As I'm going through...

[bluegargantua]

Hi,

So I'm about halfway through Hyperion by Dan Simmons.

It's really good. Lots of people have read it already. I'm late to the party because...well, I missed out for some reason and then I read Illium and had to grab some more of his stuff.

So the thing about Illium is that it's really a Sci-Fi version of The Illiad.

And the thing about Hyperion is that it's really a Sci-Fi version of The Canterbury Tales.

Which I think is pretty neat.

It also means I'll have to do the Sci-Fi version of Huckleberry Finn soon or he'll gobble it up. (though frankly, I liked Tom Sawyer better)

Just chit-chatting...
Tom

p.s. Also? Dreams in which you're stabbing people are really odd. Mainly because people appear to be made out of wood and don't really stab so well. But the $15 coin was kinda fun.

Comments

[shiffer.livejournal.com]

I'm just now reading Fall of Hyperion, and it's not as- but still quite good.

How is Illium, really?

[bluegargantua]

It totally rocks. I've heard the the follow-on book is only so-so, but Illium itself is very good.

later
Tom

[sben.livejournal.com]

I ended up enjoying Fall more than Hyperion, but I think I should reread the pair. Not having read Canterbury Tales may have diminished my enjoyment a bit, but I think more important is that even having read the whole series, I still don't "get" the Shrike (thematically).

I've heard a lot of good things about Ilium; I should put that on my reading stack as well.

[shiffer.livejournal.com]

The Shrike makes no sense. I think he started it off trying to do one thing with it, but ended up going in a different direction without being able to revise earlier parts (the "I want to revise my whole mythos but X books are already published!" syndrom, maybe).

Or, y'know, it just doesn't make any sense.

And nobody reads Canterbury Tales. I mean, really.

[sben.livejournal.com]

Shrike: Quite possibly. Simmons seems to have a thing for horror (q.v. Song of Kali), which was prominent in Hyperion, but not so much in Fall, Endymion, or Rise.

Canerbury Tales: It was standard reading in my high school's advanced senior English classes, which I didn't take because I took something lame like calculus instead. I kind of regret missing it, but not enough to actually read it today.

...or...

[(Anonymous)]

...to spell it correctly...

[mikecap.livejournal.com]

The Sci-Fi version of Huck Finn should take place on a ringworld where a giant river runs right down the middle of it, and the people/aliens on either side of the river are about to get into a civil war over whether or not machine intelligences should be free...

[anselm23.livejournal.com]

I''m glad you're finally getting to Hyperion. Took you long enough.