I just finished Neal Stephensen's Interface last night (ok, the not-so wee hours of this morning ;-) ). I've been reading it off and on on my Treo, and it got to the point where I just had to sit down and finish it. It's a little predictable, and a bit of a political fantasy into wishful thinking, but hooks you anyway.
The story is basically that the President decides the way to get the country out of its massive debt is to just cancel it (probably the most unbelievable aspect of the story, but it's the prime motivator, and once you say, "ok, what if..." and then go on with the story, it's much more believable). Some shadowy, mysterious power brokers who call themselves "The Network" who mostly manage vast investments stand to lose a lot, so throw their resources behind an Illinois governor who had a stroke. They push the final development of a neuro-implant which can be trained to replace the functions of the brain tissue killed off by the stroke, get the governor back to working order and use a radio link to it to feed him information in real time while campaigning for the presidency.
Among other things.
The first half of the book sets up a number of different threads, which get woven together into the campaign that makes up the second half. It's got a little bit of everything: interesting characters, a little neuroscience, social commentary, political cynicism... What more could you want? ;-)
Boy, was I in for a shock.
Different People is not at all light-hearted. On the surface, it's a classic tale of two people meant for each other, whose circumstances preclude them from actually getting together. The title couldn't be more apt either: Eric, openly gay son of a liberal singel mother; Cal, closted son of activist fundamentalist Christian parents --- whose father worked with the Anita Bryant anti-gay campaign no less. Cal, as would be expected in a dramatic story, runs himself through the ringer, but the depths to which he sinks are told in a level of detail that makes you wonder just want Orland himself must have gone through growing up, or who he's associated with, to be able to achieve. His description of how someone feels who is unhappy with themselves, their decisions and their lives is spot on. It was hard not to completely break down crying while reading his story.
Interwoven with Cal's story, is Eric's story --- buff, beautiful, well adjusted, and yet his life is no picnic either, and he makes his mistakes as well, though he doesn't sink quite to the depths that Cal does.
At risk of telling too much, despite the intense story, it's not a tragedy, and the story ends on an upbeat note. It even has a believable upbeat ending, although I suspect the circumstances that lead to it are all too rare in real life, and the vast majority of people who get buried as far as either Cal or Eric, for that matter, do, don't have an "upbeat ending". But it does at least leave us with hope: hope that if it's reasonably possible for these two to dig themselves out of the cavern they've dug for themselves, there's hope for the rest of us to get out of the potholes of life that we dig for ourselves.
...per the discussion of O.W.L.'s on page 311. It was good, but a
little long winded --- I think it could have been a 600 page book instead
of a 900 page book. Rather a lot of "no one understands" whining that
I was really hoping was due to, and in fact at one point it was hinted at,
someone feeding Harry drugs or that it was his link to "Lord Thingy" ;-)
But no, Harry was just acting a lot like I probably would have at that
age, under the circumstances (the angry part, not the hero part, though
he's really not much of a hero in this book). I was close enough as it
was.
It is a very dark book --- bad things are happening at Hogwarts, and it's
not fun to see them happen, and actually, that's another disappointment.
One can find parallels to some of the directions current political events
are taking in Hogwarts, but it essentially takes a superhero with a band
of loyal followers to set things right, which doesn't give readers a
sense of empowerment to set things right that they see are wrong in the
real world. Granted, I doubt J.K. Rowling had any political agenda at all
in mind writing this, but I would still have liked to see a stronger moral
stance on getting every day people to not accept injustices. Perhaps I'm
still just as hot-headed as Harry though, as I think one of the morals of
this book could be "fools rush in".
To some extent, there was a bit of fight in a couple of the characters,
but having them essentially turn into terrorists, albeit a realistic
turn for these characters, is probably not a good example (not that anyone
would consider them a good example in the first place ;-) ). At least
the stuff they pulled was more in the prank category than dangerous, and
they were careful not to interfere with the students exams...
The DA would have been a good place to organize a response, with some
backing from the Order, but it would have been a far different book, and
probably not relevant to the overall story arc she's working on. I did
expect the DA to figure more significantly in the ending, though, rather
than just providing plausibility for some of the actions in it.
It's possible that this book is just setting things up for the next one,
as the centaur prophecy certainly indicates more is coming, but on the
other hand, the ending appeared to wrap too much for that prophecy to
come true without a lot more bad stuff happening. On the third hand, with
everyone on the wrong side in this book, this ending was needed to keep the
bad guys from having too strong a hand.
One good thing is that we do learn various things about several characters,
but even so, in a book this thick, we should have learned more than we did.
A lot of what we learn about Harry is only at the end. One of them, at
least, is why he keeps getting sent back to the Dursley's by people who
should know better and care.
Overall, it just felt like a slow ramp to a quick ending.
Even so, it was a good read and I can't wait to see where she goes with
it...
Sooo, when's the next one due? (yes, I know there's no set date)