📙 Part 2: Describe a story or novel you have read that you found interesting

This episode's vocabulary

Novel (noun) – a long fictional story, usually in book form. → Children of Time is a novel by Adrian Tchaikovsky.

Trilogy (noun) – a series of three related books, movies, or works. → It's the first part of a science fiction trilogy.

Terraform (verb) – to change a planet's environment to make it suitable for humans. → The story is about a planet being terraformed for human life.

Sabotage (noun/verb) – deliberate damage or destruction, often for political or military reasons. → A genetic experiment goes wrong due to sabotage.

Supplant (verb) – to take the place of something, often by force or strategy. → The spiders supplant the monkeys in the experiment.

Arachnid (noun) – a class of joint-legged invertebrates including spiders and scorpions. → The planet is taken over by intelligent arachnids.

Nom de plume (noun) – a pen name or pseudonym used by an author. → Adrian Tchaikovsky writes under a nom de plume.

Saturated (adj) – full or overloaded, often used for markets or conditions. → The book market is pretty saturated these days.

Ancestry (noun) – a person’s lineage or heritage. → He has Polish ancestry, I think.

Slew (noun) – a large number or amount. → He has a slew of other works to his name.

High-concept (adj) – based on a striking or original idea, often easy to summarize. → It’s a high-concept speculative fiction story.

Speculative fiction (noun) – a genre that includes sci-fi, fantasy, and alternate realities. → The book falls into speculative fiction.

Engaging (adj) – interesting and attention-grabbing. → The story has engaging characters and action scenes.

Put oneself in someone’s shoes (idiom) – to imagine being in someone else's situation. → I imagined myself in the characters' shoes.

Miss out (phrasal verb) – to not experience or benefit from something. → If I hadn’t read the book, I’d have missed out.

Page-turner (noun) – a book that is very engaging and hard to put down. → That novel was a real page-turner.

Award-winning (adj) – having received a prize or recognition. → I often choose award-winning novels to read.

Dystopian (adj) – relating to an imagined, often bleak future society. → Many sci-fi books have dystopian settings.

Plot twist (noun) – an unexpected development in the story. → The plot twist in chapter five shocked me.

Character development (noun) – the process by which a character changes throughout a story. → The novel had strong character development.

Questions and Answers

Maria: You should say when you read it, what the story or novel was about, who wrote it, and explain why it was interesting. Rory here is the author of many books.

Rory: I actually loved reading Children of Time, which is a novel by Adrian Tchaikovsky. It's actually the first part in a science fiction trilogy that he wrote over the last decade. And I always find myself thinking about it when I'm a bit bored.

I suppose in a nutshell, it tells the story of a genetic experiment gone wrong on this planet being terraformed for human life. So, after this act of sabotage in a larger conflict, the monkeys that were originally meant to be used to create a civilisation on the planet are supplanted by spiders that grow to these huge sizes and take over the planet. And after a long time, I think it's maybe 1,000 years or so, the survivors of the earlier war show up and they're trying to find a new home. And they come up against these monstrous, intelligent arachnids on this planet. And a whole load of drama unfolds as a result.

When it comes to the guy that wrote it, like I said, his name is Adrian Tchaikovsky, although I think that's just his nom de plume. And he's certainly no relation to the composer. At least I found that out later on, for sure. I think he just chose it to stand out, which is sort of forgivable since the market for novels is pretty saturated, even with an original story like the one he wrote. As far as I'm aware, I think he has Polish ancestry, but I'm not 100% on that. But regardless, he's obviously a very talented author and has a slew of other works to his name and a few awards under his belt as well, I think. And that's originally what drew me to the book, since I'd seen that it had won several awards. But of course, you can't just judge a book based solely on that. It's a high-concept speculative fiction story, which makes it very easy to follow, and there are engaging characters that I found easy enough to imagine and put myself in their shoes to think about the decisions that I might have made in a similar situation. And of course, it has exciting action scenes and complex moral and ethical problems in it that really make you wonder about how we might go about colonising planets in the future.

If I hadn't read the book, I think I'd have really missed out. I bought the sequels as soon as I could, and I'm looking forward to reading more of his stuff in the future.

Maria: And what about your friends? Do they like this book?

Well, actually, yes. I gave the books to one of my pals after I finished, and he really liked them too. So at least one of them loves this guy as well.