3 book recommendations for May, 2021
Danny Crichton interviewed me for TechCrunch about the feedback loop between imagined worlds and the real one. We delve into why I care so much about speculative fiction and how I go about writing it. If you enjoy this newsletter, I strongly suspect that the conversation will be right up your alley.
And now, books I love that you might too:
What Technology Wants by Kevin Kelly has the highest idea/page ratio of any book I’ve read. Kelly offers keen, sweeping observations about why the world is the way it is and how it’s changing, effortlessly zipping from the concrete to the cosmological, from theory to praxis. This book will simultaneously ignite and satisfy your curiosity.
Steering the Craft by Ursula K. Le Guin is a concise guide to storytelling from one of the 20th Century’s greatest writers. Le Guin is as eloquent on craft as she is in any of her prose, and cuts straight to the heart of what makes narrative tick—field notes from a master.
Network Effect by Martha Wells is a tremendously fun space adventure starring Murderbot, a sarcastic killing machine that just wants to binge its favorite serials and would rather die than admit how much it cares about its friends. Compelling characters. Exhilarating action. Subversive twists. Genuine emotion (and humor!). Go read it already.
Bonus recommendation: Brad Feld and Dave Jilk have a new book out this week that applies Nietzsche's ideas to entrepreneurship—offering founders and creators an invaluable set of philosophical tools. Here’s a thread with more backstory.
In other news:
Veil came out a year ago. It’s been amazing to see how far this novel has traveled and to hear from readers about what it means to you. Writers write books, but readers bring stories to life and weave them into the culture. Thank you.
Over in Polygon, Maddie Stone wrote about what's missing in Hollywood depictions of climate futures, and what sci-fi novels are ripe for adaptation to fill the gap (Veil gets a shout-out): "We have great disaster movies. Now we need climate survival movies."
Every company/lab/team should hire writers/vloggers/artists-in-residence to distill their work into stories that invite outsiders along for the ride. Share on Twitter.
Line from my work-in-progress: "His people didn’t give up because the odds were against them. They fought, even if the battle was unwinnable. They fought, knowing that the fight would go on, that time took the side of the dogged."
“Can I get your take on something?”: “When you face a tough decision and need advice, start by writing a description of your situation.”
PASS THE BUCK: a horror screenplay. You move into a new house. Everything seems great, but then creepy stuff starts happening. Instead of opening the trap door that inexplicably appears in the basement, you sell the house and pocket a decent profit thanks to appreciation. Share on Twitter.
I went on The Bookshop Podcast to talk to Mandy Jackson-Beverly about how I write and publish novels.
Ted Chiang on the most interesting aspect of time travel: “Past and future are the same, and we cannot change either, only know them more fully. My journey to the past had changed nothing, but what I had learned had changed everything, and I understood that it could not have been otherwise. If our lives are tales that Allah tells, then we are the audience as well as the players, and it is by living these tales that we receive their lessons.”
Sentiers is one of the most consistently thought-provoking newsletters in my inbox. In this interview, Patrick Tanguay shares what he learned building a paid membership program for it.
Speaking of, a woefully incomplete list of newsletters I love: Roden, Transfer Orbit, Insight, Cabinet of Wonders, Noticing, The Science of Fiction, Exponential View, Monomythical, SELF HELP, Kneeling Bus, Austin Kleon, Dense Discovery, The Society of the Double Dagger, Inneresting, Import AI, Notes from a Small Press, and Seasonal.
David Shafer on writing Whiskey Tango Foxtrot: “I went down a dozen blind alleys and labored over scenes for weeks that turned out to have no role in the story, despite the further weeks I spent trying to cram them in. I avoided looming structural problems by working instead on solid, finished scenes. I am trying to shed or outrun these terrible habits, but probably some of that blind-alleyism is just how I do this thing.”
Novels are like screenplays where every reader is a director shooting their own private version of the film in their respective imaginations with an unlimited budget and seamless special effects. Share on Twitter.
If you enjoy this newsletter and want to support it, become a paid subscriber and tell your friends. Every month, I recommend books, both fiction and nonfiction, that crackle and fizz with big ideas, keep us turning pages deep into the night, challenge our assumptions, help us find meaning in a changing world, and make us think, feel, and grow. In an age of digital abundance, quality is the new scarcity. The right book at the right time can change your life.
When I'm not reading books, I'm writing them. If you savor the promise and peril of new worlds opening up, if you prefer hard questions to easy answers, if you seek adventures that will transport you and leave you changed, then you're the kind of person I write for. You can find my novels right here. Bon voyage, fellow traveler.
Cheers, Eliot
Eliot Peper is the author of Veil, Breach, Borderless, Bandwidth, Neon Fever Dream, Cumulus, Exit Strategy, Power Play, and Version 1.0. He publishes a blog, tweets more than he probably should, and lives in Oakland, CA.
“The Analog series from Eliot Peper is simply terrific science fiction from the (very) near future—I loved all three.”
-Seth Godin on Breach
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