Kevin's Watch

I just finished the fourth (I believe final) book of William Hertling's Singularity series. The books are:
Avagadro Corp
A.I. Apocalypse
The Last Firewall
The Turing Exception
Very fun series. The AI are interesting, with different origins. There's also lots of good stuff about copying minds into the cyber world, and the identity questions that come with that.

That set of titles sounds amusing!

Right? I had no idea what to expect. But the first book was $1.99, and the blurb was interesting enough:

David Ryan is the designer of ELOPe, an email language optimization program, that if successful, will make his career. But when the project is suddenly in danger of being canceled, David embeds a hidden directive in the software accidentally creating a runaway artificial intelligence.

David and his team are initially thrilled when the project is allocated extra servers and programmers. But excitement turns to fear as the team realizes that they are being manipulated by an A.I. who is redirecting corporate funds, reassigning personnel and arming itself in pursuit of its own agenda.

I rather like the origin of the AI. Also the origin of the AIs in the second book. And where it all leads at the end of the series is very interesting and philosophical.

Shards of a Broken Crown. The last of the Serpent War books.

--A

Still slowly riding through my re-read of A Man Rides Through.

(I'm a busy dude .)

I said I wouldn't, but in the end I did...rereading the Riftwar books now, after all the others. Busy on the unabridged Magician.

--A

Silverthorn

--A

I've been reading the Bernice Summerfield New Adventures, in order of publication. They're really old books, so been picking them up used here and there.

Bernice Summerfield (Benny, to her friends) was a companion of the Seventh Doctor Who in the Virgin New Adventures series of books. When Virgin Press lost the rights to Doctor Who, they gave Benny her own series, since she was a popular character.

And also been listening to the Bernice Summerfield audio stories from Big Finish. Started with the single releases, currently on the box sets.

Fun stuff.

A Darkness At Sethanon, last of Feist's Riftwars books.

--A

Tau Zero, by Poul Anderson. Fantastic.

I've been on a Mars kick.

I just finished Red Rising (because I heard good things about Golden Son.) Very good.

I just started The Martian, mainly because of the upcoming movie. So far it's very good.

-jay

Haven't cracked open a novel in about two months, for some reason. Up to The Last Hero in Terry Pratchett Audiobooks, which I think is probably a novella rather than a novel, as it's only four hours.

It was sorta a graphic novel Murrin.

I've just started The Gap Into Conflict: The Real Story by Stephen Donaldson.

--A

Avatar wrote:I've just started The Gap Into Conflict: The Real Story by Stephen Donaldson.

--A

I really hope to start the Gap back up after I finish the Martian...

-jay

I'm Murrin wrote:Haven't cracked open a novel in about two months, for some reason. Up to The Last Hero in Terry Pratchett Audiobooks, which I think is probably a novella rather than a novel, as it's only four hours.

It was a novella - actually an illustrated novella - can't imagine it as an audiobook; the pictures were half the fun.

The Gap Into Vision: Forbidden Knowledge

--A

kevinswatch wrote:I've been on a Mars kick.

I just finished Red Rising (because I heard good things about Golden Son.) Very good.

I just started The Martian, mainly because of the upcoming movie. So far it's very good.

-jay

Never read those. I really liked Moving Mars, though. And I can't figure out what I did with that book.

I started reading Wesley Chu's The Lives of Tao on the train to and from Edinburgh.

I just read The Metamorphosis of Prime Intellect, by Roger Williams. At first, it seemed to be a stupid S&M fantasy story. I put it down and started something else. But then I read the e-jacket notes again, and it seemed more should be happening. So I went on, and it improved. Not fantastic, and the need to suspend your disbelief is a little more than usual for a story about someone creating a computer AI. Still, it was fun, and an easy read. So I'm now trying The Mortal Passage Trilogy by the same author.

I'm Murrin wrote:I started reading Wesley Chu's The Lives of Tao on the train to and from Edinburgh.

I was not inspired to read the next book. Nothing bad about it, but it just didn't do much for me. I really don't remember much detail at this point.

Fist and Faith wrote:

I'm Murrin wrote:I started reading Wesley Chu's The Lives of Tao on the train to and from Edinburgh.

I was not inspired to read the next book. Nothing bad about it, but it just didn't do much for me. I really don't remember much detail at this point.

It's a fairly light sci fi thriller thing, and maybe a bit on the wish-fulfilment side even if it does try to talk like it's subverting that. (As much as Roen Tan gets criticised for thinking this is some great special thing early on, and as much as it shows you him not enjoying the training, it's still some random fat guy who hates his life getting magical assistance that turns him into a secret agent.) The writing's nothing special either - pretty simple and light. Like you say - nothing wrong with it, but nothing exceptional either.