{"id":1560,"date":"2017-06-18T08:46:40","date_gmt":"2017-06-18T12:46:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/galaxyalex.com\/?p=1560"},"modified":"2017-06-18T08:46:40","modified_gmt":"2017-06-18T12:46:40","slug":"review-slaves-of-the-switchboard-of-doom-by-bradley-w-schenk","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/galaxyalex.com\/?p=1560","title":{"rendered":"Review: Slaves of the Switchboard of Doom by Bradley W. Schenk"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"https:\/\/us.macmillan.com\/books\/9780765383297\">Slaves of the Switchboard of Doom<\/a> by Bradley W. Schenk<\/p>\n<p>Advance reading copy provided by publisher<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>I came across Schenk&#8217;s work through his illustrations, mainly the <a href=\"http:\/\/thrilling-tales.webomator.com\/derange-o-lab\/pulp-o-mizer\/pulp-o-mizer.html\">Pulp-O-Mizer <\/a>cover generator (if you haven&#8217;t tried it, rectify this omission immediately). Given that, I wasn&#8217;t sure what to expect from the novel; how would the style of Retropolis make the transition to a full-length piece?<\/p>\n<p>A little background first. Retropolis is a highly-stylized retrofuturistic concept based in the adventuresome fun of old pulp sci-fi stories, and that light, tongue-in-cheek style is handled with great discipline and consistency. The rules, as I see them:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Technology and science are fun, not evil. No Ewoks in Retropolis.<\/li>\n<li>Chrome glistening in the sun, not oily old hulks.<\/li>\n<li>It should all seem plausible based on 1940&#8217;s technology, with the addition of some big leaps (lighter-than-air metal, e.g.)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Given that by design the work is meant to remind us of slim, disposable volumes of tales featuring derring-do over character, how does this translate to a contemporary novel?<\/p>\n<p>The answer: quite well.<\/p>\n<p>Schenk presents a healthy smattering of fun characters, each with their own take on a world of impossible technologies. I mean, there&#8217;s a guy who keeps a slide rule in a hip holster &#8212; awesome. The humor is wit, not camp. As we slide steadily toward a world of AI, the moral question of the book (no spoilers) is timely and well-handled. And Schenk&#8217;s prose is absolutely lovely. This is an action-packed romp with more heart than grit.<\/p>\n<p>If you&#8217;ve ever sat up watching old B-movies and laughed at the titles, go pick this book up.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Slaves of the Switchboard of Doom by Bradley W. Schenk Advance reading copy provided by publisher &nbsp; I came across Schenk&#8217;s work through his illustrations, mainly the Pulp-O-Mizer cover generator (if you haven&#8217;t tried it, rectify this omission immediately). Given that, I wasn&#8217;t sure what to expect from the novel; how would the style of [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1560","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/galaxyalex.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1560","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/galaxyalex.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/galaxyalex.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/galaxyalex.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/galaxyalex.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1560"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/galaxyalex.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1560\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1561,"href":"https:\/\/galaxyalex.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1560\/revisions\/1561"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/galaxyalex.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1560"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/galaxyalex.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1560"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/galaxyalex.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1560"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}