Medium Cool is a weekly series related to popular culture, mostly film, TV, and books, with some music and games thrown in. We hope it’s a welcome break from the anger, hate, and idiocy we see almost daily from the other side in the political sphere.
Arguments welcomed, opinions respected, fools un-suffered. We’re here every Sunday at 7 pm.
I thought we might do something a little different tonight, and pick up where we left off last week when we talked about books that make you feel like you’re there.
Medium Cool – Books That Make You Feel Like You’re There
Toward the end of last week’s thread, kalakal mentioned the fictional world he would most like to live in, at least for awhile, and I thought it might be fun to talk about that tonight. Maybe it’s one of the worlds you wrote about if you participated in last week’s post – or maybe a world that someone else wrote about that intrigued you.
I know it’s hard to pick just one, so you can have up to 5 worlds you would most like to live in. But please, if you do have more than one world you would like to live in, write about them in separate comments, please! (Not trying to pump up the number of comments; I think lists of things are less likely to be read and commented on.)
But let’s make it a bit more challenging!
If the world in Witness is the one you would like to live in – at least for awhile – what role would you like to play? Would you be the one trying to keep someone safe? One of the young bucks competing for love? The children? A wise elder? Or would you like to live in that world without that particular storyline? And if so, what would be the storyline for your world?
As always on Medium Cool, I set the rules but I know there will be lose loose interpretations or the rules will go right out the window. But it’s a starting point!
War for Ukraine Day 571: The Butcher’s Bill from Last Night’s Attack on Odesa
Mr. Prosser
I would like to live on Discworld, Terry Pratchett’s creation. I would explore the exotic lands in the company of famous adventurers but in the end would retire to be an assistant librarian to The Librarian at Unseen University
bbleh
Well, obviously I want to live in Rivendell, either as or among tall, lithe, impossibly wise immortals in oddly lightweight yet richly layered robes, surrounded by beautiful natural scenery with carefully placed Art Nouveau architecture, all without any apparent means of material support.
I’d also be willing to be part of the University of Trantor, but with more up-to-date technology please.
CliosFanBoy
Star Trek. On a safe Federation planet.
Xenos
A humanoid on a nice orbital somewhere in Banks’ Culture would be nice, at least for a few decades of indulgent fun.
Chris
The Federation from Star Trek, at least in its most utopian incarnations. And precisely because “the role I play” wouldn’t actually matter much. Sure, I’d probably aim for a career in Starfleet (and I’m not saying that because it’s what the shows focus on; my degrees are in international relations, and Starfleet looms very large over the 23/24 century version of that). But if I can’t hack it in Starfleet, if my career dreams fall through and I have to settle for a lot less, I’d still be living in a world where no matter how “lowly” my job was, I’d still never have to worry about food, shelter, or health care. As someone who entered the workforce at the start of the Great Recession, I’ll never not find that appealing as hell.
laura
Fer mee, it’s gotta be Ruby Archuleta, the Body Shop and Pipe Queen owner from John Nichols’ Milagro Beanfield War. Avoid the movie and indulge yourself in this book. It is an masterpiece- it contains multitudes and if you’re like my late Dad, you’ll wake your spouse to read a passage in the middle of the night, and they too, will laugh and go back to sleep dreaming of an avalanche of butterflies spilling out of a disembodied arm.
Scout211
Our interpretations definitely might be losers but I think auto-correct was errant right there. LOL
I wouldn’t necessarily like to live there, but I think it would be nice if we all were able to visit the Midnight Library. So more like I wish the Midnight Library could exist in our world and be available to any of who have painful regrets in our lives.
ETA: The Midnight Library by Matt Haig
wonkie
I’d like to live in the London of Ben Aaronovitch’s Rivers of London series. I read the series over and over and over–six or seven times for each book at least.
Alison Rose
The Shire, baby, all the way. It’s beautiful, (usually) peaceful, everyone’s just chill and hangs out, and of course…drum roll…I would be the tall person in every room*. Everyone would come to ME to say “could you get something down for me” and it would be amazing. But I’d still be able to stand upright in a hobbit hole. Perfecto.
(*Except when Gandalf visited)
gene108
On Earth, Star Trek:TNG.
Middle-Earth: Valinor
Edit: There’s a dearth of happy utopian fictional places. There’s enough struggle in the real world. I want paradise in my fictional dream world.
Edit 2: The highest level sorcerer possible in a DND or DND-esque TTRPG. Having powerful spells on my fingertips, without all the hassle of studying wizards go through, would be cool.
dmsilev
@bbleh:
Choose your era carefully; the late Imperial period wasn’t much fun for anyone.
(Season two of the TV adaptation just finished airing. S1 had potential but dragged a lot, S2 was just flat out amazing)
dmsilev
@Mr. Prosser: Discworld would be great, but it can be pretty dangerous for normal people who get caught in the wrong place at the wrong time. And for certain parts of Ankh-Morpork, the wrong time was ‘always’…
NotMax
But- but- Isn’t it The Best of All Possible Worlds?
:)
HinTN
@bbleh:
Visionaries gotta vision!
Tony Jay
The ur-Mitteleuropa of Hammer’s Horror output, of course. When you’re not prowling the misty graveyards of long abandoned mountaintop castles in search of tragically hot bisexual vampire women, you can always find a seat in the rowdy village inn where beer is cheap and the stew is almost as welcoming as the local barmaid(s). Granted, there’s the whole Undead predators with hypnotic peepers thing to worry about, but that’s why you hired Captain Kronos and Professor Grost to keep an eye on preternatural activity while you enjoy a nice glass of chilled white with Peter Cushing and whoever is playing his charming niece.
What can I say? I’m a sucker for a nicely tailored frock coat.
Alison Rose
@dmsilev: Ah, but you just have to make friends with my fave, Detritus, and he’d have your back always.
Chris
@gene108:
I don’t need paradise, but improvement would be nice.
dexwood
The world of the The Jetsons, except for its 1950s & 60s acceptance of women’s roles.
HinTN
I think Mr Scott’s engine room would be a rich environment.
NotMax
In the Star Trek universe, Risa.
’nuff said.
Villago Delenda Est
I’d like to live in Iain Banks’ The Culture.
Mike in Oly
I was enchanted by Ian Bank’s Culture as well. What a time to be alive! But also interesting would be the world of John Varley’s future solar system. Where body modification is as cheap as clothing and tech allows us to exist in all kinds of environments.
NotMax
From the comics pages, Foozland.
“Nov shmoz ka pop.”
Scout211
It would be nice if you all could reference the book or movie that has the fictional world you would like to live in. Apparently I don’t read or watch what most of you do because I don’t recognize many of your fictional worlds.
Kent
I grew up in a conservative Mennonite extended family and have relatives who are Amish. Growing up spent my summers on a family farm adjacent to Amish farms on 3 sides.
I gotta say I want no part of that life whatsoever. They are basically Taliban without guns.
People are scandalized because the Taliban don’t allow girls to receive a high school or college education. Guess what, the Amish don’t either. If you are an Amish girl and interested in becoming a doctor? Forget it. Your schooling, such as it is, will end about age 14 and after that it is domestic life and marriage for you. And living under the thumb of your father, brothers, and future husband. Very little different from a girl in Afghanistan
I could stand to live as a crew member on the Starship Enterprise. That would be a cool world.
cain
Man, I’m not sure there is any fantasy world I would like to live in. I mean, I suppose if I had a choice it would be the world of Xanth were everything is a pun.
zhena gogolia
@Alison Rose: I’d like to be in Bilbo’s house when Richard Armitage came to spend the night. 😄
zhena gogolia
@Tony Jay: Haha, that is a really good one!
gene108
@Chris:
If WaterGirl gives me the option of paradise, I’m choosing as close to paradise as possible.
zhena gogolia
@cain: I don’t think this is meant to be restricted to fantasy worlds, that’s just what the first 25 comments seemed to be about.
I don’t particularly like sci-fi or fantasy, but then I don’t really read books to get away from reality. So I wouldn’t much like to live in my favorite books, like those of Austen, Brontë, or Dostoevsky, because I’d be sure to be the scullery maid. And if I wasn’t, I wouldn’t enjoy having a scullery maid.
ETA: In the case of Dostoevsky, I’d be some uneducated cook.
Narya
Three Pines (Louise Penny) or the Shire. I’d like Rivendell except the fading away part. And I want to visit Gondor.
WaterGirl
@Scout211: oops! fixed. i know the difference, could have been autocorrect, could have been because I’m super tired.
rekoob
@NotMax: A fine choice, and thanks also for the link to Candide.
Hard to choose — Oofy Prosser, Bertie Wooster, Freddie Threepwood in the Wodehouse world?
My grandfather said that if he could come back as anything, it would be as a rich person’s dog. Tricki Woo from All Creatures Great and Small, perhaps?
Ben Cisco
Federation, DS9 immediately after the series finale. Would love to see what happens next.
Baud
The American President/The President.
JoyceH
Star Trek Next Generation. I’d probably be something in admin or public relations. Maybe Engineering. If you’re looking for me, I’ll be in Ten Forward.
dmsilev
@Scout211: For the ones I referenced:
WaterGirl
@Scout211:
That’s a good idea! :-)
JoyceH
Or the Bartlet White House, West Wing. Maybe in the press office. Or I’d be the person who winds all those clocks.
WaterGirl
@zhena gogolia: Dare I suggest that you would welcome him with open arms?
lollipopguild
@dexwood: Flying cars!!!!!! Anti-gravity belts!!!!!!
ColoradoGuy
Iain Banks’ Culture worlds for sure.
I highly recommend Iain Banks’ “The State of the Art” where a Culture ship visits the Earth of the late Seventies, with an intriguing Paris, a slowly decaying but genteel London, a shell-shocked and divided Berlin, and an utterly depraved and chaotic New York City. And the entire world on the precipice of nuclear annihilation (our timeline), so the Ship is busy making perfect copies of all the famous artwork and artifacts of Earth.
I won’t give away the ending, but our human-appearing Culture protagonist tells more than one Earth-person “Money Is Poverty” during his visit.
ArchTeryx
I would like to live in a world that probably nobody hear has ever heard of: The world of Griffin Ranger, based on a book series by Roz Gibson.
The world is a parallel universe version of Earth where humans are absent, but several sapient species take their place. The two that have primacy are the griffins, based on many species of birds of prey, and the “greenies,” or builders. They are kakapo-sized parrots. Most of the griffins are barbarian-tribe level, while the builders have high technology. They are aggressive and expansionist, conquering and colonizing most of the world at the point of a gun, just like the Europeans once did. But they ran aground hard in the Americas. There, the griffins had allied with the hanz, a lemur/raccoon hybrid race that also had high technology, and gave griffins personal deflector shields against the builder guns. Thus, the builder invasion failed, but they were allowed to stay, at a price: They would obey griffin law with the penalty of violation being exile or death. The laws are enforced by the Griffin Rangers, a paramilitary force of the largest and strongest griffins.
While the primary villain of the series is a greenie, most greenies simply want to live their lives in peace, contribute to their flocks and their work, and not make trouble for anyone. Just like in our world, one bad leader with a will to power can do terrible damage, if they get ahold of the wrong technology…
It’s a rough, violent, and sometimes cruel world, in many ways reflecting our own.
So why would I want to live there?
This is a world with no cars, no busses, few roads outside of cities, almost no fossil fuels. Power is provided by wind, solar, and hydroelectric. Vast parts of the Northern and Southern Continents are still forested and wild. Passenger (Nomad in their language) Pigeons flock by the billions. Carolina (Flower-Headed) Parakeets, Dodos, Moas and many other extinct animals are thriving. Even many prehistoric creatures from the Ice Age still roam the Earth. The air is oxygen-rich. Short distance travel is by foot, tram, or one’s own wings. Long distance travel is by greenie-built Rail-Runners (trains) that crisscross the continent. Cities have many civilized comforts, and the greenie gilt credits provide a vibrant economy. The builders, as expansionist as they are, take stewardship of the land extremely seriously. It is no utopia, and can be as brutal and cruel as our world. But it is also beautiful in a way few humans have ever experienced.
My OC in this world is Coaad-eet the builder, exiled from his own flock by a bad leader, wandering through the wilds and trying not to get eaten by wild predators. He eventually settles in a buffalo ranch and there befriends a herder (anthropomorphic dog) named RIpples. It is a hard working life, but it is a safe one, and he and Ripples have had many adventures together. It isn’t a bad place to live.
CaseyL
I’m going to cheat. Ever since reading Julian May’s Pliocene Exile series, I’ve wanted to go back in time 6 million years and live right here on Earth. Way post-dinosaur, and no humans or even human ancestors yet.
What would I do? Be a homesteader! Hike and explore! Make friends, if possible, with the local fauna (the ones not trying to eat me).
Tony Jay
There are parts and periods of Middle-Earth where life would have been sweet. First Age Beleriand between the Sealing of Angband and the Battle of Sudden Flame, maybe. Morgoth’s hordes off the field and all those Elves bringing all the peak splendour of their post-Valinor civilisation to mortal lands, feeling so relaxed and confident about the future that many of them even forgot to be superior dicks for a bit.
Possibly Numenor around 1000 SE. After they’d started building a civilisation that could explore the world, before they became embittered cranks who just wanted to punish it for not being Valinor.
Post-War of the Ring Gondor? Rebuilding some kind of shadow of past glories, but for the first time in about 10,000 years, humans don’t have to worry about ‘The Devil’ living just a few hundred miles away. Talk about causes for optimism!
Ruckus
I’m one in the group of odd man out.
Of all the books I’ve read, science fiction, historical, futuristic, I don’t really want any of it. Every place has something that works against humanity. Because life, in books or reality, is either a test to see if you can make it or some place/time that everyone seems to want to get the hell away from. And this one doesn’t seem to have a strong desire to end one’s life every 15 minutes like many stories do, unless you follow every rule exactly, and of course you have to work rather hard to find all the rules. This one has rules, pitfalls, requirements but the rules aren’t all that difficult to find these days, nor all that difficult to follow.
kalakal
Iain Banks’ Culture
I’d like to be a member of the Drones Club in P G Wodehouse’s world
hitchhiker
I want to be on CJ Cregg’s staff during season 3.
karen marie
I’m not sure I’d really like to live in Tom Holt’s “world” but it is a fascinating, wonderful and often bewildering place to visit!
As part of my Audible subscription, I got a free listen to his book Donut, the first in his Youspace series. I’m now on the fourth book. The whole thing is insane, and the reader is an absolute delight. I’m just now finding out that Donut is his 51st book! I don’t know how I missed this guy.
The premise of the series is that one can travel between dimensions by looking through the center of a donut. The worlds in the other dimensions bear some resemblance to ours but since we don’t have goblins, dwarves or elves in ours …
There was quite a bit of time between listening to Donut and starting the second in the series – When It’s A Jar. Initially, I was lost (I listen as I’m going to sleep, so being lost is no surprise) so I went back for a second listen of Donut to get my bearings. I’m now on book four. I’m hooked.
The guy knows how to write, and he knows how to create insane worlds that make absolute sense while being completely insane.
Two things stand out to me. At no point have I thought, okay, I’ll just grit my teeth to get through this bit that makes no internal sense. And everyone is nice (even when they’re awful) but never saccharine.
If you enter Youspace, keep your eye peeled for a donut-stealing eagle or you’ll never get out.
Yutsano
An instructor at Starfleet Academy. Preferably in the 24th Century.
WaterGirl
@gene108: Good one!
MisterDancer
@kalakal: since half of y’all already got to The Culture, I’ll just say there’s a wonderful (and sadly out of print) official DOCTOR WHO novel with a The Culture analog as the main setting. It was actually my introduction to Banks’ work, if indirectly!
WaterGirl
@hitchhiker: I hope you hire me when I apply!
WaterGirl
@kalakal: Thanks for (inadvertently) giving me the idea for tonight’s Medium Cool.
Tony Jay
@zhena gogolia:
The trick is to be completely credulous and listen to all the very clear warnings about where NOT to go wandering when the moon is full. And definitely keep Kronos around. He might be an emotionally shuttered pipe-head with a kink for rough sex, but he’s basically Austro-Hungarian proto-Buffy and all the smart bloodsuckers will steer well clear.
zhena gogolia
@WaterGirl: It would be fun.
billcinsd
@karen marie: Expecting Someone Taller is one of his I quite enjoyed
zhena gogolia
@hitchhiker: I wouldn’t mind working for Don Draper. I’m a good typist and I love a Selectric.
kalakal
@WaterGirl: I did? Hah, well done me 😄
Old Dan and Little Ann
For about 40 years I’ve wanted to hang out on Endor with the Ewoks. Especially if I could ride a Speeder Bike.
Tony Jay
@CaseyL:
The problem with the Pliocene Exile is the warring races of metaphysic aliens and their culture of enslaving (or eating) and human that they got near. Maybe after the end of the books. King Sugoll’s kingdom? Settle down with a nice Firvulag and help purify all that radiation damage out of the gene-pool. Yearly trips to the coast to see the newly extended Mediterranean.
kalakal
@Tony Jay: That’s a good one. Yeah I could go for that. You could have fun with the fact that the same 20 people turn up in every village, they’ve just swapped jobs
laura
@Scout211: I’m not going to tell you one more thing about the novel The Milagro Beanfield War because it would rob you of the joys of discovery that only a first read can achieve. But high thee to your nearest used bookery, because this story will grab you, and then you’re going to want everyone you’ve ever known and loved to read it too, and then you’re going to start talking to strangers if for no other reason than to try and convince them to give it a read, and then you’re going to buy a whole mess of copies to hand out as gifts and such like, and I don’t want to ruin it for you. So, Get On It! Milagro Beanfiled War by John Nichols.
karen marie
@zhena gogolia: Have you watched A Young Doctor’s Notebook, with Jon Hamm and Daniel Radcliffe?
Not a world I want to live in! But a terrific two-season series. It was free on Prime when I watched it a year or more ago. It’s still there but now you have to pay.
kalakal
Pern could be fun as long as you’re a dragonrider
Percysowner
This is hard. I love fantasy, but am honest enough to admit that I don’t want to live in any world without indoor plumbing (central heating is a close second), and most fantasy worlds are medieval settings.
Maybe the world of Red, White and Royal Blue where the President of the United States is a woman, who wins reelection by carrying Texas after her son comes out as bisexual and dating the Prince of England (the Spare, not the Heir). It would be nice to live in a world where that could happen. I guess I’m going with fantasy after all.
Villago Delenda Est
@Scout211: Just google “The Culture” and you’ll get a laundry list of Banks’ novels.
SFBayAreaGal
@Ben Cisco: Me too
Villago Delenda Est
@JoyceH: “What is this”?
Data: “It is green.”
zhena gogolia
@karen marie: I haven’t watched the whole thing — I could only get excerpts when I was teaching that book. I liked it. It’s very bloody, but that’s true to the book. I kind of liked the conceit of having the older doctor talking to his younger self, which is a good way of capturing the spirit of the stories, where the narrator is looking back on his adventures. It’s a great book, by the way.
karen marie
@gene108: See Tom Holt! I cited him a few minutes ago – find that comment. It contains a link so you can see his stuff.
@wonkie: I like Aaronovitch’s series – I think I’ve listened to six or seven of The Rivers of London series on Audible but he sometimes disappoints in roles and attitudes.
Villago Delenda Est
@Mr. Prosser: “It’s turtles all the way down!”
zhena gogolia
@karen marie: Turns out I bought it but never got around to finishing it because I wasn’t teaching the book any more. I’ll have to go back to it when I finish binging Mad Men.
Scout211
I read that years ago. But it was so long ago I don’t remember what that world was like.
I am the keeper of our book group records and I just looked it up. We read it in 1988! Yikes!
Citizen Alan
If the TARDIS showed up in my living room and the Doctor stepped–any Doctor, including Colin Baker, Jodie Whitaker, and even Peter Cushing!– and invited me to come along, I wouldn’t even pack a bag. I’d just leave a note saying “Gone forever. Bye.”
kalakal
I think one of more peaceful parts* of LeGuin’s Earthsea would be nice
And I would love to visit Hughert’s fantasy China of Master Li and Number Ten Ox
*not Kargad
Formerly disgruntled in Oregon
Barbieland!
gene108
@zhena gogolia:
I can’t do what is now historical settings, because I really like indoor plumbing.
For the 19th century, I’d like to ride aboard the Nautilus from “20,000 Leagues Under the Sea”.
MisterDancer
There are SO MANY bits of Trek’s backstory I’d choose to live in, even if The Culture comes ahead in the final personal count. :)
I’m gonna ramble for a bit. Moreso than usual!
I think about this stuff a lot, having spent many years doing re-creation of Medieval and Renaissance cultures, especially outside Europe. There’s some great cultures for Black folx back in the day, even if they are…poorly documented in English. :(
Otherwise? Well, it wasn’t always horrible at every point in history for Black and Brown people. But finding such a point can be…challenging.
And that’s without the hot mess of European Fantasy. So little room there unless you imagine the near lack of Blackness means a lack of Racism, er someone like me shows up.
So that leaves a lot of us — and frankly, I think, other marginalized folx — with The Future. Very specific Futures. As much as I rag on Gene Roddenberry, I also know that the Golden Age of Science Fiction had no room for people like me, you know? He and his team made that room on a mainstream level, made a space for a lot of diversity that we’re still trying to make normal, to this day.
Sorry. Meant to talk about all the places and people in Trek I love. But…yeah, I do love them.
And with that: if I’m choosing Trek? I’m choosing Season 2 of DISCOVERY…on. I want to see it all, and be with a crew that really tries hard to love each other without reserve. I legit teared up when the crew reunited, and…yeah.
I know a lot of people gripe about the show, but yeah, that’s where I’d want to be.
schrodingers_cat
@zhena gogolia: Did you see that Shahrukh Khan’s latest movie, Jawan, has become a monster hit. He is in his 50s now and he’s still got it!
zhena gogolia
@schrodingers_cat: I did!
schrodingers_cat
@zhena gogolia: It’s a thinly veiled critique of India of the last 9 years.
zhena gogolia
@schrodingers_cat: Oh, sounds interesting.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
When Roger Ebert reviewed Gosford Park, he quoted I forget which British writer who said that there was no more pleasant life than that of the English country house between the wars. This, noted Ebert, was only true if you were part of the “above stairs” world.
MisterDancer
@schrodingers_cat: oh? That is of some interest…
Baud
@schrodingers_cat:
Aren’t all his movies hits?
dmsilev
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: I remember reading a similar anecdote from Isaac Asimov. A friend told him that he wished that they lived a century or so earlier, when it was easier to get servants. Asimov replied that that would be horrible. When asked why, he said ‘we’d be the servants’.
Villago Delenda Est
@schrodingers_cat: Surprised Modi hasn’t put a hit out on him.
Villago Delenda Est
@dmsilev: Horatio Hornblower revels in his freedom as a captain of a ship on detached duty, and the price of his freedom is hundreds of men enslaved.
MisterDancer
Oh yeah, Asimov would know. It’s been a lifetime, it feels, since I read his autobiography — but his early life was pretty rough.
kalakal
For many years I’ve thought it would be pretty great to be partnered with one of Anne McCaffery’s Brain Ships as in The Ship who Sang
A world that would amazing to visit just because it would be so weird would be that of David Brin’s The Practice Effect, a world were entropy runs in reverse
schrodingers_cat
@zhena gogolia: @MisterDancer: Speaking of India, PBS stations are airing a documentary from POV of a news anchor who continued to ask difficult questions even when the rest of the media capitulated before the emperor.
Adani, Modi’s favorite oligarch bought the media company and Ravish Kumar is now on YouTube.
The name of the documentary is While We Watched. Its relevant on it own and in our present context when a bulk of the media acts like an opposition party when Ds are in power.
While we watched.
Yarrow
I want to live in a world where I can eat what I want and not gain any weight and also not feel gross after I eat all the things. Where I don’t have to do all the crappy stuff I have to do. Where the weather is pleasant, the people are friendly and tolerant, the scenery is beautiful, and there are interesting cultural and outdoors things to do that aren’t horribly crowded. Where daily life isn’t horribly stressful. And of course where there are all our lovely pets.
Whatever fictional world that is, sign me up.
schrodingers_cat
@Villago Delenda Est: SRK’s son was arrested on a flimsy pretext a couple of years ago.
What Have The Romans Ever Done for Us?
Well I’ve kind of always wanted to live like Beetie Wooster in a PG Wodehouse novel. Glamorous jazz age metropolises, palatial country estates, an omniscient valet to keep me well dressed and manage my life. The worst physical malady anyone has is the occasional industrialist with problems with the lining of his stomach. Good food, better cocktails. Occasionally having to dodge a pushy aunt or an accidental engagement or helping an old school chum in matters of the heart is the biggest worry. What’s not to like?
Captain C
Like several others here, definitely The Culture.
Also, it might be fun to be Slippery Jim DiGriz’ (the Stainless Steel Rat) librarian or suchlike, or perhaps the same role for one of the Leverage teams.
CaseyL
@Tony Jay:
True! But they’re all in Europe, and Remillard’s Rebels are in Florida. I’d go elsewhere: maybe Bay Area California, or even stick with the Pacific Northwest (where I live in the here-and-now). I’d rather deal with earthquakes than Tanu, Firvulag, and the Milieu Exiles!
I’m curious about everyone who wants to live in the Culture universe. I love those books, but they paint a pretty godawful picture of what far future galactic society’s like. I can’t remember any world or culture that I’d actually want to be part of.
Ooh! Just thought of another one: Preservation Station from Martha Wells’ Murderbot books!
schrodingers_cat
@Baud: Not really. Not all his movies have commercial successes. The last few bombed. Pathaan released early this year was a success but The Fan, Harry Meets Sejal didn’t do that well.
SFBayAreaGal
@kalakal: Yes. I would love to be a Dragon Rider
Frankensteinbeck
My own books. Why am I writing them if not to paint a picture I like?
SFBayAreaGal
@Citizen Alan: Any Doctor for me. I wouldn’t have to be asked twice.
MisterDancer
@schrodingers_cat: did you mention this before? I have this on my To Watch list is why I ask…
Alison Rose
@What Have The Romans Ever Done for Us?: -0
Dorothy A. Winsor
@Ruckus: Tolkien himself talked about the Fellowship’s time in Rivendell saying that good times are pleasant to live through but they make bad stories
ETA: I’d be interested in living on Beta in Lois McMaster Bujold’s Vorkosigan series.
hitchhiker
I’d like to be on the Spotlight team at the Boston Globe while they’re publishing their many stories about Catholic coverup of abusive priests. How satisfying that must have been.
schrodingers_cat
@MisterDancer: Yes a couple of times in the G20 threads IIRC. If BJ folks are interested we could watch it as a group and do a Q and A.
Steeplejack
@NotMax:
Mmm, Vash . . .
MisterDancer
<StarWarsQuote>”Now that’s a name I’ve not heard in a long time. A long time”.</StarWarsQuote>
SFBayAreaGal
@Steeplejack: She was an interesting character.
Jackie
I LOVE Pippy Longstocking and have fantasized living her life for most of my life!
So there!
lowtechcyclist
@Percysowner:
Another thing about fantasy worlds being basically medieval tech + magic is that a good chunk of the population would have to be working the fields in order to feed everyone. That never appears to be backbreaking labor in fantasy worlds, but of course it would be. Whatever the risks and dangers of the world we live in now, I’d much rather be here than in a world where so many had to do such difficult work.
Alison Rose
@Alison Rose: Dang it, I’d written the wrong thing and went in to try to edit it, and then my internet went all glitchy and I missed the window. Bah.
karen marie
@billcinsd: I am looking forward to reading as many of his books as I can. I think he’s going to be like Wodehouse and never fail to delight.
Kristine
Another Discworld person. I would alternate between bugging Granny Weatherwax to take me on as an apprentice and working in the Patrician’s library.
Second choice: Studying at Kamar-Taj.
Mr. Bemused Senior
Yet another reason I ❤️ BJ.
David 🌈 ☘The Establishment☘🌈 Koch
Roy Hobbs playing baseball for the New York Knights or reporter Irwin M. Fletcher.
Captain C
@JoyceH: This is an excellent choice also.
lowtechcyclist
@kalakal:
Hmmm…maybe Brin’s Earth, a decade or two after 2038, the year the action in the book takes place.
Damn, 2038 is a lot closer than it was when I first read the book.
zhena gogolia
@MisterDancer: Once in a Moscow bakery a friend pointed to one of the workers and said that he was related to Isaac Asimov. I don’t know if it was true or not! But it looks as if his family were from near Moscow, so maybe.
UncleEbeneezer
@laura: I’m thinking of reading this on our trip to Taos in December for my 50th B-day :)
SpaceUnit
I’d like to live in the world of James Blaylock’s Balumnia series. It’s like Tolkien’s Middle Earth but hysterically funny and offbeat.
Say, didn’t we have this exact thread a couple weeks ago?
Steeplejack
Good suggestions here—the Culture, Ankh-Morpork, maybe Conan Doyle’s or Wodehouse’s England (with sufficient money). I might add the universe of Martha Wells’s Murderbot series, maybe on the non-corporate Preservation home planet, with occasional expeditions on one of the gigantic research vessels. Exemption from the murders, please.
Re The Hobbit, one thing that I always wondered about, even as a kid, was—plumbing. Who runs the Shire’s infrastructure, and how does it all work? Those little hobbit homes are cute, but I can see issues.
Actually, that’s an issue in almost all fantasy and science fiction: the humdrum realities of everyday life. Well, not really an issue, because for the most part readers don’t care about that stuff. But thoughts do arise occasionally.
Omnes Omnibus
The life of the Vicomte de Valmont would have its rewards, but I would have to stay true to my ‘nym and go with Andre-Louis Moreau.*
*Just to mix up 18th century French milieus.
TheOtherHank
As long as I can avoid being murdered by one of the many homicidal maniacs that throng the place, the town of Brokenwood in New Zealand, the setting of Brokenwood Mysteries, looks like a delightful place to live.
Yarrow
@SpaceUnit:
Sure seems like it.
Sure Lurkalot
@JoyceH:
I’ll be on the Holodeck.
SpaceUnit
@Yarrow:
BJ must be playing reruns on account of the writers’ strike.
Steeplejack
@zhena gogolia:
Since you’re in charge of the fantasy, couldn’t you be a high lady who never sees a scullery maid, much less has to deal with one?
Splitting Image
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Also only true if you didn’t give a rat’s ass about anybody killed during the Great War. JRRT once remarked that by 1918, all but one of his friends were dead. Many who did come back were shell-shocked or maimed.
Women were allowed to be barristers in England for the first time in 1919 solely because the war killed so many law students that the even the most curmudgeonly old men in the profession were swamped with work and had to admit they needed the help.
The 1920s was also when country houses started to get shut down and converted into hotels, because the landed gentry could no longer afford to keep them up. If you were a country gentleman in the 1930s and living a relatively blissful life, you were by definition so wealthy that the war and the Depression weren’t affecting you. That sort of life is fairly pleasant in almost any era.
El Muneco
Anywhere at a pre-industrial level of technology and social organization is out for obvious reasons – including our world, unfortunately – unless there is sufficiently advanced magic to be indistinguishable from technology.
My standard answer for this question is Beta Colony in Lois McMaster Bujold’s “Vorkosigan Saga”.
Humanity has spread through a network of wormholes and settled a number of earthlike planets over the past few hundred years. Earth itself is a backwater due to its place in the wormhole map but still remains culturally important. On the other hand, some marginal worlds in strategic junctions are undergoing multi-generation terraforming projects. With political isolation and highly advanced genetic technology, in some places, humanity is becoming … stranger. There are no advanced aliens yet encountered.
Beta Colony was an experiment – think of the political utopia envisioned by students at Wellesley after three vape hits, or the embodiment of all the stereotypes about Southern California, only writ large. Direct democracy, universal income and jobs guarantee, tight control of civilian firearms, licensed and regulated prostitution, no social opprobrium over LGBTQ+ status (this was a bigger deal in the 80s when the series started), no standing military (just a well-funded civilian exploration service), internet access is a constitutional right…
As you’d expect from the series’ origin as Star Trek fanfic, it’s another take on the Federation, only even weirder and less militaristic. Like Star Trek, there are some dark sides under the hood (and in many of the same places). But overall, it’s most of the things that I want the USA to be, only in (insert Tim Curry gif) SPAAAAAAAACE!
Steeplejack
Based on recent “Medium Cool” reading, being in the artsy fringe of Dorothy L. Sayers’s 1920s might be nice. Peter Wimsey adjacent but with the pompousness dialed down. Again, money not a problem.
phein64
If I can be a Prince of the Blood, then Zelazny’s Amber. If not, then a metapsychic in Julian May’s Milieu.
UncleEbeneezer
@zhena gogolia: The setting is great provided you don’t actually have to deal with Don, who could be a major asshole boss, at times.
UncleEbeneezer
Barbieland. While every night is Girl’s Night and I would be a mere afterthought, I would still be able to join some excellent dance numbers with a bunch of stunningly attractive people. Plus I’m pretty good at Beach.
RSA
I like the suggestions of the Star Trek: TNG and The Culture worlds, because of the idea of a post-scarcity system. I’m thinking, like some other commenters, about Rawls’s veil of ignorance: Choosing the world and its rules but not knowing what position you’ll land in.
It’s appealing to think of living in a world where magic works; @kalakal‘s suggestion of an island of Earthsea is good.
Also, going against some of what I’ve written above, I’d be willing to take my chances in The Wind in the Willows.
Chris
The Gaulish village from Asterix. The magic potion means complete safety from any and all hostile invaders. Getafix’s potions can cure pretty much all ailments. They’re not actually interested in reconquering Gaul, so you could still have all the benefits of Roman civilization, just without the tyranny and being thrown to the lions. And of course every day will devolve into a hurricane of puns, though some may think that’s a bug and not a feature.
Splitting Image
@Citizen Alan:
Whenever I play this game, I always end up in a TARDIS. Most of the time, my go-to answer would be renting a house down the street from Lizzy Bennet and family, preferably with Anne Elliot and Fanny Price living not too far away. At the first sign of a toothache, though, I’d be running back to the present day.
Hence, a TARDIS. Once I’ve got one of those, however, there are a lot of appealing vacation spots in the time-space continuum. I’ll go see if Mrs. Hudson has any rooms to let in Baker Street….
Steeplejack
@RSA:
I also thought about The Wind in the Willows. Rat and Mole have a nice, bucolic life by the river (beautifully illustrated by Ernest H. Shepard).
NotMax
The world of ElfQuest (in its original 20 issue telling, not as the bloated thing it became in successive incarnations) would be acceptable.
@Villago Delenda Est
You do realize that line is lifted directly from an episode of the original series?
Miss Bianca
@Tony Jay: I love you, man.
Did you catch in one of the previous threads that I’m going to be directing an all-female, Goth/Steampunk version of Gaslight? The ambience you describe sounds eerily appropriate, except it’s supposed to be set in London. Then again, so is Dracula – at least for part of it.
Anyway, I feel like sharing your description of Hammer-Horror-Mitteleuropa, yodeling, “Now THAT’S what we’re talking about, ladies and gentlebeings!”
ETA: That said, I think the fictional world I would most like to live in would be Oz. (No, not Australia, altho’ that feels almost like a fictional world to me, too!)
Ruckus
@Dorothy A. Winsor:
Tolkien himself talked about the Fellowship’s time in Rivendell saying that good times are pleasant to live through but they make bad stories
The thing is about fiction is that the story has to be about a different time or a rather different atmosphere to keep humans interested. Because we see the life around us and today we can see bits of the world we live in a lot farther away. And more so than in my youth when I’d read 4-6 books a month or more, almost all of them stories about far away places, some of them mentioned here or that seemed like a far better world than my 2 square feet. But today we can see all those places and see that while some of them are fantastic, the places that are often are extremely difficult to live in. I liked SciFi because it was made of worlds that were different.
thalarctosMaritimus
@Ben Cisco: Nym checks out. :)
schrodingers_cat
@Yarrow: I thought so too.
Miss Bianca
@NotMax: I love that one, too! I am still so blown away by that original Elfquest series, forty years and more since I first read it.
@Ben Cisco: And I love that one too!
raven
Have you seen the stars tonight?
Would you like to go up on A-deck and look at them with me?
Have you seen the stars tonight?
Would you like to go up for a stroll and keep me company?
Did you know
We could go
We are free
Any placeYou can think of
We can be
Have you seen the stars tonight?
Have you looked at all of the galaxy of stars?
Miss Bianca
@Formerly disgruntled in Oregon:
LOL! Yeah, Barbieland seemed pretty sweet to me too!
NotMax
@Miss Bianca
Indeed. The anticipation for the next issue was palpable.
Miss Bianca
@schrodingers_cat: I saw Jawan described in the ScreenDollars e-newsletter and forwarded that one to my boss! We probably wouldn’t be able to show it until the middle of November, I wonder if it will be around that long.
Geoduck
@Miss Bianca: I would have said Oz as well, with the specification that it’s after Ozma takes the throne. Before that, it was a pretty dangerous place.
Miss Bianca
@Sure Lurkalot: I’ll be in my bunk. (Oh, I guess there’s a clue *my* sci-fi world.)
@Geoduck: Agreed.
kalakal
@Yarrow: If I recall correctly the previous one was along the lines of “which book, film etc conjured up a sense of a time and place so well that it felt like you were there” . A lot of the replies were big on saying that they would not like to actually live in that place. eg I think C.S. Foresters Hornblower books do that but I would not like to have been in the Georgian Navy
WeimarGerman
Overjoyed not one lurker or jackal mentioned Ayn Rand.
NotMax
@kalakal
Yup yup. For example, I’ll devour books and films about the Shackleton expedition, but no way would wish to be there.
zhena gogolia
@Steeplejack: I’d be worrying about the maids all the time.
WeimarGerman
“The Land” of Stephen Donaldson’s Thomas Covenant series. I was always mesmerized by the tragic story of the Giants and the exploration of power.
zhena gogolia
@WeimarGerman: Great nym.
hitchhiker
@WeimarGerman:
In Rand’s universe there are no pets or kids. Only producers and takers.
Far too boring for this gang.
linnen
To be a Shifter of Mavin the Manyshaped’s lineage traveling the Lands of the True Game.
Journeying with the Straw Hat Pirates to explore the Grand Line and find the One Piece.
Living in the city of Olympus from the Appleseed manga series.
Steeplejack
@zhena gogolia:
Then join me in Harriet Vane’s artsy demimonde. Is it okay to have a woman who comes in and “does” for us? We’ll pay her above the going rate!
NotMax
@zhena gogolia
That’s what fainting couches are for.
;)
kalakal
@NotMax: Yeah, I think I mentioned Cherry-Garrards The worst journey in the world. I most certainly would not have wanted to be on that journey.
@Chris: Oh yes! But I would be a bit worried about buying fish from Unhygenix and his wife Bacteria. And I really wouldn’t want to be one of the pirates.
zhena gogolia
@Steeplejack: Okay. But I don’t really like Harriet!
zhena gogolia
Sorry I have to go to bed! Early morning.
Steeplejack
@linnen:
Sources?
Steeplejack
@zhena gogolia:
We’ll keep her at a cordial arm’s length. Maybe tea once or twice a month.
Memory Pallas
I’d want to join the veterinary practice in All Creatures Great and Small.
wjca
My first thought as well. I recall Cordelia saying, early on, something like: “We don’t really have poor people. We sort of cut off at lower middle class.” Not an exact quote, but that was the sense of it.
columbusqueen
@Ben Cisco: I’ll second that. And Quark’s always looked like a great place to hang out.
Captain C
@MisterDancer: He’s one of my three favorite fictional thieves, the other two being Trent the Uncatchable and Parker from Leverage.
bookworm1398
My thinking is whatever situation you are born in seems normal to you. So what that situation is doesn’t matter as much as whether it’s getting better or worse. I’d want something that is getting better.
So in Discworld it would have to be Ankh-Morpork as Lancre doesn’t really change. In Bujold’s Vorkosigan series it would be Barrayar. Beta is nicer than Barrayar but it doesn’t change.
Yarrow
@kalakal: A distinction without much of a difference in comments.
NotMax
@Captain C
Would add Shadowspawn from the Thieves’ World books.
Oh, and also “gentleman thief” A. J. Raffles.
Repatriated
Speaking of “detached duty” — the Official Traveller (SF RPG) Universe. (As a semi-retired member of the Imperial Interstellar Scout Service*, with a small scout starship on loan — in-game, this is “detached duty” status). Preferably based out of the world of Collace, just beyond the edge of the Imperium. For the setting, it’s a decent place: democratic, tolerant, meritocratic, and technologically advanced for the region. Yeah, it’s overcrowded and everyone lives in arcologies because the air’s unbreathably thin and tainted to boot, but the people are good (for the most part) and that’s what really matters.
It shows up as a peripheral location in a couple of the published adventures.
*This assumes that I didn’t die during the character generation process…
UncleEbeneezer
@Memory Pallas: Oh God, this is so my wife’s answer. That or Miss Marple’s world.
The Lodger
@TheOtherHank: Brokenwood: New Zealand’s answer to Cabot Cove.
laura
@UncleEbeneezer: You will not regret it- and the locale is perfect. I’d recommend using a special bookmark to mark the occasion of your Golden Jubilee.
Captain C
@NotMax: Not familiar with those; will have to check out.
karen marie
@Miss Bianca: I didn’t see any dogs or cats, so Barbieland wouldn’t work for me. Plus the “ocean” has no actual water. Nope.
Hidalgo de Arizona
Iain M. Banks’ culture, without question. I don’t think anyone has done quite as great a job imagining a utopian, inclusive society.
Tony Jay
@Miss Bianca:
I did! Problem is I almost always read about these neat things in the early hours of an American morning when all you guys are just passing out from meth fumes.
That sounds like a must-see. Steampunk is such a fun genre. Victorian Gothic crossed with DIY Sci-Fi.
Tony Jay
@CaseyL:
Fair point, but wouldn’t you get lonely? And what happens when you get your leg gnawed by a curious megafauna? The only advanced medical treatment on the planet comes with either a grey torc or the attention of humanity’s worst DILF war-criminal attached.
No, if you’ve got a full Mileau-built camping kit with you, that’s different.
joel hanes
Karhide, from LeGuin’s The Left Hand Of Darkness
Tony Jay
@kalakal:
Brilliant. That has to be a short story somewhere.
“Professor! Thank God you’re here! Our coach came off the road and I can’t find the ladies anywhere in this damned Forest!”
“I vant to dwink your blut!”
“Oh golly gosh!”
joel hanes
@Steeplejack:
The Wind In The Willows
yes. this.
Tehanu
Narnia. Or E.R. Eddison’s Zimiamvia — a little house in Mornagay.
NotMax
@Captain C
Realized I provided no link to Raffles.
Nor to the world of Thieves’ World.
HeartlandLiberal
I am sorta late to the party, but Witness is one our favorite movies. We have incorporated Eli Lapp’s parting words to Book into our daily life: You be careful out among them English!
Subsole
@Repatriated:
Hey, man. Anyone who wants to hang out in the Third Imperium is okay by me. I always thought the Vargr Extents would be… interesting… to visit, but no way I’d live there.
Then again, that’s most of the worlds a Traveller sees, no?
Chris
@kalakal:
I get the feeling Unhygienix doesn’t sell a lot of merchandise. There’s a reason you always see the Gauls hunting and eating wild boar instead. If you’re unwise enough to eat his fish, that’s on you.
Honestly, the pirates are doing great! In all other pirate-related media, even when they’re the heroes, the job comes with a very high risk of death; depending on the genre, it may also involve curses, witches, voodoo, zombies, and a sea-devil who will hunt you down and turn you into one of his fish-people-slaves for all eternity. Here, all that happens is they get beaten up and embarrassed periodically. Also, despite a truly astronomical number of ships sunk, somehow they’ve always got a new one a couple books later. I don’t know if they’ve got a Hand of Midas stashed away somewhere, or if they’re really good at shaking down shipowners, or if they’ve just got a lot of other successful missions going on that we never get to see, but whichever it is, they must be doing something right.
Paul in KY
Valmar in Valinor. Many years before Morgoth destroyed the 2 trees.
Caladan in Dune Universe
Coruscant in Star Wars Universe
Alderaan in Star Wars Universe (many years before it was destroyed by Grand Moff Tarkin)
Ringworld (with a good amount of the age-lengthening drug)
Paul in KY
@NotMax: That does sound quite nice…
Paul in KY
@Steeplejack: I think the vast majority of Hobbit houses have only the most rudimentary indoor plumbing. Would think outhouses or excavated slit latrines are common. Bag End is a great mansion. The best property in Hobbiton. Has many things the other houses lack, IMO.