To Read & To Write

This fast-paced yet contemplative thriller by Japanese writer Tomohito Moriyama and translated into English by J.D. Wisgo brings up all the best topics and themes in excellent science fiction: artificial intelligence, duty vs. personal inclinations, euthanasia, paranoia, and all kinds of questions regarding human nature itself. Two Of Six: A Captain’s Dilemma tells the story of the captain of a spaceship carrying six passengers. When the spaceship malfunctions and starts losing its supply of oxygen, how does the captain decide which passengers should take the extra spacecraft back home, a spacecraft which can only save two people? The captain’s only close companion is the A.I. robot assigned to work with him. How does she influence his decisions? And, as A.I., is she capable of making purely objective decisions? Moriyama, influenced by Isaac Asimov, writes a compelling plot-driven story putting philosophy in action. Though Two Of Six does not provide rich visual landsc...

Wilkie Collins’ novel The Woman In White has themes that may seem cliché: love conquers all, the truth will always come out in the end, people with an air of superiority usually have something to cover up… as Alexander Pope once said, “Charms strike the sight, but merit wins the soul.” Collins’ The Woman In White proves that, and is everything but cliché. This lengthy masterpiece of a novel is part sensation novel, part mystery, part social commentary, and of course, like every good story, part romance. It is a book that probably should be read slowly so as to savor every idea and emotion offered by this talented writer. And to read this novel slowly is exactly how it was read in 19th century England, when Collins submitted his story, chapter by chapter, week by week, to Charles Dickens’ magazine, All the Year Round. Victorians consumed this novel like starving animals from the year 1859-1860. This was a time of excess and pleasure, and “grandiose” performance (Sweet, Introduction)...