Sunday Morning Book Thread - 07-21-2024 ["Perfessor" Squirrel]

Welcome to the prestigious, internationally acclaimed, stately, and illustrious Sunday Morning Book Thread! The place where all readers are welcome, regardless of whatever guilty pleasure we feel like reading. Here is where we can discuss, argue, bicker, quibble, consider, debate, confabulate, converse, and jaw about our latest fancy in reading material. As always, pants are required, unless you are wearing these pants...

So relax, find yourself a warm kitty (or warm puppy--I won't judge) to curl up in your lap, and dive into a new book. What are YOU reading this fine morning?

PIC NOTE

Today's pic is courtesy of my sister. She assembled the kit above (called a "book nook"). I'm pretty sure at least one member of the Moron Horde has also assembled one of these. They can be added to your bookshelves to make them look cool. Of course, the downside is that they take up space which could be used by actual books. I do think they are pretty neat.

ASSASSINS IN LITERATURE

I didn't want to bring up the attempted assassination of President Donald Trump in last week's Sunday Morning Book Thread because it was still too fresh in my own memory. We all needed time to process what happened and also to allow more facts to emerge about the situation. As we've seen all week, the facts are horrific in the extreme but it could have been so much worse.

Assassination, of course, has a very, very long and bloody role throughout history. Popes, kings, emperors, etc. have all been struck down by an assassin. It often seems glamorous and cool, but the reality isn't that great, especially when an assassin takes out "my guy." Lots of people are affected, if not the entire course of history.

Assassins are still a very common trope in literature. They are often portrayed as stealthy, dangerous professional killers. They can take out good people or evil people, whichever pays more. One of the challenges of discussing assassins in literature is that there are often plot twists around the assassination attempt that would be considered "spoilers" if one talks about them too much. Let's take a look at a few examples from my own library:

• In Brandon Sanderson's Stormlight Archive, the events of the first book are triggered by an assassin clothed all in white that takes out King Gavilar Kholin of Alethkar during a peace conference. This causes the peace talks to break down as the Parshendi are blamed for the assassination and all of Alethkar goes to war against the Parshendi. It turns out to be a lot more complicated...
• Terry Pratchett's Discworld series has a few books that revolve around assassination attempts. The benevolent ruler of Ankh Morpork, Patrician Havelock Vetinari, is the frequent target. However, he is a graduate of the Assassin's Guild and is quite aware of their tools and techniques, so is usually capable of protecting himself. Commander of the Watch Sam Vimes, is also a frequent target because of his own role in thwarting the goals of the Assassin's Guild. However, Vimes is just too stubborn and clever to die, so eventually he is deemed "off limits" by the Guild and no more contracts are allowed to be taken out on Vimes.
• The Nighthawks of Raymond E. Feist's Riftwar Saga play a major role in the early books. They conspire with a ancient evil powers to assassinate Prince Arutha of Krondor. They fail three times, but almost succeed on their last attempt. These attempts drive most of the plot in Silverthorn and A Darkness at Sethanon as Arutha and his allies go on quests to uncover the dark powers behind these attempts and stop them before the entire Kingdom is destroyed.
• Hugh the Hand in Dragon Wing by Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman is hired by King Stephen to assassinate Stephen's 10-year-old son, Bane, as Bane possesses dark magic that gives him control over King Stephen and Queen Anne. They seek to free themselves from Bane's influence. It gets pretty dark later in the Death Gate series when we see Bane again...
• Pe Ell is a highly skilled assassin who possesses a weapon that can kill anyone and anything and can cut through any magical defenses. He's hired by the Shadowen in Terry Brooks' The Druid of Shannara to kill Quickening, the daughter of the King of the Silver River. Her magic protects her against almost anything, but Pe Ell believes he can take her out. He just has to bide his time and find the right moment. This is one of those situations where plot twists abound and it's easy to say too much and ruin the story.
• One of the most famous assassins in the Forgotten Realms series of novels is Artemis Entreri, created by R. A. Salvatore in the Legend of Drizzt novels. Curiously, we hardly ever see Entreri actually assassinate anyone. Kill them, yes, but they are not his direct target and are often just in his way as he focuses on his true mission, which often doesn't involve murder. In fact, when we first see him, he's more of a bounty hunter than an assassin, as he's been tasked with recovering a magical gem from the thief who stole it. Oh, and he has to bring in that troublesome halfling alive so that Pasha Pook can witness his excruciating death personally.

In addition to the above examples from fantasy literature, we have more contemporary examples where the assassin is the hero of the story:

• Ian Fleming's James Bond is known as a spy, but he has a "license to kill" from the British government. He's allowed to carry out extra-judicial murder on their behalf and will not be held accountable by the Crown. (Other national governments may have a strong difference of opinion about this policy.) Bond encounters a number of assassins in his stories, such as Francisco Scaramanga in The Man with the Golden Gun
• Remo Williams and his mentor Chiun are assassins for the United States Government in The Destroyer novels. Remo and Chiun are both Masters of Sinanju, a mysterious martial art that gives the practitioner superhuman abilities. They use their skills to take out enemies of the United States in covert operations. In one memorable mission, Remo kills Santa Claus.
• Jason Bourne in Robert Ludlum's stories is an amnesiac assassin (though this is subverted later when he discovers who he really is). He uses his myth as a prolific assassin to lure Carlos the Jackal into the open for a confrontation.

I could go on, but I think you get the point. What are some other great stories involving assassins, real or fictional? If you read through the comments from last week, you'll see a few recommendations for books on presidential assassinations--both successful and unsuccessful.

BOOKS SHORT STORIES BY MORONS

Regular Moron Wolfus Aurelius has a new short story published in the Raconteur Press anthology Or All Will Burn: At All Costs:

The anthology theme is "Family: What would you do to save one of your own?" My story was written in 2018 or '19. It's the kind of tale you might have found in Campbell's Unknown Worlds, his fantasy counterpart to Astounding, in the Forties (oddly, the story begins August of 1941). While it's fantasy, it also contains a puzzle which is solved, not through magic, but natural law. It was fun to write, and I'm proud of it -- and not a little astonished that others like it too!.

Here is the Amazon link: Or All Will Burn: At All Costs

Wolfus Aurelius

Now, which story belongs to Wolfus? You will have to guess! Here are the short stories, in order:

• Cheatin'
• Lifeboat
• IN FROM THE RAIN
• Beneath Red Sky: The End...
• The Wrath of Mom
• Princess Sparkle-Hooves
• NIGHTWOLF
• ANT FARM by P. L. "Wolfus Aurelius" Sunderson
• TAPA'S ADVENTURE

Wolfus can confirm/deny your guesses (or not...). I'll be along later to update this with the correct answer (around 1 p.m. Central time).

NOTE: I found his author page on Amazon and he bears a strange resemblance to an old college buddy of mine...kinda eerie.

MORON RECOMMENDATIONS

In light of the assassination attempt on pres. Trump, I recommend Rawhide Down: The Near Assassination of Ronald Reagan Del Quentin Wilber. Fascinating account of what happened that day, and as you read you will see that there inflection points throughout the timeline, that can only be described as miraculous. Posted by: runner at July 14, 2024 09:15 AM (V13WU)

Comment: Because of the high profile nature of presidential assassinations and attempted assassinations, it's not surprising that they have been dissected to death over the decades. "Inflection points" is a good way to describe these events because history changes depending on whether or not the target survives. What if Kennedy had survived? What if Teddy Roosevelt had died? These often make interesting fodder for alternate reality science fictions stories, as the author "games out" a possible history based on alternate series of events.

I'm currently reading Escape from Shadow Physics, Adam Kay. Kay has a PhD in Literature from Cambridge and a PhD in Mathematics from Oxford (just like The Perfessor). A fascinating attempt to understand the reality underlying quantum mechanics, starting with a historical discourse on natural philosophy.

The French could really do math at one point in time, maybe they should bring back the aristocracy after the Revolution.

The entire 'shut up and compute' school of physics is an abomination. A mathematical model that predicts correctly but that you not only don't understand but refuse to try to understand is not natural philosophy.

Posted by: Candidus at July 14, 2024 09:23 AM (dfcuM)

Comment: Physics--like a lot of the natural sciences--has been corrupted by politics for a long time. Lee Smolin wrote The Trouble with Physics: The Rise of String Theory, the Fall of a Science, and What Comes Next documenting all of the problems that physics had run into while attempting to come up with "string theory." It sounds cool, but there's absolutely no experimental means of investigating whether or not there is evidence for its validity (that we know of). However, during a period of time, you could not advance as a scientist unless you were researching string theory in any of its many permutations. Now it's "climate change" that's causing all the fuss. In a decade it will be something else. We might need to go back to basic science...

Good morning! Well ya'll know I rarely show up for the book thread and not because I don't like Perfessor lol! I read in spurts. Anyhoo... a friend recommended a few books for me to read as I begin trying a holistic approach to my illness. I just finished a very good one. It's called Dying To Be Me by Anita Moorjani. She had a near death experience and when she came out of her coma her body began healing. Just within a few months she was cancer free. Doctors were stunned. You don't have to be suffering from an illness to enjoy this book.

Posted by: jewells45fuckcancer at July 14, 2024 09:50 AM (iF0sF)

Comment: Near-death experiences can be life-changing events for many people. Some people experience pure bliss as they feel themselves taken close to Heaven. Others...well, they are taken to a much, much darker place. I've heard far too many accounts of miraculous healing after such experiences to discount them. *Someone* is looking out for us.

I can't say I've ever had a near-death experience, but I did have a very, very peculiar dream recently where I felt myself being taken up in the Rapture or something close to it. A feeling of pure, unadulterated joy. And a voice spoke to me directly. One of the most surreal experiences I've ever had while dreaming. I've also had dreams where a clearly demonic force was intruding upon me in my dreams.

More Moron-recommended reading material can be found HERE! (1000+ Moron-recommended books!)

WHAT I'VE BEEN READING THIS PAST WEEK:

After reviewing some of OregonMuse's old Book Threads, I thought I'd try something a bit different. Instead of just listing WHAT I'm reading, I'll include commentary as well. Unless otherwise specified, you can interpret this as an implied recommendation, though as always your mileage may vary.

Sandman Slim Book 4 - Devil Said Bang by Richard Kadrey

I've been slacking off a bit, so I didn't finish this book until Wednesday of this past week. It's the only Sandman Slim book that is a repeat for me, as I bought it a year or so ago at a separate library book sale. This one has James Stark returning to Earth to pick up his life again, more or less. However, his girlfriend started shacking up with another Jade chick, which promptly goes south as Candy and Stark reconnect again. Stark has to figure out just what is going on in L.A. as a rogue ghost is slaughtering "dreamers" that keep the fabric of reality together. Lose too many of them and...*poof*...there goes the neighborhood. And Earth. And the cosmos itself.

Teaching with AI: A Practical Guide to a New Era of Human Learning by José Antonio Bowen and C. Edward Watson

I talked about this book a few weeks ago as the office in which I work is doing a book study on this book. Well, the book study is now over and I don't think we ever reached a consensus about the merits (or lack thereof) of AI. We did have some interesting conversations. Our Provost sent out an email recently about an AI policy that faculty are encouraged to include in their syllabi. Personally, I have found AI useful for generating prompts for my course, but I do look at them skeptically to make sure that the prompt that is generated makes sense and will achieve the desired learning outcomes. There were also concerns about FERPA issues of faculty are uploading student content into an AI in order to "train it." I don't think the AI tools that are out there are entirely garbage--just mostly so for certain applications. They can generate "C" level work pretty easily. As an instructional designer and as an adjunct professor, I do want to help my students achieve "A" level work. It's possible that AI tools can help students overcome certain barriers, such as helping them develop self-confidence in their writing, and looking at AI-generated content (and internet content in general) with a highly skeptical eye.

Starhammer by Christopher B. Rowley

The human race has been enslaved by the Laowon Imperium for a thousand years. Now their freedom may finally be in their grasp as a human agent is tasked with tracking down a terrorist who may be the key to unlocking the shackles around the human race. The laowon remind me of the Kree from the Marvel universe in how they genetically tinker with humans to create new breeds. And they are various shades of blue. It's OK but not great.

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Disclaimer: No Morons were harmed in the making of this Sunday Morning Book Thread. Watch your six.

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