Asimov's Robots - Delightfully Charming

 Isaac Asimov’s robot stories are a joy. I usually don’t have much patience with Asimov. While his ideas are great, I tend to be primarily a character-driven reader and a plot-driven reader second, and in my experience, Asimov’s not great at either. And don’t get me started on his women characters and stance on feminism. But his robot stories, especially those in I, Robot, are delightfully charming. His character writing skills are at just about the right level for robot personalities (and his robots do have personalities), and as for Susan Calvin, surely one of the most robotic human characters in fiction, her personality is just right for who she is and what she does. Unlike with many other “unfeminine” woman characters (in literature in general of the time, not just in Asimov’s writings), I don’t feel that Susan Calvin’s personality is written to account for her scientific career or lack of partner, or to punish her for something, or anything else. It’s such an asset for her, her company, and society in general that it just comes off as who she is, and that’s OK. Asimov obviously has a great affection for his robots, and I wonder how much Susan Calvin’s robot-likeness slips her in under that umbrella. She’s certainly one of his best-written women, in the admittedly small sample size of his writings I’ve read.

Becky Chambers' "A Psalm for the Wild-Built" - Tea Monk!

 A Psalm for the Wild-Built by Becky Chambers is both filled with fascinating ideas and totally charming, an unusual combination in my experience. It’s certainly one of the most positive post-apocalyptic stories I’ve read (unsurprising for Chambers), and her take on robots, and robot-human relations is mind-boggling. I’m totally charmed by the idea of a tea monk, and I love the way her society works. So egalitarian and rural-feeling, but selectively pretty high-tech. Becky Chambers is a master at telling stories that focus on character interaction and individual responsibility that also resonate with implications and consequences on a much larger scale. Full-on space opera told on the level of the domestic. This novella is no different; though the large-scale geography is limited to a single continent, the temporal and societal expanses are vast. She has a definite talent for writing all four main SF bases – big ideas, world-building, characters, and action. Well worth reading and highly recommended. Can’t wait to read the sequel.

David Weber's Honor Harrington Series - Exposition Much?

I’ve picked up David Weber’s Honor Harrington Series again, after many years. This is a series (and an author) that I followed avidly for years and have reread again and again; one of my comfort reads, in fact. Paradoxically, I’ve also consistently skipped parts of his books again and again, to the point of never having read most of Short, Victorious War. I read him for his characters (which, even if many of them are not particularly well-rounded, are appealing), the action (which is well-written and exciting), and the good vs. evil (which is comforting, especially as the world around me seems to develop more shades of gray). What I don’t read him for is his plentiful exposition, which would be the parts I have habitually skipped. He has a lot to say about politics, military technology, and character motivations, much of which I find uninteresting, excessive, and/or redundant (this last would apply to the character motivations). The good news is that the action and character interactions still work even if you skip ahead, brother.

 This time around I’m actually reading much more of the exposition. I still don’t have a lot of interest in the military hardware aspects, but the politics are more interesting, if a little slow going. I’m not sure how much of my new-found patience has to do with my being more politically aware these days versus the politics in the later books of the series being much more integrated into a story containing less action. I’m still not committed to reading every page, but I’m getting a depth to the stories that I didn’t before.

 The sheer tonnage of exposition in Weber’s books is also interesting because that’s typically seen as a no-no in fiction writing. Yet he was (is?) a very popular military SF author, so it apparently works for him. Is it that he’s managed to pick topics such that his lengthy ruminations become part of the attraction? Or is it that you can actually skip them and still enjoy the books, a la Victor Hugo. (Not that Weber’s writing skills are nearly to that level.) Regardless of my altered reading habits this time around, I think I’m still in the latter camp.