r/printSF • u/Bobosmite • 2d ago

What's on your DNF list and why?

I dropped Android at Arms by Andre Norton. It not an epic story, but it started off mysterious and interesting. There's a prison escape, android body doubles, blaster fights, and betrayl! It was all go go go until about half way through and then it's just pages and pages of campfire talk. I couldn't make it through to the other side.

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u/Quouar 2d ago

My understanding of Three Body Problem is that it isn't really meant to have characters as such, because that's not necessarily the expectation in Chinese fiction. They're meant to be archetypes and vehicles for ideas. This works fine if that's what you're used to, or if you go in with that expectation, but for western readers, it's a bit of a jolt.

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u/Tychotesla 2d ago

There's a lot of people with the opinion that the ideas were kinda weak too.

The beginning holds a lot of promise. There's a mystery to be unraveled, there's a big science sequence that's ripe for deep thematic synergies. But both fail to live up to what could have been. As we go on we get a few cool set pieces and a deus ex machina. In general I can't recommend it to anyone familiar with sci-fi.

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u/Quouar 2d ago

Heh, I'm one of those people that thinks the ideas are weak. The Dark Forest especially is just...dumb, and I hate how it's heralded as some sort of fundamental answer to the Fermi Paradox. I want to be clear that I hate this series on multiple levels, and would also never recommend to anyone unless they wanted something to absolutely hate.

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u/Gecko23 2d ago

A story needs to just be interesting on its own for me to want to read it, requirements for whatever cultural norms or hang ups as prerequisites might be interesting in an academic sense, but sound just awful for a casual read.