Simon Brooks

Almost perfect, except the exclusionist gender generalizations.

Revisado: 03-11-24

About 90% relatable to any sex, 5% specific to women, & 5% sweeping generalizations about how this couldn’t apply to men, who are “always/never” X & then strawmanning that all males are like some highly lauded media personalities is highly insulting & triggering. I appreciated the inclusive introduction to women & anyone who identified as a woman. As a “beta” male who grew up in a household of women, & having a perfectionist mother, wife & daughter I can appreciate that they have a much harder time of it.
Ex. That dads can’t feel the equivalent of mom guilt, or any of the quandaries of trying to be it all, etc. is pure bunk. The rhythm of enjoying the book & garnering all one can to self-understand was frequently disrupted by a tirade of exclusionist & inaccurate stereotyping. It took a moment after each incident to pause, recenter, & recall she was only speaking from her experience, rather than objectively, but I get there’s a general perception.

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esto le resultó útil a 2 personas

A great extension of the original short story

Revisado: 03-08-24

Bittersweet loves this as the original short story, that was broadened to give a richer experience. I hate the journey he takes, but it was & is eye-opening.

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Appendix-worthy essays vs compelling stories

Revisado: 06-17-23

Like listening to dry chronicles (in similar biblical style) until the last two chapters. No real character development or compulsion to connect with the characters. Falls well short of the storytelling of the rest of the series, akin to dry outlines of the history to assist those truly interested in the origins of the stories & songs in the main series.

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A good overview of the various expeditions, but feels fluffed.

Revisado: 04-24-23

The book seems to claim to tell a somewhat unknown story of Mawson. It took approximately 18 hours of charting the history of the Antarctic explorations of Scott, Amundsen & Shackleton & their trials before getting into the the titular story, which was not much better fated.

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Another one fought to the “end”

Revisado: 03-25-23

While a couple of thoughtful nuggets, they were completely lost in an ocean-wide, stream of consciousness style of writing. Having trod a similar path, & being curious, I gave it a swing. It was almost more painful (at least the monotony) to get through than going through my own introspective journey!

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Couldn’t take it any more after 11 hours.

Revisado: 01-23-23

11 hours in, was just too much meandering. With the blunt sentences, you’d think it would’ve flown by. Beyond the ego stroke about a hobby architect who couldn’t attract interest, it was like watching ink dry on a blueprint.

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Felt my own emotional version of a similar story.

Revisado: 11-07-22

This cut kind of close to home. The general pattern of why he started ultrarunning (or previously tri) was similar to mine, & how it developed. Glad I didn’t need to go the extremes of races to find a similar result as he did, & elaborated in the concluding chapters. But his reasons for not racing again also mirror my own, as does his outlook on the how it helped on the journey to a more peaceful place. It was nice to hear the similarity, that this type of journey, with its own twists, nuances or tweaks found resonance, that the experience was not as individual as a run in the middle of a beautiful nowhere.

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Great story! Kids enjoyed! Narrator’s habit of exclaiming most of the delivery was distracting!

Revisado: 11-04-22

The story was great, always good to give the kids an idea of the struggles of others, even so recently (& on-going). It is always good to have a culturally appropriate narrator; however, most of her exposition were exclamations! It sounded like she was trying to be dramatic! You had to listen carefully to determine which parts really needed emphasis! It became off-putting! Marred an otherwise great tale!

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Rambled & never really came together

Revisado: 11-01-22

Struggled to the end, the storylines were barely convergent. The narrator did her best to keep it interesting, but as others said, probably not audiobook material.

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Mars colonization political science thought exercise

Revisado: 09-27-22

In-depth & detailed exploration of the politics of a Mars colony. As exciting as the watching the political process on C-Span. Struggled to finish this first volume, & I won’t be attempting to burn 22-24 more hours each for trilogy episodes 2 & 3!

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