The bits about the cultural revolution were interesting because I’ve never really seen it depicted by a Chinese person
Agreed, that was interesting. I had to switch to an epub because the audiobook version was a bit too sad though.
the whole premise of the story relies on “technology” too absurd to even dignify with the word magic
Yeah, i was a bit dissatisfied with that. My lack of hard science knowledge probably makes it a lot easier to enjoy these sorts of books tbh. Even then, fucking around with protons was far fetched.
I thinks that’s a really good point. Coming up with a couple at most points of deviation that allow for new technologies.
The premise of the expanse, for example, hyper efficient ship propulsion. It’s not explained how, but this single change allowed for the solar system to be treated as a navigable setting. At least until the alien stuff.
Blindsight was amazing, I really loved that one. It’s not exactly the most sci-fi aspect of it, but I really enjoyed the horror of a human variant that was predatory towards other human variants as an explanation for the vampire myth. Like, imagine being in a cave tending the fire knowing a predator just as human as you could be out there. Shiver inducing.
I’ll check out “revaluation space”, being mentioned alongside “blindsight” is a strong recommendation.
I don’t know where it’s from, sounds almost like something Pratchett would write. I’m fairly certain the Hitchhiker FTL was based off probability.