Traveller’s Comments (group member since Jan 17, 2010)

Traveller’s comments from the JustAdventure+ Book Group group.

Hmm, here's an example of why the first person present tense is so clumsy: I yank the knife out of the table, get a grip on the blade, and then throw it into the wall across the room. I was actually just hoping to get a good solid stick, but it lodges in the seam between two panels, making me look a lot better than I am.

J. wrote: "Personally I find that the use of a young-adult label for the book is overstating the truth. Yes, the characters are teens, and thus it might appeal to teens more than other books might, but so fa..."

It's definitely very light YA fare, my assessment thus far, is that this is not a book that can be taken seriously as serious, adult literature or even close to true SF; but for a quick light read, it's quite entertaining enough (I have found so far), on about the level that Stephen King pulp is.

After all, I've read hundreds pieces of fantasy pulp, all rated 3 stars on my shelves, and if I finished them that means that I enjoyed them, and so what.

Elvet wrote: "I'm on the fence about reading these books. I've almost picked them up a few times, but have been put off by the YA nature of them. In the past, there have not been many YA novels that I liked (Dar..."

I can see what people are talking about in that the world isn't very well thought out and explained, but on the gut level the character drama is quite enjoyable, and although there are irritating bits regarding the logic of things, I must admit that the prose is at least not boring, and more gripping than I had expected it to be.

As for the YA aspect - well I can't help noticing that you gave the first HP 5 stars. Now, the first HP has much more of a "kiddy" tone than this has, to give you any idea.

I haven't read much yet, since I have had distractions and have committed group reads and other things going on, but as far as I've read, I think that you will probably like it, Elvet.

Enjoy.

J. wrote: "There isn't any kind of in-story reason why such a choice would be more rather than less natural compared to, say first person past tense,"

In first person past tense, a person is telling about what happened to them in the past. In the present tense, they are telling it while it is happening, - I mean there's a logistical problem for me in that (where are you, the reader(/listener), while Katniss is telling you all of this?); unless, like I said, the person is commenting on a flashback he/she is having.

I've been thinking about how the first person present tense POV could possibly work. I would guess that Katniss is having some kind of flashback - like in a dream, for instance? Why doesn't Collins set an adequate background for this?

J. wrote: "Watching the Games is mandatory, so it's plausible that televisions would be subsidized. I'm told that just about everyone in Cuba has a television, even those who live in shacks and have little e..."

Oh wait. You're right! I remember now, that every single household on Mauritius has television,(a fun fact I happen to know from my visit to the island- a very beautiful island, btw) even the people literally living in tin shacks. Okay. Yes, I imagined some kind of public screen provided by the government.

The first person present tense feels really weird to me...
I mean, how is it that she just suddenly starts this monologue, and to whom is she she telling it?
She's telling someone everything that happens as they happen.. even the action moments - how is she talking and doing at the same time- it just feel incongruous to me.

Then there's this:

“I don’t even know if there’ll be wood,” I say. Another year, they tossed everybody into a landscape of nothing but boulders and sand
and scruffy bushes. I particularly hated that year. Many contestants were bitten by venomous snakes or went insane from thirst.
“There’s almost always some wood,” Gale says. “Since that year half of them died of cold. Not much entertainment in that.”
It’s true. We spent one Hunger Games watching the players freeze to death at night. You could hardly see them because they were just huddled in balls and had no wood for fires or torches or anything. It was considered very anti-climactic in the Capitol, all those quiet, bloodless deaths. Since then, there’s usually been wood to make fires.

Ok, so the country is terribly poor, or at least the fringes where Katniss lives. The story takes place in North America. NA is a very, very big place. How do they get to watch the Hunger Games? Surely the whole of America does not fit into the stadium that watches the Games.

The other possibility is television, but since they are so poor and their infrastructure has somehow collapsed to such an extent that they literally have to hunt off the land, how come they can afford television?

I would assume on some central big screen perhaps? Perhaps this will become clear later on.

The Treaty of Treason ? <_< Oi..

I'm going to use this place for notes again, as I go along: He lists the disasters, the
droughts, the storms, the fires, the encroaching seas that swallowed
up so much of the land, the brutal war for what little sustenance
remained.

So I assume the pretense here is that global warming went nuts. Still, she doesn't elaborate enough. Perhaps later...

For discussion of the book, I'll make a topic for the film too if anyone is interested.

Phew, what a harrowing story. A few things I'm wondering about, but I'll have to figure out how spoiler tags work. Or shall I just warn about spoilers and shoot?

Nice to see you joining the discussion, J, which was actually a monologue before you joined in. :)

Hmmm... "He stripped and took a shower, turning the water on so hot that needles
of heat tattooed his skin red, but he felt clean, and more than clean, cleansed and calm, when he came out after thirty minutes and wiped himself dry with a large green towel. "

This implies there is plumbing and electricity? to heat the water with... -so perhaps not steampunk after all? The vehicles depicted in Dradin's childhood don't seem all that old either.

Warning: Spoilers.
Hi, I'm currently reading the first story, Dradin in love, and a few things came up.

I'm intrigued as to where the city is set, or shall I say, which real-world location it is based on.

Initially, I thought the Amazon jungle, but now, after mention of an Occidental woman and an old man defecating in the street, I'm starting to think India. (Perhaps Bombay/Mumbai?)

Secondly, I'd like to mention that the dwarf immediately reminded me of The Witcher dwarves... :P

He's obviously some slyboots, out to make cash out of poor Dradin's infatuation.

Thirdly, I wondered what a columbarium was, and found this: A columbarium (also called columbary) is a place to store ash urns, and a columbary (usually called dovecote or pigeonhouse) is a place for keeping domesticated birds.

So I wonder which is the one that Dradin found... ??

4. Notice the descriptions of cars that sound like these must be pretty old machines - even model-T old? ..which seems to set the stage for a Steampunk background.

Hi guys. I'm still searching for a group who actually discusses the books I read, especially SF &F. Since I don't seem to be finding any, I'm just going to add whatever books to this group's shelves, and hope somebody comes along who's reading the same book and feels like discussing it. Will be adding City of Saints & Madmen by Jeff Vandermeer for now.

Fnord, I'd be VERY interested to see what you think of Ender's Game. Check we have a thread for it here in the group.

It asked me if I wanted to switch to "the new format" a few days ago, so I checked it out.

Suddenly you can't click a tab to go to all your "owned books" anymore, you have to do a batch edit to add them as "owned" now.

I don't like this, since I often end up buying books that I have in my "to read" section, and I used to just regularly go through my "to-read" shelf and add whatever I'd bought.

This is the biggest change for me, but of course there are others. (Such as "permanent scrolling" as default when you enter your shelves).

Since I didn't like the new format, I chose the option to change back to the old format, but now it seems to have me on the new format permanently, and I assumed it was this way for everybody.

I hate it! Is there anywhere that a person can complain? What was wrong with the old format? *cry*

Ah, but I see Oryx and Crake comes first, and I happen to have it. Will read it, rather than Handmaid's Tale first then, I think...

I've been planning to read some of Atwood for a while, and I see that both Arkadia, and now JKing are reading her "The Year of the Flood"

I'd be very interested to get some feedback about this book from you guys. :)

Thanks for all that feedback, Elvet! I already got myself the first book, Jhereg, but 17 instalments is a bit much for me for a series, so I'm glad to hear that they are quite self-contained.

..and I'll be sure to consult you about the correct order when I get close to # 5 or 6! :D