Damn Cool

Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? by Philip K. Dick    This book was the basis for the 1982 film Blade Runner, but the movie left out some of the main plot elements of the book. The earth has  been badly damaged  by  World War Terminus a Nuclear War. The radiation poisoning from the war has wiped out practically all animal [...]

Gateway is a science fiction novel written by Frederik Pohl in 1977.
Robinette Stetley Broadhead a future prospector examines his past for his computer generated shrink. For Broadhead prospecting means boarding alien ships nobody understands and riding then to preset locations looking for alien technologies. Most prospectors don’t return from these dangerous missions but Broadhead does successful, rich and scared.

Guess I found the book engaging because I finished it so quickly. Pohl did a great job of making me want to know just what happened to Broadhead. Pohl slowly uncovers the Gateway and it’s impact on the world, then it’s impact on Broadhead himself. Thought the climax fizzled, guess his foreplay made me expect more from the ending.

I read the book because it was on a list of the best science fiction ever written. While I enjoyed the book, it’s not one of the best books I’ve ever read, or one I’d tell someone else to read.

For Whom the Bell Tolls is a novel by Ernest Hemingway that was published in 1940. This is the story of an American (Robert Jordan) fighting against the Fascists in the Spanish Civil War.  Jordan has been ordered to blow up a bridge behind enemy line, just prior to an attack. He recruits  a republican guerrilla unit to aid him in completing his mission.  With the guerrillas [...]