Ryan Matejka > Recent Status Updates

Hell is the Absence of God - Easily my favorite of the stories. As a former Catholic, now atheist-leaning agnostic, this scratches a very specific itch for me of respecting Christian lore within a humanist perspective.

The Evolution of Human Science was a wonderful short read that ignited my imagination, instead of stifling it with needlessly long technical details thinly disguised as a story.

Seventy-Two Letters was a bore, to be honest. I had no interest in the details of how this alternate reality functioned, based on magical text writing, and the story was primarily interested in that. Furthermore, I'm starting to see a pattern in these short stories, in that Chiang is far more interested in the technical details of a concept than the story it produces, and I am the opposite.

Story of Your Life is great, of course. I love this muted look at the idea of a predetermined universe. I need to rewatch Arrival.

Division by Zero was interesting, albeit not incredibly gripping to me. I feel as though I must be missing a deeper subtextual meaning, but perhaps missing it is the surest sign that it didn't connect with me.

"Unfinished" was lovely. I've never seen the word gestalt used so many times in my life.

The first short story, Tower of Babylon, was great. Feels like it could be an actual historic story from the flat-earth times or something. Awesome read from start to finish.

I'd read this in college, along with Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit, and had been thinking about it recently. When I saw it on display at the library, it felt like a sign. I picked it up and knew after reading the first line that it was time to revisit it. Four pages in, and the prose is immaculate and addicting. Thank goodness for my professor.

The story has some interesting ideas that kept me engaged at first, but I've started to notice lots of awkwardness that's making me question whether I want to continue. Namely, there's a lot of underdeveloped worldbuilding thrown around (e.g. random mentions of the different types of bots in a crowd of people - it doesn't serve the story or add any real depth), and the writing is more telling than showing.

The initially interesting concept was quickly buried under chapters of slow-burning plot told in dull prose, and I quickly lost interest.

Interesting so far, but the women are really getting the short end of the stick in every scenario. Their partners are dead, dying, a serial killer, and sneaking around with other men.

I'm disappointed in the lack of emotional depth for a book titled as it is (I didn't read the synopsis, which perhaps better represents the story). That said, I'm also disappointed by the external conflict thus far, though I'm interested enough to see it through.