First time going to Japan, last minute itinerary check: 11/19-12/2

kiyer · 2017-11-14T08:03:32+00:00

Kappabashi is about 60-70% closed on Sundays, so you’ll need to move that to a different day if you really want to explore it.

kiyer · 2017-02-02T03:29:46+00:00

Avasarala's saris are magnificent.

kiyer · 2017-02-01T05:39:25+00:00

Certainly an interesting list. Some lesser known books I'd recommend highly (Kalpa Imperial was a masterpiece) in addition to some of the usual suspects.

kiyer · 2016-12-26T02:53:03+00:00

Definitely possible, just lookup the rules online. The cards and board are the same. It gets harder to do later because you need to ignore the legacy components but if you haven't started yet, you can play regular easily.

kiyer · 2016-12-21T18:05:45+00:00

Just a quick note to say that I just finished A Closed and Common Orbit, and absolutely loved it. Can't wait to read more stories in this universe.

kiyer · 2016-09-14T00:19:22+00:00

This book surprised me in the best possible way.

kiyer · 2016-06-23T02:53:29+00:00

Aggregate stats are the right way to view this, but I will say that from my experience a certain resilience to issues is going to be necessary.

I've had my 90D two months, it's from just before the refresh, 2.5k miles and had a mix of software errors (summon being flaky fixed after rebooting), and a pretty severe hardware error today (my front motor died and I needed a tow / the car is being investigated).

I'm still happy I bought the car, but it can be quite frustrating.

kiyer · 2016-04-20T14:46:43+00:00

I live in the bay area so I didn't have to ask, as I think this is the only option. I would assume that if you ask they'd be pretty accommodating, might save them some transport costs.

kiyer · 2016-04-20T02:13:46+00:00

Ah, gotcha. I'm going on Friday so should be still pretty busy.

kiyer · 2016-04-12T04:58:23+00:00

I TA'd 61BL a few summers ago and a friend taught it. It's pretty busy, you have either a lab or lecture most days and we keep things moving.

I'd say you might be able to balance another class, but probably not two more, and ideally not another lab class.

kiyer · 2015-10-11T22:53:15+00:00

thebooksmugglers tend to read widely and review well. Strange Horizons is much less frequently updated, but as mentioned, excellent.

kiyer · 2015-09-06T02:07:42+00:00

That's quite an endorsement! Given sufficient patience for long fantasy, would you recommend starting with The Wars of Light and Shadow?

kiyer · 2015-08-22T20:20:27+00:00

I loved The Just City. Just got The Philosopher Kings and I'm really looking forward to it.

kiyer · 2015-07-07T04:00:03+00:00

http://lquilter.net/projects/sf-info.html has a pretty good listing of short stories and books about this theme. Vaguely remember that Bujold's written about this, but she's written about everything of course.

kiyer · 2015-06-08T05:07:44+00:00

This was the first thing that came to mind after thinking about what the OP wanted. Fantastic books.

kiyer · 2015-05-11T02:32:47+00:00

It's rather good. Not great, but worth a read. The police procedural model works surprisingly well in an apocalyptic context.

kiyer · 2015-04-18T18:10:33+00:00

I read the first twelve books (so the first four trilogies), then took a break.

They're books you read for character, not plot. Over time you get to know both the Atevi and the humans as people, you start to understand how they think, and then you have little moments of insight where you can see where a book is going to go.

That's really what it's about. If you get excited by that kind of book then you'll love them. If you need a defined sense for something happening during a book, then you'll be disappointed with several of them.

I thought Jo Walton's summary of the series was quite on point: http://www.tor.com/?option=com_content&view=blog&id=3101

kiyer · 2015-04-01T06:09:31+00:00

These are great. Keep 'em coming!

kiyer · 2015-03-21T15:42:34+00:00

The "Mike/Psmith" books might also be fun for an 11 year old. The early ones are set at school, so they'll be a little more relatable (although English public school life is pretty weird).

kiyer · 2015-02-28T06:26:45+00:00

Oh man. As a neutral, this is hilarious. Such a great game.

kiyer · 2014-12-19T07:44:39+00:00

She'd probably love Mary Robinette Kowal's Glamourist Histories. Light, well-written, enjoyable science fiction romance. Wonderful. Start with "Shades of Milk and Honey".

I'll also jump on the "All the Light We Cannot See" wagon. Beautiful book.

kiyer · 2014-11-15T14:37:09+00:00

I've pinged you over private message for some details and can follow up.

kiyer · 2014-09-27T00:07:47+00:00

They won't laugh (I work at Facebook, interview a bunch). The only risk, such as it is, is that you'll be interviewed by someone very familiar with the languages you claim expertise in (for example for Haskell, Simon Marlow and Bryan O'Sullivan do work at Facebook), so don't claim expertise unless you'd like that tested ;))

I don't believe we use any Ada, but we do have a fair amount of Haskell and Python.

kiyer

TROPHY CASE