Jacob Ford

Read in the voice of smart passion

Revisado: 10-10-19

This book is read just right: emphatically, empirically, empathically. Nothing too over the top, with outrage where outrage is written.

It codifies political passions and movement goo into solid ideas, theories, history, and sometimes even code people like me need to latch onto.

It’s really good, and motivating.

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Lovingly paired future & past, in odd raspy voices

Revisado: 05-02-19

In this apocalyptic novels with out-of-order flashbacks to the days before society's breakdown, future and past pair nicely: I think the way you're supposed to pretend wine pairs nicely with your food.

A little unnecessary (and literal) "as you know Bob" and some inconsistency between what technical details are explains vs. which are not, and which violence is detailed and which is conveniently censored.

It's a good technically thought-out apocalyptic book.

The thing I really just couldn't handle was Nancy Wu's voice for all the male characters. Kind of a gratey, raspy mixture of lifeguard bro and Batman parody. It's not fun to listen to, and in many instances I feel it brought a tone to their lines that wasn't supposed to be there. A couple instances where tone or sarcasm felt invented on female characters too.

But! Wu did bring a loving warmth to the Chinese characters as they expressed love and dismay though a cultural divide (a big part of the book) and as they pronounced—sometimes struggling to pronounce—English phrases and names. I thought that was a lovely audible addition to the story.

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Facts plus Wonder

Revisado: 02-23-19

Just the right tone for the end of civilization. Sometimes a little too much dwelling on symbols until we’re sure to have gotten in. And then annoyingly little dwelling on some plotwise kindling in the end.

But oh well. Do read it; it’s a nice one.

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If you can, listen at the subject

Revisado: 06-10-18

Listen as you pace Saint Marks. It’s really a comforting balance of footnoted history and soothing anecdote.

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Author’s Lovely Melodrone

Revisado: 05-24-18

Authors have a way of reading their words without performing them. Pronouncing then without proscribing emotion. It’s a good thing, like trusting a single typeface to tell the ensure story of book, despite all tones and emotions, which it will.

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Has a lot, missing a few things

Revisado: 05-17-18

Like a more academically dense and daylong 99% Invisible episode, the thoughts and conclusions and births of traditions that have become just another part of life today, from a time where the birth of new traditions was just another part of life.

What’s missing: a PDF companion with all the images and figures. You get embarrassingly lost hearing text read to you that was clearly designed to be set next to the image being discussed.

What’s strange: each layer (chapter) can’t quite decide if it’s self-contained or linear with its neighbors. They reference each other in both directions and contain redundant information, but are labeled in sequence and at least seem to be trying to build up some overall story. The lesson: just don’t be confused when a chapter briefly recaps something to you which you thought you’d heard a whole chapter on an hour ago. That’s exactly what’s happening, and you didn’t miss or misunderstand anything.

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The most self- and extra-referential of all the Hitchhiker’s Guides

Revisado: 05-16-18

Martin’s a lovely reader, the book has sci fi’s only good and cute romance that not academically metaphoric, and the only annoying bit is the stock musicy interludes they insist on inserting between random chapters.

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Good, simply

Revisado: 12-02-17

This book is so simply and well written. It does not overembellish. It does not dumb down. It is not boring nor is each chapter written as an isolated story sometimes repeating information from a previous chapter (I felt Walter Isaacson’s Jobs biography did this a bit). It celebrates a designer and his work without over-glorifying simple things or suppressing the joy and fun and happy mistakes of the process.

Leander scrapes up all he can scrape up from a famously secret company, and Simon reads the book at just the correct pace. It’ll feel slow at first, but it’s correct. I recommend resisting the urge to speed it up.

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Kitsch Worth Trying

Revisado: 08-10-17

The writing here is okay, and it does pain me to say this because I do think Alyssa is a person I’d like to spend a day with.

The writing is awkward, with good stories strewn in strange places for vague reasons which I think involve morals. Some anecdotes are way overcooked with explanation and exposition, while others which seem to have real West Wing grit end up annoyingly dry.

The final chapter is actually titled “Conclusion.”

So a lot (though not all) of these chapters read like the front flap of a book in an airport newsstand, but, yes, I do think they are worth reading.

It’s a good book, with good stories, and proves that every confident and inaccessibly dream-achieving person is dealing with the same anxiety, annoying dietary restrictions, dying cats, and requests to get other people Diet Coke that you are dealing with yourself.

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A hint at what this generation might be studied for

Revisado: 07-30-17

Don’t listen to this for prose. Don’t listen to this for scandal. Definitely don’t listen for its weird cover art. Listen because it credits the thousands who invented the iPhone, and not any one inventor.

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