Pathfinder by Orson Scott Card Book Review

So, at long last, I decided to crank up my Drum and Bass channel on Pandora and finally get this review finished. 

Rigg is a pretty ordinary kid from the outside. In fact, he's of the lowest social standing there is, a "privick" from far upriver who makes his living with his father hunting and selling furs. But Rigg has one ability that makes him extrodinary: he can see the paths. The paths of all who have ever been, all the animals, the people, the insects, he can see their paths through space and time, reaching back thousands of years. He's been able to prevent the death of himself and his father on a few occasions, but beyond that, Rigg doesn't see much purpose for his "gift". 

Then that changes. Suddenly things begin to spiral faster than Rigg thought possible, and he realizes that his gift may not be entirely useless after all. In fact, with the help of a few friends, it may even have the ablity to change the world...both in the present, and in the past. 

Review: 

Many sci-fi lovers are already familiar with the name Orson Scott Card after his ingenius book Ender's Game, following the journey of a young boy destined to win an intergalatic war against an alien race. However, in Pathfinder, Card changes direction just a bit, moving away from the Sci Fi genre (while still including sci-fi themes) and more towards the Fantasy genre. Then he takes on a dangerous theme in terms of writing: time anomoly. 

Card himself adknowledges in the authors note that he's decided to "embrace paradox." Gee, thanks a lot. True to his word, Card takes his time explaining every move the characters make when playing with the time space continuum, making this book feel, in a lot of ways, less like a novel and more like a science fiction textbook. His characters, playing the part of the teachers, debate back and forth every step on the way about what they are doing and what the consequences will be, and despite the fact that their conclusions make no sense whatsoever to them or the readers, they plunge head first into space-time (quite literally, you'll find) and do the impossible, not only travel back in time, but manipulate it. Card's genius explains how things often taken for granted in sci fi/fantasy can be explained by time anomalies. Invisibility? Just jump forward a few seconds. "Super speed"? Just accelerate your brain power to where you're faster and more alert than your compainions, then use that ability to go back in time. In this book Card becomes, in a way, a professor of Science Fiction. He's been around the block a few times, and now he's going to explain for us every step of the way why time can be an important part of science fiction that is rarely explained or understood. 

Card is clearly a genuis, and definately deserves credit for his absolutely brilliant concepts surrounding everything we know and enjoy about the genre he writes in. However, this book is not without fault. Far from it, in fact. While the genuis and concept are definately there, the story that is applied to them is terribly underwhelming. Ultimately, Card's mistake lies in that the story does not have a purpose. What it lacks is a character who can challenge our protagonist, pose a threat to him. Rigg and his family have been given extrodinary powers, but to do what with? Who has the ability to pose a challenge to Rigg? Ultimately no one, which makes the story a slow and tedious read with little development along the way, unless of course you take it this series as it seems to be: again, a textbook on sci-fi/fantasy and nothing more. 

And lets not even get started on the dialouge. There is just so much of it. As I said earlier, eighty percent of the book is filled with dialouge of the characters trying to figure out why the heck time travel is even possible and how is works, going back and forth, in a loop, then back again, trying to understand what the consequences will be of any one move they make. Will they disappear? Forget why they even time travelled in the first place? Annoy their readers? Beats me, and them apparently, because in the end they decide that the English language was only created for one time, the present, and trying to explain time is pointless. Unfortunately, they only figure this out after boring most readers for six hundred pages with their back and forth arguments. Personally, I found the dialouge a bit bittersweet. I love that I was able to finally wrap my mind around certain parts of the time space continuum, but disappointed that that was all the depth the story had. No riveting plot twists, no real, difining characters, just time, science and dilouge.

Any way you look at it, Pathfinder is pure genius in concept, but very disappointing in story. I will be finishing the series, because the brilliance of finally having time anomaly explained has captivated me, but since the story and characters were so underwhelming,  I'll be reading a few other series before returning to this one. Overall, if you're a die hard sci-fi/fantasy fan, writer, or thinker, you will probably benefit form "studying" this series (again, textbook), but if you read for the story, the legendary fight between good and evil, characters that make you laugh and cry, then you may not find what you're looking for here. 

Rating:

3 out of 5

Why do things have to be so freaking complicated??

I'm currently reading Orson Scott Card's book Pathfinder. 

There's a lot of good and bad to be said for this book, but the primary thing that has grasped my attention is it's fresh look at the world of Sci-Fi/Fantasy and the elements of it that we take for granted, for example, supernatural abilities. In the theory of Card's book, the anomalies that we normally percieve as "super powers" like super speed and invisibility can really be explained by time anomalies. Ultimately, they are all explained by scientific theories about time. For example, by skipping moments in time, since there is more space in atoms than there is matter, one can turn invisible (trading speed for stealth, unfortunately, since skipping time would slow down the Invisible considerably). Super speed can be explained by the speeding up of the mind or the slowing down of the world. 

And if you think that sounds complicated, with til you get to time folding. Or time travel. You haven't even stratched the surface of what Card has in his mind's eye here. 

This book, more than anything else, forces me to think about things I wouldn't normally think about, extending my mind to places I really don't like going. Even though Card makes his theories understandable, this series is, more than anything, a harsh reminder of just how big, fantastic, and freaking complicated the world is. 

On one hand, this really frustrates me. As Sherlock of the BBC once said, "I don't know. I don't like not knowing." One of humanities greatest qualities is their desire to know, to explore, to understand, so in that respect, this really ticks me off. Trying to wrap my mind around something that is so far above humanity we could never comprehend leaves me disappointed in my own insufficiancy. Even people like Orson Scott Card, as genius as he is, can only create theories. Complete underderstanding of time is a height I don't believe we'll ever reach, at least not in my lifetime.

But on the other hand, that's okay. In the words of Hank Green, "I am a towering mountain of ignorance. I don't know." Not knowing is both a beautiful and torturing thing. Perhaps it's best defined like that; beautiful torture. We will never know the ins and outs of time, never reach the outer reaches of the universe, will never understand the many mysteries of life, but that's partially what makes life beautiful, that we're going to continue to try to find out, and as we do will grow closer and closer to the creator who does understand the many, many things that we don't. He created them, after all. The Bible says that a day is like a thousand years to God, and a thousand years like a day (2 Peter 3:8) and that one day he will abolish all this timey wimey stuff once and for all and replace it with eternity, and then none of this will even matter.

So yes, I'm not afraid to admit that I am a towering mountain of ignorance, foolish and stupid. I DON'T KNOW. Life is too freaking complicated for a dumbarse like me to understand it, but that's okay. Because I know the one who does.

And that's all that matters. 

Monsters, Mazes, and....what the heck?!

I'm not entirely sure what I expected when I picked up The Maze Runner for the first time. 

I came a bit late into the hype over the series, as I do with most popular books. In fact, they had already released the trailer for the Maze Runner movie by the time the book had worked it's way through the forty-some library requests to get itself to me. The commercial looked promising enough and I was excited to get into the series, and I must say I was very impressed. James Dashner took an epic concept that goes back to Ancient Roman literature and transformed it into a exquisite sci-fi story that included a plot that never stopped twisting and turning. Although I was impressed, the first book definately wasn't complete. Even so, I found myself a bit worried about the sequel, The Scorch Trials. After the brilliance of The Maze Runner I was afraid the concept would be lost upon beginning the sequel, but again, I was not disappointed, nor could I bear to put it down as the plot thickened in every way possible. The original brilliance of Dashner's opening book to the trilogy extended all the way through the books and never ceased to amaze me. 

Dashner's ability to tell a believable story that excites and captivates is something that is lost upon many authors of his genre. Despite it's popularity, dystopia style stories can be difficult to create and tell, especially original dystopias. Often dystopia becomes it's own concept that is copied over and over with slight variations to story and characters. While the original concept of The Maze Runner is similar to a few other dystopia books, it develops into a story that I believe is one of the few truely "original" dystopia stories that has been put to paper in recent years. Many people, when refering to the plot of a book, movie or teli show refer to it as a "roller coster." The Maze Runner is exacly that. New bends, twists and loops hide behind every corner, jolting the rider back and forth so that, although they have countered many sharp turns, are never ready for the next one. Dashner weaves together brilliant story with epic plot twists that build upon each other and never stop doing so until the book is closed. 

While Dashner is a brilliant storyteller, one thing his series lacks (for the most part) is really solid characters. While his character development is good, the characters themselves are a bit dry. Dialouge is similar, but not nearly as much. In every Dashner book I've read so far (The Maze Runner Trilogy, Eye of Minds, Rule of Thoughts) it seems to prove true that he focuses mainly upon the story and less upon the characters that live in his concept. 

While The Maze Runner Trilogy has no moral, per se, the series ultimately demonstrates how friendship and hard work can get someone through the worst life has to offer, even being thrown into a maze with nothing but a few supplies and a ton of monsters. It also tackles the very difficult question of, "Does the end justify the means?" Ultimately, it's up to the reader to decide for himself if the controversial actions of "The Creators" can be justified in the name of the greater good (may even be worth a blog post in time), but if point made in this series is unarguable, it's that people with good intentions, with no one to hold them accountable, can be corrupted and eventually fall far away from their original goals.

The Maze Runner Trilogy is possibly the most brilliant modern dystopia I've read to date. While characters aren't everything I like my protagonists to be, the concept of both the story and the antagonists are downright brilliant, and I'd definately recommend it to anyone looking for something fresh in the world of dystopia and science fiction. 

Rating:

4.5 out of 5 stars. 

Real Talk: Distractions

Blarg. 

That's all I've really had to say about the last few days. I'm sure there's a word out there to describe the last few days but right now blarg is working fine. I don't even know what it means, I just know how it feels. Maybe I'll google it later. 

The last few days have just been blarg.  I've been held up on my documentary project (which I'll have out soon, Lord willing) due to car issues, so I'm stuck on that project. In the meantime I have a library book that's due when I haven't even finished the one I've been trying to read since December, and then there's school, completing the tremendously boring cycle of life. It's the cyyycle of liiiiife.....

That's not the point though. The point is it always feels like I am distracting myself. There are highlights in life when we aren't living the boring routine and are instead doing something fun and/or crazy but when examined closer those are really just distractions too. Distractions from what? I don't know, life maybe. Maybe we just want to distract ourselves from the chore of being alive. Sometimes these distractions are fun, sometimes they aren't, but there is always some sort of distraction to keep us at least slightly interested in something other than just being alive. 

But ultimately that's all the cycle is: distractions. In the end they are meaningless chores that spend our time, making us feel like we've accomplished something when really we haven't accomplished anything of real worth. So the question is what are the things that aren't distractions? What few things can we do that actually mean something?

I think that's the purpose of religion in the world, people striving for something more than the daily system. People striving for that more-ness that will make them feel like they've actually done something worth while, but religion eventually becomes a distraction as well. I'm ashamed to say that my beliefs often have turned into nothing more than distractions. I often lose what makes my time with God worth meaning and have replaced it with empty distractions, making me feel like I've done something, when in reality it's all just hay and stubble. 

I don't really feel like going any deeper than that. I've already given my brain enough to chew on.  

Ramblings: Main Characters, Integers and Divergence

Every good novel has a main character. Fact. If the novel does not have a main character the novel normally sucks. Often the "main character" of a novel is the character who's point of view the novel takes place in (Hunger Games, Percy Jackson), however there are times when the main character in a novel isn't given a viewpoint (The Book Thief, Fault in our Stars). So what defines a main character? What makes a character the main character? I'm sure there are many explanations that people could come up with but to me the main character is the character that can do something no one else can do. Be it something small, like knowing the power of words, or something large, like being the savior of the physical universe. 

So what's my point? I want to talk about the Divergent Trilogy, specifically about the main character of that series. 

If you haven't read the entire Divergent Trilogy, STOP READING NOW! MAJOR SPOILERS AHEAD!

Divergent, on the surface, is the story of a girl who comes of age, must choose her destiny, and falls in love with an incredibly attractive young man named after the number Four. Sounds like the average young adult novel, right? Totally cliche. But not so fast. The first book might give this impression, maybe even the second, but by the third installment in the series I noticed something interesting happening. Tris, who many may think of as the "main character" doesn't really possess a quality that no one else has. She's Divergent, but as we find out in Insurgent there are actually tons of Divergent people. She posseses the quality of three factions where most Divergents posses only two. I guess that's different, but still, nothing that can change the story. It puzzled me for a while, then it hit me. Duh, I thought, Tris isn't the main character! The more I thought about it the more obvious it became. So who is this main character? I may be wrong, but I really don't think I am. I think it's Four, better known as Tobias. Now, to make my case. 

First of all, Tobias is a much more defined character than Tris. He has a history, scars that will never heal. He knows pain first hand, and he understands what risks should be taken and which should not. To further this point, Veronica Roth has stated that the Divergent trilogy was originally going to be in his point of view, but it just never felt right. So she created Tris.

Secondly, Tobias is really in the center of the story. Jeanine Matthews wants to take over the government run by Marcus Eaton, Tobias' father. After Jeanine takes control, Evelyn Eaton, Tobias' mother, takes the government from her. After that, Marcus and Johanna (leader of the Amity) rebel against her. Then in the middle of it all is Tobias, who is bitter with both his power-hungry parents, his dad for abusing him and his mom for abandoning him. 

Lastly, Tobias has the ability to do something that no one else can do; forgive. In the end, when the memory serum is getting ready to be used on the city, Tobias has to wipe one of his parents memories before they destroy each other. However, in the end, instead of wiping her memory, he forgives his mother. He convinces her that power isn't what she ever wanted, and had the strength to forgive her even after she abandoned him to years of hell with his father. And he singlehandedly ends the war with the power of forgivness. ("I know that sounds like a cat poster, but it's true")

While there is a great deal to be said for Tris' sacrifice (how about that life ruining ending, Divergent fans?), in the end, it was Tobias' strength that saved the city. He overcame his bitterness and hurt, and although the pain would never heal, he chose to ignore it for the ones he loved. I didn't like Divergent much when I first read it, and it's still not among my favorites, but this man is one of my favorite characters possibly ever. He demonstrated what bitterness and anger does to a person, showed the power of forgivness, and despite having lost everything, continued to fight. 

And I think that's pretty darn awesome. 

Music Review: x -- Ed Sheeran

Hello my beautiful readers!

I meant to get this to you yesterday, but the charger on my tablet broke, then we watched a movie, which probably deserves a review itself, but before I get off track, here is my review of Ed Sheeran's recent album "x" (pronounced "Multiply").

**NOTE**: I am reviewing the Deluxe Edition of this album, which features an extra 4 songs that, in my opinion, complete the album, as I don't consider 12 tracks a "full" album. **

Ed Sheeran is a bit of a new face in the music industry. With the success following his debut "+" in 2011, he's quickly become one of the biggest acts of the time. And no wonder, with his incredible songwriting and musical abilities, and that falsetto voice you can't help but fall in love with. Plus he has a pretty awesome accent. And now, three years later he releases his second major album, "Multiply".

From the very beginning of this album we see Ed's musical talents in the song One, a beautiful melody about love and devotion, quickly followed by another acoustic song, I'm a Mess, about personal failure in relationships and the desire to make it right ("And though I've only caused you pain/You know but all of my words will always be low/Although all the lies we spoke/When you're on my road/Walking me home/See the flames inside my eyes/It burns so bright/I wanna feel your love").

The album then takes a surprising turn with the hit single, Sing, an irresistibly catchy party song showing a bit of Ed's hip hop side with some rapping on the second verse. Don't is also a bit of a surprise with a bass synth and piano in the chorus, something we hadn't seen yet on this album. The song sings about a fellow singer whom Ed fell in love with, who later cheated on him. The chorus and bridge include a couple surprising use of profanity, cleverly censored with an inhale of breath to avoid an explicit label ("Don't *inhale* with my love").

Then back into the folk/pop ballads we go. In Nina, Ed describes the pain of having to end a possible future relationship because of his job and busy touring schedule, mourning what could have been. Photograph follows in this message as Ed sings about the joy and pain of love. Bloodstream is another song about mistakes ("I've been spinning now for time/Couple women by my side/I got sinning on my mind...How did I get so faded?"). Thinking out Loud and Tenerife Sea are beautiful love songs, the first about Ed's commitment to a life long relationship. The latter sings of a lover who Ed describes beautifully. Both are touching songs about love in it's purest form.

Runaway is about, well, a runaway, fleeing his dad's abuse. He sings in the chorus about his love for his dad, and later the hope that things could change and he could return. Then Afire Love is a song about love in the midst of tragedy.

As if right on Que, Ed decided to get away from the deep stuff for a few songs and goof off with a bit of hip hop, first on The Man which, despite the censored profanities is a pretty meaningful song, talking about, again, a breakup and the depression it brought in the midst of his busy career. Then comes Take it Back, a straight-forward rap song quite a bit like Sing, that is to say, without much meaning; just a song to enjoy. 

The deluxe album concludes with Shirtsleeves, yet another heart touching breakup song, Even My Dad Does Sometimes, and closes with the epic I See Fire, a song from the soundtrack of The Hobbit: DoS about a band of dwarves determined to take their mountain back from the dragon Smaug.

This album oozes meaning, love and heartbreak. Ed is a top of the line musician who has definitely earned his popularity. As a matter of fact I'd go as far as to say he's one of the best overall musicians of our time. There are many positive things here to discuss.  Nina compares how love should be alike to how God sees us ("And you don't even need to worry about your weight/'Cause We can all be loved the way that God made us"), on I'm a Mess and Bloodstream Ed is brutally honest about his mistakes, and his quest for life-long love on songs like One, Photograph, and Thinking Out Loud is definitely something to be praised.

However

Ed just doesn't seem devoted enough to following that quest, as is seen on songs like Sing. The several alcohol and marijuana references along with the profanity (even while being censored) might be a turn-off to many listeners, myself included. There is a lot of good to take from this album, but there is also a large amount of worldly klunk. If you plan on listening to this album, I recommend taking a bit of time out of your schedule and listening to the whole thing in one listening, so you get the big picture, as blurred as it may be. 

Overall Rating:
4 out of 5 stars

The Random Ramblings of, yours truly, Elijah Thompson

Well I sorta felt like writing a blog post.

Not that I have anything interesting to write most of the time. Well, okay, I do, but things work much better in thought than they do on paper. I have way too many unfinished drafts of posts I wanted to write but after reading them over realized they couldn't express my true thoughts. 

Some books that I read just give me a feeling, evoke some emotion in me that I don't recognize. If I considered it long enough maybe I could put a name to it, but as soon as I try to define the beauty of what I feel and think, it loses it's clarity, because let's be honest; unless you're Adam Young, Ed Sheeran, or John Green, it's impossible to fully express your thoughts in words on a sheet.

Which is why blogging is difficult at times. So many books I've read that I wish I could express in this virtual piece of paper just how they make me feel. 

I begin to wish that there was a machine that could translate my thoughts into words, but machines cannot understand emotion, so they would not be able to accomplish it any better than a ceiling fan could. Which leaves only one option for us, and that is telepathy, which is impossible at this time.

The result is a really boring blog. There is a desire in me to blog but a fear that by trying to express myself I will bring the magic in my mind to human standards, turning it into nothing more than empty words and time turned meaningless. 

BUT, but, I can still try. Because fear is something that can be overcome. I will try to express myself in a way that is both coherant and enjoyable to read. 

So let's start over.

My name is Elijah Thompson.

Welcome to the High Desert.