read: facial justice

By L P Hartley

Whom I've actually never heard of

As a book concept it was quite fascinating. Equality to the extreme, where even the pretty have to be brought down a notch in pursuit of equality. Instead of pursuing the implications of such a society, I felt that the author went instead into the petty story of an individual. I suppose she(maybe he) did touch upon the decay in a high conforming society (things not upkept), the need for the inspectors who were ironically above the rules. It touched a little on the idea of the underground/aboveground society split although to no effect unlike The Time Machine. All the interesting ideas but explored rather superficially methinks.

Read: First they killed my father

Cambodian massacre from the eyes of a 5 year old survivor. It's so far away from the life I have now I cannot imagine most of the things she described. At such a young age, to feel so much hatred you want to kill, to see so much deaths and where survival is so difficult that there is no room for others (stealing food from her baby sister, from an old granny, ignoring her best friends mother hugging her best friends corpse). It's written in the simple language of a 5 year old, but which made the horrors all the more stark. 

Read: The Quiet Earth

Not quite a science fiction, but more of a human nature story on what happens if everyone else (or most people) in the world got wiped out.

The building up of the character foreboding the eventual outcome where he kills off his only other companion. 

The science is fairly inconsequential to the story, and the bizarre loop ending, reminiscent of Groundhog Day also doesn't quite make sense.

Interesting read with a fair bit of drama though.