It really starts going at the last chapter of part 1 and into part 2. Im about half through Hard Rain Chapter. It's really good now.
Yeah I'm in the hardcore descriptive portion. Found myself zoning out. Still intrigued and glad to hear it is paying off.
Glad I glanced at the thread, I'm pretty early into it but probably would have given up without hearing it's worth dealing with it.
Don't get me wrong, this shit is through the whole book, just becomes less prominent as you go through. I'd say my opinion on the overall shiftiness of the book started turning around at about 45%. The A+5000 chapter (67% or so) it almost becomes a totally different book, just a heads up.
Through Hard Rain Spoiler Enjoying it as the plot is moving along. Really like the relationship between Ivy and Dinah. Also making a prediction sure to be wrong - Whenever we jump ahead 5000 years, I assume they're gonna try to rehabitate Earth. They're gonna run into people that survived all that shit under ground and came from Rufus/Dinah's ancestory. That's also the basic plot for the 100, so it's probably not going to happen.
Quick thought Spoiler: through 77% 300 straight pages of descriptions of how new guns and ammo were made and named whyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy. Obviously this means there's going to be war coming but GOOD GOD MAN CONDENSE THIS BULLSHIT
Through Ymir aka Longest Chapter Ever Spoiler - I thought Markus was a little power hungry with his "body gaurds" But his intentions were obviously pure/for the good of the ship. -JBF is a conniving cunt. -Also lol at facebook/spacebook surviving the apocalypse - I hope Tekla gets a chance to fuck up JBF later. Through Endurance Spoiler - Only 12 survivors left - and cannibals at that. daaaaaaamn - And they're taking over the ship? daaaaaamn. fuckers. Cleft Spoiler - RIP Doob - lol at them all clucking about what personality traits to keep and remove. Such a women's discussion. - And Tekla putting them all in their place - And now we understand the title. Im sure most have realized it way before this point, but Im dumb On to part 3! I should finish this bad boy today or tomorrow.
I'm honestly struggling to finish. Spoiler: 80-85% HOLY FUCK JUST GET ON WITH IT. I'm so fucking bored of this journey by the 7. Obviously they are in Alaska, obviously they are going to find artifacts of Dinah's family and obviously those indigenous people who are acting weird are Dinah's 5000 year old relatives. Holy fuck, how does it take 200 pages to get to the fucking point. There better be some sweet ass warring and underground cities with some fucking action at the end of this trail.
Im still early on so I'm not reading your spoilers but you've been very back and forth in this. It almost makes me more exited to read it. Maybe I'm just a masochist
There are parts that are very good. I'm not a sci-fi fan honestly, so these frequent data dumps just make me sooooo bored.
I'm about 25% though and Spoiler really want to like this. There are certain similarities to the Martian although it is taking far too long for things to happen. Everything is being dragged out. Just get to the hard rain already. I keep expecting it to get really good and it keeps...not.
Finished, rating is spoiler free but left it spoilered in case people didn't want to prejudge the book. Spoiler: Rating 5/10 Would not read again or recommend to others. Again, I am not a big scifi fan but I love The Martian. I also just got done reading The Stormlight Archives so maybe I'm just comparing this interesting but terribly written book with Sanderson's epics. Idk Spoiler: Thoughts What a shitty, unfulfilling ending. Cal and the sailors mutated into fish people. Great. That's the fucking point of the book???? Re-read the epilogue. Still shitty. Whatever.
Through The End of the Book Spoiler Nailed it Ohhhh So did Ivy's fiancee sub commander - Also good to see that strip clubs survived the apocalypse. That was a pretty meh ending/climax. Feel like there wasnt a great payoff to anything. Pretty frustrating because there's some really interesting stuff. There's a phenomenal book/story in there somewhere. I had enough for me to keep him curious until the end, but felt like it could be much more. Oh well.
See I feel like there are Stephenson fans who think this is the greatest book ever (based on user reviews and it was featured on one of my podcasts I like listening to) but I don't possibly see how you could ever get that from this book.
I'm ~15% through. I'm enjoying it but I'm an engineering nerd as mentioned before. He doesn't offset the technical talk with humor like Andy Weir did with The Martian. With that said I enjoy it more when we get back to what is actually going on with the people as opposed to the technical specs of ships and processes.
I find the tech specs interesting to a point. But I feel like he gets very aspergery and takes 500 words when 75 would do just fine and still provide lots of detail. It obviously didnt stop me from finishing. For whatever reason - it kept me engaged enough. usually I jump ship on something like this.
i'm about 40% through, and was reading out by the pool today and just couldn't finish a chapter. it just kept going on and on - like Truman said, 500 words when 75 would do. i can tell it's about to pick up and want to keep going, but i honestly don't know if i can. i'm traveling out to CA on Thursday, so it's gonna depend a lot on what i can do tomorrow. if i can get through a lot tomorrow, i'll try and finish it on the flights. if not, i might put this on hold a bit and read a few other books.
Soooo, Don't judge... But I listen to Writing Excuses, which is Brandon Sanderson's podcast with writer friends about what makes a good book. This last episode it was their feature book (they are sponsored by Audible). Did more research, I guess the woman who was raving about it actually READ for the audiobook. So that's probably why.
10.32 iirc. Highly recommend that podcast if you like to read, for me it's like watching a food network show (on how to make recipes) except it's about the process behind writing fiction.
Finished Armada last night. From laxjoe and RonBurgundy reviews. I might wait a few to read this. I'm sci-fi'd out. I need another genre.
RonBurgundy is keeping me going. I'm ~200 pages in, to the "chapter" called Cloud Ark, it's just so much content for so little plot movement, it's driving me crazy.
so i think i'm putting this book on hold. read a bit today after work and just got to ymir (a, what, 200 page chapter?) and just need to stop for a bit. even with them finally getting to the white sky, hard rain and Spoiler the president coming on board i just am struggling to keep going. i've read 15 or so books this summer with the vast majority being books i start to read as soon as i get home from work and don't put down until i go to bed. with this, i'm wondering what's new streaming on netflix while i'm in the middle of a sentence. will try and come back later and hope the people that have/will read it enjoy(ed) it. peace
I'm pretty late, but has anyone volunteered to hook folks up with an e-version of this book? I'll give it a read. Hopefully I finish by months end.
Not sure what this means, because on on Audible Anyway, I have 18 out of 31 hours left. That puts me at 40%? Either way, it's a flipping struggggggle. The other day I meant to bring this to the board, but I spent my entire trip to work(~25 minutes) listening to the characters debate about something that could have been effectively handled in like 2-3 minutes.
Cartel by Don Winslow is my next book. English professor posted on FB it was the best book he read in 2015, he said something like "XXX total pages, and I don't think there's a bad one in the bunch, best book I've read in 2015" Since Winslow is already one of my favorite authors it's a slam dunk for me. If you're looking for something maybe a little different.
Done... So how far in until you get to the chapter you referenced above? If I am still this bored at 60% I'll give up on it. 31 hours is a big investment.
That comment was at around 40% I felt at this point is where it starts to move a little more. There's still pages of tech specs, but the plot moves more. I would say try to hang in there until 65%. There's a big event, shift there. If youre still bored, bail.
Spoiler Finally some good shit happening. Let's hope it picks up from here. Nuking Venezuela seems like a good idea even today. Curious to find out what Sean Probst dies with the comet.
Into Ymir now, feels like it's picking up. Appreciated the WTF moment at the end of Hard Rain, interested to know the point.
What will I miss if I skip ahead to like 63%? I'd be fine with an abridged version. There are books that give you far too much detail about things, and then there's this book. I liked Cloud Atlas much better so far, but it sound like the final 3rd will be in my wheelhouse after reading reviews. This is how I feel (from Goodreads):
Ok... I'm going to skip to 55% through. Thanks Truman for the Cliffs. At 42% through, here are some questions.... Spoiler They just decided who goes, and Dube was kind of pissed that he couldn't. Now they are going on and on about the plan to get the comet (why do they want it again? Water? All I know is that Shawn/Sean went off to get the comet and then brought it back somehow. Now Markus (Marcus?) is trying to figure out who all is going to the comet to do (not sure what).... I think. Looks like Sean died of bleeding to death -- not sure what punctured him yet. I also know they lost 97% of their embryos, but Markus said they were never really important anyway. I didn't really follow why they weren't important? Finally... Who/what was in the cloud arklets again? I can't remember.
Spoiler Comet = water for propulsion mostly. Sean hooked his ship into it and got it back to an orbit reachable by others. You don't need embryos if people can have sex with each other, they state somewhere in there they will need hundreds or thousands of years to develop a place that is large enough to support a bigger, more diverse population. Cloud arklets = Arkies = young men/women/people drafted from random civilizations around the world. People in Izzy = general population = older, hand picked science/engineers/astronauts.
Just to add to this Spoiler The Arkies that seceded where led by Julie (JBf) former president of the USA who illegally got herself in the ship to begin with. Then manipulated like 80% of the space population to break away from izzy becuase she was oissed she lost any influence and convinced them all Mars was a better solution for survival. The mars solution was considered by the powers that be an impossibility. So basically she talked almost all off the surviving human race to go chase something that was deemed a suicide mission by people a lot smarter than her.
Probably more 55% time frame I'm assuming? Spoiler So, 80% of the Arkies died going to Mars? Is that what I'm hearing? Or will it still be TBD? Are Markus' secret police important at all? When I make the jump... Dinah will be alive, but will Dube, Ivy, Myra, or Tekla?
Spoiler Arkies fate tbd Markus turned out to have good intentions. He sacrificed his life so Dinah could bring the comet back in. Secret police wasn't that important but you'll kind of see why it want a horrible idea All of them are alive.
Ok.... Pulled the trigger, and I'm starting now at the Endurance chapter. Spoiler 400 survivors of? Izzie is being eaten by what? Who is Amir?
I would really like to know the author's thought process, because he wrote a great novel but pushed 500 pages of excess into it