Having read the prior two #LaundryFiles books by @cstross, I finally looked into what a Memex device was / is / could have been. The funniest thing is I can say that I have played a part in creating a database analogous to one in function.
For a year I worked for minimum wage for a company that created fully-cross-indexed blocks of PDFs for various legal cases. If a document referred to a specific river, we created a link to the index’s notation of that river.
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While not microfiche, as the Memex in @cstross’s book used, it’s analogous to it. PDFs are electronic versions of physical documents, as microfiche are photographic representations of paper documents. The Memex system then links between points in the documents to allow the reader to go back and forth, akin to looking up a word’s definition in a glossary or other reference, like HTML.
I look forward to further learning how the #LaundryFiles are my biographical records.
Here’s my problem with the art.
I do not wish to see what @cstross’s protagonist looks like, I want to imagine it in my head. That way, unless the person is specifically described in exquisite detail, I — like any other reader — can make them look like me. Equally, I do not wish to see exactly what the Evil Dæmon™ looks like, because I can make them far uglier in my mind than what you see there.
Symbolic, expressionist, impressionist, even (bleah) fauvist art is preferable.
@cstross
I have noted the UK covers are superior (in my mind) and will be sourcing books 5–15 from British sources. For some reason the first four are available from my local bookstore in Ace / Penguin editions, but no title further (although there may be a couple near the end from UK houses).
Anyway: increased shipping is in my future, it seems.
I blame you for writing such excellent tales that now I am condemned to read them all. Damn and blast you!
[:: man yelling at cloud meme ::]
That Old Guy with the Beard
Charlie Stross