<html><head><meta http-equiv="content-type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8"></head><body dir="auto"><div dir="ltr">Hello šš» <br><br>Apologies for missing the April 5th meeting <br><br>The books recommended by Wes are all available at the NYPL. So Iām good with these choices. š<br><br>And they <b>all</b> look fascinating from the blurbs. <br><br>Gloria </div><div dir="ltr"><br></div><br class="Apple-interchange-newline" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto;"><div dir="ltr"><blockquote type="cite">On Apr 7, 2024, at 3:59āÆPM, Wesley Brodsky <wesbrodsky@alum.mit.edu> wrote:<br><br></blockquote></div><blockquote type="cite"><div dir="ltr">ļ»æ<span>Hello Everybody;</span><br><span></span><br><span>All from reviews I read in the Wall Street Journal (WSJ). I have not read any of them. The descriptions in āquotesā are amalgamated from Goodreads and Amazon. The books are available on the Old Colony Library Network and are for sale by Amazon. </span><br><span></span><br><span>Consider Phlebas</span><br><span>Iain M. Banks</span><br><span>This was not from a review of this novel which I read in the WSJ; it was suggested by a review there of a coffee-table book filled with the sketches and maps Banks created about his āCultureā series, of which āConsider Phlebasā was the first.</span><br><span>āThe war raged across the galaxy. Billions had died, billions more were doomed. Moons, planets, the very stars themselves, faced destruction, cold-blooded, brutal, and worse, random. The Idirans fought for their Faith; the Culture for its moral right to exist. Principles were at stake. There could be no surrender.</span><br><span>Within the cosmic conflict, an individual crusade. Deep within a fabled labyrinth on a barren world, a Planet of the Dead proscribed to mortals, lay a fugitive Mind. Both the Culture and the Idirans sought it. It was the fate of Horza, the Changer, and his motley crew of unpredictable mercenaries, human and machine, actually to find it, and with it their own destruction.ā </span><br><span></span><br><span>2054</span><br><span>Elliot Ackerman & James Stavridis</span><br><span>This is a SciFi war book, concerning artificial āintelligenceā. James Stavridis, is a Retired Admiral. In my humble opinion, artificial āintelligenceā is over-hyped. It does not exhibit āintelligenceā as people normally consider it. I think it is automated plagiarism. However, this might be an interesting book.</span><br><span>āIt is twenty years after the catastrophic war between the United States and China that brought down the old American political order at a moment when a radical leap forward in artificial intelligence creates an existential threat to the USA, and the world. The American president collapses in the middle of an address to the nation. After an initial flurry of misinformation, the administration reluctantly announces his death. A cover-up ensues, conspiracy theories abound, and the country descends into a new type of civil war.</span><br><span>A handful of elite actors from the worlds of computer science, intelligence, and business have a fairly good idea what happened. As some of the worldās great powers, old and new, state and non-state alike, struggle to outmaneuver one another in this new Great Game of scientific discovery, the outcome becomes entangled with the fate of American democracy.ā</span><br><span></span><br><span>A View from the Stars: Stories and Essays </span><br><span>Cixin Liu</span><br><span>This is by the author of āThe Three-Body Problemā, which we have read. It is not one novel, but we have read books which were not one novel before.</span><br><span>āFeatures a range of short works from the past three decades of Cixin Liu's career, putting his nonfiction essays and short stories side-by-side for the first time. This collection includes essays and interviews that shed light on Liu's experiences as a reader, writer, and lover of science fiction throughout his life, as well as short fiction that gives glimpses into the evolution of his imaginative voice over the years.ā</span><br><span></span><br><span></span><br><span>Wes Brodsky </span><br><span>"It is of the utmost importance that Concepts not trouble you with silliness or complications, unless you are searching for really difficult work."; Giordano Bruno (1582)</span><br><span>_______________________________________________</span><br><span>Join Zoom Meeting</span><br><span>https://us06web.zoom.us/j/94460014978?pwd=a1BFQndDa1NYTnlNcUVCMU95dWdNZz09</span><br><span></span><br><span>Meeting ID: 944 6001 4978</span><br><span>Passcode: 244476</span><br><span></span><br><span>Recurring Meeting; Generally the first Friday of every month at 7 PM</span><br><span>_______________________________________________</span><br><span>reading-group mailing list</span><br><span>reading-group@lists.nesfa.org</span><br><span>https://listsmgt.nesfa.org/mailman/listinfo/reading-group</span><br></div></blockquote></body></html>