(grr, let's try this again without deleting a paragraph, don't know how that happened, sorry)
Well, as one who recommended it (it made my list of top books I read in the last ten years), I'd like to say that I got invested in the characters! :P :) (However, I should append here that I am a scientist, and have spent way too long in the academic world, and I was always going to be partial to a book about the process of science; lightreads talks about perhaps being more invested were the book about a political campaign -- in which case I would probably be far less interested/invested in the characters.)
I don't think I would compare Goodman's writing to LeGuin's. To extend the metaphor, I think of LeGuin's writing more as a... prism, or a faceted gem, where the interaction between the writing and the content contributes to what you call the wholeness of vision (which I really like; that's a good way to describe LeGuin's writing).
Goodman's writing in this book, by contrast, is lucidly clear, without this interaction; it exists simply as a clear medium through which the content (the characters) are observed, without getting in the way for good or ill.
It impressed me a huge amount, don't get me wrong. I think it's a gift to be able to write in a way that is that transparent. But it impresses me in a totally different way than the way I'm impressed by LeGuin's books :)
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momijizukamori and
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Date: 2012-03-21 04:33 pm (UTC)Well, as one who recommended it (it made my list of top books I read in the last ten years), I'd like to say that I got invested in the characters! :P :) (However, I should append here that I am a scientist, and have spent way too long in the academic world, and I was always going to be partial to a book about the process of science;
I don't think I would compare Goodman's writing to LeGuin's. To extend the metaphor, I think of LeGuin's writing more as a... prism, or a faceted gem, where the interaction between the writing and the content contributes to what you call the wholeness of vision (which I really like; that's a good way to describe LeGuin's writing).
Goodman's writing in this book, by contrast, is lucidly clear, without this interaction; it exists simply as a clear medium through which the content (the characters) are observed, without getting in the way for good or ill.
It impressed me a huge amount, don't get me wrong. I think it's a gift to be able to write in a way that is that transparent. But it impresses me in a totally different way than the way I'm impressed by LeGuin's books :)