Reading Smart with Gene Wolf

I finally finished The Fifth Head of Cerberus. I must say, I was surprised by the ending. I didn't see it coming until maybe the last 10 pages. Gene Wolf effectively kept me guessing. The best description for the book would be "anthropological science fiction." It's definitely a book about colonization but not in the usual way--hopefully knowing that won't give it away. I don't think it will.

While it's hard to adjust to the shifts, the form was brilliant. Wolf writes three different tales with three different narrative strategies to create one cohesive book. At first the elements seem disjointed and only loosely connected, but everything came together in the end so perfectly. It was genius, and the synthesis of such variance into a whole couldn't be more appropriate of an "anthropological science fiction."

I give it three out of four stars.

A Good Book is Hard to Find

Quite a while ago, I began reading Water for Elephants. I've wanted to read it for a long time but just never got around to it. Then the movie came out, and I thought, "I have to read it now before it gets spoiled by common knowledge."

Even though it took me a while to read the book, it has nothing to do with it not being engaging enough. I liked it almost from the start, but life has been busy. I haven't had time.

I picked it up again this weekend and wasn't really able to put it down since. Tonight, I stayed up way too late so that I could finish it. "Just one more chapter," I'd say to myself. You know how that goes. I couldn't stop until I was done.

It is a dark and beautiful book. It shows some of the ugliest faces of humanity in gruesome openness. It depicts a gritty life, extending into senility. And yet somehow it captures hope.

This is one of the best books I have ever read, and I've read a lot.