Review of "Hothouse" (3 stars): Pleasantly surprise
- 3 Followers
- 1 Following
- 37 Posts
Avid sci-fi and fantasy reader. But also German and English fiction and the odd non-fiction. Frequent library and used bookstores in Toronto or wherever I may be. AKA @[email protected]
Review of "The Time Traveler's Wife" (4 stars): Creative writing at its best
Review of "The Book of Skulls" (3 stars): Not bad
Review of "The Last Murder at the End of the World" (4 stars): Riveting mystery
""Doctor Proteus - this is Mr. Haycox." "How are you?" said Paul. " 'Do," said Mr. Haycox. "What kind of doctor?" "Doctor of Science," said Paul. Mr. Haycox seemed annoyed and disappointed. "Don't call that kind a doctor at all. Three kinds of doctors: dentists, vets, and physicians. You one of those?" "No. Sorry." "Then you ain't a doctor." "He is a doctor," said Doctor Pond earnestly. "He knows how to keep machines healthy." He was trying to build up the importance of graduate degrees in the mind of this clod. "Mechanic," said Mr. Haycox. "Well," said Doctor Pond, "you can go to college and learn to be a specialist in all sorts of things besides making people or animals well. I mean, after all. The modern world would grind to a halt if there weren't men with enough advanced training to keep the complicated parts of civilization working smoothly." "Um," said Mr. Haycox apathetically. "What do you keep working so smoothly?" Doctor Pond smiled modestly. "I spent seven years in the Cornell Graduate School of Realty to qualify for a Doctor of Realty degree and get this job." "Call yourself a doctor, too, do you?" said Mr. Haycox. "I think I can say without fear of contradiction that I earned that degree," said Doctor Pond coolly. "My thesis was the third longest in any field in the country that year - eight hundred and ninety-six pages, double-spaced, with narrow margins." "Real-estate salesman," said Mr. Haycox. He looked back and forth between Paul and Doctor Pond, waiting for them to say something worth his attention. When they'd failed to rally after twenty seconds, he turned to go. "I'm doctor of cowshit, pigshit, and chickenshit," he said. "When you doctors figure out what you want, you'll find me out in the barn shoveling my thesis.""
— Kurt Vonnegut: Player Piano, pp. 133-134
