doing it deliberately?
no subject
Date: 2020-07-19 05:06 am (UTC)Could be. I'm not going to give a clear answer on that because it's not within the realm of things I want to think about.
no subject
Date: 2020-07-19 02:35 pm (UTC)