Books of 2016

1. Neal Stephenson - Seveneves - Multitude of characters  travelling through space to escape a catastrophe on Earth, with plot spread across millennia, is what the best space operas are about.

2. Brandon Sanderson - Shadows of Self; The Emperor's Soul; The Way of Kings Part I & II;Words of Radiance - Quickly, go read Sanderson's books, he's a rare fantasy author who writes faster than you can read.

3. Amanda Downum - Dreams of Shreds and Tatters - Sometimes I pick books for their titles. Sometimes it turns out to be a great choice. 

4. William Gibson - The Peripheral - I'll borrow this spot on description from Wikipedia's review "Like many Gibson books, The Peripheral is basically a noirish murder mystery wearing a cyberpunk leather jacket (...)"

5. Ken MacLeod - Descent - There's not many science fiction books set in Scotland, forget trainspottings and such, we need more Scottish sf like this one.

6. Ian Tregillis - The Mechanical; The Rising - French and Dutch empires fighting for domination on American soil, questions about free will and adventures of Clockwork servants. 

7. Jim Butcher - The Aeronaut's Windlass - Humanity living on Spires, miles about mist shrouded ground, monsters, flying ships and air pirates.

8. Nina Allan - The Race - An eerily plausible dystopia set in UK, with genetically improved racing dogs playing a large part.

9. Andrew Greig - Fair Helen - who would have thought that a retelling of the Border Ballad Fair Helen of Kirkconnel Lea could be so captivating?

10. David Barnett - Gideon Smith and the Brass Dragon & Gideon Smith and the Mask of the Ripper - More Steampunk! I seem to be slightly biased towards it - these are books 2 and 3 in the series and you find in them what it says on the cover and much more.

11. Jack Vance - The World-Thinker and Other Stories - Classic American sf. Just read them.

12. China Mieville - Embassytown - Embassytown is a city on an alien planet, where alien Hosts communicate using two mouths and so the only way to speak to them is via pairs of genetically engineered identical twins. And there's much more creative fireworks from a man whose books made 'New Weird' genre popular.

Displaced

And once again I feel like I don't have a place to call home.

It happens when you move country, of course, all of a sudden you have a house that you live in and a house that is your family house and this strange shadowy memory house that you, every now and again, long for when homesickness strikes. And yet, you feel strangely homeless. Displaced.

And then it fades and you make grudging peace with some of the annoyances of your new life and you make a conscious choice to say 'home' and mean 'the house I live in' and to say 'my parents' house' referring to where you used to live and it's fine. The feeling of homelessness passes. There is a future home you start building in your head, that will be a more permanent place.

And then it's gone. With one back stabbing political move I'm left drifting again, the house I live in is just a house I might lose at any moment, if I lose a right to work, if Germany or Spain or France decides not to play this round of game of politics the way British government wants them to. The dream of a house I might have had in a year or two or five is shattered and gone and I already moved away from my family home in my head. And it's confusing. And it makes me want to go and find my home, somewhere, again.

And do you know what the worst part is?

That now I will never be sure, if I go away and settle and live and make another place a home, that it won't all be abruptly taken away, again.

So I might never feel at home anywhere else.

Don't feel sorry for me. Just think about all the things that are going on in EU nationals' heads right now that no UK newspapers cover, no radio station talks about, no internet clip summarises. Talk to us. Ask us if we're ok. And listen.

Three examples on politics of cats being superior to politics of humans .

Politics of humans: We will only do this if the other ones do it first because if we do it first than we don't have a leverage. Stalemate! Impossibility!

Politics of cats:

Cat 1: Hey, move.

Cat 2: No.

Cat 1: Move.

Cat 2: No because it's my spot and if I move you will take it.

Cat 1: Yes.

Cat 2: No. You move.

Cat 1: Ok.

Cats swap places.


Politics of humans: We can not help vulnerable humans because they were born on another side of an imaginary line on a map.

Politics of cats:

Cat 1: Hey, kittens.

Cat 2: Yes.

Cat 1: Are these yours?

Cat 2: No, I found them in the bushes and they smelled hungry so I made milk.

Cat 1: Ah. I'm going now.

Cat 2: Yes.


Politics of humans: Posturing, posturing, empty promises, lies, posturing, posturing, rhetoric, empty threats, lies.

Politics of cats:

Cat 1: I don't like you and I don't agree with you sitting in this spot of sun.

Cat 2: If you approach I will hit you.

Cat 1: You hit me!

Cat 2: I told you!

Cat 1: I challenge you to a duel!!

Cat 2: I will hit you!!!

*scuffle, howling, flying fur* Cat 1 wins and settles in the sun. Cat 2 sits at the edge of the sun spot, furiously ignoring cat 1.

The game of Civilisation

Remember these times when, during history lessons, you'd think to yourself "How could people, who were living then, not see this coming? How did they not do anything about it? Why didn't they object?" and shake your head?

Now is then.

Now we have to deal with a person who managed to run a casino to the ground running world's largest economy, holding hands with fascists. Now we have to deal with screaming crowds of online trolls, repeating slogans they barely understand in the name of alternative facts. Now we have to deal with trying to save our humane impulses towards millions of displaced by wars in the times of economic cirsis. Now we have to watch European Union crumble, Russia stretch, getting ready to pounce, nationalism in its ugliest form slay reason wherever you look.

The history is shaping right in front of our eyes.

And I have a bad feeling that some years from now someone pouring over whichever articles, posts, blogs, books, documents survive the next global crisis, will be shaking his head asking himself "How could people, who were living then, not see this coming? How did they not do anything about it? Why didn't they object?"

...

I don't like how this game of Civilisation is panning out. Can we reload the last saved game?