<ELLIOTTCABLE>
anyway: yeah, Charles Stross, Vernor Vinge, and Neal Stephenson are a great start
<whitequark>
to make it work you need to take a compressor
<ELLIOTTCABLE>
“The Zombie Survival Guide: Complete Protection from the Living Dead”
<whitequark>
like a fridge one
<whitequark>
it's ok
<eligrey>
ELLIOTTCABLE: or are you referring to the zombie survival guide
<eligrey>
oh that yeah
<whitequark>
and fill it with ultrapure helium
<whitequark>
and that's it
<eligrey>
i ctrl+fed prep
<eligrey>
when you said prep
<eligrey>
yeah i read that book back in highschool
<eligrey>
it has plot sorta
<ELLIOTTCABLE>
lol and Hitchhiker's Guide is in your to-reads
<ELLIOTTCABLE>
do you like Pratchett?
<eligrey>
but it gets too messy
<eligrey>
ELLIOTTCABLE: i've watched his movies!
<eligrey>
lol
<eligrey>
they're good though
<ELLIOTTCABLE>
who's Robert Charles Wilson?
<ELLIOTTCABLE>
Alistair Reynolds.
<eligrey>
he made a cool book about earth being trapped (or saved depending on some stuff) in some time thingy
<ELLIOTTCABLE>
Reynolds, Vinge, Stephenson, Stross. Read every single book, short story, compilation, editors' note and prologue, by any of them
<ELLIOTTCABLE>
and then ask me for more
<eligrey>
ELLIOTTCABLE: already read everything from vinge and stross
<eligrey>
except stross' laundry stuff
<eligrey>
ELLIOTTCABLE: Reynolds is intimidating
<eligrey>
i kept getting tired reading revelation space
<ELLIOTTCABLE>
Hugh Howey is …a bit heavy-handed with the opinions, but engaging writing nonetheless. The ‘Dust’ omnibus is classic. Will take you places for real.
<eligrey>
maybe if i dont try to read it so late
<ELLIOTTCABLE>
eh skip that one then
<eligrey>
yeah i heard dust is nice
<ELLIOTTCABLE>
a good place to start with Reynolds is Diamond Dogs / Turquoise Days (I think?)
<eligrey>
but i've had so much of it spoiled from people talking about it
<ELLIOTTCABLE>
it's short, to the point, gruesome as *fuck*, and gets you engaged with his writing style
<eligrey>
ELLIOTTCABLE: will look into that
<ELLIOTTCABLE>
some of his realllllly long-timeline stuff can be …
<ELLIOTTCABLE>
disjoint from reality in a way I can't suspend disbelief for, easily.
<ELLIOTTCABLE>
yeah Dust isn't good enough to read it if you know the ending already, honestly.
<ELLIOTTCABLE>
it's not High Fiction™. It's just a great shocker and engaging characters.
<ELLIOTTCABLE>
Scalzi? Redshirt, or his Old Man's War stuff?
<eligrey>
haven't read any of that
<eligrey>
i'm used to the timescale stuff that stross does in accelerando
<ELLIOTTCABLE>
Vernor Vinge's other works? Tatja Grimm's World, I liked a *lot*. the Across Realtime series.
<eligrey>
i got upset listening to greg egan's "explaining everything about that timescale stuff ELLIOTTCABLE was talking about but repeating it 10 times" crap in permutation city
<whitequark>
there's also RICOR stirling cryocoolers, they're more compact, though less powerful
<ELLIOTTCABLE>
Jack McDevitt? Great author for characters, again. (I have a thing for engaging characterization.) his Alex Benedict stories are really great adventure nonsense.
<whitequark>
but the annoying part about RICOR is, they're ITAR regulated as dual-use equipment
<eligrey>
he wouldn't stop obsessing over repeating the same experiment a million different ways, all verbosely elaborated
<ELLIOTTCABLE>
stuff ELLIOTTCABLE was talking about? what do I talk about? I don't have a very good memory.
<whitequark>
because .... hmmmm i think IR seeker missiles
<eligrey>
ELLIOTTCABLE: the timescale stuff
<whitequark>
so i'm not gonna ship one out of US
<eligrey>
that you're referring to
<ELLIOTTCABLE>
do you like, uhhhhh, what's the movie version,
<ELLIOTTCABLE>
Edge of Tomorrow?
<ELLIOTTCABLE>
(originally AYNIK)
<ELLIOTTCABLE>
famous now, but truly excellent if you somehow missed the movie *and* the original novel
<eligrey>
ELLIOTTCABLE: any books dealing with or at least aknowledging uploads?
<ELLIOTTCABLE>
er, no idea.
<eligrey>
acknowledging*
<ELLIOTTCABLE>
I don't do sci-fi for the science, I do it for the setting behind characters. I like stuff like Asimov as much (or more) than hard-scifi.
<whitequark>
lol asimov
<whitequark>
his writing is abysmal
<ELLIOTTCABLE>
only sci-fi, or do you like fiction?
<eligrey>
these deep space operas are all nice but it's kinda annoying when nobody except charles stross will use realistic spacecraft
<ELLIOTTCABLE>
whitequark: blasphemy.
<whitequark>
i've re-read foundation nicely and it was disturbing just how bad it was
<ELLIOTTCABLE>
ironicalelly, I found myself completely fucking unable to type that word
<whitequark>
the sci-fi is cool tho
<whitequark>
shrug
<whitequark>
s/nicely/recently/
<ELLIOTTCABLE>
I love stross's spacecraft :P
<eligrey>
for deep space travel nobody in their right mind is going to try to ship a couple humans and a life support system when you could just use a solar sail and a computer
<ELLIOTTCABLE>
so, fantasy?
<eligrey>
ELLIOTTCABLE: if you suspend disbelief as to how exactly uploading would ever be done, all non-FTL stuff in stross' stories is so hard
<ELLIOTTCABLE>
ohhhhh for awesome action and satisfying main-character idolization feelings, Vorkosigan sagaaaaa
<ELLIOTTCABLE>
Lois McMaster Bujold's everything.
<eligrey>
I need to start using my kindle voyage more