The Sword and Laser discussion

I'm also going to use spoiler tags in the post because I always wish people would.

(view spoiler)[Okay so once you hit the end you find out that the iterations of the two characters are just bits of code trying to work themselves out, and it ends with one of the characters saying there's no use living without someone to love and they clean up their own code (since they are the manifestation of the person who wrote that code, allegedly) and leave it so the alien can't get in on their way out....

So where my brain is stuck in its own loop is, what in the context of the novel is "real?"

Are the aliens real?

Is the underground city real?

Were there really people who turned into angels/demons?

Are there really humans who traveled and started a new colony somewhere else?

Because one *could* argue, and I feel like arguing, that the entire novel is just a suicide note - where a person basically is saying they can't live without love, the end. And none of the rest of it had to exist except the mistake they made in the code?

Obviously everything is fictional because it's a novel but what is real to the book?

Bleep bloop, I am stuck here. (hide spoiler)]

Bleep bloop.

Maybe, yes.

I think that your argument may be right, and yes things are a bit open to interpretation, so here is mine.

(view spoiler)[I think the only "real" segments were the ones where Adrien (I think I'm remembering that right) designs the city, goes to the surface with his kid. This ends when Steven uploads the Elysium program with the rocket, with the explosion of that rocket being a transition back to the unreliable narration of the program. And then the very end was also "real" for the AI. The further you get away from those moments the more abstract things got I felt.

Or the whole AI(possibly multiple) were built from scratch, and the only "real" segment was the end when it talked to the alien.

And I'm sure there are many more ideas people have thought of, that is one reason I did like this story, is it was open ended, and was such from the beginning. (hide spoiler)]

The only thing I feel sure about is...
(view spoiler)[what is told to us by the only creature that (seems) outside the program, the alien at the end. Literally everything else is a construct of the program and while maybe based on memory and brain scan (that may or may not have been affected by a head wound), it's all obviously unreliable.
So IMO I feel confident that aliens invaded, humans survived enough to 1. build ships and depart and 2. create the atmosphere program, enough time has passed that the aliens have come to think of Earth as their home.
For some of these things to happen, we have to assume some other events, such as the underground city so that humans could survive long enough to build the ships and also create the atmosphere program.
(hide spoiler)]

On a slightly separate topic, IMO I think the book description does a TERRIBLE disservice!! I for one feel really potentially shocking, amazing reveals of the atmosphere program AND that the data is corrupt, were ruined by putting that right on the book description. I can only imagine how I would have felt as a reader to have had it dawn on me what was going on!
That said, I'm not sure what a better description would be, but I'm really disappointed to have those key elements "ruined" for me.

Anyone else feel that the entire story (view spoiler)[was what the alien watched, and misunderstood the whole way? The alien doesn't understand gender or human relationships, so kept interacting with this corrupted feed, trying to understand and failing. (hide spoiler)]

Liam, I didn't read the book description until after I had finished, and I was so glad I hadn't. I agree completely that it does a huge disservice, and ruins an interesting twist.

That would be an interesting thread on its own. "How would you right the back of the book description?" Want to start it Liam?

Liam wrote: "On a slightly separate topic, IMO I think the book description does a TERRIBLE disservice!! I for one feel really potentially shocking, amazing reveals of the atmosphere program AND that the data is corrupt, were ruined by putting that right on the book description. I can only imagine how I would have felt as a reader to have had it dawn on me what was going on!
That said, I'm not sure what a better description would be, but I'm really disappointed to have those key elements "ruined" for me."

Totally. I really hate it when the marketing for something spoils the story. I've started avoiding movie trailers since they spoil so much. A classic example of posters & trailers ruining plot twists is Terminator 2. I read the novel based on the script & watched it many times. The T-800 being there to protect John & not kill him was supposed to be a surprise, but all of the marketing for the film spoiled it.

John (Taloni) wrote: "Anyone else feel that the entire story [spoilers removed]"

Yes and I agree with you and with John (Nevets) and Liam that this is one interpretation, and really the main one I landed on. But I really enjoyed thinking it through.

Anyone else get the idea that the story is an allegory for post-colonialist healing?
The way that at the end... (view spoiler)[the invading and colonizing alien, who even though seemed sincere and "good hearted" presumed to own or be entitled to know everything... where Adrianne, the remaining ghost of the colonized, was very adamant that "This is not for you." This repository of the end of human history, this memorial for the destroyed people, is written in the very sky above the invaders... but it's not for them. They not entitled to it. Even if they're sincere about just wanting to learn. Invaders don't get to have everything. (hide spoiler)]
Not sure I expressed it properly, but it seemed to be a pretty clear theme to me.

Liam wrote: "Anyone else get the idea that the story is an allegory for post-colonialist healing?
The way that at the end... [spoilers removed]
Not sure I expressed it properly, but it seemed to be a pretty cle..."

Most definitely, I see this in it. It's a bit ironic but comforting to think the colonized could (view spoiler)[ decide to end the access the aliens have by finishing/ending the code rather than allowing the continuous versions to go on. (hide spoiler)]

Jenny (Reading Envy) wrote: "It's a bit ironic but comforting to think the colonized could..."

Oh! I got the sense that what happened at the end was... (view spoiler)[She had ended the bridge program only, the interface that her as the A.I. served between the alien (and anyone else making a "direct connection") and the database-in-the-sky. In essence, leaving the memorial atmo'program but eliminating any attempt to interact with (and thus change or delete) it. And, also, eliminating herself as the A.I. (hide spoiler)]
At least, that's how I read it :O

Liam wrote: "Jenny (Reading Envy) wrote: "It's a bit ironic but comforting to think the colonized could..."

Oh! I got the sense that what happened at the end was... [spoilers removed]
At least, that's how I re..."

Oh but (view spoiler)[ "she" doesn't really exist right? So I thought that was also ending "her." That's why I read the entire thing as a suicide note. Too dark? (hide spoiler)]

Jenny (Reading Envy) wrote: "Oh but (view spoiler)"

:O Oh wow, I didn't see it that way. (view spoiler)[I didn't read it that she understood what she was and what was going on until the very end, when enough of the data was repaired and she attained self-awareness. Up to that point, what we were reading was the A.I. (her) trying to make sense of the data with all its corruption and fragments. It was only after "she" remembered what she was and why, that she decided to shut herself down... but just herself, the bridge, as she was designed to be by Steven. The A.I. built from Adrian/ne's mind scan. She isn't the database, the atmo'program itself... she's just the bridge. (hide spoiler)]