Sci Fi On The Beach | Reading Vlog

quickly becoming one of my all-time favorite authors a lot of what motivates him is oh cool I could buy more alcohol are you ready to end this Vlog on a dud fine he can have one dud he can have one hello so I've actually already started this Vlog I recorded two clips starting and finishing a book and then those clips were deleted so we're going to do it again and I'm going to summarize the th those two clips in one which ideally don't want to start off a vlog having already finished the first book but honestly it's probably better for you cuz we're talking about quite a few books in this Vlog so it's going to be a little bit shorter this way maybe I know your attention span isn't long enough for all of that so this Vlog we're going to be talking about borne then the companion the strange bird the other companion dead astronauts this is all vandermeir but don't worry then we'll deviate to roadside picnic I think we'll be next and finally remote control so it's a Sci-Fi Vlog I've already finished born and it was magnificent so I will give you I will talk to you about it now by the way I love this cover it's gorgeous this cover extremely interesting this one this one look at the other cover look at the Hard back I either had to choose between having matching sizes slash bind types or pretty cover I'm really mad about that allow me to set the stage postapocalyptic world ruined City we don't know why but we do know that it's terrible this is from page one so super duper not spoilery and for a moment there was no ruined City around me no search for food and water no roving gangs and escaped altered creatures of Unknown Origin or Intent no mutilated burned bodies dangling from broken Street lamps so that's the setting that Rachel is navigating our main character when she encounters for the very first time born what is born you ask who is born how is born he's doing fine thanks born is a I hate that I said that born is a creature that Rachel found because you see this city that is ransacked the city that is apocalyptic that is terrible that is in a horrible condition is there's this giant levitating flying bear named Mor that flies over the city and occasionally biotech and resources fall from the tough of his fur and people collect it to try to survive one day mord was sleeping and Rachel salvaged a creature out of his fur to me Bourne was just Salvage at first I didn't know what Bourne would mean to us I couldn't know that he would change everything still on page one no spoilers this is a great book anyway this book is unbeatably strange around every corner born is this creature that at first she thinks is maybe a plant or maybe some sort of animal a Strang looking object that at first she isn't even sure if it's sensient or not but then he starts moving then he starts changing form then he starts speaking this book in from its from its introduction and the way it sets everything up to the interactions that follow is so strange there are Oddities around every corner there's more proxies normal-sized bears that go around destroying everything that's not mored there's bioengineered animals there's feral children and there's a company that seems to be responsible at least somewhat for the desperate state that they're in or maybe not fully responsible maybe just uh tried to help when things started going south there's so much strangeness around every corner but because of the way it's told because of the earnestness in which everything is said it feels it it reads with such confidence that even though you're reading very strange things when you say it out loud when you're reading it or at least for me when I was reading it I just it it felt like of course it's this way this is the only way this world could have been it's told everything is told with such gravity that I feel compelled to go along with everything and it almost feels less like absurd and more as if this is exact this is the only way the story could have been told I love the way born is described this creature that we don't know about initially but very quickly get to know better and better in the way he learns language in the way he can kind of morph and change into a salamander or into like if he's nervous and he can fling himself under the ceiling and flatten himself or uh into I I don't want to give too much away he he can he can adapt very easily and he tries to understand he tries to understand uh Rachel as well as her boyfriend Wick he tries to understand Humanity he tries to understand the company he wants to know what Rachel wants for him who he can be for her but he also wants to know who is he and how does that fit into what others expectations are from him as the story progresses uh borne ends up being both somehow childlike and sweet and adorable but also genuinely terrifying because he can change so rapidly and because he does very odd things like picking up what are thought of as the dead astronauts skeletons and hanging them on his wall and when Rachel says please take those down that's not decoration I don't want those hanging there and she's like just put them in the club ET and find something else to hang on the wall and he says I can't the closet's full what do you mean what's in the closet what's in the closet borne and it's that it's the half information that makes Bourne terrifying and very early on in the book he kills three people that are that are attacking bothering Rachel so we know from the beginning that he can kill people we know that he can morph into things we know that he can learn things rapidly we know that he doesn't understand humanity and as he tries to understand sometimes he gets it really really wrong and that's terrifying yet the way he is written I'm going to use the word again it's done with such earnestness that you can't help but feel drawn to him like you want to be closer to him and the way that he and Rachel's relationship is written too is done with such earnestness that this tenderness of this girl who finds this creature takes it in and then adopts it and and it becomes like a child to her this sounds strange but in the book their connection their relationship their bond is written with such tenderness that it it's the only way it could have it reads like it's the only way the story could have gone Wick to plays a huge role he once worked for the company and he now has this a lot of baggage uh connected to it and he has he's very smart and he also does a lot to try to survive when he first meets borne he just wants to take him apart and use him for parts or understand how he works and uh in general he doesn't fully trust Bourne and Bourne doesn't fully trust him so there's a little bit of friction there but also Wick and Rachel's relationship is something that is valuable to them both so there's a lot going on with that as well and at the core of the book actually I'll read you a quote we all just want to be people and none of us know what that really means and I think that that ties in so much of what this book ends up doing and the way the reveals come they're to do with more than just born they're to do with many elements of the story and the way those reveals unfold it's it's so much more layered than it initially sounds like it'll be it sounds like I've said a lot to you about this book but the truth is there's so much more to discover because there's so much Happening Here in in in the realm of the world there's so little explained like how the city got to this state what truly is the company and um what Wick's baggage is with it some of it is explained much of it isn't and I think that's something that vandermeir is a master at is giving you the exact amount of information that you need for the story that you're supposed to be told and the rest is sort of left because that's not part of this story and because you don't get to know everything that's not how the world works and that makes his stories that much more compelling to me vandermeir is quickly becoming one of my all-time favorite authors I have already started the strange bird and I am already obsessed with it it's written so beautifully and it's very short it's only 100 pages long I am so amazed by it I'm reading it very very slowly but it's blowing me away but I won't talk to you about it right now because this clip is long enough so instead I'll just say welcome to the Vlog oh [Music] hello I shattered my glasses so all I have to see through are um prescription sunglasses which I love for me it's been great uh but the camera doesn't appreciate sunglasses for the white balance so I'm going to talk to you without glasses is on so I did finish the strange bird I loved this so much so so so much vandermeir has become one of my all-time favorite authors it's done it's set in stone this is my life now I am in a vandermeir Obsession and I'm just going to run with it honestly like I'm just going to roll with it so uh because this is only 100 pages long and because it's a companion to born and while I mean I suppose you could read this in whatever order you wanted to like could read this before born but obviously it would be it would behoove you to read it in the publication order um because of all of these factors I will not tell you much about this story however I will read you a quote so she only relaxed her camouflage puffed out her feathers and turned more iridescent and allowed color to burn across the feathers like a wildfire and as far as the old man was concerned that was her answer that she was beautiful and therefore for good so the strange bird again I'm going to keep very very vague because of it being only 100 pages and a companion now I'm just repeating my I'm going to keep this very vague um so the strange bird is a strange bird it is a creation of the company and it is so uniquely done one thing I don't think I mentioned in when I was talking about born at least I don't think I mentioned it in the second clip one thing that I love about vandermeir creating these strange otherworldly feeling creatures is the way he describes them there's a scene in Bourne where Rachel is borne is injured and he needs Rachel to inspect him and to help him he just needs Rachel to inspect him so she starts feeling around uh on borne's body and through that we end up finding out about all these different textures that borne has how varied he is in different areas and how many different purposes how many different functions he can have and the strange bird is described in a very similar way that just the uniqueness of the strange bird the uniquness of her makeup as well as the experience that she's had what she's gone through to make her this way the memories that she still holds and then as she's interacting with the scientist sorry the kids are now playing above me uh as she's interacting with the scientist the way he views her as beautiful and therefore good the um sort ort of volatile reaction he has when she invokes some of her memories and repeats back some things that tie to his own memories anyway she is able to get free and she's able to explore the world more so through this we learn a lot more about this world and about the company so I would say um one thing about Bourne and I loved this about borne is it wasn't heavy on the World building while it is a postapocalyptic world and while there's so much fascinating things happening with the company with the Creations that the company has made with the world as we see it in that inborn we also just don't go that deep with exploring all of it we really are very intimate with Rachel uh borne and in places with Wick so this is like it's like it's like the for this is going to sound snobby it's for like the true fans like the hyper fans of born that it's like I need to know more we get to learn more but not in a way that's sort of like an appendix instead it's in a way that's very intimate with a new creature with a new um a new human a bird uh but you know you'll understand that if you've read born with with a new personhood who is going through this world and we're exploring the world and we're learning more about it through the strange bird I loved it so much so so so much I did start dead astronauts but I don't have a lot to say to you about it because uh I'm very close into it this is another companion vandermeir once again but I'm actually going to uh probably this is going to be the last book I talked to you about in this Vlog because I've decided that this is going to be my beach book I'm not going to read it when we're all chilling in the house I'm going to read it when I'm sitting out on the beach um because as strange as this sounds vandermeir has become a comfort read for me even though he writes very strange odd um sometimes dark things which by the way the strange bird was an incredibly emotional book deeply deeply emotional and very sad at times and vandermeir doesn't write cozy but he has become my comfort read because he seems to just write for me like every book he writes seems to be a win so this is this is my beach book um in the meantime I have been giving roadside picnic a lot of my focus so this is uh a which I'm I can read perfectly fine with my prescription Su glasses everything's just darker so roadside picnic is a classic sci-fi um this is strange I've just finished chapter one there are four chapters in this book it's very short um but the chapters are long so what can I say about this because I don't know um we are following a man who I would call intentionally unlikable uh he drinks a lot he's very Snappy he's very short with people he's just very Gruff and um he is so there's this there's six places on Earth called zones and essentially what's happened is alien aliens have made no they haven't made contact aliens have come to Earth and they've affected Earth but they made no attempt to make contact they don't care about talking to humans they came they did what they wanted they left and now there are these six zones around the world where the aliens landed and in those zones um it's horrifying like there's there's so many death traps in the zones uh be it some like sludge I think it was that's like poisonous be it uh like these gravity defying things that could crush a person be it the I keep I keep thinking man my vision's unclear I need to push my glasses up be it uh the a web that who knows what it is but we should definitely certainly not touch it please don't touch the web um so in these zones aliens have come they've left artifacts they've left their presence and it's deadly and they gone bye so I really love sci-fi books that do first Contact in a way that's like ah the aliens don't care about us we think they should because we think we're the center of the world but the aliens are really just not threatened or concerned and then humans are like but it's us we're Humanity how dare you um so that was something that Solaris was also like don't ignore me um so anyway we're following this character and his comrades and they're going into the Zone which is illegal and bad and you shouldn't do that um but they do this book is very it's interesting in the way that it's written because I'm reading this with Joanna and she mentioned that it seemed easy like the zone is clearly deadly really hard to get into like it's a thing and yet they seem to have go gone in and gotten out relatively with ease and it does feel that way and the thing is because I don't think it actually was easy I think it's just the way that it's written because I personally really love atmospheric books especially for something like this where we're going into a zone that is like barred off you shouldn't go you're going to get in trouble if you do go and you're found out um it's deadly there's mysterious strange otherworldly things going on there and I want to know all about it you know like I want to take a second to describe this room or describe everything to what does it feel like is it musky is it dark is it is it does it feel oppressive does it feel eerie are there noises going on in the distance that you can't identify like I want to know every detail about the Zone but really nothing is described except for what's essential to be described like there's a web okay the web is going to be important so we describe the web nothing else is important so we describe nothing else there's going to be we're going to throw some nuts and bolts in front of us to make sure that there's no traps okay cool now you've know that detail moving on so it seems like we were in and out of the zone so fast and it's not because it was so fast because it said that they were there for four or 5 hours but I don't feel like we were there for more than a couple of minutes and I don't feel like we did much to get in or out I really really really love everything that's happening in concept but in execution it doesn't work for my very atmospheric reader uh heart where I want I want the Zone like I want to be immersed I want to be freaked out I want to go into the zone and I want to feel tension but instead I go into the zone and I'm like okay make sure you soak up every detail because all you're getting are the details not the feeling of being here again I just read the first chapter which is long I mean it's like 50 some pages 57 pages is when chapter 2 starts so you know it's not it could pick up but right now great ideas uh but as a story it's not giving as much as I want it to there's your check-in and those were the kids bye [Music] hello I have finished it's on the ground hang on roadside picnic and okay first of all actually first I want to clarify something that I said in the last review that I think uh wasn't complete so I mentioned that I really wanted review last clip I really wanted this book to be more atmospheric and in saying that and describing all the things I wanted atmospher IED I fear I may have misrepresented the book so I want to be clear it's not lacking in atmosphere entirely there's plenty of atmosphere here things are described well the different sort of uh when people go into the Zone the different ways that the Zone interacts with people's bodies is described quite well not just that there's a web on someone's back and that's something to be noted but the fact that there are different symptoms that people will come away with like having their fingernails and uh toenails peeled off or having their children uh be born mutated or a huge variety of different things that the zone does to people that come out of it and different uh parts of the zone that interact with people in different ways so I just want to be super clear that there's plenty of things described and there's plenty of um mystery like fear in the known that's happening in this book uh people who survive the Zone only survive because of those that went before them reporting back the methods that they use to get through it and and because we're following someone who has been in the zone many times this isn't his first experience but even with it not being his first experience even with him having been in there and maybe maybe he's not in awe of the wonders of it like I still feel like you know maybe some more description would be cool like it just very quick things just happen very quick in the story and I would just love to slow down and take it in a little bit more so I just wanted to clarify all that cuz I don't want to make it seem to you like there's no descriptions in this book I hope it didn't come off like that in the first clip anyway what a book it continued to be very fast-paced it continued to be a little bit more distant and a little bit less character focused than I tend to enjoy in my books but oh my goodness what a cool story not just in what the zone is but in the conversations around uh like for instance red is not a likable protagonist he is very disenchanted with the world with the idea of being just an a working man just an average Working Man the monotony of life um he isn't kind to people around him he is a drunk and he a lot of what motivates him is oh cool I could buy more alcohol I can't I can't say I can't talk about the stuff that I really want to talk about as the as the novel progresses and we get the the the end goal uh because of situations that are happening with his family um what his end goal is and the decisions that he makes are startling and the way that he the hardened way that he goes about it the way he kind of refers to the key which is something that you won't understand until unless you've read it but the way he refers to the key in such a distant and um almost he almost seems like he looks down and the tie-in to the title The why why this book is called roadside picnic I adored it's just it's it's a very interesting I love this different kind of take you know so many movies so many uh Renditions of first Contact are very focused on the big bad aliens right like they're here to destroy they're here to take over over they want to take our resources they want to experiment on us like they're here to steal what's ours and infiltrate the humans and I love a good story that's like no they don't care about us like we are so insignificant and they have other things they have other things on their mind and and we're not we're not it this book is written very um classic Sci-fi esque it is written very much as an Ideas Book those ideas are on the surface but those ideas are really really rich and fun to engage with so go into it knowing that you're not getting what is how how stories modern day are often times told we're not going to get stuff that's super character focused uh super focused on the action or the big twists reveals it's very classic Sci-fi in the way that it's written so go to it knowing that there are elements of it that I didn't enjoy entirely but so much of it that I thought was so cool I have started um remote control which is my final Nolla uh I've read the first chapter and it's a pretty interesting start but again we're it's what is it 150 pages long so I'm not going to I'm just going to wait till the end to talk to you about it so enjoy this bird sanctuary or at least I hope you did cuz it's over now [Music] he hello I have finished reading remote control and I enjoyed this so much so this follows a young girl who after a seed falls from the sky it this seed gives her the powers of life and death um she can she has the ability to take the life through a touch of anyone that she sees she can take down entire cities if she wants to it's an incredible power she develops this um this nickname the adopted daughter of the Angel of Death her Story begins living in Ghana with her parents and her brother and after a this is early on in the little novela um after her entire family is killed uh and she is devastated and just sort of sitting with their bodies and Reckoning with what's happened she goes on a journey trying to find the seed again um and it calls to her there's like she has this intuitive knowing of it pulling at her and knowing in what direction she's meant to go to find it her companions are a story of Mythology a bindup a a book of Mythology that she just takes out and reads and reads again as she travels as well as a fox and she meets many people along the way her powers cause her to be extremely recognizable upon first Lu people generally know exactly who she is usually and when they do they either give her gifts and like dot on her or they fear her and try to get away because also this is set in a futuristic sci-fi world where uh there's like Robo cities and robo cops and a ton of technology and trade in technology but she by nature of her powers um disables all technology like ruins every technological thing that she comes too close to so um there's that fun side of it as well it's so interesting the way that it's written because it's written in this sort of uh tur clipped way yet it's also very intimate very close very personal and uh it's told there's there's an interesting focus on on the stories that are passed down and that are told and the weight that they in our lives but at the same time the way that this particular story is told it's told like a story so it almost feels like we're reading a myth as it's being written as it's being told we're witnessing it unfold and the pros sort of reflects that that um wondrous sort of uh vibe that that her story carries anyway her name at the beginning of the novel is Fatima but after her family dies she's given a new name sanova um and and as she travels sova's original goal the way she chooses to use her powers her abilities is to either um assist those that are ready for death and need help getting there or um in self-defense you know if someone meets her on the road and tries to attack her then she will she will kill them um to in self-defense however even that evolves and Chang and she finds herself changing a lot over the novel and I won't say any more than that because I do think that with it only being 150 Pages um there's a lot to discover and I don't want to take that from you if you do choose to read it but I enjoyed this so much uh it is written in a way that is both intriguing sometimes vague sometimes you're left wondering what where tell me more about this power tell me more about you know something will be mentioned some worldbuilding aspect will be mentioned and you want to dig in deeper but because it's a novela you get what you get and uh it's told in this way that draws you in but still leaves you wondering it feels like a fairy tale it feels like a tale being told as we walk with her on her journey I enjoyed it so much I am a little bit mixed Unsure how I feel about the ending I kind of have to sit with that to figure out where I stand there but I enjoyed reading this and I'm I'm I'm going to pick up more from this author I have started and um gotten not very far into dead astronauts I'm still only 87 Pages this was supposed to be my beach book this was supposed to be the one that I I read while I'm sitting in the sand which I mean like I'm here with kids obviously I'm not reading on the beach I'm staring at the waves making sure they don't carry my children away but or like playing in the waves with them it's been really peaceful it's been a wonderful time but um I'm not reading on the beach and honestly I don't really like this book and that sucks for me because vandermeir has become one of my alltime favorite authors this is my sixth vandermeir book I've read them all very close together and I plan on continuing to binge his Works after this this might be my one dud this might be my one dud it's just too abstract vandermeir always writes his books very abstract he always is doing something strange with the way he tells his stories uh it's it's always what do you mean tell me more kind of like remote control uh is but in a very different way he writes in a way that makes me want to think a little bit more on everything that he says um and this one I'm like struggling to just follow what he's saying it's so there's so much Oddities happening around every corner and sometimes he'll say something that just like hits and I'm like oh I love this book yes I'm in it now and then he'll continue on and I'm like no I'm lost can't tell what's happening like I maybe it's me maybe I'm the problem I'm going to go read it because it's the last book I have so I got nothing else to read I would dnf it if it weren't Vander I would already be done I would say you know what I'm going to get something from the library on my phone and I'm not going to read this I would quit it it would I would quit it if it weren't vandermeir but because it's vandermeir I will continue reading and I just really hope it's more than a two star we're leaving tomorrow so I'll have plenty of time to read it in the car right [Music] home are you ready to end this Vlog on a dead IDF dead astronauts not even going to give you a rant for it because it's just I couldn't do it I can't express to you how sad this makes me I did flip ahead and some of the later uh chapters are formatted in a really interesting way uh which I read House of leaves and the formatting of House of leaves is like half of the appeal of that book so I want to give this book another try to figure out what's going on here so my goal right now this is very much a temporary dnf because it's vandermeir and I'm not going to actually quit on one of his books I won't do it but this is absolutely the wrong time for me um I need to start this book over this book is written there's definitely some time stuff going on possibly alternate Dimensions there's definitely a murder duck happening in this story and I need to go back start it over with the correct expectations and I don't know take notes or something so this is a temporary dnf I'm going to we need some space we're on a break um and I'm going to go next month I'm going to be reading his entire mushroom Trilogy I don't remember what it's called and then I still have at least one Standalone if not two to read by him and we we're getting the fourth book in area X um in October so I have plenty of content still to burn through and love and I'm going to enjoy more vandermere books and then come back to the one that has presented itself as a challenge for me reread the beginning and hopefully love it and if not then fine he can have one done he can have one so in this Vlog I read born which was extraordinary amazing oh my goodness love the strange bird also incredible love this little Nolla redside picnic which I love the ideas of some of the execution I would say that this is definitely more of an Ideas Book I love discussing this and trying to figure out okay what do you think the ending was how do you think this if there was a chapter 5 what do you think happened I loved doing that with people on my Discord and with Joanna who I was reading it with that was so much fun but as a narrative it's not like the most interesting story ever but I still really enjoyed it remote control which is another little novela I really enjoyed this and I'm very intrigued to get more of this world so I'm going to continue on with this and dead astronauts which I don't want to talk about anymore I'm not entirely sure how much footage I actually got while I was at the beach I was like I was chilling I don't know how much I actually pulled out my phone to record things but I know I got at least one Sunset so hopefully it's enough to make this Vlog interesting to you I hope you enjoyed it I would love to chat with you more about any of these books if you read them or if you plan on reading them I'll see you again soon bye

Channel: Merphy Napier | Books

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Length: 36min 48sec (2208 seconds)

Published: Tue May 28 2024