First Lines of Richard Butner's "The Adventurists"

 "On the ferry to the island, I saw a man dressed as a jester. His image flased into view in my side mirror as I sat there half-dozing behind the steering wheel. It was midday as we chugged along across the sound, and the sun glared off of the smattering of pickups and SUVs and vans on the deck. For a second, I thought I had dreamed him."

Richard Butner, The Adventurists

 

First Lines of Chris Voss "Never Spilt the Difference"

 "I was intimidated.

I'd spent more than two decades in the FBI, including 15 years negotiating hostage situations from New York to the Philippines and the Middle East, and I was on top of my game. At any given time, there are ten thousand FBI agents in the Bureau, but only one lead international kidnapping negotiator. That was me.

But I'd never experienced a hostage situation so tense, so personal."

- Chris Voss, Never Split the Difference

Essential reading for anyone who needs to negotiate anything. I think about this book all of the time.

The first lines of Becky Chambers "A Psalm for the Wild Built"

"If you ask six different monks the question of which godly domain robot consciousness belongs to, you'll get seven different answers."

- Becky Chambers, A Psalm for the Wild Built

A quirky tale by the author of The Long Way to a Small Angry Planet. Entertaining but felt lightweight, despite the interesting world building (the details about the different gods, history and evolution of robotics and their withdrawal from humanity). I wasn't sure why it left me cold, but after reading Clark Seanor's essay about Chambers at Strange Horizons ("Recycled Air: Wayfarers and the Tyranny of the Everyday") I think that there's very little danger in the book. I never really felt like the characters were in any real danger - either physical or psychological. Perhaps this is because I knew this was the first book in a series, but without that edge it was hard for me to really invest in the plot.

 

First Lines of Alex Hutchinson's "Endure"

 "The broadcast booth at the Autodromo Nazionale Monza, a historic Formula One racetrack nestled in the woodlands of a former royal park northeast of Milan, Italy, is a small concrete island suspended in the air over the roadway. from this rarefied vantage point, I'm trying to offer thoughtful guest commentary to a live-streaming audience of an estimated 13 million people around the world, many of whom have rousted themselves out of bed in the middle of the night to watch. But I'm getting antsy."

- Alex Hutchinson, Endure: Mind, Body, and the Curiously Elastic Limits of Human Performance

Hutchinson book examines what goes into the physical and mental limits of human performance. And there's a lot to cover! At times the book feels likes a collection of articles rather than a cohesive narrative. Regardless, learning more about what drives fatigue and what science is discovering  about overcoming it is fascinating. Much of what he presents is on the cutting edge, with many techniques (e.g., electro-jolts to the brain!) out of the reach of an average athlete. I had some good takeaways, including that simply "swishing and spitting a carbohydrate drink" without consuming it provides endurance benefits: 

"...the mouth appears to contain previously unknown (and as of yet unidentified) sensors that relay the presence of carbohydrates directly to the brain. In Tim Noake's central governor framework, it's as if the brain relaxes its safety margin when it knows (or is tricked into believing_) that more fuel is on the way." (p. 190)

First Lines of Becky Chambers' "The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet"

 "As she woke up in the pod, she remembered three things. First, she was traveling through open space. Second, she was about to start a new job, one she could not screw up. Third, she had bribed a government official into giving her a new identity file. None of this information was new, but it wasn't pleasant to wake up to."

- Becky Chambers, The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet

Fun SciFi novel about the close-knit inter-species crew of the Wayfinder who has signed up for a dangerous but lucrative shipping gig. Succeed, and they'll have sufficient funds to live comfortably. Fail and they'll find themselves in a politically fraught situation with no clear way out.

Chambers is playing a long game here - the main plot plays out over a series of multiple novels, which makes this a relaxed entry into her world. I appreciated the time she took to introduce the characters, providing all of them with varied backstories and motivations. It was a fun read, mainly because the characters are (with one notable brooding exception) refreshingly pleasant and get along with each other.  There's an easy optimism and refined species relations that reminded me of the original Star Trek. However, the crew's easy comradery prevented me from taking their struggles too seriously - there was a lack of edge to the character dynamics. It didn't help that the book reads less like a novel and a collection of interconnected short stories - like the first series of a long Netflix series. 

Regardless, I felt like The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet is an excellent beach read: entertaining and interesting but not too challenging. I enjoyed it and am curious to see if this impression changes as the series progresses.

The Libertarian Exit

In a recent Harpers essay, Hari Kunzru writes an insightful essay about the libertarian desire for freedom. Kunzru shows us how freedom-lovers feel that the systems and cultures in which they reside are limiting their liberty to choose and thus sparking a desire for exiting those cultures. (He also points out the irony that the culture they desire to leave is often what enabled their success in the first place). The root of this desire stems from valuing the "freedom to choose" above all else (Kunzru points us to Milton Friedman as the source here) which inexorably leads libertarians to want to remove themselves from everything that might constrain their choice. 

While I find some libertarian principles alluring in theory, the libertarian groups that I see display their beliefs in selfish words and actions that prevent me from subscribing to them. I believe societal and political constraints are there for a reason; we've seen how unadulterated capitalism (or unconstrained freedom of any kind for that matter) leads to huge inequities of power. Those without power need systemic protections or they will get trampled. An easy example of this are overtime laws that protect hourly workers from businesses overworking them without fair compensation. Libertarians say that these hourly workers can choose to work at these jobs or not, a disingenuous argument that ignores the reality that many of these workers (for a variety of reasons) often don't have the power or ability to move between jobs (i.e., to choose). The argument often continues that laws like this constrain businesses from choosing the best way to operate their business, or from employing people who want to work longer hours. This seems to be easily countered with one of the innumerable examples of businesses that, absent any effective implementation of constraints, end up in unethical or inequitable positions.

Look - many of these laws and constraints libertarians complain about may be poorly implemented, or have unintended side effects. But it seems to me that we should strive is to adapt these rules to work better for everyone, not to throw them out entirely. Until the power in this country is more fairly distributed, rules and laws that constrain employers will remain essential. As Kunzru closes: "Exit is not a benign withdrawal. It imposes costs on those left behind, and the freedom of Exiters substantially depends on the unfree labor of others."

First Lines of John Richardson's "A Life of Picasso Vol 4"

"Of all of the problems besetting Picasso in late 1932, foremost was the misery of married life with his Russian wife, Olga. As recounted in volume III, the former ballerina, who had prided herself, to Picasso's ever-increasing dismay, on being an impeccably ladylike consort and hostess, had become a termagant at home."

- John Richardson, from A Life of Picasso: The Minotaur Years, 1933-1943

Another excellent volume in Richardson's Picasso multi-volume biography. I appreciate how he blends facts, antidotes, and observations about Picasso's artwork in a brisk narrative. He doesn't get too bogged down in details while giving important events the space they need to thrive. My only objection about this book is that it felt too brief: It ended in 1943 as WWII was still raging and affecting everything about Picasso's life. I understand the choice - Picasso's art was about to change as he changed mistresses from Dora Marr to Francoise Gilot (as Richardson puts it, "Picasso's love for [Gilot], and hers for him, would be that of master and pupil rather than master and slave.") Still, I longed for the narrative to continue until the end of the war. With Richardson recently dying, I'm bummed that this will be the last volume and won't continue to cover the latter years of this fascinating artist's life.