turnitin® Drop-In Q&A Session
User questions will dictate the topics addressed: how to create a rubric, how to post your syllabus, how to post notes to the calendar section, etc.
- Tuesday, February 19 at 11am in EKS Reference Computer Commons
- This session will most benefit the following Departments:
- All Undergraduate & Graduate Departments
- All are Welcome
- Feel free to post questions here in advance
Tags: Library Workshop, Turnitin
Expedition to the Mountains of the Moon
Expedition to the Mountains of the Moon by Mark Hodder (Pyr 2011)
In Hodder’s final installment of this steam punk trilogy, we again meet Sir Richard Burton near the conclusion of the tale, which in turn takes place about forty years prior to we left him off in the second book, The Clockwork Man. We (and Burton) are not given long to dwell in the past before Hodder spirits us away to 1914 and World War I. Unlike our Great War, this one has already gone one for considerable length of time and British are making a last stand in East Africa (Just forget about the British Isles. Those had been long lost to the Germans and Kaiser Nietzsche).1 Burton should, and had been, long dead. Time travel is funny like that. This world war, if not more hellish, is certainly more unnatural than the one that almost no one now remembers. It certainly have nightmares of its own. If the reader may recall from The Strange Affair of Spring Heeled Jack, two classes of innovations arose centuries before their time—some in defiance to the laws of nature. One followed a biological path (the geneticists) and the other a physical or engineering path (the technologists). By the conclusion of TheCurious Case of the Clockwork Man, Britain had abandoned genetic research in favor of technology and Germany, in a quest to arrive at the Superman that would transcend nature, worked exclusively in genetics. The range and scale, as depicted in Expedition, to which plants and animals can be made into weapons and engines of war is truly horrifying. One weapon in particular, in which the victim is transmogrified into a plant but where the properties of each are blurred, figures predominately. Fortunately Hodder’s prose does not extend as far as his imagination, so that the reader who does not wish to be compelled to face the full force of these horrors need not do so.
There is a certain relief, then to return to the present of 1863 where Burton and Swinburne are sent to find the last undiscovered Nāga black diamonds, which as we learned from the Clockwork Man, allow for—among other things—time travel.2 The cover-story for this mission is that Burton is off once more to find the source of the Nile. Burton brings with him all our favorites from the past two books. No explanation is made about how a poet, a number of policemen, and a mechanical philosopher (just to name few) fit into the official story. The crew, however, would give the promise of excellent company and wit over what would prove an arduous expedition. It is a promise unfulfilled. Everyone is always repressively grim. Early on, Swinburne takes on the role of avenging angel. Burton is forever serious. Almost every member of the expedition dies off in one way are another, without the relief of gallows humor. One might of expected that when Burton’s old love, Isabel, joins the team as the leader of a small army of Arab Amazons, that something interesting would happen. Yet too soon Isabel reverts to form, developing a stiff upper lip. Hodder even misses opportunities with the villains. As with the race to find the source of the Nile in our time, Burton is in a race to find the black diamond against John Speke. It is clear, almost from the moment we encounter Speke that he is not of nefarious material. Instead, the blame can be shifted to the Germans and the Babbage machine that occupies half of Speke’s brain. Even George Lucas knew that we needed to be loathed and intrigued by Darth Vader until the Sith Lord redeems himself at the very end. The Germans, are easy to hate—if only because Hodder has uniformly made them such tedious monsters. One gets the impression that Burton’s exhaustion in is quest is matched only by Hodder’s single minded determination to finish the series. It is enough make one wish to return to the World War.
That wish is granted, since most of the time one is bounced between 1863 and the years 1914-1917. At least the World War has the benefit of a fresh character, H. G. Wells, war correspondent. Wells (who goes by Bertie) is interesting enough, but can’t hold a candle to the previous installments of Swineburne, drunk or sober. Swineburne, whose mission of vengeance was mercifully cut short by his presumed demise in 1863, does reappear in the World War, not a mere plant but an entire jungle. In the last few chapters, and all too briefly, we can at least hear the voice the delighted us in the past two books, if actually meeting him is not unlike discovering Audrey II from Little Shop of Horrors.
Burton does make his way back 1840 to stop the assassination of Queen Victoria and the madness that Edward Oxford bequeathed to the past. Hodder does manage to pick up the pace here and Burton stands on the knife-edge of either resetting events back into balance, merely reinforcing the horrors Burton has witnessed, or adding a new voices to the cacophony. In the end, Burton (and apparently Hodder) make the mistake in concluding that is the assassination of the monarch is pivotal and not Oxford’s retreat to 1837. In an attempt to work against the reader’s anticipation, Hodder manages to dissolve his first and best effort in this trilogy in to roiling gray ether of his final entry.
1You may recall that I previously complained about Hodder’s treatment of Nietzsche. Things have not improved.
2And in the process answers the question of how it is that a historian, such as Spring Heeled Jack could travel through time.
Tip of the Week
Looking for newspaper articles on a specific issue or event?
The Reference Librarians are glad to help. We can help you find what you need–either in print or online.
Questions? Ask us!
Happy Valentine Wishes for 2013
Tags: Holiday Tree, Valentines Day
Annual Spring Fundraiser with Wiley Cash
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Evening Events
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Reservations
Tickets
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Friday, February 15, 2013—7:00 PM
Rolling Hills County Club Friends of the Ethel K. Smith Library
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Death By PowerPoint: How to Create an Effective Presentation
This Lyceum event teaches participants how to use PowerPoint effectively in their academic pursuits as well as in the professional world. The presentation will cover common mistakes, which will then be avoided by the participants in future presentations.
The presentation will also cover the pecha-kucha format of linear presentations, as well as up and coming alternatives to PowerPoint. These alternatives can be more effective for student and faculty use depending on the discipline, assignment, or venue. This Lyceum event will also prepare students for in-class presentations as well as the Undergraduate Creative and Investigative Partnerships Symposium.
This Growth Lyceum will be held in the Recital Hall on Monday, February 11 from 6:30 p.m. until 7:30 p.m.
Tags: Lyceum, PowerPoint, Presentations
Visual Literacy: Seeing the Big Picture
In today’s highly visual culture, “information literacy” no longer simply refers to text-based information. Students are now presented with a wealth of visual material that can be used to enhance — not merely supplement — scholarly work. In this session, learn how to help students locate, evaluate, and incorporate credible visual resources into reports, presentations, and other assignments. Tips for citing visual resources will also be discussed.
- Wednesday, February 13 at noon in LaVerne Dining Hall
- This session will most benefit the following Departments:
- Art
- Business
- Education
- History and Political Science
- Sciences (all areas – undergraduate & graduate)
- Sport Sciences
- All are Welcome
- Feel free to post questions here in advance
Tags: Lunch and Learn, Visual Literacy
Ethel’s Database of the Month
Highlights:
- Comprehensive, full-text database
- Includes
- Plot summaries
- Synopses
- Literary criticism articles
- Book reviews
- Citation tools
- Literary glossary
- A guide to literary research
- and more
- Hundreds of classic works available full-text
A great resource for:
- Finding Literary Criticism on a specific author or work
- Finding full-text articles
- Conducting Literary research
- Understanding the meanings of poems, stories, and novels
- Literature classes! (GPS 210, English, et cetera)
Tip of the Week
Need an article or book that we don’t have?
Consider InterLibrary Loan! See any Library Staff member for details
Questions? Ask us!
Tags: InterLibrary Loan
Recent Acquisitions
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HG4516 .D5 2002 |
