[Dragaera] some comments on _The Incrementalists_

[Philip Hart]

On Sun, 29 Sep 2013, Alexx Kay wrote:

>> Spoilers for _TI_ below.
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> Seriously spoilful.
>>
>>
>>
>> Go read the book if you haven't.
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> 4. Presumably there weren't always ~200 in the group, but I missed how
>> it can grow.  Could Celeste have just made an extra stub and spiked
>> someone with it?
>
> Check out my brief exchange with SKZB at
> http://dreamcafe.com/incrementalists/ for some partial insight into those
> questions.

So sounds like just a feature - someone made the Garden and either chose 
204 or didn't.


>> I'm also confused about how the last century could
>> have been so awful despite benevolent help newly empowered by advances
>> in communications - maybe Celeste was busy in 1930 or so keeping the
>> group from doing anything in Germany, for example?
>
> A) Making things Better is Hard.
> B) Awful by what standards?  Sure, it had lots of unpleasant bits, but it
> was, taken as a whole, better than the one before it, which was better
> than the one before that, and so on.

I probably disagree, but of course it depends on the pre-intervention 
baseline.



>> 5. Some of the handling of the developing friendship and romance ("Ren
>> laughed, and my heart flipped--flopped") seemed a bit telling not showing,
>> though actually it probably wasn't.  Maybe I don't feel enough of a sense
>> of Ren's personality.  It's hard to accept her (really anyone) agreeing to
>> be spiked - if you're not stronger than a soul that has survived many
>> combats, your life effectively ends.  Ok, in her case she's under a geas.
>> But then it's difficult to know what's her and what's Celeste - a theme
>> of the book, in fact, but also a barrier to feeling for the character.
>
> The romance plot reminded my unpleasantly of Late Heinlein.  "We are In
> Love because the Author demands it."

I thought it might have been residual geas, or direct.  I don't know, but 
can imagine, that people under pressure are more likely to fall in love; I 
just didn't always buy the expression of the experience.

Perhaps my objection is really to Phil giving Ren all his triggers after 
knowing her (in person) for a few days, esp. when for all he knows Celeste 
may have access to her memory.



>> 17.  Not 17 chapters, or n*17.  I didn't spot Devera - wasn't actually
>> looking.
>
> She's in the elevator, next to the family of four.

Oh yeah, right, thanks.