Unfortunately for English readers, this book is only available in French. The author, Catherine Dufour, is a young promising French writer.
It is a long time since I was not such delightfully surprised by a French SF author. This book is a collection of twenty short stories. She is brilliant, provocative and politically incorrect. She reminds me Philip K. Dick with a little of Pierre Pelot (French writer of the 80’s) and Edgar Allan Poe.

In “L’accroissement mathématique du désir” (The mathematical growth of desire) my preferred short stories are “Je ne suis pas une légende” (I’m not a Legend) which is obviously a tribute to Matheson, “L’mmaculée Conception”, “Confession d’un mort” (Confession of a Dead) and the hilarious “Une Troll d’histoire” another tribute to a series of French comics.

Thus, if ever you find her books in a library, run and read.

Anathem, the last book of Neal Stephenson (september 2008) is a pure marvel. Neal Stephenson already wrote many best sellers. Snow Craft, French title “le samourai virtuel” described some foundations of cyber worlds. The noun metaverse has been created by Neal. The Cryptonomicon kept me in thrill all along the 900 pages. These are great geek books.

In “Anathem”, Neal sends us in another universe. On the planet Arbre, the avouts, some kind of scientists/monks, live isolated from the secular world in convents. The secular world fears the potential of science. The two worlds are carefully isolated. A young avout, Fraa Erasmas is ready to spend his full life of mathematician in his cloister. An event will change his destiny and the future of his planet.

I could not stop reading the 900 pages of the book. I wanted to know the end of this complex philosophical adventure: A mix of science fiction, philosophical treaty and initiatory road movie. As for Cryptonomicon, you’re enchanted. The last book that similarly enthralled me was Dan Simmons’ “Ilium” (and of course “Olympos”).
Bragelonne has purchased the rights for France. Nevertheless, I recommend French readers not to wait the French translation. They will loose many subtleties that only French speaker may find. Many neologisms inherit from French. Neal Stephenson either leaves in France or speaks French.

If you liked Asimov’s foundations, then you have to read Anathem. In any case, you should read it.

During this summer, I read the three first books of Glen Cooks’s “Chronicles of the Black Company”.

Tne books tell the story of a free company of mercenaries. In fact, the narrator is the doctor of this company. Of course, the black company is hired by evil forces. Once a contract accepted, the honor of the Company requires to obey. Although the members of the company are not people you’d like to meet, they are not inherently bad. This generates some problems. And there is evil, and even more evil. Thus, is it not better to fight with evil to stop more evil?

A small regret for the 3rd book. There are some obvious tricks (very Hollywood movie style) that you anticipate too easily.

Good chronicles for light summer reading.

Saturday, August 1, 2009

During this holidays, I decided to give a second chance to this saga. The second book is less basic. The hero takes some more roughness. He looks more and more like Elric The Menilbonean. He starts to have some pleasure in killing. He becomes less Manichean.

Funnily, I found in the following books references to another author: Roger Zelazny. One of the 6 free towns has the name of Amber. And even more explicitly, the hero announces that he has a passion for Zelaznian literature. So do I.

Zelazny is of of my favorite SciFi authors. The Amber chronicles are great. I am always surprised that Hollywood did not adapt this saga to screens. My second favorite author is Ursula K Le Guin (Earth Sea cycle, The dispossessed, The left hand of darkness…)

I started this saga from Michel Robert. It is awfully deceptive. The hero is a super hero with super power and extremely powerful in the middle of battle between the forces of Light, forces of Darkness and forces of Chaos. No main default. I hate this type of heroes. They are not interesting.

As super hero working for the chaos, I prefer Elric of Menilboe the Necromancer. Funnily, the hero has a dagger with special power that he does not control. This looks far too much to Stormbringer the evil magic sword of Elric.

My advise, don’t start this saga. Read (or re-read) rather Moorcock’s saga of Elric.

The saga is only available in French.

Techcrunch is well known for its analysis of nice start-ups and the newest trends. His latest recommendations was for business people not to read business books but rather Sci Fi books for imagination.

Thus, Techcrunch provided its list of preferred books. I must confess that I have nothing to reject on this list. I don’t know “The wasp factory” and have not read the latest Stephenson. But all the other ones I highly recommended.

For security minded people, I would recommend also two other books of Neal Stephenson: The Cryptonomicon and Snow Crash (le samourai virtuel in French). In the last one, it was the first quotation of multiverse and metaverse.

The world is a disc carried by four elephants that stand on top of a huge turtle. Magic replaces technology. Humans interact with dwarfs, trolls, werewolves, vampires, and even a librarian orang-utang… For 25 years, Terry Pratchett has wrote a series of hilarious mad books.

If you spent (or even still spend) nights playing advanced Dungeon & Dragons, if you are hooked on “The Lord of Rings”, and also on Douglas Adams’s silly humour, then the Disc World is for you.

How did I discover Terry Pratchett? Through a collaborative project! Many years ago, we tried to set up a project with Philips about an European equivalent of TCG. The project leader decided that the project’s name would be: Ankh Morpok. Ankh Morpok is the main city of the Disc World. It was the first time, I heard about Terry Pratchett. The project was not accepted. Some years later, I found one of the title in my local library. It was an error, I got addicted.

My favorite characters:

• Lord Vetinari, the patrician; The members of my team who claim that they could have guessed it
• Death would always speaks in CAPITAL

I would recommend to French readers to read the books in English. I find it far funnier, although at the start you will have to get used to slang writing. But after a while, you get used to.

Be aware: Highly addictive books I warned you.