Andrew Hunter Murray on dystopias • Hacker News Board

Re: Andrew Hunter Murray on dystopias

#11

Post by flerovium » Fri, Nov 19, 2021, 4:08 PM UTC

> The Last Day is a story set a few decades from now in a world like our own but with one catastrophic and enormous difference

Do you need a catastrophic difference to get a dystopia? This works as well for me:

> The Last Day is a story set a few decades from now in a world like our own.

Re: Andrew Hunter Murray on dystopias

#12

Post by gnat » Fri, Nov 19, 2021, 4:14 PM UTC

It's an interesting book, and a fun read. It's not hard sf, but he has done a good job of imagining plausible consequences for his one "what if". It's simultaneously a good read for the physical consequences (hot zone, water levels, food supply) but also political (fragility of democracy) and personal (navigating mysteries, distrust, zero-sum situations). He's a competent writer and this was a well-executed novel. (Surprisingly so given it was his first)

Re: Andrew Hunter Murray on dystopias

#13

Post by jspash » Fri, Nov 19, 2021, 4:28 PM UTC

toyg wrote: post #5

user-the-name wrote: post #3

Andrew Hunter Murray is also a researcher for QI, and co-host of the related and very entertaining podcast No Such Thing as a Fish.

And a de-facto voice-double to Stephen Mangan if he wanted to, I swear I can never distinguish the two on the radio.

Random anecdote: I used to work with a Stephen Mangan voice-elganger!

I try not to post reddit-like comments like this, but found it strange that there are other people out there who sound like this.

Re: Andrew Hunter Murray on dystopias

#14

Post by vmilner » Sat, Nov 20, 2021, 9:44 AM UTC

user-the-name wrote: post #3

Andrew Hunter Murray is also a researcher for QI, and co-host of the related and very entertaining podcast No Such Thing as a Fish.

I met him while on opposing teams on the BBC's Only Connect show. Excellent chap. We beat his "QI Elves" team, (which then beat the team that beat us...).