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Messages - Alia

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16
Literature / Re: Yearly Targets (2016) - Totals and Specifics
« on: December 25, 2016, 10:38:54 am »
If you add Sanderson's Arcanum Unbounded and Legion to my list, it seems I've read 13 books this year. Might go up to 14 if I manage to finish yet another Polish novel I am currently reading. Not bad, for my limited free time.

17
General Misc. / Re: Denis Villeneuve in-talks to direct a Dune adaptation
« on: December 25, 2016, 10:34:35 am »
Arrival was great (and based on a story that could be called unadaptable), so I have great hopes for Dune.

18
General Misc. / Re: What are you watching?
« on: December 25, 2016, 10:32:39 am »
We've got Netflix but no free time, so we haven't got to The OA yet.

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General Misc. / Re: What are you watching?
« on: December 06, 2016, 07:32:32 pm »
Anyone watching/watched Black Mirror on netflix?

Planning to, but at the moment we're catching up with Vikings. But a lot of our friends have very good opinions on Black Mirror.

20
Literature / Re: Yearly Targets (2016) - Totals and Specifics
« on: December 03, 2016, 06:05:06 pm »
In the meantime I've read Brandon Sanderson's Legion and Legion: Skin Deep. The first is a longish short story, the second is a novella, all in all something to read between some other lenghty works and to lighten up mood. I liked it a lot, it's fun read on pretty serious topics - and also in the second story there appears a (deceased) character who seems to be a true nerd and being a nerd myself, I had a laugh while reading the descriptions.

21
Just listened to "One Night", Alia.  I am going to have to look into this more as it was extra relaxing.

Nice to hear that, hope you like their other songs.

ATM I'm listening to Spotify playlist called Classical X, which is mostly film scores and some modern composers like Phillip Glass. Strange but fascinating stuff.

22
Deine Lakaien again, this time their 30th anniversary collection. And we're going to their concert again, in March - this time it will be acoustic.

23
Literature / Re: Yearly Targets (2016) - Totals and Specifics
« on: November 16, 2016, 06:12:38 pm »
Finished reading Brunner's Sheep Look Up, which is my 10th book this year. It's really good, but also terrifying, terribly realistic and up-to-date. It's set sometime in late 1970s (near future, as it was published in 1972) but many things are all too familiar - terrorism, pollution, bacteria that are immune to all know antibiotics, social unrest, big corporations doing whatever they want for profit, American interventions in other countries - as well President Prexy, who sounds very much like Trump. It's not very long but demands concetration, because there is at least a dozen major characters and even more minor ones, everything is connected and sometimes it's like the butterfly that causes a tornado. Or a complicated tapestry. All in all, certainly worth reading, it did not age a day.

24
General Misc. / Re: What are you watching?
« on: November 06, 2016, 06:40:13 pm »
We finally got our Netflix subscription and immediately started watching Stranger Things. I really loved it - the 1980s feel, the characters, the acting. And the whole small-town atmosphere and everyday life drama going on in the background to the supernatural. And they have really good cliffhangers at the end of each "Chapter". We watched four episodes in one sitting and the next Sunday we wanted to watch just one or two - and finished by watching all four that were left.

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General Misc. / Re: The Offended Eye
« on: November 06, 2016, 06:36:07 pm »
So, let me say something about my background now. I'm Polish and white, like most of people in Poland. But I am also a woman, a socialist liberal and a nerd - which at the moment means that I am outside the official discourse of our government and state-owned media. Since our last election (a year ago) everything is becoming more nationalistic, isolationistic and xenophobic. And, oh, they wanted to ban abortion in any circumstances (currently it's allowed only if pregnancy is dangerous for the woman's life, the embryo is unable to live or heavily disfigured or if the pregnancy is the result of crime). Anyway, this discourse promotes the skinhead, neo-nazi types as modern Polish patriots. The result is racist attacks, mostly on Arabs (you know, the whole islamic threat and all that), but recently a Polish professor of history was beaten on the tram because he was talking in German to his colleague, a German professor of history.
Our Independence Day is coming. 11 November, the Armistice Day. And you know what - we warn our non-Polish friends to better stay at homes on that day (fortunately, it's a holiday, so they do not have to go to work or school) or they might get beaten by our brave young Polish patriots.
And you know what? I love my country and I hate it at the same time. I don't want to leave, but I'm so afraid it will get worse and worse. I've survived the communist regime, early 21st century seemed to be all bright and promising, membership in NATO and EU, open borders, open minds... and now it's all falling apart.
So yes, I am offended. I am offended by racist jokes and comments, I am offended by anti-gay rhetorics, I am offended by our women-hating government. I never thought I would go marching in the streets, and yet during this year I did it several times. It won't change anything but at least I can see that I'm not alone.

26
Literature / Re: Yearly Targets (2016) - Totals and Specifics
« on: November 06, 2016, 06:10:52 pm »
Finished reading Hidden Life of Trees, started John Brunner's Sheep Look Up. I've read about the third over the last two days and it's a really fascinating. I also had a very strong feeling it must've been influenced by U Thant Report - and I checked, the report came out three years before the book so it's highly possible. Again, like Stand on Zanzibar, many points of view and characters, whose paths cross at one point or another, very short chapters interspersed with excerpts of news, adverts, TV programmes, etc. And I must admit I am grateful for the search function on my Kindle, because I have to check the names from time to time, to see in what context they've appeared before.

27
Leonard Cohen, The Future. Again. The lyrics always get me. "Give me Christ or give me Hiroshima".

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Literature / Re: Yearly Targets (2016) - Totals and Specifics
« on: October 22, 2016, 04:44:25 pm »
Finished Pokój Światów - it got more gripping in the second half but still, I did not feel I could really empathise with the main characters. But great worldbuilding.
Now I'm starting another non-fiction book, The Hidden Life of Trees by Peter Wohlleben. The original is German, I'm reading it in Polish but it is also availabe in English. I'm kinda botanist-amateur and I like to read something like this from time to time.
BTW, in the meantime I let Pokój Światów rest for a while and read Wicked Plants by Amy Stewart. This is a very small but fascinating book about the world's most dangerous plants. Really fascinating read - although I had to read it with my Google ready because I read it in English and sometimes I did not know the Polish names of plants (although the Latin ones often helped - I'm strange this way).

[EDIT Madness: For italics tag.]

29
Literature / Re: Yearly Targets (2016) - Totals and Specifics
« on: October 09, 2016, 05:22:03 pm »
The book that is available in English is not the military s-f I read on holiday - it's the author's first book, a totally different story in a totally different setting.
I recently finished a collection of short stories that are retellings of Polish legends and folk tales, called Legendy polskie. It's available free of charge as it is sponsored by one of our online auction sites, there are also films and music videos. The films are directed by Tomasz Bagiński, who in 2002 was nominated to Oscar for his short film "The Cathedral". If you're interested, you can watch the films on youtube with English subtitles, although I'm not really sure what you would make of them without cultural background:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1J_Y12RqeLM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hRdYz8cnOW4
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M-skpeuYmfE

And at the moment I am reading yet another Polish novel, Pokój światów by Paweł Majka, which is his take on War of the Worlds. I have a problem with this book, because the story is less interesting than the background, the creation of the world.

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Literature / Re: Yearly Targets (2016) - Totals and Specifics
« on: October 08, 2016, 05:33:05 pm »
OK, so these are the titles:
Olga i Osty by Agnieszka Hałas (my high school friend)
Czytanie z wnętrzności by Wit Szostak (philosopher)
Łzy Diabła by Magdalena Kozak (military s-f) - by the way, her first novel, Nighter is available now in English: https://www.amazon.com/Nighter-Vesper-Book-Magdalena-Kozak-ebook/dp/B01H9QOVAC/ref=sr_1_1?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1475947933&sr=1-1&keywords=nighter - it's about vampires in special forces, fun read.
Wilki by Adam Wajrak - about wolves

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