[W8D]⋙ [PDF] Gratis The Mote in God Eye Larry Niven Jerry Pournelle 9781568650548 Books

The Mote in God Eye Larry Niven Jerry Pournelle 9781568650548 Books

Download As PDF : The Mote in God Eye Larry Niven Jerry Pournelle 9781568650548 Books

The Mote in God Eye Larry Niven Jerry Pournelle 9781568650548 Books

There's not much about "The Mote in God's Eye" that I could add to the thousands of existing reviews. So what I can do is comment on the conversion to Kindle.

Really? would be my first comment. Not many would be happy with a book edited this way and sold and I'm not pleased with the poor conversion done here. About one mistake per page is probably a fair estimate. From simple "but" changed to "hut" to "Blaine" changed to... other things. No page numbering. No chapters. Really?

This is available out there on mobi (copyright infringed, to be sure), but I paid for it because, well, firstly 'cause I hate the friggin' thieves who provide the stolen stuff, but also, in the few I have tried to read that were illegal conversions there were so many misspellings and errors it made them unreadable. I'd rather pay for the real deal than get some hacked-up mess for free. I don't watch pirated taken-with-a-camcorder movies nor take 'free' mp3's. I just don't feel it's the right thing to do.

But neither is it right to provide the consumer with junk like this. Was it readable? Sure. Were the mistakes so great that it interrupted and made reading tedious? No. On the other hand, why should I pay for sub-standard translations? Why should any of us? Amazon retains complete control, given the proprietary nature of the product and formats, not to mention they sell it. So they should guarantee the quality. And it's not there.

Sorry Jerry and Larry, but your work is better than this and deserves better. You should be pissed, too.


Tags : The Mote in God's Eye [Larry Niven, Jerry Pournelle] on Amazon.com. *FREE* shipping on qualifying offers. The Mote in God's Eye is a science fiction novel by American writers Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle,Larry Niven, Jerry Pournelle,The Mote in God's Eye,Simon & Schuster,156865054X

The Mote in God Eye Larry Niven Jerry Pournelle 9781568650548 Books Reviews

Let's get "the bad" out of the way first. The version has some odd formatting issues (weird line breaks and such). If you want a book with character studies, this ain't what you're looking for, move along. The characterization of women can be off-putting, but I'll address that below...

Now, for "the awesome" because this book is full of awesome! First, you have a Human Empire 2.0 that is being built and consolidated back to Human Empire 1.0 size, but is less technologically advanced as the prior Empire. Political stuff, outer systems uprisings, civil wars in systems, all of that jazz. Into this already teoubled stew an alien probe ship comes (literally) sailing in. Alien probe's point of origin is determined, and due to circumstances a less-than-ideal set of people get to go and investigate the alien world. Kind of normal SF so far.

Then the authors take us to the Mote and the aloens that launched the probe. An alien culture that is well and truly alien. the humans don't know enough about the culture to even realize what questions they should be asking. They're smart enough to cobble together some somewhat disturbing conclusions based on observations, but the truth behind those observations is not fully appreciated until they leave. None of the characters are able to put the whole picture together alone, which is a nice change from the "Mary Sue" type character you usually find in SF.

The attitudes towards the only female on the ship are very mich a reflection if the 1974 publication date, but the authors make those attitudes believable based on the situation the Human Empire is in and the culture in which it functions. I found the attitudes startingly backwards, but contextually appropriate.

I first read this book when I was 11, reread it when I was 22, and again at the age of 32. At each reading I found new facets to engage me, and remembered the bits that hooked me when I was younger. This book hots every single one of my markers for a true literary classic accessable to most age ranges, the aliens are completely alien (with juuust enough human-relatable attributes to mess with the humans), it is eminantly re-readable, and it casts light on areas of human thought and behavior that could use some (or a lot) of correction. It makes the reader question humanity's attitudes towards wars, differing cultures, and how to treat each other.
I read "Lucifer's Hammer" when I was a kid. I grew up the youngest in a household of avid readers and so was a pretty precocious reader, picking up whatever books my parents and older siblings brought into the house for their own reading. So I was pretty young when I read "Hammer." I'm sure I missed a lot of its subtleties because of my age. But I do remember I liked it a lot. It seemed my dad must have had an interest in apocalyptic fiction, because I remember reading a few of those and found them fascinating. Stephen King's "The Stand" held the top honor of favorite book until "The World According To Garp" came along.

Anyway, when browsing some group messages on Goodreads I first saw mention of "Mote" and, recognizing the authors names from "Hammer," decided to take a look. The rather legendary recommendation from Robert Heinlein kind of sealed the deal.

During the reading of the book, I read more people's thoughts on it, and found everything from best ever to cheesy and outdated. The reviews that called it outdated annoyed me more than deterred me. The book was written in the early 1970s, so allowances must be made. Do you hold it against Moby Dick that they don't have iPhones? So, yeah, the book is dated. Big deal. The message contained in it far outweighs the drawbacks. The story takes place about a thousand years from now, and it frequently mentions the characters using their "pocket computers." In 1972 or so, the authors prognosticated this as being cutting edge tech. I found this amusing, as a mere 40 or so years after its publication, I was reading it on MY "pocket computer," a Fire. Some reviewers found it sexist that there was only one female human character, and she was very outdated due to her beliefs (the "good girls don't need birth control" comment was often cited). Well, in the early 1970s, lots of women felt that way, especially daughters of senators, which she was. The only gripe from other readers that I agreed with fully was the Scottish guy, who was a carbon copy of Scotty from "Star Trek," complete with corny accent and nearly identical dialog ("I kenna DO it, Captain!") It seemed a stretch since the characters from other nationalities, the Russians for example, didn't have attempts made to imitate their accents.

So much for the negatives. In my opinion the pros of this book so far outweigh the cons there's really almost no reason to bother, but I want to be fair.

So the basic story, and I don't want to give too much away (read MINOR SPOILER ALERT), is about the human empire's, which is intergalactic at this point, first contact with an intelligent life form. I found the storytelling of this book masterful. The authors tell a story about how amazing First Contact might be. But the authors plant very tiny seeds, which germinate slowly while you read, that all might not be as well as it seems. It just have me creepy chills as I read, that things rarely go so well without SOMETHING going wrong. It was almost a "Star Trek" meets "Jurassic Park" scenario. If that seems an out-there analogy, consider that most of Michael Crichton's books were about mankind's constant arrogant blunders into disaster by repeatedly failing to consider all possible outcomes and assuming that we can control every aspect of our environments. That's all I'll say on the matter of the storyline.

So, overall impression is that it is worth the read both for the story itself, which is fascinating, and especially for the way the tale is told. It's a well-crafted book.
There's not much about "The Mote in God's Eye" that I could add to the thousands of existing reviews. So what I can do is comment on the conversion to .

Really? would be my first comment. Not many would be happy with a book edited this way and sold and I'm not pleased with the poor conversion done here. About one mistake per page is probably a fair estimate. From simple "but" changed to "hut" to "Blaine" changed to... other things. No page numbering. No chapters. Really?

This is available out there on mobi (copyright infringed, to be sure), but I paid for it because, well, firstly 'cause I hate the friggin' thieves who provide the stolen stuff, but also, in the few I have tried to read that were illegal conversions there were so many misspellings and errors it made them unreadable. I'd rather pay for the real deal than get some hacked-up mess for free. I don't watch pirated taken-with-a-camcorder movies nor take 'free' mp3's. I just don't feel it's the right thing to do.

But neither is it right to provide the consumer with junk like this. Was it readable? Sure. Were the mistakes so great that it interrupted and made reading tedious? No. On the other hand, why should I pay for sub-standard translations? Why should any of us? retains complete control, given the proprietary nature of the product and formats, not to mention they sell it. So they should guarantee the quality. And it's not there.

Sorry Jerry and Larry, but your work is better than this and deserves better. You should be pissed, too.