Jack William Bell's Journal: Three hours, thirty-two minutes (and counting)...

It has been a day of strange coincidences between my personal life and and that slice of my virtual life that occurs here on slashdot.

Today I finished reading David Brin's novel Glory Season, and was thinking of reviewing it here. Meanwhile Brin is also featured on the front page of /. for an article by him published in Salon asking people to take a slightly different look at the Lord of the Rings. To which I did a short response during a break.

Hmm...

And it doesn't end there either, but the other coincidences are something I will leave for a separate post because they have no LoTR connection. In the meantime I meant to take a nap before leaving for the movie, but finished Brin's book instead just a little while ago.

My take? Definately worth the read. In person Brin is brilliant, but annoying. In print he is often simply brilliant, and always readable. Glory Season is a very good science fiction book if you like the kind with fully realized societies and fascinating speculation. Perhaps the speculation itself is way off base, but it works in context. And the story itself is a good read.

I understand many feminists really do not like this book, and I can see why. But I have to wonder if Brin isn't right about one thing; a matriarchical society will be no more perfect than a patriarchical one. The problems are different, but both are composed of imperfect human beings.

I really should be taking that nap...

Update: I forgot to add my favorite Brin story. I wasn't there, but my friend Paul C. was and this is how he reported it to me -- This occurred right after the release of the movie version of Brin's 'The Postman', which many people were derisively referring to as 'Dirtworld'. Brin was one of the panelists at a discussion of movie novelizations at an SF Convention and someone asked him what he thought of 'The Postman'. His response was "They can rape my book, but they can't rape me." Heh.