Robinson Crusoe

Rating:	★★★★
Category:	Books
Genre:	Literature & Fiction
Author:	Daniel Defoe

Aerie Books Ltd.
340 pages

I chanced upon a copy of the classic "Robinson Crusoe" while browsing the shelves of the local Booksale. Being the curious sort of fellow that I was, and having heard about this book before, I snapped it up (as it was dirt cheap as well anyway).

The book was shelved for about 3 months before I got around to reading it (which based on it's size, would take me only an average of 16 hours or less. :P).

Robinson Crusoe is basically about an Englishman during the colonial era who had the misfortune of being marooned on an island somewhere (as far as I could infer from the book) in Caribbean. It tells of his struggles, his triumphs and mishaps as he lives his solitary existence for around 3 decades. He eventually fins a companion, the famous guy "Friday" and gets off the island to tell his story.

The edition I was able to procure was "complete and unabridged", and as such was written in older English, with some occasional grammatical errors which was probably the norm of the language during those days. I likened reading it to perusing through someones autobiography. The basic plot was in place that he would become a castaway and eventually be rescued, but the chronicle of his day-to-day struggles to survive come across as very spontaneous and random, which adds a little flavor of realism, although some situations documented therein are not outright believable. Often the protagonist would have these long boring ramblings about his revelations in faith during the times when he'd experience a religious epiphany of sorts, although the afterword reminds us that Defoe needed to place these certain elements of religiosity in order to make the book palatable to the audience of his time. Nonetheless, it is an excellent work of fiction and provided me with an entertaining read. I would say that it would serve as a template for "Being Marooned on an Island for DUMMIES". :P

Das Boot (The Boat)

Rating:	★★★★★
Category:	Books
Genre:	Literature & Fiction
Author:	Lothar-Gunther Buchheim

© Piper Verlag GmbH, Munchen 1973
Cassell Military Paperbacks Edition 2002
563 pages

I first encountered the German phrase Das Boot way back when I was probably still in grade school as I was perusing through some of dad's books and magazines on military history. Dad told me that it was a movie about life aboard a German U-Boat during World War II.Since I never got around to watching that movie and thought little of since since then.

However, as my luck would have it, I stumbled upon a copy amongst the "on-sale" shelves in Bridges Bookstore at VMall. It wasn't really in bad shape, and at 100Php, I felt that it was a bargain!

The title literally mans "The Boat" in German. It tells the story from the point of view of a naval war corespondent assigned aboard a German submarine as it goes underway on patrol, responding to orders from U-boat HQ to intercept and attack Allied shipping convoys.

Buchheim served as a lieutenant on minesweepwers, destroyers, and submarines during the war, and offers vivid descriptions of the claustrophobic underwater madhouse that is home to a crew of 50.

Although the story itself is a work of fiction, the level of realism gives one a good picture of what went on in the belly of the ship, and more interestinly, what raced through the minds of the crew as they lived out their lives underneath the waves, being away from shore for months at a time.

The story opens at a bar in France near a port where the U-boats are docked. After their last night of merrymaking before going out to sea, the U-boat and her crew are finally underway. The narrator tells it like it is; the long boring trek out to open sea, the dangers of the Atlantic storms, the cat-and-mouse games played by submarines and surface ships, and the grim realities confronted by the crew when disasters strike within an enclosed metal tube travelling deep beneath the waves.

The book's cover proudly proclaims "one of the best novels written about war", and it dosen't disappoint. I've read my fair share of war books thanks to my dad's rather extensive collection. I've read a biography on the great Manfred von Richtoffen, the dreaded "Red Baron" German flying ace of World War 1, an autobiography of the "Blond Knight of Germany" Erich Hartmann, who I believe was the most sucessful German ace during World War II, having been credited with around 250+ aerial victories, another autobiographty entitled "Stuka Pilot" written by the ace dive-bomber during the time (forgot his name), plus a host of other war stories, most of which are as aunthentic as they come because dad shied away from buying fictional accounts as much as posible.

This book is definitely a must-read for any military enthusiast, especially those that enjoy reading about the World Wars. Not a book for kids, it contains a sprinkling of cuss words, graphic descriptions of disfiguring injuries, and tall-tales about sailors' visits to the local whorehouses at their ports of call. =P

Sci-Fi bookworming..

I've been bitten by the reading bug these past few days, thanks to a healthy exposure to great finds at Booksale and Goodwill. :P It's just insane.. In a span of 4 days, I was able to burn through 3 different books! And here they are in the order they were read..

I'm such a Star Wars geek. :P Dad snapped this one up for me at the Booksale branch there in Shoppesville. Turns out it was a sourcebook of sorts for the now-defunct Star Wars role-playing game. It contained a lot of in-depth (presumably canon) material on the inner workings of the Rebel Alliance, from the chain of command, down to the equipment dossiers. Being true to the RPG form, it also provided pre-rolled stats for certain characters mentioned within that can be used as NPCs. I totally devoured this book, finishing it in around 5 hours. :D

On the same day that dad bought me the Star Wars book, I browsed through the bargain shelves there at Bridges Bookstore in VMall. I was hoping for another Dune book, having initally found House Atreides there. Alas, my search was fruitless, but I picked up this novel about Picard's first command  and his foray beyond the galactic barrier. This book didn't put up much of a fight either, and I finished it in around 5 hours (9pm-1am)!

When we went to SM City North EDSA this past Sunday, we browsed through the Booksale there as well. Lo and behold, I was able to secure a copy of the second book in the Dune series (I was so entranced by Dune: House Atreides that I went out and bought a copy of the original Dune novel at full price). I started work on it right away, and finished reading it around midday yesterday.. :P

I still have a book up my sleeve, having bought Das Boot (The Boat) at the same time as the Star Trek novel. :D Now if only I could make this enthusiasm carry over to my academic readings.. :P 

Warcraft Archive

What a find!!

I found this baby on the sci-fi shelves of Fully Booked when I went on an exploratory run with my bro to Bonifacio High Street. (Yes, its the first time we drove there :P)

It's such a great deal because it carried 4 different stories (3 full novels and a short 8-chapter story) for the price of 2 novels! (around 350 each)

I'm a great fan of books written as part of the official lore for Sci-Fi and Fantasy worlds, and this compilation doesn't disappoint. :D There's only one problem...

Now I wantz dis wun az well.. :P (Starcraft Archive)

Sands of Time

In a previous post (click here), I lamented the rapid decline of the science fiction genre from bookshelves. After having read the most recent (and final) addition to my Star Wars: Republic Commando collection, I thought that my sci-fi reading days were over.

As fate would have it, I chanced upon a copy of Dune: House Atreides on sale in Greenhills. I had been eyeing the Dune series for some time but due to prohibitive prices, I was reluctant to risk what little cash I had on a bunch of books I might not like. I fisrt heard about Dune way back in grade school when Westwood games came out with what is probably considered the great-granddad of real-time startegy games - Dune 2: the Building of a Dynasty. It was a solid game with a then-novel concept of real-time combat. It also had what seemed to me was an engaging storyline, pitting 3 houses wth different charcters (noble, insidious, and evil) against each other. However, I was then ignorant of the fact that it was based on a highly popular epic story, touted by some as the sci-fi equivalent of "The Lord of the Rings". As I got older, I noted the appearance of these Dune novels on bookstore shelves and discovered that it had quite a cult following as well.

Now that the opportunity had presented itself, I snapped up the book and immersed myself in the Dune universe, and it didn't disappoint.. I now have no doubt as to why the original Dune merited such high praise. The universe that Frank Herbert created is just so vast, with an intricate web of storylines and subplots that boggles the mind. The story draws upon events than span across milennia, and stretches the imagination to its limits. After putting down the book, I knew I wanted more.. I just hope that despite the dwindling stocks, I may be able to complete yet another collection of excellent science fiction lore.

Where have all the Sci-Fi gone?..

For the past few months, there has been a noticable dearth of science-fiction novels on bookstore shelves around the metro.. In most places like NBS or Powerbooks, the sci-fi section has shrank to a solitary shelf on a book rack, often sharing space with the apparently neverending Dragonlance or Forgotten Realms fantasy series. In fact, the only place I've seen with a sizable Sci-Fi section is Fully Booked there in Promenade (with Greenhills being a traditional geek haven and all).

Sigh... It used to be such great fun browsing through all those great works of futuristic fiction. I was lucky enough to have amassed my own (almost) complete Robotech collection. I have all 12 books spanning 3 generations, the complete 5-book Sentinels campaign, and the final End Of the Circle book. ( I'm still missing the Zentraedi Rebellion, which went out of stock a few weeks befote I went out to buy it.. dang!  I wonder if I can steal Wesley's copy... hehehe)

Recently, I was lucky enough to have snapped up copies of Jedi Healer and Republic Commando: True Colors, both of which are novels based upon Star Wars lore which I have almost given up hope of finding.

With stocks dwndling and hardly any new titles coming on the shelves soon, I'm forced to make the sad presumption that Sci-Fi is almost dead (at least, in this part of the world)... :(

From my observations, these are the probable causes of the decline in sci-fi titles:

1. Star Wars is officially over
 - Star Wars titles used to dominate Sci-Fi shelves (around early 90s), but with no further movies coming out, and almost all aspects of the universe realized in novels (through obscure stand-alone titles like Tales From Jabba's Palace and the like), Star Wars fans may have already lost the drive to delve into the once infinite unverse of that galaxy far far away..

2. Star Trek has lost its appeal
- another staple of the science fiction community, Star Trek novels have been losing their foothold in store shelves all around, though the upcoming Star Trek movie might be able to do something anout that.. I saw the trailer and it was AWESOME!!!

3. Recent advances in technology
- lets face it, with the current pace of technological advancement seen in society today, science-fiction is slowly turning into sciece-fact. A good example would be real-time teleconferencing, once the stuff of mystic sci-fi technobable 20-30 years ago, is now readily available with the advent of faster internet connections, webcams, and third-genereation mobile handsets. People don't have to imagine stuff about what the future could be like anymore, coz tomorrow they'd wake up and see the technology right at their doorstep.

I'd also like to include under this heading the paradigm shift from paper-based reading resources to online ones. I remember browsing thick volumes of encyclopedias just to do my research, but when my brother's time came to look stuff up for school, he could readily do so via the web! Add that to the current trends in computer and console gaming, and you now have a generation that barely bothers to look around and grab a book, much set time aside to curl up on the sofa and read it..(hmm, I guess this applies to books as a whole)

Sigh.. that's progress I guess.. Now if you'll excuse me, I have to get back to chatting with my friends on YM, while browsing the net for info on hovercars and jetpacks... ;)