MPJ

Before the start of the Great War, the prevailing sentiment in most, if not all, European countries was that victory in any major military conflict was guaranteed only if it was fought with a large, durable, well trained and modern army. The dawn of the 20th century established the environment in which countries entered the race to mobilize the largest part of the qualified population, to create faster motorized transport for troops and logistics, to use state of the art communications and the greatest range of artillery as well as to use various new drugs in medical treatments like morphine and even a cocaine to boost the troops and fuel their fighting mood. Comparing to 19th century wars, new warfare was revolutionized and upped to the next level. By June 1914, the stage was set and only a spark was needed to fire off the conflict.

But was it really inevitable? Was the military race alone enough to cause the conflict in which 20 million died and many more wounded? Or did it need a plot to be played in just a specific order that would lead to the unavoidable horror? Did it need at least one party to actually want the war to happen? To honestly believe that a war on that scale could be won?


When asked if the Great War could have been avoided, Ronald Spector, professor of history and international affairs at George Washington University said that ’if Sir Edward Grey hadn't been the foreign secretary in Britain, then Britain might not have necessarily entered the conflict. Furthermore, if German Kaiser Wilhelm II hadn't been the flaky person he was, then the Germans may have made different decisions, and in the end if Austro-Hungarian Archduke Franz Ferdinand, who at the time was the head of the faction that wanted to avoid war, had not been killed, the outcome might have been different’. According to professor Spector and many others, the real trigger for the first world war was indeed only a combination of these unfortunate coincidences that took place in the summer of 1914 - military preparations, the alliances, the people in power - all of those steps that built one after another created the Great War.

In the aftermath, the war did happen and to many, including me, the question was not who won it four years after, but rather what stage it created in following years. It ended the Austro-Hungarian empire, the German empire lost a lot of territory, the Turkish empire ceased to exist. On the other end new statehoods arose along with new wave of nationalism as many felt they hadn't achieved enough for their sacrifices and loses. History books at the end of the war never really recognized the winner or the looser. It officially ended in the Compiègne railway car on November 11, 1918, and the final document was signed as an armistice.

The start of the second world war in the Balkans was known as the "April War" that lasted no more than 10 days in the operation called "Führer Directive No. 25". The swift conflict ended on April 14th in armistice based on unconditional surrender of Yugoslav military forces. My grandfather was a 22 years old corporal in the former Yugoslav army when he was transferred to a war camp in Germany in mid-April 1941, along with other 30,000 surrendered soldiers. He spent next four years in Nazi military camp leaving behind his young wife and 2-year-old son.

I am sure it was not easy for him to cope the entire time of imprisonment and captivity, especially in the beginning, but considering all the horrors of the most cruel encampments of Nazi Germany, unconditional surrender of the entire Yugoslav Army came with negotiated terms and agreement of fair treatment of all the prisoners during captivity in various labor camps in the following years. Perhaps the main trauma for all the former soldiers came in the second part of 1945, after the fall of Hitler's Third Reich, when all of them along with more than 7 million of displaced people ended for several months in the chaos of the immediate post war traumatic experience of trying to find their way home. After his return to Serbia under completely new regime, the life treated him pretty well and the post-war time is perhaps the best described with his own words "Although I was not a member of the communist party, I think I was respected in society, I became a councilor of the municipality of Nis and a member of the council of the electronic industry. Above all I was proud of my family and 50 years of marriage."


Doing a hard labor in the fields and machine workshop helped him to pass through the war relatively undisturbed and, if we exclude the short April war in the beginning, I am sure the bullet holes in the car he used to maintain was his only reminder of all the horrors of the war. He was pretty quiet about all what happened to him for years, until one of our family gatherings about thirty years ago when he opened his soul and told us the most of what happened in those four years and especially couple of those last months in 1945 when he headed back home on foot. 

It doesn't happen often that after reading a book you can compare most of the places and some of the portrayed characters with real sites and buildings along with real protagonists from the historical story. Actually, this never happened to me before and after I've reached the last cover of 'Beneath a Scarlet Sky', a novel written by Mark Sullivan, published in 2017 I saw the rare opportunity of visiting the city where it all happened and where all the sites still stand today. Not much later and after my entire family read the novel or at least got familiar with the story, we packed our backpacks and hit the road. In the aftermath, the result is this blog post along with embedded video story as a documentary of the half a day walking tour of Milan in Italy where everything happened more than 70 years ago. In the spirit of a fair warning I advise you to read the book first before watching the video since it might spoil the reading for you or to wait for upcoming series or movie with Tom Holland in the lead role.


The novel is based on a true story of an Italian teenager Pino Lella, who lived in Milan during the second world war and within the last two years until the very end of the WW2, helped many Jewish people to escape to Switzerland over the Alps and in the final year to act as a spy for freedom fighters while being a personal driver for general Hans Leyers, Adolf Hitler’s left hand in northern Italy. Pino survived all the horrors of the war and the Nazi occupation and deeply fell in love with Anna, a girl he met on the streets of Milan on the day of the first bombing of the city. He constantly dreamed about the future they would one day share.

This book tour would not be possible at all without fantastic Valeria Andreoli from BellaMilano who guided us throughout Milan beautifully almost five full hours! It was amazing to mix the real streets, all the buildings, the castle and the cathedral, hotels, the train station and even the monumental cemetery with our vividly built images of all the places we already formed from the book and Mark Sullivan's amazing narrative.


Undoubtedly, spending three days in Milan for us provided lots of more opportunities for visiting the history back to the time all the way to Leonardo da Vinci. Around the year of 1482, he moved to Milan to work for the duke of Milan, Ludovico Sforza as an engineer, sculptor, painter and architect. Until 1499 when Milan was invaded by the French he left behind the 'Last Supper', a famous mural painting of Jesus and twelve apostles, many paintings including 'The Virgin of the Rocks', Milan's Narvigly, the system of navigable canals to ferry people and merchandise in and out of the city, 'Leonardo`s horse', uncompleted equestrian sculpture and many more.

We were especially interested in Leonardo's engineering projects and his machines, models and sketches displayed in 'Museo Nazionale Scienza e Tecnologia - Leonardo da Vinci' and within new exhibition dedicated to this amazing man called 'Leonardo3' stationed in 'Galleria Vittorio Emanuele II', another Milan's landmark from 19th century. This second video log of Viktor's shows a glimpse of what we managed to visit and learn.


(Un)expectedly, at the end of our first visit to this great city, we have left with many more footage from what we initially planned to make with Pino Lella's and Leonardo's stories. All these are now packed in this third video embedded above and if you like to see more of Valeria and stories hidden behind Leonardo's paintings, especially the ones he did in the Sforza castle, if you want to learn what you need to do if you are in search for a good luck charm during your first visit to the legendary 19th century shopping mall or if you are eager to check out one great Italian restaurant along with couple of more places we managed to visit, this is the video definitely worth clicking to.

As for us, I am more than sure that Milan definitely didn't see us wandering its streets for the last time. The rest of Italy too.

The book references:
https://bellamilanotours.com/footsteps-pino-lella/
https://marksullivanbooks.com/

Beneath a Scarlet Sky:
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/32487617-beneath-a-scarlet-sky (en)
https://www.newtoncompton.com/libro/lultimo-eroe-sopravvissuto (it)
https://www.knjizare-vulkan.rs/istorijski-roman/44294-pod-grimiznim-nebom (srb)

Museums:
https://www.museoscienza.org/en
http://www.leonardo3.net/en/

Something was bothering her for days.

She didn't actually know what it was. It was not the food. She knew that well and her belly was not itching her. Not a single bit. Mom was giving her delicious portions every day and she was feeling healthier and stronger every morning. It was not the air or water either. The forest and all three plains outside were.. Like the usual.. Beautiful and green with lots of life emerging from the trees and rocks. Even the ocean was calm and perfect the other day when she foolishly followed her older brother and his two peers to the cliff. They mocked her all the way down the stream and even took all her snacks she had and found on the way.

No. What she started to experience just the other day after the trip to the cliffs was some sort of discomfort she never experienced before. Nobody could harm her in the forest. It was not that. Not even on the plains. She was always following her mother and brother during all their travels and never got into any trouble. It was something in mom's eyes ever since the northern plain got into flames after those fireballs fell from the sky. They were almost like thunder only slower and different in noise they made. And they came from clear sky. It was nothing serious really and even looked beautiful when one ball hit the ground and the other exploded above the forest into thousands of chunks and fire showers in the same time.


Everything calmed now. They made little damage and all the fires were now gone but still ever since then everything started to seem different. Fireworks from the skies didn't stop really but there were no explosions like the other day. It looked like all the fireballs couldn't reach the ground and instead made red and orange patterns high above the forest. It was beautiful. And spooky in the same time. She started to feel it as well. She couldn't hear all those loud noises from birds and small animals for two days. Even the waterfall just next to their playground sounded quiet and eerie. And the most of all unusual things happened was her father. He returned last night. She saw him only twice last season and all the timidness she emotioned last couple of days, ever since the sky fire, with him around, started to grow into real fear.

The very next day they moved out. Just before the dawn, she and her brother started following their parents. They never ran that fast. They never ran in the group at all before. Even others joined. The other species and relatives. Some, she recognized from.. well.. mom's breakfast portions. But she wasn't hungry that morning at all and only tried to keep fast pace with her family toward the hills. It seemed that their father were taking them to the high ground and all those peaks she dreamed to visit someday.


And then it started. She heard something so loud she thought there was no such thing in existence. And she knew the bolts and thunders well. The ground started to move. In all directions. The rocks and boulders started to fall from the peaks. And in that very moment she did something she thought she would never do. The fear was gone in an instant and only pure curiosity emerged her tick skin. She took tree long jumps and climbed the sharp edge toward the only place on the cliff with clear view toward the ocean. She even used her tiny arms to balance her inproportional body.

On the horizon there was a stream of rocks coming from the sky. Just like the one that, the other day, exploded above the northern plain and lighted a forest fire. Only bigger. Much bigger. They were hitting the ocean one after another and making water to glow. All the sudden it stopped being beautiful and colorful. Only frightening and terrorful. And then she saw their father. Enormous rock. No. Gigantic boulder. No. The mountain. Yes. Just like the one they were climbing at right now.

At the end of the trail.

When it hit the water, all the fire and all the glow, all the thunder and roar, everything what she just saw and heard for the first time in her life faded out into one pure and ultimate silence. All the sentiment and fear accumulating last week disappeared instantly and merged into one single emotion.

Something new and pure. Something behind the nature. Something raw.

The anger.

----------------------------------

Image credits:
Kokoro's Eye from "Playing with Dinosaurs" exhibition in Taipei
Tyrannosaurus family watch Asteroid by Gary Collins

You know that feeling with reading novels when your bookmark location is in the second half of the book and you find yourself turning pages faster and faster in order to find what happens next? If your reading interests coincide with mine, the most likely case is that you are reading either science fiction, spy or fast pace action thrillers or good and old adventure stories filled with espionage and politics in the background.


Well, that was before.. Nowadays, if I wanted all that combined in a single novel, there's a new sub-genre called technothrillers and with some of them, especially with new authors in the self-publishing realm and in almost all occasions I found myself turning pages even faster. Three of those great technothrillers you could find presented in this blog post. The premises are extraordinary and all of them borrowed from science fiction: smart robotic nano particles enhancing human bodies, evil artificial intelligence operating Darknet and one extraordinary idea of a teleportation based on the time travel.

Let's start with nano-scaled interface between human brain and computers. It was always a holly grail to make this efficient ever since the invention of the first computer. Even now to create this post I am using the old fashion keyboard to type the letters, checking for typos, taking care of the grammar and rolling the mouse around the table for lots of other commanding purposes. "Interface" by Tony Batton is giving us all potential outcomes of the system without all those helping gadgets only by using nano particles with remote access to everything with CPU and with the thriller plot that is in one word - outstanding. I will only add that I touched the icon for the sequel purchase just couple of moments after I finish the book.


For the next technothriller in line these three reasons were enough for me to hit the download button: Dark Web&Net layers of the internet, villain AI and automated corporations. It was amazing how all this, not so hard to imagine, near future inspired Matthew Mather to create this astonishing novel named "Darknet". Simply put, I felt that all what's happening in this techno adventure was as real as in any ordinary thrillers. This reality in one way or another is really knocking our doors, especially the part with automated corporations with no need for humans in roles of CEOs, CMOs, CTOs and all the other C?Os. The scary part is that we even don't need supreme AI to take over, just advanced automation. Thriller part of the book is as perfect as the premise itself. Enough said.

Last, but not least, comes the boldest Scifi premise in Douglas E. Richards' "Split Second". While at first it is not immediately comprehensible how time travel can be used for teleportation and then for entire thriller story, it is quite simple really. I don't really like to spoil the book here, especially since the author kept the details from the reader for a big portion of pages but I have to say that it is ingenious idea. I will just give you a hint to think about it - we are living in a universe with four dimensions by its nature, three spatial ones and time as the fourth. If we move along one dimension, i.e. up and down, we are not really moving left or right or forward or backward. We would be only using one spatial dimension and travel forward in time. The other two spatial coordinates would stay the same. Similarly, the question from the book was, what if we would be able to use only time dimension and move just a fraction of the second forward or backward in time and NOT using spatial dimensions by doing so? Where exactly would our spatial coordinates be AFTER the time travel? Where everything else would be after our arrival? If you are intrigued, this book is definitely for you.


To summarize this spoil-less review and even though I liked and enjoyed all the stories the same, the plausibility of the background science fiction is always important to me and with these three, "Darknet" is maybe something we could witness within our lifespans and just for that fact if I had to rate these three technothrillers, it would be my first choice of recommendation. As much as I would love to see something similar to the nano-sized robots floating our bloodstreams, "Interface" premise is still going to wait for better understanding our own intelligence and brain activity. The wait must also include significant nano-scaling of the CPUs as well. As for the time travel, if you ask me, this might stay in the fiction only for a very long time, perhaps even to stay in the realm of the impossible, but who knows, we might witness one day time travel of the information data somehow if sending any mass back in time proves to be unfeasible.

Nevertheless, I truly enjoyed all the twists in stories, all the characters and their interactions and development, writing styles and how everything unfolded at the end of all three novels. Warm recommendation goes without saying.

Books:
http://www.tonybatton.com/interface/
http://matthewmather.com/books/darknet/
http://www.douglaserichards.com/split-second

More thriller reviews:
https://www.milanzivic.com/2017/04/cotton-alex-will-travis-and-david.html

I was very young when I visited Olympus for the first time. It happened during our early vacation in the region back then in eighties of the previous century. I vividly remember there was a dangerous dirt road with not much room for two vehicles to pass by, ending near to the one of the mounting homes with embedded small tavern which can really print on its portfolio that was built on the top of gods' heavenly entrances. For some fairly strange reasons, Coca Cola and Souvlaki on the tavern's terrace felt really tasty, just as the pure and clean water from the water stream just next to it. Unfortunately and despite of all of my efforts, I couldn't see or find anything divine or out of worldly items or even a glowing shiny rock. There were no gods whatsoever. Or naked muses. Or beasts with snakes instead of hair. Or horses with wings. Or mighty heroes. Nothing. Well, I was only 10 years old. What did I know.. Maybe that pair of hawks we saw flying around the highest rock across the tavern and screeching in high tones were actually Apollo and Artemis arguing about something.

On the other end, it might be that I visited Olympus during gods' withdrawal. Way too early...


But, before I continue with the actual glimpse to the modern Olympus fiction and short reviews of one hilarious book and one extraordinary comic, I think I need to write a word of two about the photo I embedded above, which might be interesting to read. This is in fact the mount of Olympus (just like the highest peak shown from the air in the post header). The most famous mountain in the entire world. The mighty one. It is not the highest of them all - just slightly lower than 3K meters and not even the highest in the entire Balkans, but it was the one chosen by gods to built their own abode during the ancient times. Sitting just next to Aegean Sea, it is the first sight you see when you travel from Thessaloniki to Athens in nowadays Greece. I took this image in 2010, from the beach in the sea resort of Leptokarya, described by Wikipedia as "the former seat of East Olympos municipality, which is part of the municipality of Dio-Olympos". During my countless visits of northern Greece in past several decades, and all of them during summer holidays, believe it or not, all of my Olympus photographs ended with similar heavy stream of clouds above mountain peaks. It is like Olympus is always hidden in clouds by some weird meteorological reasons. Well, that was not entirely true as I have seen Olympus naked in the occasion or two, but still it was not often. It's like Olympus is attracting the clouds and capturing them to stay and hide it's peaks.

This summer, almost forty years after my first excursion to the famous maintain, we took the perfect opportunity to board a tourist bus and venture their Olympian route following new paved roads carrying people to the multiple resorts within mounting base and visiting Olympus' main attractions. At least to the point where road limits heavy buses to proceed. The tour included town of Litochoro, famous Bath of Zeus, Agios Dionysios Monastery and Old Panteleimon, picturesque mountainous village on the slopes of the mountain. Surely seeing the sites with your own eyes has no alternative and the next best thing is to check couple of those travel guides and stories you can stumble online, but as far as this post is concerned, I will leave it to my son Viktor to tell you all about it in his channel's video log we both filmed this August. If you find it pleasing, you know the YouTuber's drill - please like and subscribe... ;-)


The mountain definitely contain a beautiful charm of its own, but we all know that Olympus is best known for its part in Greek mythology and with all its ancient fiction it inspires writers all over the world ever since. With some of them, the thin line between fiction and nonfiction is not really visible at once but in the case of Michael G. Munz's amazing novel called 'Zeus Is Dead: A Monstrously Inconvenient Adventure' one would say it is all about fiction and laugh out loud (LOL) moments. The gods in this comedy returned from their withdrawal after more than two thousand years with all of their entourage and got back to the active and mutual life with mortals. And they returned with a twist.

What is the most interesting about old Greek gods, compared to all of the modern religions of today is that their godhood was not that estranged from their creation like it is now the case with all of those Jerusalem monotheistic beliefs. Greek gods loved to mingle with mortals. And by mingle, you know what I mean, which is especially true with Zeus (probably Dionysis too). In fact, within the opening chapters of the novel, Apollo defined it best when he said that "Gods are just like mortals, only ... better." And that means with everything that we can use to describe ordinary people, including conspiracies, hatred, intelligence, stupidity, love, sex, affairs, ... It's like the Greek gods possess everything good and bad we mortals experience on daily bases, only theirs is enhanced and powered off the charts. And of course, they could change appearances into hawks.. and to do other magical stuff. So, by establishing that we can safely say that all the gods in the "Zeus Is Dead: A Monstrously Inconvenient Adventure" are more than just divine creatures. They are active characters in the story and along with amazing Michael's narrative, that is playing with the reader on numerous occasions are something that gives this book, at least for me, the originality I have never experienced before. The humor is everywhere, especially in the narrative, that on many points require fair amount of reader's geekery and knowledge of ancient mythology. I'll stop here with no further spoiler and only my warm recommendation.


As for the other media dealing with Olympian myths, there are numerous movies and among them "Clash of the Titans" and "Wrath of the Titans" with Perseus played by Sam Worthington and Liam Neeson as Zeus. They were not that bad movies at all, despite all my reservations and best of all the script of the second movie offers the answer to the ultimate question of how and why gods from Olympus ended their presence on Earth. Of course Henry Cavill as Theseus in "Immortals" was also one of the visually great movies with heavy usage of old Greek myths and Olympian gods in main roles.

On the other hand, the world of graphic novels never disappoints and Rick Riordan's novels with Percy Jackson adventures recently, after debuts with two motion pictures, transferred into extraordinary enjoyable comics. The world of demigods in so far two graphic books looks very nice and, I have to admit, much appealing than in movies. Perhaps because reading comics was my first love from the early childhood and/or maybe because these two books were my first comics reading with Kindle way of presenting graphic novels but nevertheless if you are into Olympian myths and love great fiction emerged from old tales my recommendation for Riordan's "Heroes of Olympus" series with "The Lost Hero" and "The Son of Neptune" goes without saying.



zViktor22 YouTube Channel
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCH2BtavSrxaRyvOJS5JZaHQ

Zeus Is Dead: A Monstrously Inconvenient Adventure
http://michaelgmunz.com/books/zeus/

The Lost Hero: The Graphic Novel
http://rickriordan.com/book/the-lost-hero-the-graphic-novel/

I had once a parrot pet called Cheda. He was incredible - long ago during my university days Cheda was my only friend throughout countless sleepless nights when I was preparing for exams. He came very young and we spent lots of quality time together in my room. I never closed the cage gate so he was as free as possible and used entire flat to spread his wings. He belonged to a Australian cockatiel parrot breed or nymphicus hollandicus, how was his real scientific name. Nymphs are very popular for their ability to mimic human speech and of course for their talent to sing beautifully.


Cheda was no different and over time he learned a decent amount of words but what he performed the best was a tune from the movie "The Bridge on the River Kwai". It was not a simple melody for a parrot and you had to see his frustration in all those moments when he missed the note - on a numerous occasions I had to pet him and telling him to take it easy - but eventually he perfected it to the level of supremacy and in fact, if there was a parrot singing contest back then, he would easily took the throne. Without a doubt, "the Kwai" song staid way too long in Cheda's repertoire and soon enough on one occasion I literally begged him to try and learn something else.

I had no idea if Cheda's native parrot language was any good, after all he was born in captivity and spent his entire life seeing other parrots only on TV. To give a little more thought on the matter, even in those custom captivities with multiple animals of the same species sharing the same cage, so to speak, I doubt that they are able to use their 'native language' so well, or at all. Think about this - if a human baby is isolated from any social activity from the moment of birth, how would he or she be different from other animal species? With nobody around to teach him/her the human language, the baby would grow up and communicate only with different sounds and gestures. The same as what appears to be the animal language. But do animals have a language similar to what we humans developed over the eons? To articulate sounds into words and sentences? To actually speak to each other? At least with those species considered to be more intelligent than others? Perhaps among not so many scientists out there who are endlessly researching animal verbal abilities, the best answers we can hope to get is from Denise Herzing, who are contentiously studying wild Atlantic spotted dolphins off the coast of the Bahamas for 28 years.


With technology maturing enough and with computers powerful to help analyzing dolphin language in real time, Denise and her team developed a wearable human-to-dolphin communication device called Cetacean Hearing and Telemetry (CHAT). With use of CHAT and tools like hydrophones (underwater microphone and speakers) we are now one step closer to the ultimate goal - understanding and talking to another species and in this case dolphins. Surely, understanding animal languages is not just about sounds in audio spectrum we evolved to use - it is proven fact that dolphins can hear up to 150kHz in the ultrasound spectrum and if we add non-verbal add-ons to the spoken language such as body gestures, it is more than obvious that Denise and other researches only scratched the surface of the ultimate goal toward the computer-based translators as we know them from scifi, especially the one described in the Star Trek universe.

Computers are surely already as fast as they are and digital data retrieved and converted from audio and visual inputs are already processable in real time. However, they are just tools - to make it really work we need to do all the programming and that requires understanding of what we are receiving in the data. To do that a breakthrough in understanding foreign languages without aids such as Rosetta stone is very much expected. The algorithm that would succeed to understand any language only by observation and monitoring. Perhaps the good idea would be to learn more from animals in that realm as well. There was one documented story of a dolphin called Moko appeared to "talk" to two stranded whales before leading them to safety. Two pygmy sperm whales got stuck at Mahia beach on the east coast of New Zealand's North Island and their desperate mood changed only when Moko arrived and as it seemed verbally advised them how to get to safety.


The ultimate goal is surely the supreme translator that will fit inside future smartphone with access to the database of all the languages in existence and not just those spoken by humans. Until that many more research is needed followed by at least one breakthrough in understanding interspecies communication of those based on Earth and probably beyond. I am more than positive that it will happen sooner than later, perhaps just like in the fiction stories such as "Breakthrough" novel series written by Michael C. Grumley.

I am finishing the fourth book in connected thriller story and all I can say is that "Breakthrough" is one amazing series fully based on the current interspecies communication research with addition of AI software capable of analyzing dolphin's and gorilla's verbal communications in real time and instant translations in both directions. I am surely not going to spoil the content but if you add decent science fiction twists neatly embedded into one great thriller, what Michael C. Grumley created is one of the best adventures I have read in a while.


It goes without saying that I recommend warmly embedded Denise Herzing TED presentation of her current research within Wild Dolphin Project in Bahamas and Michael C. Grumley's novels. I learned a lot from both sources and definitely earned myself one more topic for the future reading habit. I could only imagine what it might mean if we could really talk to animals and I'd not be surprised if that would be really possible for more than several species and not only those considered with higher intelligence.

Image refs:
* https://alexfoundation.org/
** https://www.space.com/dolphin-intelligence

Books ref:
*** http://michaelgrumley.com/

Refs:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cockatiel
https://blog.ted.com/talking-with-animals
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0050212/
https://voxy.com/blog/2012/04/do-animals-have-a-language/
https://wonderopolis.org/wonder/how-do-animals-communicate
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/magazine/7294051.stm
http://www.wilddolphinproject.org/

In almost all Cyberpunk masterpieces in literature, comics, movies, games or whatever media exposure we think of when it comes to this genre, the settings is familiar. Dark atmosphere in both social and technological aspect of the story with dystopian surroundings and thin distinguished line between all characters within, no matter whether they are good or bad. I can't tell exactly why, but despite all the prosaic backgrounds and used stereotypes, I actually like this literary movement, perhaps because of the fact that people can't be really divided into good and bad per se. We all are combination of all possible adjectives out there and their summary is what makes us what we are. Actually, this is more accurate and closer to the truth compared to the "normal" or "usual" fiction with its ordinary hero-villain relations and idealized characters. Of course, like in any other genre, there are many poor and unmentionable works but also couple of those masterpieces, like in the world of movies, the famous Ridley Scott's "Blade Runner" or "Neuromancer" by William Gibson, in the world of science fiction novels.


Surely, the mantra of almost all Cyberpunk science fiction is advanced technology, placed in not so far future, exploiting the ultimate fate of humans along with major role of corporations that are developing and deploying it to the people. Actually one of existing nature of nowadays corporation-technology pair inspired me to start writing this post in the first place and perhaps some of you already guessed, it is current stage of social networks and the world they became after promising couple of years after their invention. In my case, the beginning of socializing the internet was inspired by establishing and experiencing new virtual friendships and new ways of spreading ideas along with simple feeling of participation in something futuristic and big. However, after years of maturing, it all went in very different direction. The endless stream of news feeds without quality conversations replaced the great main idea along with commercializing the entire thing. Today, with some of the networks, you can even buy likes or force people to read your piece not by its quality but instead by buying appropriate keywords. In past couple of years I found myself too many times in front of the screen rhetorically asking one simple question "Why, on Earth, am I reading this?" and often wondering what happened with my own interests and why I stopped searching them directly and instead waiting for them to appear on my customized social network feeds?

Further trouble with social networks, once joined, is that it is very hard or even impossible to leave. With some networks, deleting is not the option at all, only "deactivating" your presence and leave it intact on the company's servers for who knows what reasons. With others, you can't even deactivate your account without deleting other useful services that are too heavily connected. With all of those with actual "delete" button, you have no proof that your virtual past is really deleted and not just hidden behind the (fire)wall of corresponding corporation data center. In the aftermath, you have to ask yourself whether or not this behavior is the dawn of the Cyberpunk future we read in novels or just a curved present that is going to eventually fade out and be replaced by something new.


That's how I see the present day but to continue with the main topic, let's see how Cyberpunk authors deal with future evolution of the almighty internet and computers of the tomorrow. If we just glimpse to the technology behind the scenes of the Cyberpunk world, coated in heavy noirish detective story with a little or heavy emotional connection between main characters and with lots of not-necessarily futuristic weapons and tough fights, we can see one possible (or plausible if you will) vision of the near future where humans can easily become nothing more than just a slaves of advanced technology and mediocre lives within the system that can't be possible to escape from. Just take for instance Gibson's prediction of futuristic internet that will continue to "offer opportunity to waste time, to allow us to wander aimlessly, to daydream about the countless other lives, the other people, on the far sides of however many monitors in that post geographical meta-country we increasingly call home".

In the cyberpunk fictitious world, worldwide network would also be responsible for the very existence of the artificial intelligence, matrix like cyberspace with vivid virtual reality, robots and various machines that will be doing boring things for us, cyborgs with applicable neural interface with host computer augmented by nanotechnology and like in "Altered Carbon" by Richard Morgan, potential ability to digitize full personality or entire consciousness and store it for eternity into home computers or even other bodies. "Altered Carbon" came this year on Netflix in its amazing motion pictures version and it was extremely good. Imagining cyberpunk future by reading only is very hard, even for us technology geeks and TV shows or movies are always welcome, especially if they are made in such amazing production like the one behind Takeshi Kovacs adventures on futuristic Earth.


Now, interesting question is should we consider cyberpunk as a pure entertainment or we could safely put it in the same basket with original and genuine Science Fiction as it was in Jules Verne's or Arthur Clarke's time with expectation of some of its predictions to become true? Well, if you ask me, even though we are facing here with dark predictions rather than something good and promising for future generations, we simply can't rule it out. We are already taking technology for granted and if this trend continues I can't see how can we avoid all the dark sides that comes within. Invention of AI and nanotechnology along with super fast (quantum) computers will bring us inevitable breakthrough foundation for the society with humans not being the ultimate player anymore. However, I don't think we should be afraid from upcoming and remarkable inventions in science and technology. It will change our lives yes, but surely it doesn't have to be overnight or all bad. Actually, I think it will bring more benefits to us than side effects. So, no, I truly want to believe that dark settings from cyberpunk worlds will not become true. Not on a great scale, I don't think so. We will wait and see. Well, maybe not you and me, but some future generations for sure.

However, what I am more afraid of are humans themselves. The corporate part of the story. Many villains in cyberpunk stories are hidden behind the corporations and their agendas and the natural question pops to mind - is there any real danger of transferring the power from political system of nowadays democracies toward corporations and their pure financial interests? Or to put it in simple words, is it possible that in any futuristic world scenario, future companies compared to today's Google, Microsoft, Apple, Gazprom, Wal-Mart, China National Petroleum, Leading German Car Manufacturers, AT&T, or any other industry lords you can find in below reference page, can be strong enough to take over the power and completely restructure the world as we know it? I am sure this is very hard to imagine from current point of view, but I am still having goosebumps every time I give I thought toward the possible world in the future where current political system weakens enough to the point that it could becomes vulnerable to the ultimate collapse with all the corporations waiting with their jaws open and ready. If you browsed my blog before you probably already know that I blame politicians and politics in general for all the dark times in the history of mankind, but if I could think of anything even dangerous than that, then it would definitely be bunch of wealthy people behind the catchy corporate names with only profit in their minds and the only goal to grow even bigger and wealthier than all the competition.

Original post: July 2014, Update: March 2018.

Image refs:
https://www.netflix.com/rs/title/80097140
http://www.mymbuzz.com/2017/12/08/netflix-altered-carbon-new-teaser/

Story refs:
https://www.neondystopia.com/what-is-cyberpunk/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_cyberpunk_works
http://www.cyberpunkreview.com/
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0083658/
http://project.cyberpunk.ru/idb/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_largest_companies_by_revenue
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Altered_Carbon

DNA is a fascinating world. That single molecule of life contains all the information about individual living being. Any bacteria, plant, insect, algae, fish, animal or human grows from that one molecule seed. Probably even some alien form still waiting to be discovered on some moon orbiting Jupiter or Saturn. In one way or another, the same could be true with all life in the universe. All of us are grown from that single instructions manual inside the single DNA set of written directions. And there are no two identical DNA in existence, even if we could mix the same two identical human egg and sperm cells several times, similar but different resulted DNA would always be the outcome. We are surely still not mastering the DNA and bio-engineering - it is still young science and even though one giant molecule of life was hinted by various scientists and scholars more than century ago, it was only in early fifties of 20th century when James Watson and Francis Crick created the first double-helix model of DNA structure. Discovery and sequencing of the genome codes responsible for various features and properties of a living beings started almost immediately afterwards. Of course, morality and potential hazards of cracking the code followed and by today we have lots of different opinions of what future of DNA research should look like and what kind of practical applications and engineering would be made out of it for our own species.


Surely, curing genetic diseases comes first in mind and there is no doubt this will be something extraordinary for the future edits of human embryos. The only 'problem' is what the definition of 'disease' is. If you ask different people and scientists you will get different answers and the most interesting one comes from the very co-founder of the double-helix, James Watson, who once said that stupidity is sort of genetic disease and if we can cure it in the future we should do it. The same goes with not appealing physical appearances, he joked that having all girls genetically altered to be pretty would not be that bad either.

But even before getting into genetically modifying of the genome sequences of embryos, morality is knocking on our future doors already - consider this - way before going into pregnancy, future couple might be able to have a glimpse of their potential children just by interpreting DNA sequences of embryos and to project the 3D image of offsprings live on screen. They would be able to know not just the physical appearance of their potential sons and daughters but also other features, such as estimates of their IQ or medical hazards in their adult age. Scary or not, future couples might be able to choose their children from the bag of their frozen embryos that can be produced in vast numbers and easily. I don't know about you but having a picture of, say my potential daughter and choosing for her not to be born is a huge moral decision. I don't think I could do it. Not without serious consequences.


But before giving a thought or two about more serious genetic engineering and genome modification in spirit of the new Daniel Suarez novel called 'Changed Agent' let me start the review with one old and epic cyberpunk movie from the eighties. Blade Runner. I did mention this great film back in the day within the post 'Cuberpunked Future' but now in light of 35 years of genetic research after the movie was filmed, after all the GMO controversies, after Dolly, the cloned sheep and many more fictitious books and movies with the genetic engineering in the background, I think Blade Runner does not really belong to cyberpunk genre anymore. Genetic modification is not something what we expect to happen in distant future and it is not walking on the edge between the reality and fiction anymore. It is happening now and I believe it will not take long to gain more knowledge and understanding of DNA code in order to achieve the holy grail from described prediction - to create a detailed image of a living being just by looking into DNA molecule of a single piece of hair or tiny drop of the blood. I will leave it to you to conclude what we might do with this futuristic device, but one particular study comes to my mind first with relation to ancient DNA or persisted samples of i.e. neanderthals which stuck to minerals or in the layers of sediment. One day we might literally create a photographs of ancient people and extinct species.

Anyhow, later this year new sequel of Blade Runner is announced and if it is going to be only half as good as the first movie, it would be another epic masterpiece in science fiction genre. Furthermore, after 35 years, new filming CGI allows now further explanation of the creation of replicants and genetic modifications themselves and according to the trailer (embedded above) it all looks more than promising.


Finally in conclusion of this short glimpse into genetic modifications of humans, thanks to the new Daniel Suarez novel 'Change Agent', what I have learned before while reading about GMO in realm of microbiological life, plants, animals and food in general is now widely expanded to the level of potential future of the dark side of human DNA edits. Like anything else that comes with prefix of being breakthrough discovery in history of mankind, genetic editing comes in wide variety of great possibilities with curing genetic diseases and enhancing human body to fight more easily with 'ordinary' infections and diseases, including cancer. But also it provides ways of destructive and to say the least, non-ethical features and procedures that might reshape human evolution to the edge of self-destruction. 'Change Agent' is dealing with this dark side of genetics in the near future that could come very soon after we reach fully understanding of DNA and possible alterations of genomes.

Daniel's new book is not just a pure Sci-fi prediction of the future, but also one great thriller and adventure novel centered on the outcome of one additional prediction of what might happen if editing of a single human being would be possible during the adulthood (editing more than 30 trillion cells in human body in the same time). Now, if you ask me this is walking side by side to the impossible or at least resembles more to the far-stretched cyberpunk prediction, but who knows, I am sure that average reader of Jules Verne's 'From the Earth to the Moon' in the 19th century could have felt the same reading about men sitting in the most powerful cannon launching them into space and toward moon. I am sure, at the time, many were convinced that would never happen.


Still and for the time being, genetic editing of the embryos in their early stages are something more plausible, expected and somewhat tested with GMO research with growing food. However, regarding the plot and twists in the book I will stay with my initial decision not to spoil the stories of the novels and movies I was writing about on the blog and this book will be no exception so I will finish this post now with my full recommendation and for the very end I will only quote Bryan Frey, one of the main characters stating one of the obvious potential outcome if the dark side of the genetic engineering of humans prevails and people start enhancing their children before they are born:

"I don’t imagine we are going to remain a single species for much longer."

Image refs:
https://twit.tv/shows/triangulation/episodes/297
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0083658/
https://www.statnews.com/2016/04/20/clever-crispr-advance-unveiled/

Refs:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CRISPR
https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2017/04/ancient-dna/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ancient_DNA

Thrillers. Books perfect for the summertime. Even though they were not exclusively tied to the beach, in my case, of all occasions, somehow sand and Kindle went along hand by hand the best. Every time. As with default definition, thriller stories and novels engage all your senses and trigger right level of entertainment and all kind of emotions during those couple of days of intense reading. Also, they alway successfully keep away your thoughts from your job, your daily issues and raw reality from your mind. In previous couple of years (mostly summers), my stock of thrillers piled up significantly, so I decided to create a recommendation and small glimpse into stories of five different styles of writing and with that many main characters stored in the similar background of political or fictitious conspiracies. And all that in familiar form of classic 'villains vs heroes' storytelling with the hero winning the girl every time. Cliché, I know, but I love it and enjoy it all the same. Furthermore, in all the novels, if chosen carefully, there are always tons of new stuff to learn about.


I decided to write this post in fashion of the 'first names' thread I started before and with thriller novels that comes in sequel. With five book series, five novelist and five main characters. Perhaps the best description of the first character is to introduce a public square in the heart of Copenhagen. Højbro Plads. The place where no tourist misses to visit and the place where Cotton Malone, the hero from the Steve Berry's stories lives and owns a bookshop. This is, sort of, his base of operations and the place that provided great action and suspense in couple of novels. Needless to say, several years ago, when we visited Copenhagen, I definitely wanted to see the place myself and to experience the feeling from the books. I surely have nothing to add to the Steve's choosing of the Cotton's home, except to recommend a visit during the Christmas time. Because of festivity and ... sausages. Perhaps, if you ask many people about Danish national cuisine and their prime dish, first thing that will come to their minds are pastry and cookies. Not me. When I go to Denmark, one of the reasons are their sausages. And the best ones can be found on the street, like those in above image. The only problem with Danish sausages is that they come in wide variety of flavour, sizes and aromas. You cannot try them all with just one visit of Højbro Plads or other places. So if you like them like I do, prepare to be frequent visitor of Danish capital especially on holidays.


But and to get back to Steve Berry and his series of twelve books of Cotton's adventures (so far), I have to admit that I didn't read them all. I learned about the series late - perhaps in the time when I switched reading from paper to Kindle and in the process skipped several from the middle. I read them enough though to state the obvious - the writing and the storytelling are gradually improved and getting better and better with every new book. The stories are of course not linked, they are stand alone novels, but the characters are more than connected and intersected in many ways and this can only be understood with reading entire sequel. The research of the background is thorough and I love Steve's final chapter with "separating facts from fiction" and if you add plots and twists from both history and present time of many global nations, these books definitely offers more than just entertainment. Events are described to the level that there is almost no need for later googling and further research and that's what I like the most with this series. I remember I learned a lot about history of Antarctica, China, Korea, Alexandria, US and countries throughout Europe including Russia. I have just finished reading the last novel "The Lost Order" and needless to say that my knowledge about America and their Civil War expanded a lot. If you asked me yesterday about the cause of it, I would promptly say 'slavery', but today after this book (and others before, especially the one with plot knitted around Mormons in Utah and the previous one related to cold war) I definitely learned a lot more about true complexity of the 18th and 19th century as well as all the political relations in present days between countries and intelligence services throughout the world. Conclusion for this series would be simple - if you like political thriller search no more. Enough said.


Next in line, after Cotton Malone and his 12 novels is Alex Cross, another great character introduced in book "Along Came a Spider", the classic thriller from 1993 written by James Patterson. The writing is amazing. Chapters are short and always force you to start reading another one in search for more information and it goes effectively well from true punk-ish style narrated by the main character, toward the well described other chapters when action goes from leading investigation to the villains or other characters. The main impression with this book (and others I read so far) is that it gives you strong feeling of plausibility of the full story. Not just the crime story but also the credibility of how the system works. Even though Cross is, in a way, the leader in the large police chase, there are no moments of epiphany in this book, like we used to in so many novels and movies where one brilliant character does all the work and in true hero style saves the lives of all the others. No, in here, you will find the real team work and true relations between several agencies and law in action. I did read several more books from the Alex Cross series (shown in the image above) but I have to admit it was all in the paperback time. There are twice as many novels in this sequel comparing to Steve Berry's but to tell the truth, pure and raw crime stories like these are not high in my priority list. But I do love action and crime solving and I am sure more Alex Cross stories will be loaded into my Kindle's memory. One already has - "I, Alex Cross" is the very next book I intend to read in the future as it seems that is probably the best so far according to other reviews.


Surely, thriller as a genre cannot survive on it's own. It requires a background story as a bottom layer and in previous two series, reality is dominant and conspiracies are believable. The world around us is filled with political agenda and criminal behaviour and to base stories upon that is not a big brainer. On the other end, "Library of The Dead" by Glenn Cooper and it's sequel novels "Book of Souls" and "The Librarians" are something entirely else. The stories behind Will Piper adventures are much, much suitable for the hot sand and lazy days of one summertime or any leisure time no matter when. It has it all, great mystery that remains mystery to the very end with lots of action, guns and villains all over the place with one dedicated hero portrayed with all his good and bad sides and all that filled with tiny dose of humor. Pure entertainment. If you go for this, and I couldn't recommend it more, prepare to swallow the trilogy in a record time. It really occupies you from dusk till dawn and writing is very well done with all it's chapters jumping from one timeline to another. What I also liked very much in Glenn Cooper's trilogy is how nicely he used "the library" story to explain many historical and modern puzzles, like possible explanation of evolution in christian religion, existence of prophets and psychics, background of nowadays governmental conspiracies and with usage of well known people in history of mankind he managed to give good credits to the whole thing and to mask the fiction into great thriller. As for the mystery theme in all three novels and the divine (or whatever it is) connection related to our already written destiny on this world, even though it is walking on the very thin wire it serves the purpose as the backbone of the story and never goes on the front light. Yes, it triggers, at least with me, couple of thoughts of good and old dilemmas of what life along with soul really is and whether or not we are just bunch of dummies in the hands of one master puppeteer, but still, in the end, this is there just in form of one great entertainment and nothing more.


However, and if we stay in the world of entertainment, government conspiracies are very high in my reading and watching list. It's hard to explain why. I simply love the mystery and possibility that there is something out there, something extraordinary and new. Something that only lives in fiction. And for today's glimpse into this world I chose to show you one extraordinary novel series, written by Patrick Lee and called "The Breach". After I have read all three books with Travis Chase in lead role I can tell you that if you enjoy 'conspiracies' genre this is standing shoulder to shoulder with Fox Mulder. And not just conspiracies. Sci-Fi part, all the twists and storytelling is something I was never encountering often with other authors so far. Everything was perfectly wrapped and almost unpredictable to the very end. Something I am secretly hoping with any book I start to read. I admire both authors, Patrick Lee and A.G.Riddle, the author of the next trilogy I am about to recommend, for the imagination they have and willing to transform into letters. I can't thank them enough for entertainment I had for weeks.


As for the last main character and the final recommendation, if I would have to say anything about expectations, when I loaded The Origin Mystery, with David Vale in the hero role, written by A.G.Riddle, two summers ago I expected a lot and this is exactly what I got! You have to be brave to make yet another novel about Atlanteans and the author wrapped it just right. He managed to connect several Sci Fi genres into one successful story. For my taste all the sciences are there and connected perfectly. Biology, virology and genetic research including junk-DNA involvement, physics and space travels, quantum entanglement, Antarctica, known history and use of connection and conspiracy theories like Nazi bell (Die Glocke) or Roswell UFO sighting. Script play with time dilatation and hibernation. Space battles of enormous proportion. Explanation of Gods and ancient astronauts. If you add usual 'Indiana Jones' type of adventures and romance there was no better choice for me entire summer. Perhaps, using so many connected sciences in the plot is too risky as the author faces with challenges of choosing what is more important and deserves to be explained better at the expense of other technologies or speculations but I don't mind. All in all, Riddle's Atlanteans are perhaps the best version I read in a long while and I warmly recommend it.

Everybody love heroes, great happy endings and eternal fight between good and evil. Thrillers are about that. No matter if they are following reality or fiction or any mixture between those two, these books will always be there and always number one entertainment. And not just for the summers.

Cotton Malone
http://steveberry.org/books/cotton-malone-series/
https://www.goodreads.com/series/44279-cotton-malone

Alex Cross
http://www.bookseriesinorder.com/alex-cross/
http://www.jamespatterson.com/alex-cross

Will Piper
https://www.librarything.com/series/Will+Piper
http://www.glenncooperbooks.com/

Travis Chase
http://www.patrickleefiction.com/
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/TravisChaseSeries

David Vale
http://www.agriddle.com/books
https://www.goodreads.com/series/104994-the-origin-mystery

I loved her.

I still do. With everything I've got. Ever since that cloudy day four years ago when we met in the park. Ever since I realized she was the one I was looking for my whole life. Ever since she shared her heart and her entire life with me. Ever since I moved into her place a week after we accidentally jogged into each other.

And look at me now under this eerie rain... Standing on her grave. Alone and wet. I don't know what to do. She would be alive if it wasn't for me.

It was all my fault.

That day I was returning from my afternoon walk and saw Garry, the mailman, from across the street just leaving our building. I hurried back. When I entered our apartment she already opened the envelope and a bottle of red wine. With the glass half empty she saw me, gave me tired smile and pointed the letter on the floor.

"It's another rejection.. Oh, Husk.. I am not sure I can handle them anymore". She made one of those heavy sighs she started with in recent months and looked into the glass. "Ever since I got fired from the Tribune all my handwritings and all the scripts were rejected... All of them... By everyone." She looked exhausted and beyond sadness when she finally raised her head and stared at me. "You have beautiful eyes. You know that, don't you?"

It was not the first time she was acting like this. I always tried to comfort her. To give her hope. But today, I didn't do much. I looked at her gently and then the glass. She gave me little surrender smile, wiped the tears and went to the kitchen. With the bottle in one hand and the glass in another. "I need to prepare something. Bruce is coming to dinner." She turned and gave me that threatening look when I was about to react harshly, like I always did in situations like that. "And please behave this time. You know that he's my former supervisor at the Tribune. I need this... Maybe he is my only chance. I spent all the bright ideas... I am not sending any more letters. Not anymore."

I knew all too well that Bruce was not only her former supervisor. He was the one who fired her. He was also her ex. I hated him. There was something in him I never manage to comprehend. His eyes, his behaviour, his moves, his vague rhetorics. His fragrance. There was nothing compelling about him. He was just one of those bullies in suits. A bad man. I almost exploded at him last time. I couldn't risk another scene today so I went for a dinner downtown. I wanted to slam the door on my way out. Hard. I couldn't do it.

I couldn't eat much as well. I lost all my appetite and took a long walk before I got back. I knew he already left and I just wanted to avoid her tonight and leave explanations for the next morning but at the door I realized something bad happened even before I came in. In the dining room were broken glasses, spilled wine, shattered vase and her bloody face behind her hands. She was sitting in the corner and sobbed silently. I couldn't breath. He hit her. Bad. I should've known this would happen. I was so stupid. The rage started to boil in my veins. Why did I leave in the first place? I had to be here to protect her. Maybe it's not too late. I turned toward the door and made a step.

"Stop." She cried. "Husk, no. Don't go. He's not worth it. Please..."

I went anyway.

I chased him for three blocks in all directions before I gave up. He probably took a cab or came with a car, otherwise he couldn't outrun me. Not after what I have just seen. The running calmed me down enough so I turned back and hurried home. I wanted to be there for her. I hoped that would be enough.

But she wasn't there. She didn't take anything with her. Not the jacket, nor the phone. Not even the shoes. The door was wide open and I saw the blood stains on the hallway walls here and there. She left enough trace to follow her path. But I didn't need anything to know where she went. The place where I found her last time. I hurried like hell. I needed to find her on time. Before it could be too late. Before...

I ran faster.

When I passed second building to the south and reached dark alley in the back, I found her sitting against the wall. She was already dead. I was not fast enough. Syringe and the spoon were fallen next to her and the rubber band tangled in her palm. She was looking at me with her open eyes for the last time. I froze. I didn't know what to do. I just sat next to her.

It was all my fault.

I loved her. All the way and all too much.

I still do.

So, here I am, standing on her grave on this eerie day. The rain had stopped. I still don't know what to do. I failed her. I should have been... Better. But I wasn't.

The life today was like this dark rain. It came to an end. So I just lay down on the grave, put my head on my paws and closed my eyes.

"It is unwise from some interstellar species to give us technology to leave the Earth - chances that we would use it for star wars are bigger than we would go the next level and use it for peaceful exploration of solar system and beyond." - What is Intelligent Life?

As promised in my last post story about one grim political view of the last forgettable year, please behold another glimpse to the humanity from another angle. Let's move today from raw reality to the reality-inspired fiction and make a little peek into three science-fiction masterpieces. Two of them, product of current almost expired year, that if you ask me, are making this forgettable year, well, little less forgettable. But before Daniel Abraham's and Ty Franck's "Babylon's Ashes", sixth book of The Expanse and "Rogue One: A Star Wars Story", Star Wars sequel, I think this is a perfect moment for me to start the review with another classic, in the most genuine meaning of the word - Arthur C. Clarke's "Childhood's End" that also deals with the same topic - humanity, all his weakness and soundness and the potential future based on our current conditions. And about the war that is, as it seems, inwrought in our core to the bone. So deep, that we still can't imagine a life or our own evolution without it.


In "Childhood's End", Arthur C. Clarke answered the question of what would happen if everybody on Earth disarmed and dismantled all their weaponry. In his novel, alien race forced people to do just that and the result of hypothetical 21st century without militaries and conflict and with just one world-state is described with these words: "The abolition of armed forces had at once almost doubled the world’s effective wealth, and increased production had done the rest. As a result, it was difficult to compare the standard of living of twenty-first-century man with that of any of his predecessors. Everything was so cheap that the necessities of life were free, provided as a public service by the community, as roads, water, street lighting, and drainage had once been".

But we are humans and evolutionary speaking only half a step ahead of the most advanced living creature on Earth in the realm of entire animal world. Therefore, for many years or decades and maybe even centuries in the future, world without armies, animosities and all kinds of hatred will only stay in fantasy stories like this one. On the other end, this is what I admire the most about Arthur C. Clarke. In most of his novels and stories, if not them all, this pacifist note is always present, including two other of his masterpieces "Rendezvous with Rama" and "Space Odyssey" series. Maybe this fact and the one that there are no real heroes in his imagination from the ordinary 'Hollywood' point of view, is what his books will always be considered as classics. "Childhood's End" is no different and the portrayed possible human evolution with total ascension of human collective mind is something that will give you lots to think about days after last page in the book is read. There is also a TV miniseries created last year based on the novel but I warmly recommend a book. They are not comparable after all, even though the script is not too much diverted from the original.


However, to make sure this post is true sequel to the previous one with reflection of this year political affairs or hatred if you will, let's get back to the old good war. The cliche, that if told or filmed right is guaranteed to bring you back success, glory and not the least, money. Please don't get me wrong here, I do like this kind of stories with lots of battles, heroes, villains, happy ends and well known fight between good and evil. After all, worldwide authors are not the ones who created the mess - they are only inspired with current political, religious and other types of conflicts in nowadays Earth and her history. This is the exact truth with "The Expanse", the novel series and last two books in sequel. What we had in first four was largely driven by science fiction and existence of alien protomolecule and the gates system. Last two are all about war and expanding conflict between people living on different planets, moons, stations and asteroids. Even though, concluding the conflict in the end of the "Babylon's Ashes" is anticipated from the beginning and with good guys winning as expected, the story is written pretty well and one year of waiting for conclusion, for me was worthwhile and with reading ended with great dose of entertainment. However, while "Childhood's End" is leaving you with many thoughts with its imaginative ending, "Babylon's Ashes" left only with bitter impression that humanity in its core didn't changed in the span of 200 years and all the hatred survived with only different background. All the racial, class, religious and all kind of known animosities survived just the same and spread across Solar system creating another series of wars, only this time with railguns.

On the other end, and also contrary to "Childhood's End", SyFy TV show of "The Expanse" is really extraordinary and exceptional. It is advertized as the best science fiction show after Battlestar Galactica and I agree fully. First season was simply great and visual effects are only adding another value to the equally exceptional novels. When I first wrote about "The Expanse" in posts Martian vs Expanse and Science of Life in Solar System, I expresed all the hope that all the characters, places, events and scientific tools as well as gravity and its changes, would be portrayed in the series just as it was in the books and after first season I can only confirm that they didn't divert at all and with all the filming technologies and effects managed to provide the same experience as the one from the reading. On some occasions even better, as one space opera, or franchise, is perhaps more suitable for the screen than for just the words. I do recommend both especially because the books are way ahead from the TV show keeping in mind that filming only started last year.


And finally, at the end, the series that doesn't even hide the word "wars", even from its title. Sadly, since first three movies was filmed long ago in the era of the old FX 'analogue' special effects, "the war" in the galaxy far, far away didn't really look too great. Don't get me wrong again now, it was awesome for the time being, but indeed warfare was not the prime theme in the first movies, perhaps with little exception in "The Empire Strikes Back". But even that one only a little. Next three movies came later to fill the gap but, even with decent effects and storyline, with me they left only a feeling for "Star Wars" being more a fairytale for children than one serious franchise. Somebody says Jar Jar Binks? The effect was little improved with last year "The Force Awakens" but I have to admit that I had more hopes in that one. It was good alright, but still the feeling was not really perfect. Maybe over the years we all ended with too much high expectation?

And then just a week ago came "Rogue One: A Star Wars Story". Finally, the 'Star Wars' movie that really, well ... is about the 'war'. The real and raging war. Believable one. With tremendous action and fabulous end. With good guys dying just as the bad ones. With only a hint of the force and fairytales. And with believable death star and exciting space battles. If they removed the sound of spacecrafts in the void of space I would definitely be the happiest person in the theater as this was the only thing I noticed bad in the movie. Maybe for the good feeling, I should credit low expectation I fixed for the projection this time or maybe it was the festivity of the second half of the December or even the fact that Cineplexx opened brand new theater in our neighborhood but nevertheless, like in the end of the movie, I think Star Wars with this one earned new hope for the future.


Well, that would be my glimpse to the world of science fiction for this year. There were more novels and movie sequels I can remember I read or watched during the year (Star Trek Beyond, Patrick Lee's The Breach Series, Matthew Mather's Nomad series, our Game of Life adventure, "The X-Files" season 10 and even decent "10 Cloverfield Lane" and "Spectral") and overall I dare to say that this year and especially this december improved the impression a little for one forgettable year I described in my last post. Let's see what the next one will be in both reality and fiction. Anyways, happy 2017th!

Image refs:
http://gmonster320.blogspot.com/2015/12/childhoods-end-episodes-1-3-reviews.html
http://www.space.ca/the-expanse-season-2-first-look/
http://www.slashfilm.com/star-wars-rogue-one-concept-art/
http://www.wallpaperbetter.com/rogue-one-a-star-wars-story

The Expanse, Expanded (Adam Savage):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p8vR2FB1PGM