3.0 KiB
City of Angles
-
Author: u/None *
-
Score: 11
-
Created: 2013-12-03T07:45:56
Post:
Comments:
u/None [+2] (44 seconds later)
It's a webnovel that is not yet fully written and not rationalist per se. I think, however, that it is very smart fiction and the themes are quite interesting.
It's really really complicated to explain the premise without spoiling. There's this city that is kinda like an alternate dimension to which people from Earth are imported, and it's a very strange city. Randomly, new buildings can appear between old buildings; new lines of underground can be added, and the old ones rerouted; roads change direction; entire blocks swap places; the pumbling and electrical systems loop around with no origin for electricity or water but they come anyway; etc. It is a very strange city.
And then there's the Sideways, which is a part that is apart from even the city, to which you can only get if you walk entrances only visible from the corner of your eye. And in there, space isn't quite Euclidean, and weird stuff happens.
There is an overarching plot, and all the short stories of the book are within that plot and are related. They are also more or less chronological, and each more or less follows one character.
u/flame7926 [+1] The Lone Power (a day later)
I liked it and found it very enjoyable to read, but I thought one issue it had was with the world being too unpredictable. Its not good for a plot to be too predictable, but when it is impossible to see coming, as in completely new things are introduced right before the ending, that grates on me. I've found this problem in other of this author's stories as well. Its not deus ex machina's at all, its more the reader not being able to predict the world at all, or know enough of it to guess.
u/None [+1] (2 days later)
Could you elaborate? I didn't get this feeling at all. I had sort of the opposite feeling in that I guessed the "wham" revelation at the end of the first book a full 3 chapters before it. What part of the plot did you feel was unpredictable?
u/flame7926 [+1] The Lone Power (2 days later)
ending and I'm not sure what else, but I remember having the feeling of having no idea where it was going. It just seemed like new elements of the setting or the world were constantly being introduced, which isn't a bad thing, but with it and the book after it like new stuff is being put in and every new thing will affect what happens. I read that author's Anachronauts series right after that though, so I might be transferring some of my impressions from that.
u/None [+1] (2 days later)
Hmm. Well, I had guessed Spoilers about three chapters before the end of the book, so I don't think it's unpredictable. It may be just hard to predict. (Also, do put spoiler tags on that in case anyone reads this.)