Fortune's Pawn

My partner decided to pick up Fortune's Pawn, book one of the Paradox series by Rachel Bach, because it had a female protagonist, was written in the first person, and it featured power armour.  I decided to read it too, as one does.  

It's what I would describe as military space opera, because the science of the power armour is more akin to Marvel's Iron Man than anything based in hard science.  

It's no worse for being so, in fact it's a rather good read.  The story romps along with plenty of action.  Just don't expect the tech to stand up to any real scrutiny.  There is also a romantic sub-plot that some readers may not like, but there is lots of kick-ass action, too.  So a book of two parts, which may be a problem for some readers.  For all its soft SF handwaves I still enjoyed this book enough to want to read the sequels.

We've been watching a lot of stuff recently.   

As I'm still thinking about what to say about Continuum, and we are still watching Orphan Black, I shall briefly discuss Idiocracy.  

This is an older film that came out in 2006, which often gets mentioned in passing when discussing the future of humanity.  It's a comedy, and as a long time reader of SF I can't help but be reminded of The Marching Morons by Cyril M. Kornbluth, or for that matter Woody Allen's The Sleeper.  

In fact the plot of Idiocracy is one that will be familiar to all long time SF fans.  The premise is actually ludicrous, because the effects of fertility and intelligence are correlated, but not causally linked.  In short the science sucks.  On the other hand, while the science sucks big time, using the setting to lampoon contemporary mores and values works.  While Idiocracy didn't get a proper release, it has gained a well deserved cult status.  It's a pity the plot isn't stronger.

With regard to my work this week, it has been one of two halves.  

The first half of the week saw nothing useful done.  The second half I managed to edit 30,000 words of The Bureau, and edit five chapters of act two of Bad Dog, adding a 1,096 words to the story in the process (which was not my intent).  So it's been a bit of an emotional roller coaster ride for me, as I struggle to get to grips with what I need to turn my writing into a polished end product.