5.6 KiB
S.I. Book Nine: Trans: finished
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Author: u/DataPacRat Amateur Immortalist*
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URL: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1pr56pg1KVNdGR9wD27uBP8nNa91k7JUUcsV4Dc4UIAI/edit
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Score: 16
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Created: 2015-10-02T03:45:11
Post:
Comments:
u/None [+5] (7 hours later)
I have no idea how to say this in a tactful way, but the first chapter on your website gave me a terrible, terrible first impression. Is this a book for furries or did I just completely misunderstand it?
u/DataPacRat [+5] Amateur Immortalist (14 hours later)
While the story contains furries, I have been consciously trying to avoid writing "furotica". I've been keeping a specific content-rating rule in mind: I'm willing to include explicit content only if I'm able to write about it with detached, clinical detail as opposed to in a titillating manner.
Or, put another way, I'm aiming for Jack Chalker crossed with Charles Stross and David Brin. I may be ending up closer to Well World than Uplift, but I'd at least like to think it's better than a kick in the pants. :)
u/chthonicSceptre [+5] Highly Unlikely (10 hours later)
It's a book for furries. If you can get past that, it's thought-provoking pulp fiction.
u/derefr [+6] (18 hours later)
Despite all the furry content, I'm not sure it is a book for furries. To me, it's speculative fiction exploring what an (not-necessarily-friendly) AI foom would do if it worked like a wish-granting genie trying to grant everyone's individual wishes at once.
Furries exist in reality, thus their 'wishes' would be manifest in such a "foomed" future as well. But there are plenty of other weird desires people have, that also end up manifest, and not one of them are really what the books are "about." There are unbirthing zones, catgirl-ization zones (which later become googirl-ization zones), and presumably zones for any other weird thing the human id has ever wanted.
But not every zone (or even most of them) was born from a fetishistic desire; some people would really like Optimus Prime to exist, so he does, as a Pepsi-branded 18-wheeler. A lot of people want their spiritual beliefs to be true, so the Native Americans now get to reincarnate by communing with spirits. And so forth.
Bunny's mecha-fursuit, on the other hand, I'm not sure how to justify, but it feels like it does have a justification—the feeling that someone, at some point, made a rational decision that an egg-laying rabbit would be the most suitable form for someone exploring the post-singularity future. Maybe it'll get revealed eventually, but it doesn't really need to.
u/chthonicSceptre [+3] Highly Unlikely (19 hours later)
Ah, I should begin by saying that I agree with your explanation. My phrasing of the first sentence was meant to be in agreement with the question.
That said, you did kind of undermine your own argument about "someone, at some point, made a rational decision that an egg-laying rabbit would be the most suitable form for someone exploring the post-singularity future." In particular: "Furries exist in reality, thus their 'wishes' would be manifest in such a "foomed" future as well."
Regardless of the narrator's circumstances, and even regardless of the quality of the work, it really is obvious that the author is a furry.
That said, it does read a bit like the Well World stuff.
u/DataPacRat [+3] Amateur Immortalist (2 minutes later)
Took me longer than expected to write, but I've finally made my way through the next section of Bunny's adventures in Post-Singularity-land. I'm trying out a new comm protocol for beta-reading, but feel free to use GDocs' commenting system to add whatever constructive criticism you feel appropriate.
u/chthonicSceptre [+3] Highly Unlikely (58 minutes later)
I would like to mention that I was betareading S.I. until book two or three, at which point life happened and I stopped. I just want you to know that I'm really sorry, and as soon as I have time I'll go back to annoying you in GDocs.
It really is a good story.
u/DataPacRat [+3] Amateur Immortalist (14 hours later)
Thank you for the compliment, and I look forward to your further suggestions for improvement.
u/None [+3] (an hour later)
I just want to mention that I was reading S.I., and as a resident of the Niagara Peninsula who has spent significant time in an around Brock University, the section there was creepy as hell. I've been down the trail by Alphie's Trough. I've ran the stairs of Schmone Tower. I've looked out over the lake towards Toronto.
I've swum in Lake Ontario in the middle of the night.
Like, damn. Creepy.
u/DataPacRat [+2] Amateur Immortalist (14 hours later)
Like, damn. Creepy.
Believe it or not, I was initially reluctant to bring Bunny to the region, but I'm glad that the decision has paid off. :)
u/liamash3 [+2] Mizu (3 days later)
Ah, this. I remember reading this on Sufficient Velocity, back in 2014. Then I forgot about it until now. It's an interesting exploration of a potential future world, from what I recall, but does tend to lean towards the 'furry' element as others have said. Although at the point I'd read up to, that was only in the fact the main is an anthropomorphic bunny-girl who lactates, IIRC.
Worth a read for some interesting guesses as to what a post-singularity gone wrong could end up as, I feel.