of Lars J. Nilsson

OK, so here’s a short rant on whet I don’t like with so called “epic” fantasy: the readers and the editors. It’s prompted by a “listopia” list over at Goodreads. Listopia is a place where massive lists of books are created and members vote on the “best” books, and the list changes accordingly. The list triggering my annoyance is of course called “The Best Epic Fantasy“.

I’ll blatantly steal the 20 first books on the list for this post:

1. Harry Potter (#1-7)
2. A Game of Thrones (A Song of Ice and Fire, #1)
3. The Chronicles of Narnia (#1-7)
4. The Hobbit
5. The Eye of the World (Wheel of Time, #1)
6. The Fellowship of the Ring (The Lord of the Rings, #1)
7. His Dark Materials
8. The Two Towers (The Lord of the Rings, #2)
9. The Return of the King (The Lord of the Rings, #3)
10. The Name of the Wind (Kingkiller Chronicle #1)
11. Wizard’s First Rule (Sword of Truth, #1)
12. A Storm of Swords (A Song of Ice and Fire, #3)
13. Eragon (Inheritance, #1)
14. A Clash of Kings (A Song of Ice and Fire, #2)
15. Assassin’s Apprentice (Farseer Trilogy, #1)
16. The Gunslinger (The Dark Tower, #1)
17. Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone (Harry Potter, #1)
18. American Gods
19. Dune (Dune Chronicles, #1)
20. The Belgariad

So what’s up? A quick look tells us we’ve got Tolkien on 4 spots. Fine, Tolkien is Tolkien, but if we partly discard him we get: 3 children’s books at top 4, Harry Potter as the number one epic fantasy, one science-fiction master piece, 8 standard boring run of the mills fantasy tropes (young man discovers his destiny as king, magician, whatever), no less than 3 George R.R. Martin when there should have been none, only 4 books with any kind of originality, and for fucks sake: the Belgariad? Oh, and I’m ignoring Lewis altogether. Why? Because I really, really don’t like him. This is a rant, remember? My blog, my rules.

(The lists have a problem we should acknowledge: duplications abound. Also, to be “epic” you probably want the entire series, not single books, and hence you’ve got a mismatch of “boxed sets” and single volumes.)

Now then…

Run-of-the-mill fantasy: You know the drill: young man, unknown destiny, dragons, gods trapped under mountains, intelligent horses and a man with fire instead of eyes. Any questions? And yes, that means Tolkien, Eddings, Hobb, Paolini, Goodkind, Rothfuss and Jordan, right there. And to a certain degree Rowling and as well. Not all of them are bad, mind you, but it is extremely annoying that, for example, Goodkind and Eddings ends up a “the best epic fantasy” list.

Romanticism: Certain people are born to rule, born to magic, or otherwise special. Forget egalitarianism, forget democracy, we’re back to the rule of the elite again. OK, so I’m ripping of David Brin here, but the man’s got a point: where’s the visions and the originality? And do we really want a world you’re either born with an ability or you’re not, and you’re not then tough luck. Who questions Aragorns right to rule?

What editor? Hello Goodkind, Rothfuss, Jordan, Rowling, Paolini, Hobb and Martin! Some of the blame of the state of fantasy must be put at the feet of the editors. When an author becomes famous, apparently all rules are off. There’s a very simple explanation for it as well: the readers does not care, they expect the books to be massive. If I’m not mistaken it’s been shown that when it comes to fantasy, thick books sells more than thin ones. Now tell me what that says about the readers…

What does that leave us with? Well, Tolkien should be on the list, that’s a given, and you could argue that he shouldn’t even be on the list at all. But after that? From the top: Jordan had a brilliant voice the first couple of volumes, and for that he deserves recognition. Then of course the “what editor?” sickness kicked in. It’s a pleasant surprise to find Pullman on the list so high up. Originality? Really? I loved Rothfuss flair, but then the “what editor?” destroyed the second book. Stephen King? Well… Yeah, why not? I haven’t read the entire saga yet so I won’t comment. But what I’ve read is certainly head and shoulders above much of the competition. Then Gaiman, and an applaud from me. And Dune, which is undeniably science fiction (although I agree some so called SF is actually Fantasy in space-clothes), but: still damn good.

That’s the rant for tonight: You understand why I don’t like it now? This is apparently what people want. It is what they think is the best. Children’s books, reused plots and romanticism. It’s depressing as hell. I love Fantasy, but I understand why people look down on it: just read that list one more time and I think you’ll understand as well.

A Shadow in Summer by Daniel Abraham

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

This will be a short review as I actually finished this book a while back, and it wouldn’t be fair trying to outline more than the big pictures given my horrible memory.

I really wanted to give this book more than 3 stars. On a scale of 10 it would have been a strong 7. And the reason I wanted to rate it higher is simple: It is not you ordinary run of the mill fantasy. No any orphan discovering their destiny as kings/magicians/gods. No cheesy love story (but a nice triangle, if you know your Arthurian legend you’ll be right at home). A unique magic system. And so on.

However, I never really got gripped by the characters, and I never believed in the story, and here’s why: The magic system, unique as it is, is presented without limits. In this book we’re led to believe that there is *no* boundary in sight; one single “demon” can reach out and rip every single unborn baby right out of their mother’s womb. Literally. From a continent away. And naturally the first thing I ask myself is: why don’t they?

So let’s get abstract for a moment: why don’t they? In any believable world there will be people taking advantage of power, and if you introduce magic that is controllable, you need to explain why the greedy, evil or power hungry has not taken over the world. If you’re going to employ magic make sure there’s things you can’t do, and make sure your readers, who don’t have the implicit knowledge of your characters, are told. You don’t have to go to Harry Potter extremes, nor Eddings but both are examples of magician stories, and within both it is clear that you can’t do everything you want, that there are boundaries for you might.

Power without boundaries is meaningless.

So no, I didn’t really get gripped. I probably will read the rest in the quartet. But not for a while. There’s a lot of other books out there.

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Random birdsong, disturbing your morning sleep:

• Very good piece about how we treat ourselves. Self-help of the month! “You Are Unique, Not Special”: http://t.co/7Uc6NPy
• From Jason Robbilard: “Barefoot and Natural Running Form: How Do I Know If I’m Doing It Right?”: http://t.co/t00aFhH
• An old classic: “Hell’s Angel: Mother Theresa”, by Christopher Hitchens: http://ow.ly/5RxAl
• Brilliant! “Debunking Kalams Cosmological Argument”: http://ow.ly/5QccN
• From Lifehacker.com: “Think before you speak”: http://ow.ly/5DVoV
• Robbilard again: “Run for Fun: A Running Plan for the Rest of Us”: http://t.co/S6GBtTZ
• More self-help: “Embrace change”: http://ow.ly/5qzx5

Enjoy!

A new year, a new part of Kungsleden. The crew this year was V+R together with little sister C, but also an old acquaintance in the form of Gustav who went with us a short hike a few years back, and now graced us with his presence again. This was to be a warm-up for a longer trek into Sarek later this year. However, for various reasons the long trek got cancelled, so so far this is my only hike this year. Not that I have given up entirely, I may still get up there one more time!

New gear? Well, if you’ve read previous accounts you’ll be unsurprised that, yes, we had new gear! The most spectacular of which was that both C and Gustav had decided to buy new tents, and in fact single person tents (although Gustav’s Helsport Ringstind 2 is actually a small 2 man tent). So 5 persons had 4 tents As documented to the left, C had the good taste to buy a Hilleberg Akto, just like mine. But shiny and red instead!

My main new gear was a new backpack. Namely the brilliant Granite Gear A.C 60. And damn! That’s a good buy. After a small adjustment it became the most comfortable backpack I have ever worn. My only gripe is the lack of places to tie external gear. But as I bought the optional top lid as well I can always add than when I need a few extra litres. Without the top lid I did fit a 6 day hike, but without cutting down more on volume going past 8-9 days may a stretch. But having said that: I’m extremely happy with it!

Day One; A Light Evening Walk
We decided to meet Gustav at Ammarnäs, and to have dinner at STF. The trip up was uneventful, apart perhaps from the fact that none of us knew how to find STF when we did arrive. Details, details.

As we’ve done previous years we used the excellent Bussgods to send a bag ahead of us down to Hemavan. It is very nice to be able to get a pair of jeans and a t-shirt on after your first post-hike shower! Worked this year as well, apart from the fact the the pick-up place in Hemavan had changed to the Airport which had closed when we arrived. Ooops. We did get the stuff though thanks to R and the help of the staff at STF.

After dinner we set out towards Aigerstugan. Our idea was simply to try ot get above the tree-line before nightfall. It quickly turned out that in order to get there we needed to go the entire stretch to Aigert. Which we did. The First night camp was a few hundred meters past the hut.

We did meet a fellow wanderer coming the opposite way: as a true minimalist he walked in sandals and had lightweight gear, including an umbrella (!). He talked constantly about the TERRIBLE, TERRIBLE mosquitos, and gadflies, and flies, and GOD! THE MOSQUITOES! Er… I may be exaggerating, but according to him we were heading into the worst stretch of fly and mosquito-ridden mountain imaginable. That put us on the mood. But for the record, and we’ll get back to it, it wasn’t that bad by a long stretch.

Which reminds me: The nice lady at Aigertstugan was the first person to be able to tell me if, and why mosquitoes “goes to bed” at eleven. Almost always during my hikes, at about eleven o’clock in the night, the mosquitoes disappear. I have imagined some sort of subliminal food-and-sleep clock that calls the little buggers home, but I appear to be wrong. It’s simpler than that: If the temperature drops low enough the mosquitoes becomes dormant. So a really warm night in the mountains they’ll stay awake. Which they did the first night, just to prove her point

Day Two; Close Thunder
From Aigert to Serverstugan is a straight 20 km walk. But fairly flat, and to be honest, not very exciting. Luckily we got artificial excitement though: Midday we walked straight into a thunderstorm. For those of you who haven’t been in the mountains when the thunder is rolling around (yes ‘around’, not as you’d expect: ‘above’) your head, it is a special experience.

We where kind of lucky anyway and managed to bypass the worst of the rain until the last couple of hours which gave us plenty of fairly nice weather anyway. I have it by rumor that R and Gustav stopped and took a bath at one of the lakes. But bath-chicken that I am I think their just making it up to appear macho.

At the end of the day we where rather wet and the weather didn’t seem to let up. This early in the hike we really didn’t feel like packing wet tents, and when we arrived at Serve, and immediately was served lemonade on the house and putting our feet up, we decided to do something new: namely to stay in the hut as opposed to somewhere close. Apart from the fact that it was very warm inside at times, we had a relaxing evening and night.

Day Three; Oh Migod, the Gadflies!
So, our friend from the first day wasn’t entirely wrong: I have never seen, let along been stung by, so many gadflies. At the end of the day you where numb and just couldn’t give a shit about them any more: Let the little bastard sting, I’ll kill it when I’ve mustered enough interest. Oh bother!

Apart from that, this was a rather nice day, with just a little bit of rain as we approached Tärnasjön. At which point we had a choice to make: If we wanted to attempt an ascent of Norra Sytertoppen during the trip, an extra day for weather-adjustments could be good. And since there’s a very conventient boat across Tärnasjön, we could press on to Syterstugan the same day. This would cut one day of walking (mainly though birch woods, oh poor us!) and position us right at Syterskalet for the next day. Said and done!

Did I say nice weather? Well, as we arrived close to Syterstugan it became rougher. We could see heavy rain moving in the valleys. Me managed to pass through the outskirts of one during our walk, but the motherload hit us when we had pitched our tents and cooked dinner. In fact: R handed out dinner through the tent door and then me and C (having separate tents) had to run for it! Heavy rain? Oh yes… But I didn’t get too wet, and I’ll admit: sitting in my tent with the almost deafening sound of the rain and wind on the canvas, eating warm food and sipping whisky made me a very happy camper indeed.

Day Four and Five; Into a Post Card
Syterskalet is one of those iconic images of the Swedish mountains that makes a great image, but is even greater when you’re actually within it. This day started grey and boring but ended up with sunshine coming though. And we did find perhaps the best camping spot we’ve ever had.

So here’s the tip for anyone passing by who want to find the place to camp: east of Viterskalsstugan you can wade over Syterbäcken to get either up into Viterskalet or to follow the path up to Norra Sytertoppen. Just wade across the water and you have a big flat grassy plain you can stay at. But do make sure you pitch the tent so that you can lie and watch Syterskalet in the morning light. I did. And when the tent gets hot in the morning, opening up to a vista like the one to the left explains why I hike. If you still don’t understand, you’re a lost cause.

In fact, we stayed at the same place day five. C, R and Gustav went up to Norra Sytertoppen while me and V explored Viterskalet. On the whole, I think the ascent was the right choice, but V had a bad foot and my legs was a bit too tired so we opted for a simpler day. Not that I’m complaining, the weather was nice and spending a day with V is a luxury I too seldom get to do.

In the afternoon Gustav decided to press on towards Hemavan. He really wanted to catch an early bus home the day after. The rest of us was in no such rush as we weren’t flying out until the day after and opted to stay. I mean, with that kind of camping spot, you really don’t want to move! So Gustav packed up and walked away. And there was much rejo… Er… wailing and gnashing of teeth.

Day Six; Descent
Day six was basically just getting down to Hemavan. A nice, short trek ending with the birch woods in the Hemavan alpine center. Not too much to say about really. We did end the day spliendidly: first a shower, then coffee and a cake, then a beer or two in the sun, then pizza and beer. Really, is there anything more to life?!

Yes, we have pretty pictures!

Now, excuse me while I go dreaming about my second trip this year…

This post is a month late, I know. But it is also kind of depressing to write as this is my first failed batch of beer. Here’s what happened: First of all the yeast behaved strangely indeed (as described here), and then I got an enourmos amount of gunk and compared to the small batch size I had problems getting a clear beer into the bottles: there was always a bit of dirt following in. And then… Something must have gone wrong: the beer went sour and undrinkable. Infection? Possibly. Damn shame.

But not to cry! Autumn is here, which means I just had an opportunity to try it again, only this time with fresh hops! That report will be in a following post. Up and onwards!

Embassytown by China Miéville

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

This is, beyond doubt, a very ambitious book. Playing with the idea of language as the foundation of our self-awareness, the author builds up a world where humans live by the grace of their “hosts”, a wildly alien species which does not understand speech if it is not spoken by two mouths simultaneously, but one mind. All utterances the hosts make in Language (notice capital ‘L’) are true; they cannot consciously lie. Also, strangely enough, they cannot “refer”: all symbols in the language must be precise. For example they’ll say “the glass which is half-full sitting in the window”, instead of simply “that glass”. The word “that” does not exist in Language. From there on it gets stranger.

This is “the new weird”, so don’t expect anything you can relate to. Perhaps my attention span is low, or my memory for detail deficient, but I never got hooked, the expositions always left me hanging. There was always this thing or creature I wasn’t quite sure what it actually was, and it distracted me from the story. I cannot for the life of me even describe what the “hosts” look like, according to the author, even now: I have no clue.

The character building is sketchy, but wonderful, and together with the cheer “what the hell is this really about”-ness kept me going.

Now. I’m a lunch-time poet and a couch philosopher, and I admit to some confusion: philosophy of language was never my strong point. Also, it get’s harder due me never getting the hang of the world building. But here’s some questions: Is it at all possible to imagine a creature which is not incapable of lying due to nature, but to language? Does a language which does not allow for referrals at all make sense? And the big one: the hosts only understand Language spoken by humans if it is spoken with two voices but a unified mind, but this begs the questions: how the hell does it know it’s a unified mind?

That last question almost had me stop reading. As far as I can tell we get no good answer to that, and it is central to the entire story.

By the way, consider this: Asked by Edge.org, “what do you believe but cannot yet prove?”, American philosopher of mind (and, I admit, my one of my heroes) Daniel C. Dennet, answered something along the lines of “that language is a prerequisite for consciousness”. That without language we wouldn’t have been able to be conscious, or even get there: first you get the language, then you evolve the consciousness from there.

So yes, I accept that language shapes the way we are and the way we see ourselves, but most of the time, when the book lingers over some strange detail of the hosts communications, I was distracted by “how the hell would that work?”, or “is that even possible?”, or simply “er… what?”. Which somewhat diminishes my returns from this book.

However, in the end the author kept me reading. And, I’ll give him extra points for trying, and some more more originality. But it is not a book I expect to return too.

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So, I did a an experimental batch last week. The brewing went alright considering it was a year since my last attempt. The only real glitch was the boil-off. For those of you not in the know, this is the amount of water that you’re boiling away while adding hops to the beer. And this is important as the strength of your beer will depend on how much water you have in proportion to the malt (which is transformed into alcohol and carbon dioxide by the yeast).

So, how much was I off? Well, for some reason I boiled off almost a liter more that planned, and ended up with an OG on 1.068 instead of for 1.054. Hum…

The next little scare was more serious: normally your fermentation barrel starts making these little “plop” sounds as the yeast starts to work, and this is how you know that  you’re on the right track. I heard nothing but one single, timid little plop after 48 hours. And then… nothing. A bit worrying, because if the yeast isn’t taking hold the batch is in trouble. I did have a peek and saw a healthy amount of froth in the barrel, indicating that somehow, something was at work.

So, I decided to go to a secondary fermentation stage a bit earlier than usual after only 5 days. Which calmed my nerves, the beer had a healthy smell and the gravity was down at 1.018, so well on it’s way to the estimated final gravity of 1.014. Phew!

Here I lost more of the final volume as the amount of yeast compared to the batch size was ridiculous, and there was a lot of frooth and yeast residue I couldn’t use. But hell, if I get a couple of bottles through it’ll be alright: this is an experiment after all!

And how did it taste? Really, really promising! I’m a happy nerd! To celebrate I added some hops, more Svalöf Mauritz, to the secondary fermentation (“dry hopping”) to see if I can get a brilliant aroma out of this one. Stay tuned, next week it goes on bottle!

Random birdsong, collect for your amusement:

• “Don’t base your decisions on the advice of people who don’t have to deal with the results.” @MoreedMurrar
• Self-help must-read of the day, “15 Style of Distorted Thinking”: http://ow.ly/5kZYU
• As the man says, easier said than done. Still good. Via @boingboing: http://ow.ly/5kZOw #stoicism
• “Where not all in it together: That bankers still gets bonuses is like Bin Laden getting air bonuses after 9/11.” – Greg Russel
• Stephen Law on Pseudo-profundity: http://ow.ly/5j2fQ
• Independent testing on minimal running shoes? Hell yes: http://j.mp/kC2IOV

So I’m back from the exile in Spain. And you know what that means don’t you? Yeah, that’s right, I’m starting a new brew. Or at least, I’ve ordered what I need for my next brew.

My mother has a small cottage outside Vingåker, and as a boy I used to run around there every summer. Hell, I still run around there whenever I have time. Imagine my surprise as a budding beer brewer to find hops growing justbeside the road. Well, perhaps I shouldn’t have been surprised, hops where growing at almost every farm or small homestead in Sweden back in the days.

So I thought this one will be a tribute: Last autumn I got my hands on some of the hops, and as I only managed to get a few grams, I’ll pair it with Czech Saaz and Swedish Svalöf Maurit, with pale malt, to ultimately become a Blonde Ale. A light, not very strong or bitter summer ale, to go perfectly with light summer days.

And for you nerds, here’s what I’ll use:

• 60% extra light malt (extract)
• 40% light malt (extract)
• 1/5 Saaz – 60 min
• 1/5 Saaz – 20 min
• 1/5 Svalöf – 20 min
• 2/5 Vadslund – 10 min
• Wyeast “American Ale”

The brew will start on Monday. Whish me luck!

Born to Run by Christopher McDougall

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Here’s a hyped book indeed, but having sat through it in one go (6 hours) it is a well deserved 5 star.

Others will expand on the content, so I’ll concentrate on a few highlights. And there are many in this book. Part adventure story, scientific discovery and party book, it’s a rip roaring extacy ride with a lot of impossible-to-let-go pages.

Characters: what an intriguing lot of personality! From the cadaverous mystery of Caballo Blanco (“the white horse”) to narcoleptic hipster kids and obsessed ultra-marathon runners, this book has them in abundance. And the author treats them all fair and square. Very nicely done.

Language: erratic, somewhat slang-ridden, but in my mind, nicely flowing and entirely appropriate. If it leaves you put off, I can sympathise, but when I got past the first 5% (yes, I’m on a Kindle) it just felt… Right.

Interesting stuff: shitloads. I’m a nerd with a passion for hiking, I’ve been running since early adulthood, and yes, last couple of months I’ve started looking into the whole “barefoot movement” thing. Still, this book had me hooked to figure out what the scientist would say, something you don’t always associate with “page turning”.

On the whole, it is a charismatic book about charismatic people and the lost love for running. It resonated in me as it seemed to have done in many others.

And yes, I’m now officially playing with a very different way of running than I’m used to. If it works out, I’ll let you know.

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