[nesfa-reading-group] Reminder: Next Reading Group Discussion (Sourdough) is on Dec 8th

[R. Luoma]

On Thu, 30 Nov 2023 16:17:14 -0700
Tracy Marks <tracy at windweaver.com> wrote:

> I don't see how this book would be classified as science fiction
> or fantasy at all. MAYBE we could consider one incident later
> in the book to be so bizarre that it's in the realm of fantasy,
> but that's about it.

You must have encountered some unusual yeast starters
if you considered the one in the book to be humdrum/ordinary.
I thought that some of the aspects of the sourdough starter
and loaves had fantasy elements (albeit not in the dramatic
Moria/Hogswarts sense).  The gigantic sourdough mound
near the end (to me, at least) follows the classic scifi trope
(e.g. Arch Oboler's "Chicken Heart" or the aforementioned "The Blob").

While not at the "Max Headroom" level, there seem (again, to me, at least)
to be a number of "20 minutes into the future" aspects
similar (again, to me) to William Gibson's _Pattern Recognition_
or speculative aspects like Pynchon's _Gravity's Rainbow_ [1]

-- 
R. Luoma     malkin8244 [at] pobox [dot] com

[1] _Gravity's Rainbow_ was nominated for the 1973 Nebula Award