Book: Douglas Rushkoff's "Survival Of The Richest"

After reading two fantasy books involving magic and sorcery, I decided to take a break by reading a book about the fantasies of billionaire techbros.  Douglas Rushkoff's "Survival of the Richest", about the fantastical views of some billionaires in the tech industry, is less entertaining and more frightening.

Rushkoff starts with an anecdote meeting some tech entrepreneurs whose main concern was how to maintain the loyalty of their security people after society collapses.  This was the first WTF moment in the book and they keep coming throughout.

By the end of this book I was really worried about how much power these deluded oligarchs have in their twisted hands.

I gave this book four stars out of five on Goodreads.  After reading this book I am worried and you should be too.

Books: Robert Jordan's The Wheel Of Time Books 1 And 2: "The Eye Of The World" And "The Great Hunt"

I have been remiss in keeping up with my book postings.  Since I read the first two books of Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time series back to back, I will post about them together.

Book 1 of the series, "The Wheel of Time", is a very typical fantasy quest book.  A young man/woman with a modest farming/shepherding background is discovered by a wise mage/sorceress, and they go on a quest to defeat evil in some form or other, while collecting members of their adventuring party.  I have read/watched several examples of this type of story, "The Lord of the Rings" and the "Belgariad" would be such examples.  They are a well worn story, but reading these types of books is like slipping on your favorite fuzzy socks.

I generally liked the first book.  I'm not sure about some of the naming used in the book – Darkfriends? really?  Sounds like the super friends of something – but you learn to accept a lot of cheesy/corny stuff when you read fantasy.  I like the world that is being built and the history that has been revealed.  The story is pretty good if not a little formulaic.

Book 2 of the series, "The Great Hunt",  continues the quest moving along at a good pace.  The action and the story progresses, introducing new characters, and tightens the storyline as we approach the ultimate showdown, that will come further along in the series.

There are a few characters that are a bit infuriating.  Their behavior seems a bit off.  Would Perrin keep his abilities secret or would they have been shared with his close friends?  These can be overlooked but it does bug me at times.

In the end, I gave both books four stars out of five on Goodreads.  There are fourteen books in the series and I expect I will eventually finish it ... unless some grievous writing sin is committed.

Book: Adrian Tchaikovsky's "Service Model"

 Book eleven for the year was Adrian Tcaikovky's "Service Model".  I've read a few of this author's books and I like his writing.  This book follows the adventures of an unemployed valet robot as it navigates the decline and destruction of the human race.

The cause of humanity's decline is left vague until the end, but it becomes obvious, as the valet robot goes from one job opportunity to the next, that humanity's destruction is self-inflicted.

The book flowed well and held my interest.  I could see how humanity's dependence on technology could eventually result in our demise.  The book is not uplifting but it was entertaining.

I gave the book four out of five stars on Goodreads.  I enjoyed its portrayal of our bleak future.

Book: Yuval Noah Harari's "Nexus"

My tenth book of the year was Yuval Noah Harari's "Nexus: A Brief History of Information Networks from the Stone Age to AI".  This book was not what I expected.  It ended up being a mix of interesting and irritating.

As a person with an electrical and computer engineering background, I have certain expectations when I hear the words Information Networks.  This book expanded the definition to include religion, politics, and social networks.  This is not a bad thing, as it expanded my view of networks and how they influence information and people.

The irritating thing about this book is the author's ideas on Artificial Intelligence (AI).  You would think, by reading this book, that AI is already equal to human intelligence.  Anyone who uses the current LLM AI soon discovers it is far from being intelligent.  The author almost treats it as some unknowable God.   It is not.

I gave this book four stars out of five on Goodreads.  I gave the book the benefit of the doubt because it did expand my views on networks, even when the AI adoration became a bit much.  I seem to like this author as this is the third book of his that I've read (see the others here).

Book: Dan Simmons' "Hyperion"

I have seen this book in bookstores forever.  I have held it in my hand but never bought it.  Finally, thirty-five years after it was first published, I bought the ebook of Dan Simmons' "Hyperion".  I am very glad I did.

The book follows a group of people going to the planet of Hyperion for a pilgrimage.  As they approach the planet, they tell the stories of why they are going and what their connections to Hyperion is.  These stories are all unique and engaging.

I read this book entirely on the Camino de Santiago, and I couldn't wait to finish my walking and chores each day so I could dive back into it.

I gave this book five stars out of five on Goodreads.  I loved the characters, I loved the world, and I loved the storytelling.  It has been a while since a book engaged me so deeply.

Book: Timothy Snyder's "On Tyranny"

I took a short break away from fiction and read "On Tyranny: Twenty Lessons from the Twentieth Century".  Timothy Snyder lists twenty things that facilitate or are characteristics of authoritarianism.  Unfortunately, as I read through the twenty chapters I realized that all twenty are occurring today in America.

I have always been a pessimist.  Reading this book, my feelings toward my country just became more pessimistic.  It would be bad enough if it were just one or two signs but they are all there in plain sight, and they are all being called out on social media.  Our country is sauntering into authoritarianism in full view of everyone and most of America is ignoring it.  I swear, if we get out of this mess, it will be because of some stupid accident, and not anything we have done.

I gave this book four stars out of five on Goodreads.  Everyone needs to read this book but not enough will.

Book: Ursula K. Le Guin's "The Left Hand Of Darkness"

I started this book before I left for Spain.  For some reason, during the first couple of weeks, I didn't read at the end of the day.  Finally, after a couple of weeks of just vegging at the end of our walking day, I decided to start reading again, and I have to say, I am kicking myself for not reading sooner.  Reading was the perfect afternoon and evening powering-down activity, and I started sleeping so much better.

This book, "The Left Hand of Darkness", is another on my 'classics' reading list that I'm putting together.  I've never read Ursula K. Le Guin before and I liked her writing style.  The book, published in 1987, is an exploration of gender, gender fluidity, and gender's influence on society.  It's done in a subtle way that isn't in your face, and in a very approachable way.

The book follows an envoy from a planetary alliance visiting a world to invite them to join the alliance.  The envoy is male.  The people of the planet are gender neutral, except for brief months when they randomly become male or female and become fertile.  There is some action as the envoy is not believed and, being male all the time, he is considered a pervert in the eyes of the population.  He is pursued, but in the end, the planet joins the alliance.  This storyline really is just background behind the story of the relationship between the envoy and an exile who helps him.

Strange to think that a book from 1987 is a 'classic', but it is nearly fifty years old, and lately, I've been running into a lot of things celebrating their fiftieth anniversary and considered classics.

I gave this book four out of five stars on Goodreads.  It could have been better, and it was a bit of a slow burn, but I enjoyed it and was impressed.

Weekly Ephemera #145

Ok...It's been a while since I last posted.  As a matter of fact, I didn't post even once in June.  This is the first time since August 2006 – when I started Homer's Travels – that I've had a month without a single post.  This is unlike me.  The reason: my third Camino.

• Since my last post, the Wife and I finished her Camino (and I finished my third).  I could have posted while I was walking, but it didn't feel like an important thing for me to do at the time.
  
  We returned from Spain on Tuesday and I am having a difficult time re-entering the real world.  I was originally going to put together posts to document each day of our walk across northern Spain, but I stopped taking notes on day two or three.  Instead, I'll be composing three posts: my impressions of the walk, photos taken by me and the Wife, and a magnets post.  I'll give one preview of my impressions: I'm very proud of the Wife.
• Speaking of being proud of the Wife, this Friday was our twenty-eighth wedding anniversary.  The Wife celebrated by having a spa day.  We didn't go out or anything, as we were/are still tired.  It takes a while for your body to recover from walking thirty-seven days straight.
• While I was walking I was still reading.  Actually, I stopped reading for the first couple of weeks of our Camino.  Not sure why I stopped, but I eventually re-started my reading, and it became an important part of my after-walk recovery.  I ended up finishing three books which I will post about eventually.
• After getting home, I started catching up on my TV watching.  It was an activity that didn't require me moving, which is the only activity I could psychologically muster.  The only notable show was "Ironheart".  I like how it became a mix of tech and magic, and I was pleasantly surprised when an infamous magical villain was introduced.  I hope there's a second season.
• I ended this last week going to a concert – more on that in a later post.

Book: Neal Stephenson's "Snow Crash"

I decided to start reading some sci-fi 'classics' so for my sixth book of the year I read Neal Stephenson's "Snow Crash".  The book was published in the summer of 1992.  It's a very computer/internet heavy science fiction story set in a satirical alternate future.  I had difficulty reconciling the WWII and Vietnam war references with the advanced level of technology used in the book but it still works when you accept that the book is less a narrative and more a commentary of where the real world was heading.

The book started out slow with a lot of exposition of how computers and the internet work which is understandable.  In 1992, few people understood the internet, and many weren't using computers for anything besides work.

Some of the action takes place in the Metaverse, a term first coined by Stephenson.  Despite Meta (formerly Facebook)'s trying to create the Metaverse, this part of the book has not come into existence yet.

Once all the exposition was out of the way, the book read a lot smoother.  Once I accepted this was some satirical timeline where computer tech was more advanced than ours, I started to enjoy the book a lot more.  The novel's world-building was a bit weird and took some getting used to but added a bit of humor and a lot more strangeness to the read.

I gave this book four stars out of five in Goodreads.  I have avoided classics because I often couldn't get past the outdatedness of the material but, if I get over my hangup, I will find many enjoyable books to add to my collection.

Book: Richard J. Evens' "The Coming Of The Third Reich"

For my fifth book, I returned to non-fiction.  This e-book was given to me by a gamer friend back in February 2022.  I wanted to read it but I kept putting it off for one reason or another.  Given current world events, I finally decided to read Richard J. Evans' "The Coming of the Third Reich".

"The Coming of the Third Reich" is the first of a three-book series on the rise and fall of the German Nazi Party.  It covers the period from the late 1800s to 1933, when Hitler became Reich Chancellor.  The second book covers 1933 to 1939 and the third book covers World War II and the end of the Nazi party.

I'd known a lot about this history for a while.  Back in the 1980s, when I was in college, I read William L. Shirer's "The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich".  Evans' book goes into more detail and is an easier read than Shirer's book.

Reading this book while watching what has happened in the past thirty-five years or so is kinda scary.  The parallels, especially during the last one hundred days of the current administration, are both creepy and quite foreboding.  An example of history rhyming as Mark Twain might have said.

I gave this book four stars out of five on Goodreads.  I have the second book in my e-book library.  I expect to read it sometime this year, and I wouldn't be surprised if more parallels reveal themselves.

Book: Danial Suarez's "Delta-V"

My fourth book of the year was from an author I've read before, Daniel Suarez.  It's been fourteen years since I read "Daemon" and "Freedom".  His new book, the first of two, is "Delta-V", a near future science fiction book about asteroid mining.

There are really two parallel tales in this book.  The main one is the selection, training, and launching of the asteroid miners.  The secondary tale is about the subterfuge and law bending used to finance the asteroid mining mission.  The main tale is well written and interesting.  The secondary tale stretches credulity.

Credulity is a variable.  If I'd read this book when it first came out in 2019 I would have really struggled with that secondary tale, but now, after a couple months of the President and Elmo, I could start to see something like this happening in our 'new world chaos'.  Along with this I found it weird that the American life seen in the background of the storytelling was so normal.  I struggled to understand how we could get from where we are to where the book is in the mid 2030s.  This has always been an issue for me.  I once stopped reading a Clancy-esque war drama after the collapse of the Soviet Union.  I just couldn't get over how the world in the book could no longer mesh with the real world.  I guess you could say, in terms of near term sci-fi, we have reached the singularity.

Despite this I liked the book and gave it four stars out of five on Goodreads.  It was interesting enough that I have added the sequel to my reading list.

Book: Orlando Figes' "Revolutionary Russia 1891-1991 A History

With my third book I returned to non-fiction history.  I read Orlando Figes' "Revolutionary Russia 1891-1991 A History" to partially fill in a large hole I have in my knowledge of history.

The book discusses the rise and fall of the Bolshevik revolution from famines at the end of the Tsarist era to the collapse of the Soviet Union.  It is an overview.  It is not a deep dive but it was just enough for me, what I was looking for.  I knew little about Lenin or how Stalin consolidated power.  Sadly our situation today was an echo of what I was reading.

The book is well written and flows nicely.  At times I wanted a little more information but, as I said, this is not an in depth study.  I came away knowing more than I did before.

I gave this book four stars out of five on Goodreads.  It did what I expected in an easy to read way.

Book: Cory Doctorow's "Red Team Blues"

Just like I got my Scalzi book from a Humble Bundle deal, my second book was from a Cory Doctorow Humble Bundle deal.  I've never read any of Doctorow's books but I've listened to him on This Week in Tech (TWiT.tv) and I've read some of his posts on Mastodon (@pluralistic@mamot.fr) and I find him very interesting.  He has gained some nerd notoriety by coining the term Enshittification to explain how internet platforms start out good for the users and evolve to be bad for everyone (essentially).

My first Doctorow book was "Red Team Blues".  This is the first of a trilogy that follows forensic accountant Martin Hench into the depths of dark money movements and cybersecurity.

I enjoyed this book.  It never went too deep into the weeds but it did graze the tops of said weeds a few times which was fine for me.  Is this for everyone?  I'm not sure.  You need some understanding of tech and cybersecurity to follow it at times.  I would call it a nerdy thriller.

I gave this book four stars out of five on Goodreads.  There were a few loose ends that didn't get tied up to my satisfaction but it was well written and I liked Martin Hench.  I will be reading other Doctorow books this year I think.

How I Rate Books

Since I started publishing book reviews on Homer's Travels I've always given some ratings.  It started with just recommended or not.  I eventually moved to Goodreads which uses a five star scale.  Here is what those stars mean to me.

For fiction I basically consider three criteria.  (1) Do I like the story/characters.  (2) Is it well written.  (3) Is there something novel/unique in the story that surprises/delights me.  If these three criteria are met the book gets five stars.  Most books will not meet all three.  If two are met then it will get four stars.  The most common situation is criteria one and two are met but not criteria three.  If it meets criteria one, but misses on criteria two and three, I would likely give it three stars.  If it misses all three, but I am just disappointed, it will get two stars.  If it makes me angry, or I do not finish the book, it will end with one star.

For non-fiction the criteria are similar.  (1) Am I interested in the subject and approach of the book.  (2) Is it well written.  (3) Do I learn something profound and/or am I surprised by what I learn.  Five and four stars are the same as for fiction.  Three stars means I disagree with the premise/argument but it is well written.  One and two stars mean I think it is wrong, written/argued poorly, or makes me angry in some way.

Obviously there is lots of subjectivity in my ratings.  Sometimes I let things slip.  Other times I give them no leaway.  Reading, especially fiction, is always read in the eyes of the reader.

Book: John Scalzi's "Kaiju Preservation Society"

I follow John Scalzi on Bluesky (I don't actually 'Follow' him but he is in one of my lists).  I've enjoyed several of his books (the last being nearly six years ago) and I was happy to see the author offer a Humble Bundle of his books for charity.  I jumped at the chance and purchased the bundle.  I'd already read many of the books but, after removing these, I still got ten books for a reasonable cost and a good cause.  So, my first read of the year was John Scalzi's "Kaiju Preservation Society".

Kaiju is the Japanese word for giant monsters.  Think Godzilla.  This book has an interesting explanation of how Kaiju exist and where they come from.  The book is essentially a political intrigue involving rampaging monsters ... and Kaiju.

This book is a palate cleanser.  It's light, funny, and easy to get lost in.  By the third chapter I was laughing out loud, a rarity for me while reading.  Despite dipping its toe into real world politics, it takes you to a world where, with some minor suspension of disbelief, you can have fun with monsters.  It was the right tone for where we are today.

I gave this book four stars out for five on Goodreads.  There were a few things that didn't ring right so it lost a half star.  I look forward to continuing my read through Scalzi's library after a six year pause.

P.S. I should put a post together about how I rate books.  Some people have asked me why, when I like a book so much, I only give it a four out of five.  Maybe soon.

A Homer's Travel's Look Back At 2024

"History doesn't repeat itself, but it often rhymes." - Mark Twain

2024 was going to be the year of the nap but instead it became a crappy echo of 2016.  2016 started with the loss of family members and friends and ended with a disastrous election.  This year we lost family members and friends and, once again, gained an incompetent government with a large side of corruption and stupidity.

I feel I was coasting most of this year.  Few things excited me.  Many things left me dumbfounded.  Eight months of this year were all about my Mom.  My schedule revolved around hers.  I think I lost a little of myself during those months.  The passing of my Mother was sad but a bit liberating.  Too bad the rest of the year fell apart thanks to ... stupidity ... selfishness ... apathy ... I guess a combination of all of those.  Overall, 2024 was not a really good year for me.

Let's look back at 2024, shall we:

• January:  The year would be dominated by the health of my Mom. This month she was diagnosed with parkinson's disease. I bought a new GPS. We left on a short vacation to Tampa.
• February:  We had a great time in Tampa. Very relaxing. We tandem skydived which was interesting but a bit of a let down (kinda like scuba was in 2016). Glad I did it though. I filed my taxes and went to see the Oscar nominated shorts.
• March:  The Wife went to New York for the Big East Men's Basketball tournament. We started planning our Great Britain trip. The start of multiple sprinkler system repairs started this month.
• April:  We went to see Omaha Supernova volleyball (one of the Wife's students will be joining them in 2025). We went to the GodSon's school gala in Minneapolis. We remodeled our bathroom.
• May:  The new bathroom was finished. My Mom had her last birthday.
• June: The Wife's student, the one ordained as a Deacon in Rome, was ordained a Priest in Omaha. We cancelled the Wife's Camino trip when we moved Mom's spinal surgery up. Mom's surgery was a success and her back pain diminished soon after her procedure. She would be at a rehab center for a few weeks. We were hit by a big hail storm this month. We would still be fighting the insurance company in November.
• July: Mom fell at the rehab center and fractured her hip. More surgery and more rehab to come. We celebrated our twenty-seventh wedding anniversary by taking care of Mom's finances and having burgers. On the way to celebrate the MoH and BM's birthdays our car got totaled by a semi. We had no injuries but OOF. We took the Wife's car and went to Minneapolis with a side trip to the Dignity of Earth and Sky statue. We tried to distract ourselves by watching the Olympics. July was a crazy a$$ month.
• August:   Mom went home from rehab. She was happy to be home. A week later I found her in her kitchen after she'd passed away. While we prepared Mom's memorial and burial we tried to live a normal life. I got a new car totally paid for my insurance. We went to a political rally, our first. Mom was buried near my Dad's grave. The Wife and I came down with COVID for the first (confirmed) time. Both cases were very mild. 2024 was not being gentle.
• September: Things started becoming more normal this month though this would be a brief respite until the real world caught up to us. We got vaccinated before our next international trip. We went on our trip to Great Britain (documented in October and November) and met with friends.
• October: We returned home from our Great Britain trip, a fun adventure. We voted by mail. The October weather rollercoaster resulted in our first brief freeze of the season. Eleven years have passed since the end of my second Camino. Not being done with us yet 2024 took one of my Aunts and one of the Wife's cousins. I had a follow up CT scan.
• November: One of the Wife's aunts and cousins visited this month and had a nice visit. 2024 had the coup de grȃce when the election crashed and burned.  After one phone call from the Wife we got a check from the insurance company to complete the roof repairs from the June hail damage.  I left Xitter and moved over to Bluesky.  We celebrated Thanksgiving with family,
• December: The house was decorated for Christmas including putting the balls in the oak tree out front.  Our TV died and was replaced.  We celebrated Christmas with family ... and Moose.
• Hiking: Like in 2023 my walking started off strong as I prepared to do the Camino with the Wife. Mom's schedule and our travel disrupted my walking until I somewhat got back on track in October.  I successfully pushed the length of my walks out beyond the ten mile mark.  In the end I managed to hike 605.4 miles (974.3 km) over 69 hikes. This distance ranks in seventh place and the number of hikes ranks ninth place since I started keeping track - an average showing I would say.   Definitely not a bad showing considering I really didn't hike much in the summer months.
  
  In early November I crossed the one thousand hikes recorded over seventeen years of keeping records.  Onward to two thousand!
• Books: I set a goal to read twenty books this year and, unlike last year, did not meet my goal reading only twelve books.  I read nearly everyday including while we were traveling (which is odd for me).  Despite this I think I read less per sitting and took a long time to finish books.  Here are my Goodreads Stats for 2024.
• Concerts, Shows & Music :  We went to a few concerts this year. With the Wife, I went to the Eagles, Peter Frampton, and Melissa Etheridge. I also went to Joe Satriani and The Offspring by myself.
  
  I listened to a lot of music this year - mostly during naps and on long airplane trips. According to Spotify I listened to 2,839 songs from 1,264 artists for 39,710 minutes.  Here is my Spotify 2024 Wrapped if you want to explore what the shuffle button did music-wise this year.
• I posted 96 times this year. Not as many as 2023 but good enough I guess.  I think I need to write more but I'm afraid of either going too dark, too political, or too preachy. 

What will 2025 bring? We are going to Guatemala early in the year to see where I spent my formative years and to visit parts of the country I've never been before.  We will be going back to Spain to continue, and possibly finish, the Wife's Camino in the summer. A trip in the fall is not out of the question but we are still mulling over possible destinations.  Other than that we will be trying to keep our sanity intact and brace ourselves for what 2025 has in store for us.

Here's to a Happy, Prosperous, and Healthy New Year for all.  May you all find happiness in 2025.

Book: Kelly and Zach Weinersmith's "A City On Mars

My last book of the year was a non-fiction analysis of the feasibility of building settlements in space, the Moon, and Mars.  The authors are skeptical of the venture at best.

The Weinersmith's "A City on Mars: Can we settle space, should we settle space, and have we really thought this through?" takes on all the arguments, justifications, and  'science' of establishing colonies on the surfaces of the Moon and Mars and in space and argues why most of them are either incorrect or hopelessly naive.  In a way the book is a buzzkill.

I can't say I totally agree with the author's conclusions but they do give compelling arguments.  I think they aren't saying it will never be possible but they are questioning the timeline many space settlement enthusiasts, especially President-elect Elmo, are peddling to the masses.

They also cover space law in detail.  My cynical self read this and thought "Like these yahoos will obey space laws.  They barely obey terrestrial laws."  I found this space law discussion interesting but not very convincing.

I gave this book four stars out of five on Goodreads.  I liked it ... it bummed me out a bit ... but sometimes we have to be hit over the head with the reality stick.

Book: M. R. Carey's "The Fall Of Koli"

My eleventh book of the year was the end of the Rampart Trilogy.  M. R. Carey's "The Fall of Koli" continues the adventures of Koli who we read about in "The Book Koli" and "The Trials of Koli".

This trilogy is ... mediocre at best.  The third book fills in a lot of the history that explains the dystopian version of England.  In doing so, though, it almost 'jumps the shark'.  The story takes a sharp turn before returning to its original story and it feels a bit discordant.

The third book definitely has more action and mystery than the other two books.  I did get into it near the end of the book but it still did not reach any heights.

I gave this book four stars out of five on Goodreads.  There really wasn't anything wrong with it, and reading the whole series wasn't a waste of time or anything like that, but it was just a middle of the pack reading experience for me.

Book: Patrick Rothfuss' "The Narrow Road Between Desires"

I have mixed feelings about Patrick Rothfuss.  His first two books, "The Name of the Wind" and "The Wise man's Fears" were pretty good - the first of those I would say was even great.  The last book came out in 2011.  The third book ... has not been published yet and I am starting to think it never will.

The author has published two related books since his last big novel.  Both books have concentrated on one supporting character from the other two books.  The first was a novella about Auri - "The Slow Regard of Silent Things" which I liked very much.  The other book was my latest read "The Narrow Road Between Desires".

This novella follows Bast, a friend of Kvothe (the main character of the first two books).  His story, like all of Rothfuss' books, was well written.  The author has a way with words and his prose flows on the page.  If only he would actually write more.

I gave this book four out of five stars on Goodreads.  It left me wanting more but history has told me not to expect anything soon.  The progress of this series is too slow to satisfy the reader's desires.

Book: Yevgeny Zamyatin's "We"

The ninth book of the year was a precursor to, and inspiration for, George Orwell's "1984".  Yevgeny Zamyatin's "We" was written in 1920-1921 in Russia.  It was purportedly a result of the author's disappointment with the direction the Bolshevik revolution was headed.  "We" is considered to be one of the early books that formed the dystopia genre of science fiction.

"We" describes a far future when the One State, a totalitarian state that conquered the world after the 200 years war, rules over everything.  Everyone lives in literal glass houses so nothing is hidden.  Everyone lives according to a detailed schedule dictated by the One State to guarantee the happiness of the people.  Sex requires authorization from the One State, anyone can request to have sex with anyone they want (if the One State agrees), and the authorized dropping of shades during sex is the only privacy allowed.

D-503, the main character, learns of descenters that throw his whole worldview into turmoil.  Can a revolution be the final one or will there always be another?

Despite being written in 1920 the world the author created feels plausible and terrifying.  The people - referred to in the books as 'numbers' - are generally happy with their lives.  Seeing happy people who do not realize what they are missing is a bit unsettling considering how ill informed many Americans are today.  Are they really happy or do they not know better?  Is the lack of discord the same as happiness?  Is the lack of personal decision-making and responsibility freedom?  "We" could have easily been written in 2020 with only a few tweeks to scientific terminology.  

I gave this book four out of five stars on Goodreads.  I'm not sure I should have read it when the world we live in currently is in a turmoil of its own.  It is not a hopeful book but seeing a totalitarian society from a happy member of said society is thought provoking.