"Children of Memory" by Adrian Tchaikovsky (2023)

"They tell each other how great they were and will be, because a fake future's easier to face than the truth of more dead harvests."

Adrian Tchaikovsky's Shards of Earth was also reviewed here a while back.  The two books are surprisingly different.

In the distant future a crew of spacefarers visit a colony established on a distant world long before their civilization came to be.  This colony represents an earlier, more primitive strain of humanity, separated from our spacefarers by millennia of unrest, exploration and evolution.  After one of the crew descends to the surface of the planet, events quickly spiral out of their control, and as they race to uncover a still more ancient mystery they find themselves increasingly embroiled in both colonial politics and the planet's troubled ecology.

Children of Memory is a flawlessly written book.  I admire Tchaikovsky's way with words.  He paces the whole thing to perfection, holding back on certain details until just the right moments.  He's a masterful storyteller, and this is not the kind of praise I give out often.

This said, there are a lot of "smart dumb books" in the science fiction genre, and this might be yet another example.  It's hard to discuss the ending of this novel without giving too much away, but let's just say that the book's conclusion hinges upon an artifact left behind by an earlier, non-human civilization, and the way in which the spacefarers are able to manipulate this technology seems implausible.  This aspect of the novel reminded me a lot of the movie Independence Day, in which Earth scientists somehow manage to hack a massive alien spaceship with whatever version of Windows they were using at the time.

The more linguistic/existential parts of this novel are great, however.  I just wish that the twist at the end hadn't been so disappointing.  It's the kind of story that makes a great deal of emotional, if not logical sense.  The future technologies at play in the book are never discussed or explored in any detail, leaving the whole thing feeling somewhat hollow in parts.  Even so, from the vantage point of the little girl at the center of the story this novel is still satisfying, even in the presence of its technical shortcomings.

I'd give this one a slightly higher grade than Shards of Earth.  I have issues with both books, but Children of Memory is much more involving.

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"Shards of Earth" by Adrian Tchaikovsky (2021)

"Shards of Earth" by Adrian Tchaikovsky (2021)

"Solace nodded.  The Betrayed were a relatively new faction within internal Colonial politics.  They were officially decried by Hugh and yet, mysteriously, they'd never been outlawed.  The Parthenon didn't care for the legitimate Nativist movement either, which was all about returning to one unified human identity.  They celebrated old Earth and embraced the rhetoric of humanity's past glories.  The Betrayed went a step further, preaching that humanity would have been the galaxy's dominant species, if allowed to fight the Architects 'properly.'"

Adrian Tchaikovsky is a British author of science fiction.  He arrived at science fiction from interests in zoology and role-playing games.  At the time of writing he's written over 30 novels and has received many awards.

Shards of Earth is the first book in The Final Architecture series.  It's followed by Eyes of the Void and Lords of Uncreation.  Shards of Earth won the Best Novel award from the British Science Fiction Association.

In Shards of Earth a crew of space salvagers find themselves at odds with several different spacefaring civilizations, some of these human and some of them not.  While the salvagers contend with various interested parties over the contents and nature of a salvaged ship, the galaxy wrings its hands over the fate of the Architects, a destructive race of beings seemingly absent from the scene for an extended period of time.  But are the Architects truly absent from the scene?  And can our crew of space salvagers reveal the truth about these Architects before it's too late?

In terms of tone and characterization this book reminded me a lot of Star Wars, although it's a much bloodier take on that type of science fiction.  Spaceships vanish into and return from a kind of hyperspace without any thought given to relativistic time dilation, and other futuristic plot elements are also treated in very cursory terms.  

I'm not complaining about this aspect of the book because sometimes dwelling on such matters gets in the way of the story the author is trying to tell.  It's often enough to let the crab alien in the corner just be the crab alien in the corner, and to let the sentient cockroach colony think its thoughts without trying to explain why it's thinking those thoughts.  Pondering such things can be fruitful for many science fiction authors, but not for all of them.  In this respect I'm glad that Adrian Tchaikovsky knows what kind of author he is, and what kind of story he's trying to tell.

I found Shards of Earth a bit slow in parts, and the ending seemed to go on longer than it should have, but overall I enjoyed it.  The doses of gore peppered throughout the story were appreciated, as were the interactions between the more eccentric human characters and the stranger sorts of aliens.  I have the feeling that if someone tried to make a movie out of Shards of Earth they'd probably bungle it, but as the book stands it represents some very solid storytelling that left me wanting more.

I look forward to reading Eyes of the Void and Lords of Uncreation soon.  Science fiction of this caliber isn't easy to find nowadays.

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"The Anatomy of Violence" by Adrian Raine (2013)

"I do believe that in tomorrow's world we can rise above our feelings of retribution, reach out for rehabilitation, and engage in a more humane discourse on the causes of violence."

Adrian Raine is a professor of Criminology, Psychiatry, and Psychology.  Aside from this book he has written two others, all concerned with the psychopathology of violence.

At the outset I should say that if I'd known he was a psychologist I wouldn't have bothered with this book.  I have long harbored a dislike for psychology and psychological methods, stemming primarily from (what I perceive to be) a lack of empiricism.

Let me put it this way: a mechanic, a doctor, and a psychologist observe a man drive a car down the street.  

You ask the mechanic: "Why did the car move down the street?" and he'll tell you about the gas pedal, the fuel lines, the fuel injectors, the pistons, and other contrivances.  Sure - he'll start with the gas pedal, but eventually he'll work his way back to the man driving the car.

Then you ask the doctor.  "Why did the car move down the street?"  He'll tell you about the driver's brain, his lungs, his heart, his circulatory and nervous systems, and other bits of anatomy.  Sure - he'll start with the brain, but eventually he'll work his way back to the engine.

But the psychologist?  Well, 9 out of 10 will argue that the man's brain wasn't a factor, and that the workings of the car aren't worth discussing.  And if they does acknowledge the car, any discussion of the vehicle will be restricted to emotional states and predispositions!

I hope you'll forgive me for sounding crotchety.  Let's just say that as a teacher I've had a long acquaintance with Psychology, and I wasn't eager to renew that acquaintance through this book.  In my opinion psychologists - those fence-sitters of the academic profession - do little good and far more harm.

As for the book?  Well, it presents itself as a study of the biological causes of violence, but there's a generous helping of bullshit to go with all the hard science.  The author talks about brain imaging, genetic predispositions, nutritional factors, and resting heart rates, but in the midst of all that there are a host of dubious studies, and still more dubious conclusions.  

To sum up, color me unconvinced by The Anatomy of Violence, even though some of the material on serial killers was interesting.  It was this material, in fact, that got me through the book, and had it not been present I doubt I would have finished it.

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