Hector A. Ruiz

MBA, Project Manager, Tennis Player, Musician, and Author of "How to Destroy a Country"

The spaceship that keeps taxiing

As far back as I can remember, The Beatles have always been my favorite band. Not only that, but I also rate them as the most influential band of all time, and anyone who says otherwise should receive history and music lessons for a full year. They are the greatest band / musical artist of all-time period. Unquestioned. Undoubted. Undeniably.

So what about the Rolling Stones? I mean after all, many fans and pundits point to the Stones as the greatest band of all time after The Beatles. As far back as I can remember, I have never really cared that much about The Rolling Stones. I do not dislike them, I actually enjoy all their songs. However to me, they have always sounded like the band that tried to be better than The Beatles, but never could. To me, if there was a textbook dictionary definition of “second fiddle”, it would be The Rolling Stones. So this past weekend I decided to listen to all their discography, song by song, to try to understand why are they rated so highly in the musical spectrum. I have been listening to them all my life. I listened to them non-stop with a now more mature ear to see if my perception of them changed, and I could appreciate their greatness as others do. In the end, my perception remained unchanged. Given the result, I decided to share my thoughts on why The Rolling Stones are rated so highly, beginning with the premise that far from being the second greatest band of all time, 

The Rolling Stones might in fact be the most overrated band of all time.

#1. Marketing.

I am obviously not a baby-boomer, so I was not around at the time the Stones rose to fame. However as you should probably know, I am an avid reader and an amateur historian who enjoys time traveling to different eras and relating to how events and people influenced life.

As The Beatles took over the musical streamline, several copycats / competitors emerged. Many were frauds, many were talented -but not as talented-, but none could equal John, Paul, George and Ringo. My guess is that there was a definitive push by other records / labels / producers, to incentive some sort of competition and / or rivalry with The Beatles. The band who benefited the most from this push, are The Rolling Stones. Think about it: The Yardbirds, The Monkeys, The Kinks, The Animals… all failed. The Who and The Beach Boys just could not keep up. And then there were The Stones.

#2. Mick Jagger.

I do not know what “it” is, but Mick Jagger has it.

Every single woman I have dated -and almost every single woman I have met- has been attracted to Mick Jagger. I have always found this remarkable. The guy is skinny as fuck. He is not handsome, he is not… anything. What do women see in him beats me.

#2.1. Mick Jagger, the frontman.

Continuing the above analysis, there is something crucial that I recognize of Mick -even if his irresistible manly attributes to women escape me-: Mick created the frontman figure. Before The Stones, a band’s singer was merely, well… exactly that: the signer and no more. The Beatles did not need a frontman, because they were so frigging talented, their music functioned as a vehicle for any audible and visible vein they as artists needed to fuel audiences. However, aside from them, Eric Burdon was just The Animals’ singer, just like Jack Bruce for Cream. Jimi Hendrix was the singer for his band, but his prowess as a guitarist were the main protagonist of his performances.

Mick on the other hand, established the role of a singer who could interact with the audience, and evoke feelings from them beyond those originated from the band’s songs. His dancing, his mannerisms, his expressiveness, would elevate the band, and his particular role within the band. If you think about it, Mick does not even have a great voice. He is an average signer at best, easily surpassed by even Ringo Starr. But by incorporating a persona that magnifies the role of a singer and expands it into what is now known as a frontman, Mick was able to stand out like no one else did.

Now give the frontman a great voice, and now you have a real powerhouse on stage, which is how Robert Plant and Freddie Mercury elevated the role of a band’s frontman. Peter Gabriel also elevated it, albeit in a different way, with complex lyrics and costumes to portray characters from Genesis songs.

#3. Exploiting sensitive topics.

The band releases an album with a cover that looks awfully similar to Sergeant Pepper’s. They also write a song about the devil -which ultimately becomes one of their masterpieces-.

So why does my opinion of The Stones remain the same? Well, in short because they fail to impress me. Other than their biggest hits, most of their songs feel kind repetitive. When I was listening to Exile on main street, I had a hard time distinguishing between the tracks. At one point I thought I had been listening to a fifteen-minute piece, when in fact four songs had gone by. Mother’s little helper has always been my favorite song of them. It’s a great piece with great lyrics, but still, remove the sitar and it’s just a flat song in A-Major repeating the same musical theme for three minutes straight. Compare that to The Beatles, where you have not one, but four distinct and unique voices capable of bringing a plethora of emotions to the listener. In The Stones, you are stuck with Mick since 1963.

Then there is the band itself. If you asked me to name what I consider the second greatest band of all time, I will have to do a lot of research and homework to come up with a single choice. However, when it comes to naming options, they would be: Led Zeppelin, Deep Purple Mark II, Pink Floyd, and Genesis. Deep Purple would have probably been the second greatest, had Mark II survived longer than what it did. Pink Floyd could hold the title, but they are not quite there yet for reasons that deserve a separate entry. Genesis -Gabriel’s era- is another strong candidate, but unfortunately, they are too niche. So let’s talk about Led Zeppelin and how do they compare to the Stones as candidates for second greatest band of all time. For the sake of argument, let’s assume Zeppelin’s catalogue is original -meaning let’s not bring up the plagiarism issue-.

Mick Jagger vs. Robert Plant: this is perhaps the only aspect one could evenly weigh. Still, Plant’s voice is infinitely superior to Jagger’s.

Keith Richards vs. Jimmy Page: Richards is a great guitarist, one of the best of all time. My issue with him is that, other than a few glimpses of creativity here and there, he never truly evolved. Page on the other hand, created memorable riffs, solos, works of art that are studied to this day. Yes, Satisfaction is great, and I am quite sure it was groundbreaking when it came out, but if Satisfaction broke new ground, then How many more times broke a new core; Whole lotta love created a new planet; Immigrant song sent us into outer space; and Stairway to Heaven, well… it’s Stairway to Heaven.

Brian Jones / Other guy vs. John Paul Jones: you know you have a problem when you kind of struggle to remember the band members of what supposedly the second greatest band of all time is. I will keep this one simple. As great as Brian Jones was, he was no John Paul Jones.

Charlie Watts vs. John Bonham: this one is not even fair.

…so broken individually, The Rolling Stones cannot even compare to Led Zeppelin. You can make the case that the whole is greater than the sum of the parts, but going back to the original premise, that only holds true for The Beatles. The fact is that Zeppelin is by far a superior combination of individual musicianship.

What is left is then the comparison of their respective peaks: 1963-1972 for The Stones, and 1968-76 for Zeppelin. During this period, The Stones released: Rolling Stones now, Out of our heads, December’s children, Aftermath, Between the buttons, Their satanic majesties request, Beggars banquet, Let it bleed, Sticky Fingers and Exile on Main St.

Zeppelin did: I, II, III, IV, Houses of Holy, and Physical Graffiti. Each one of these albums is a masterpiece. There is not a single wasted track. 64 songs, one better than the other. Some conventional, some rock, some blues, some folk, some with mythological references, some with Caribbean influences, some funk, some ballads.

Overall, both band’s catalogue is very close, but due to their variety and multiplicity of themes, I have to give the advantage to Led Zeppelin.

As I close these lines, I think of that comment I overheard from Roger Federer. “How can he be considered the greatest of all time, when thanks to Djokovic and Nadal, he’s not even the greatest of his era.” That is what The Rolling Stones are to me. They are like a spaceship that keeps taxiing waiting to take off, but never does… and never did.

Merry Christmas!

…and Happy Holidays to everyone!

HR

Fourth wing

Fourth Wing by Rebecca Yarros is an enlightening book, not precisely for being a literary masterpiece, but for originating a new marketing case study on consumer behavior.

As I write these lines, Fourth Wing sits at Amazon with a mesmerizing 285,000 ratings averaging 4.8 out of 5 stars, and 278,000 reviews on Goodreads and an average rating of 4.57. To put it in perspective, The Beatles merchandise ratings add up to tens of thousands. The Harry Potter box set features sixty thousand ratings -with Sorcerer’s stone leading with 130,000. Granted it is possible a significant percentage of those 285,000 ratings are spam, still would it be safe to say that even at the worst case, at least a third of them are legit? Maybe a quarter? Does that mean that 70,000 people made a conscious decision to rate this book a collective 4.8 out of 5? Not even Game of Thrones, Harry Potter or Lord of the Rings feature comparable numbers. “There has to be something astonishly great about it”, I thought. Spoilers: there is not.

I got my hands on Fourth wing while I was also reading another fantasy sci-fi story (Sun – The Reborn series). I realized I needed some sort of compass from the genre in order to properly review Sun, so I figured that using Fourth wing as reference would be the best choice based on the recent trend that has driven its popularity to stratospheric heights. “Maybe this is the standard of the sci-fi fantasy genre”, I thought.

As I breezed through the pages, a recurring thought would accompany my reading: “Who can enjoy this book? The writing is predictable, the characters have every possible stereotype you can imagine, the plot is non-sensical… so what is so great about it?

Some of the highlights include (general paraphrasing):

“I love you, but I can’t…”

“You are not meant to be a dragon rider, because you are (insert random challenge) …”

“He is so evil to me, and that’s what makes him so irresistible…”

There is nothing wrong with these cliches. In fact, there is nothing wrong with teenage love and artists exploiting it. This is the same wave Ed Sheeran and even The Beatles rode during their initial years as band. Unlike the former, fortunately the latter evolved from the trend, and that is how they became the greatest influential band in occidental music, but back in their early pop days, you just had to switch off the thinking part of your brain, pay no attention to the lyrics, and enjoy the ride for what it was. In order to finish Fourth wing, you may have to do the same thing: enjoy the fantastic amalgamation of the highlights from some of the most successful artistic works from the past twenty years:

1. Dragons, from Game of Thrones.

2. A school / training location setting, from Harry Potter.

3. A major war taking place in middle Earth, as in Lord of the Rings.

4. A frail female lead character, like in Divergent.

5. A romance element of a young female discovering love, as in Twilight.

6. A young female lead character with outstanding skills, like in Hunger Games.

7. A spectacular very explicit sex narrative, as in… well, all books that need a spectacular very explicit sex narrative because the core elements of proper writing are missing.

…so the problem that I kept running into was that every time I flipped a page, I found myself saying / THINKING out loud: “That’s from Game of Thrones”, or “Oh, just like it happened in Lord of the Rings”, or “Ok, this kind of feels like that scene from Divergent”. Therefore, unless you haven’t read any of those books (or watched the movies), Fourth Wing -like Sun- will hardly surprise you. With so many references, I felt like this book tried to cover multiple ideas, and while it didn’t quite fail at its attempt, it never truly succeeded because it neither displayed any originality, nor it developed any of the themes to a deeper level. It is hard to become interested in a story where so little effort has been made on its construct.

Even with the critical part of my brain switched off, there were two things that slightly bothered me about the book. The first one was the hardest to get past by: the dialogue. It was a little off-putting that the personalities of these middle Earth / medieval characters resembled modern 202X Tik-Tok teenagers. For most of the book I felt like I was overhearing a conversation from a group of kids hanging out at a New York City bar. I was actually expecting Violet to say something like: “Fuck me!! This is so cool!” I was actually shocked it did not happen. It was very disappointing to read such poorly written teenage dialogue. For context, good dialogue written for teenage characters would be: Arya Stark, Frodo Baggins, or Harry Potter. They do not say “Fuck” every other line.

The second grip was from a contextual perspective given the setting where the narrative takes place. I am guessing that this war has been going on for quite some time, and that after several years of fighting it has taken its toll on Navarre. The vast efforts to win the war are palpable, meaning that hundreds if not thousands of people are needed to win it. If that is the case, then why do volunteers who are not skilled in a particular trade have to die. Why not give them another job and sign up for something else? I get it. Becoming a Dragon rider is a life-or-death deal, but couldn’t they become supply carriers, healer assistants, or something to that effect, as it happened with Starship Troopers, or even that goofy movie Hot Shots?

As it happened with Sun, there is nothing profound in Fourth wing. There is no major revelation, no major character transformation, no grand arc, and nothing to have it stand out as a literary masterpiece. Did I dislike Fourth wing? No. Would I recommend it? I can come up with dozens of other better books to read over this book that felt more like a Saturday morning cartoon show that dragged on forever.

There is nothing wrong with Fourth wing. Unless you don’t want to be singled out as the one person in your circle who hasn’t read it, you are honestly not missing anything special by not reading it. On the contrary, you are missing a lot in life if you have not read Dune, 1984, The Prince, or the Divine Comedy. Fourth wing is just an average book that has all the ingredients to become hugely popular (which it did), but not transcendent. The characters are decent, the story is decent, the writing is mediocre. 4.8 out of 5, as in better than War and Peace, Don Quixote, and Huckleberry Finn? No.

A quarter of a million ratings averaging 4.8 out of 5. Maybe it is just my opinion that Fourth wing is not that great and in reality, it is. Maybe it is not that great, and a quarter of a million people are unfamiliar with past literary works Fourth wing not only draws inspiration from, but actually copies ideas from. Maybe the roles of good writing have reversed and The Divine Comedy, The Trial, and Great expectations are being revealed as poorly written, and Fourth wing is the proponent of the new literary world order. Then again, I want to think there is a reason why these literary works have survived for hundreds of years, and are still studied to this day. Will Fourth wing become one of them too? Only time will tell… or maybe it will become an HBR case study.

HR

The Substance

This is a spoiler-free review.

Every generation or so, a new director with a groundbreaking vision appears in the artistic scene of cinema. Sometimes it is two or three. Lean and Kurosawa, Fellini and Kubrick, Spielberg and Lucas, Lynch and Scorsese, and most recently, Nolan, Anderson and Aronofsky. All of them pioneered in one or many ways the art of visual storytelling. While watching The Substance this past weekend, I kept wondering if Coralie Fargeat is the embodiment of this generation’s new groundbreaking vision for movie-making.

Take Nolan for example: most people will immediately associate his name with The Dark Knight trilogy, Interstellar, or  -most recently- Oppenheimer, with a minority being familiar with Memento or Insomnia. Take David Lynch: well-known thanks to Mulholland Drive, Twin Peaks and Blue Velvet, but not so much for Eraserhead or The elephant man. Or take Aronofsky for Black Swan and The Wrestler, but not so much for Pi or Requiem for a dream, the latter of which I will reference in this review given the amount of similarities it share with The Substance.

With a daring combination of driving inspiration from Kubrick, Fargeat does not eschew on either visual or narrative story telling, instead relying heavily on both special effects and properly executed exaggerated dialogue to appeal to different types of audiences, from those who appreciate the poignant emotion of an ambition tale turned into madness, to those who will enjoy the absurdity of overacting adequately used for comedic effect.

However as I previously stated, it is Requiem for a Dream the true framework that was used for The Substance. If you have seen Requiem and watch the Substance, you will immediately relate to my thesis; if you have not seen Requiem, but you have seen The Substance, and watch Requiem next, you will join me as a proponent of their undeniable connection. I truly liked The Substance, though I am not prepared to say it is great or brilliant movie. The plot was good, creative, and even though the premise is simple, it brings a surprising emotional depth I have not seen in a while. Who could not relate to the thought of being able to live the life of a zenith version of yourself? How far would you go to live that life? How willing would you be to sacrifice part of your well-being to see a better version of yourself triumph in aspects you would not be able to? Alas hope can lead to bad decisions.

I have always thought Demi Moore is a good actress. She had great roles in the late eighties and early nineties with Ghost, A few good men and Nothing but trouble, until she let her ability to capitalize on her name blind herself from selecting good scripts, with a fall from grace that began with Striptease, and kept sinking to new lows with G.I. Jane and Charlie’s Angels. Other than a few glimpses of her glory days shown in Margin call, this is the first time since the early nineties I witnessed her fully utilizing her talents and living up to her potential. In The Substance, she marvelously delivers a heartbreaking yet realistic performance of a huge star past her prime who looks to relive her glory years. You can almost feel that she is not playing the part, but in reality living it. Thanks to Fargeat’s direction, the end product is a film filled with images that leave an permanent imprint on your mind, and a voice that resonates as an hymn to how selfishness leads to self-destruction.

Margaret Qualley also delivers a solid performance, but is not as good as Demi’s. You would expect her character Sue to be a pusillanimous contrast to Demi’s Elisabeth, or at least the single character with a conscience, but I guess it is part of the film’s message: that once you become part of the system, there is no way out. Yet even though Qualley does her best, he is greatly aided by Fargeat’s direction. Going back to the comparison with Requiem, I could not resist to see the paralelisms with Qualley and Jennifer Connelly, and with Demi and Ellen Burstyn (Connelly being far superior than Qualley, and Demi coming close to Burstyn’s performance, but not that close). Since there is no counterpart character for Jared Leto or Marlon Wayans, The Substance stands out as a more multi-faceted individual character study, than Requiem with its hard-hitting theme shared by all four protagonists. When measured against Requiem, The Substance needed the Kronos quartet (it also needed Keith David). The Substance might have better box-office numbers and reach out to a wider audience, but Requiem will always be the better between the two.

Regardless of how unappreciated the early works of great directors are, or how Aronofsky’s Requiem impact in filmmaking might be overlooked and undermined by The Substance’s, Fargeat excels at bringing a fresh perspective to brand new audiences unfamiliar with means and methods pioneered twenty years ago, by paying homage to many shoulders of the greats she stands upon: Kubrick’s framing and cinematography, Aronofsky’s visual techniques, and Waters’ unpredictability. There is also some David Cronenberg in it.

In the end The Substance is one of those films where rating will come down to tastes. Some audiences may find it boring, others interesting, others puzzling, and others too simplistic. I will rate The Substance 7 out of 10. It would have been a solid 8 / 10 had it ended twenty minutes before it did. Unfortunately, its third act tried to outdo The Fly’s, and it ended up slightly resembling Malignant’s, where the audience are left to wonder whether the film’s message was intended for the viewer or the establishment… or both.

A very watchable film I recommend to anyone. Then again, so is Requiem for a Dream.

HR

“Sun” by Torrie Q. Jones

Written by Torrie Q. Jones (Instagram, X), Sun is the first book of the Reborn sci-fi / fantasy series I was asked to review. It tells the story of Adam and Taki, two characters who experience a rebirth that allow them to become part of a conflict between the world of Demons and Angels. This review is spoiler free.

In order to establish my reviewing parameters, a 5-star book in this genre would be something comparable to Game of Thrones, Lord of the Rings or Harry Potter. A 4-star work would be a book, that is not as good as the aforementioned works, such as the recent popular best-seller “Fourth wing“. “Sun” is on neither category. So, where does it fall? In order to find that out, I will go over its positive aspects, the elements that contain room for improvement, and finally, its negative aspects. Let’s start with the positives.

The story is good. It is a relatable tale of exactly what the author promises to deliver. Set in the present time in New York City, it provides a sense of reality the reader will appreciate in an otherwise plethora of works that are supposedly set in medieval / middle Earth times, yet feature characters with modern personalities and dialogues.

The characters in “Sun” are well constructed and somewhat relatable (more on this in the upcoming lines). They feel real and are given plenty of humanity, although sometimes maybe too much.

The reading did not feel boring, and I would go as far as to say that it was engaging. All these elements drive the book to succeed in meeting the minimum standards of a coherent story the reader will be able to follow and -hopefully- enjoy. Now for the areas of improvement.

The is very little embellishment of the narrative, which is more presented in a report form, and while the characters are properly given a spectrum of emotions in their thoughts and actions, the narrative -which is essential for the reader to dive into the story-, lacks humanity. Almost everything is stated as if it was a report, rather than developed in a compelling way. There are plenty of literary devices and resources to develop a narrative, to describe a character, establish a location, build a setting, and outline events, yet the author rarely uses any. For instance, I could describe Taki using something along the lines of:

“Even though short in stature, she always emerged portraying a determined, disciplined, and consummate professional, a character she built during her years studying in Japan, after being made fun of during her first weeks in her school in Okinawa for being small and a little chubby.

Very quickly Taki resolved to not allow herself be looked down by even the shortest person around her. She enrolled in jujutsu, an endeavor that paid off by having her embrace the physical and philosophical teachings of the ancient art, and while not the best student in her class, her performance would consistently be placed in the upper half. This gave her the much needed confidence she strived, living so far away from her home. In a short period of time, Taki grew into the person the world would begin to see in a different way. Straight shoulders that pushed her breasts forwards, presenting herself in an imposing and respectful, yet not vulgar way, as to announce to the world “I am here”, was the pose she adopted. Her resounding footsteps could be heard fifty feet away from where she was, and because of her short legs, she would move in quick steps at a pace of two steps for every second, taken with the precision of a metronome. With her full body in motion, deceivingly curvy at a distance due to her inclination to dress in baggy clothes, but well-muscled in reality, Taki was one to make sure her presence was known everywhere she went, to the ears with her walk and to the eyes with her caramel bronze-like bright skin, which was the final icing that completed the reasons why she would shine and stand out within any room she walked in.”

By using a text like the above, there is information being conveyed to the reader, both from her physical appearance and her personality, as well as a little bit of her life. Additionally, the door is open for a deeper understanding of the character. When reading a book, readers desire to quench their intellectual thirst, so it is better to let them gradually learn more about the story, the ambient, the history, and especially the characters. In comparison, in “Sun”, Taki is described as if we are reading a dossier:

“She stood at five feet nine inches, two hundred and twenty pounds”; “jet black thick coarse hair that reached the middle of her back, (…)”; “Her martial arts training undeniable helped put some more definition into those curves.”

Unless it is relevant to the story, as in there is a height limitation somewhere down the road, or a MacGuffin mechanism that is triggered by a mass greater than that 220 lb., the reader does not need to know the exact height and weight of a character… or exact breast size. This briefing approach occurs with almost all the characters.

Metaphors are seldom in the narrative, there is little foreshadowing, no alliteration, minimal imagery, and no euphemisms. The point of views switch so quickly, there is very little time to settle on a character’s persona. Another reviewer mentioned its “mental-movie“-like feeling “given by the details“, which is similar to my sentiment. The reason is because “Sun” feels more like a movie script, than a book. This is not something particularly bad, but it is definitely an aspect that needs to be improved if the author wants their book to read and feel like a book, and not a typical three act movie script setup, confrontation and resolution. My favorite chapter was Breakfast, which was well written, and filled with exposition that gave the characters the chance to evoke feelings within their setting, but more importantly, all mounted over a framework that contained an artistic narrative. However, Breakfast was the exception to the norm. I must reiterate that there is nothing wrong with the narrative missing literary devices. However having them would have elevated it.

On to the characters, there were times in which the two main characters felt they were the same person. Their introduction, development and arcs were similar. On a few occasions I was wondering if it would have been beneficial to merge them as a single character with a better overall construct. Also, while the protagonists are well presented and their importance is clearly understood, the story lacked an antagonist of at least close to equal degree of magnitude as Adam and Taki. The “bad guys” never felt intimidating, menacing or even capable of threatening the protagonists. Overall, every character -good or evil- is generic, which is not necessarily bad either, but leads to the following: unless you have not read any books, or watched any sci-fi / fantasy movies or series, “Sun” will rarely surprise you. Due to the fact based narrative, the story is predictable and became monotonous at times. An example of this is that Adam remained as a fish out of water for way too long, even through the third act.

From the very beginning it is clear that “Sun” will not allude a Sydney Carlson-like sacrifice, a Roy Batty-eque ending monologue, a Tyrion Lannister self-finding journey, or manifest a Captain Nemo conflicting personality. However, a glimpse of any of those moments would have heighten the characters and enhanced the book as a whole. The most intriguing characters were Chike and Lucia, who I feel the author was betting heavily on them being the big revelation, but even they resulted generic and predictable. Again, not that this is a bad thing. Is the characeter’s construct work for the story, and are they effective in creating an emotional connection with the reader? Yes. Are any of the memorable characters? No.

In the end, the final confrontation between good and evil felt flat because the stakes were not high, despite all the efforts the author put on the build-up to it. The good guys were just good for the sole reason that they were “special”, and since the bad guys did not have any motivation they were simply bad given their labeling as demons. An introduction of a motif or symbolism, an elaboration on the elements surrounding the world, the reasons why they were in jeopardy, and a deeper look into their motivations would have definitely favored the excitement of the story.

There was a moment in which “Sun” made me feel as if I was reading a novelization of Matrix and Independence Day. The former as an example of a product with a protagonist that is the least interesting and most generic of all the characters in the story, that ultimately succeeded financially and critically because every other character that converges towards Neo, is profound and well constructed -including the antagonist-. The latter because it is an example of a product that became financially successful employing generic one-dimensional characters and a predictable linear story. Now, on to the negatives.

The majority of the book’s flaws are due to bad editing. Not too deep into the reading, I had to go back and confirm I had read there was a credited editor. Let’s examine the issues:

  1. The tone took too long to set. Just because the story progresses in a coherent linear manner does not mean the way it is told is adequate for the genre. Up until the end of the first third, “Sun” felt more like a romance novel rather than a sci-fi fantasy story. Close to the end of the first third, there are a couple of chapters (particularly one in which Xeno and Dillon are introduced) that would have effectively worked in establishing the book’s tone and developing the story, had they been moved to the beginning. This was a major miss on the editor.
  2. The formatting is not good. Since the reading transmits that the author was more focused on stating facts rather than conveying a beautiful narrative, proper formatting could have aided in polishing the structure. Instead, the paragraphs felt like blocks in which a particular item was stated, discussed and closed, move on, as if the reader is being briefed. The abundance of several four pages chapters leads to too many chapters; the majority could have been condensed in order to facilitate the reading. The blank spaces at the end of random pages was also confusing.
  3. The unexpected tonal shifts and vulgarity. As an author myself, I always go back to the question my editor poses to my manuscripts: is this element (word, sentence, paragraph) necessary to the story? Is it adding any value? If the answer to any of those questions is “No”, then get rid of it. Nothing in this book would have suffered if 95% of the cursing and vulgarity would have been removed. Everything has a place and time. “Fourth wing” made the same mistake, but to a lesser degree. In “Sun” it goes way overboard. It is hard to take the story seriously when two highly profiled characters are having a serious conversation about a matter that propels the plot, when all of a sudden they shift the tone to a completely uncalled for nuisance of dialogue filled of explicit language. I laughed several times due to the unlikelihood of the situation.

These are the negative aspects I recommend the author should fix on their next work. So the final question is, how do I rate “Sun“?

I am going to give this book three out of five stars. As it happened with “Independence Day“, it meets the minimum requirements of a coherent linear readable and enjoyable story, but nothing more. Does it have potential to become a best-seller? Yes. With the help of a better editor and even another writer to address the points I highlighted, I can see this series becoming a success for its audience. Will it be memorable on its own if it remains unchanged? That is up to the audience.

HR

US Open 2024

Twenty-two years.

Twenty-two years had to pass in order to have a Grand Slam Champion not named Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal or Novak Djokovic. Keep in mind the count is still going for a Grand Slam not to feature a finalist not named Federer, Nadal or Djokovic (who made it to the Australian and Wimbledon, but fell short on both occasions).

Congratulations to Jannik Sinner. I watched him play five years ago and I knew he was going to win the US Open one day.

Hr

The worst band breakups: Oasis

Today we are resuming my “Worst Band Breakups” series. So far I have covered Supertramp and Styx. Today I will discuss the band that prompted me to start this series: Oasis.

I first heard Oasis back in 1994, and I went to see them at Earl’s Court in 1995, when they were -arguably- at their absolute prime. Even then, the Gallagher brothers were not particularly friendly to each other. At first I thought it was an act, but in time myself (as well as everyone around the world who followed them)m realized that their dislike for each other was genuine. As it happened with Supertramp, the reasons for the rocky relation between the brothers is filled with rumors, unconfirmed stories, and a lot of speculation. The general consensus though takes us through the early years of the band.

Supposedly, Liam and Noel never got along, even as kids. There was a particular famous story about Noel playing guitar as a teenager and Liam pounding a tin drum incoherently just to annoy his older brother. As they grew older, Liam was the one who founded Oasis. Noel was a member of a somewhat unsuccessful band and would rarely interact with his brother, especially when it came to music. Eventually Liam realized that Noel was a way better musician, composer and songwriter than any of the members of his band -including himself-, and ended up inviting Noel to join them. This is how Oasis was formed.

Noel quickly assumed control of the band and started outputting the series of hits we are all familiar with that resulted in their first two albums: Definitely maybe, and What’s the story (Morning glory)?, all by himself. With nothing left to do, Liam -again, younger brother- was left relegated to a secondary position. However he still had quite an important role: lead signer and front man. Still, as time went on, Noel kept on berating on Liam, and Liam had no other option but to sit back and take it, with signing being his only escape route. I am no phycologist, but to me this is a classical younger brother syndrome.

As the years went on, Noel started to sing in a few of the band’s songs, which left Liam even more outcast. Cornered, Liam started behaving like a spoiled little brother: he started showing up late to the studio, or drunk, or late and drunk; he started showing up late to concerts, or drunk, or late and drunk; in addition to drinking, he started venturing into drugs; all of this while presenting himself as the absolute leader and cornerstone of Oasis.

By the early 2000s, the excess life and abuse led Liam’s voice to deteriorate, and by the middle of the decade it rapidly descended into putting him in a position where he was an image without sound during their live shows. When Noel demanded Liam to come clean and provide a reasonable explanation of his failing voice, he responded that he had health issues, which were never disclosed. Noel then would begin to doubt whether if there were any medical issues at all, and suspected that the cause of Liam’s decline was the abusing lifestyle he was living without showing any dedication or commitment to the band. Finally, in 2009 Noel had enough and released the below statement

“It is with some sadness and great relief…I quit Oasis tonight. People will write and say what they like, but I simply could not go on working with Liam a day longer.”

Supposedly they have not spoken to each other since… until now.

With the upcoming tour in the books all over England and Ireland, several
questions are pondered by Oasis’ fans:

  • Why reunite after so long denying any possibility? Are the reasons financial?

and more importantly:

  • Will they be able to survive the tour without breaking up.

Stay tuned and we will see.

HR

Visualizing things in a different way

I have been away from my long time love and I want to retake my relationship with her. Yes, I am talking about you darling, so starting today I will be posting articles referencing you, my dear love: Math.

I feel in love with Math during school, however our relationship really went to the next level during my high-school senior year. I had a lot going on at the time in my life (you can read about it in my book). Up until that point I had always got Math. Almost everyone around me though, struggled with it to more or less degree, while I was cruising understanding everything and anything it threw at me.

The reason why people struggled was because they learned math by memorization, starting with the premise of multiplication tables: 2×1=2, 2×2=4, 2×3=6, and so on. Rinse and repeat for the other numbers. As Math gets harder this system falls apart because students have to memorize concepts that become unsustainable from the perspective of brute force learning through repetition.

Early on I discovered that the key to be good at Math was not to memorize; but instead, put your brain at work. By thinking and understanding how concepts worked -rather than memorizing- I was able to navigate Math’s many streams with ease. Every journey allowed me to learn from the waters, while the challenges along the way taught me how to deal with them. As you can imagine, water is dynamic and constantly changes, so I was able to learn something new with every passage. More importantly, I always employed what I had learned from my favorite movie quote of all time: “We must constantly look at things in a different way.” from Dead Poets Society.

I will never forget one of my college’s freshman year Calculus tests. It consisted of four questions: two demonstrations, one analytical exercise, and a lone harmless integral that at first glance, looked as easy as adding 2 plus 2, yet it slay wounds on the entire class… except on yours truly. Very few people were able to solve it, and the few who accomplished it were able to, not without writing several lines of trigonometric equivalencies.

The harmless integral

The integral was actually question #1, so it was the first thing I read on the test. As soon as I saw it, I immediately skipped to the next question, and realized the other questions required more time and effort. For a time limit of two hours in the test, I felt comfortable dedicating up to forty minutes for the other three. I knew the integral would take me less than a minute, so I figured I would solve it as soon as the professor would call “Time’s up”, during the time spent from people getting up and handing their exams. About an hour into the test I was done with questions 2, 3 and 4. It was time to get out of the classroom.

There are many lengthy ways to solve this integral. One is to use dual angle identities, such as:

…which leads to a long series of identity equivalents to get to the solution.

You can also use:

which leads to an even longer series of identity equivalencies that take you to the solution.

Or you can also apply several trigonometric properties, such as bringing…

…into the mix. All these routes would take at least fifteen minutes of vital test time, and one way or another they will get you to the solution:

…which you can leave as is, or continue simplifying by expressing the (2x) on the numerator and denominator as function of Sin (x) and Cos (x). This is incredibly time consuming, however it was a must in our class, as professors required students to show all final solutions expressed in terms of Sin (x) and Cos (x). However, thanks to my secret weapon, I was able to get to the simplified solution on a mere two lines in less than 60 seconds (no pun intended atNicholas Cage’s film).

The key here was to rewrite the numerator… the hidden numerator… “1”:

!!!!!!!!!!

The rest was to sew and sing.

Nobody, no one in the entire class solved the integral this way. To this day, I do not have a straight explanation of how I immediately determined the triviality of the integral after having visualized the solution in a matter of seconds. You have to keep in mind that circumstances are different when it comes to tests: nerves, pressure and other external factors play a crucial role that hinders your ability to think straight. Therefore I cannot speak for everyone else in my class who went through the hard way, or tried other unsuccessful methods. However, I truly believe that neither nerves, nor pressure were as key as my secret weapon of visualizing things differently.

After exiting the classroom, everyone started checking answers, and some of my classmates came up to me and say: “Wow, how did you come up with that?“, “Wow, that was amazing thinking on the spot!“, or similar comments. I just told them exactly what I did:

I visualized the function in a different way.

HR

Alien – In space no one can hear you scream

With the upcoming release of Alien: Romulus, I wanted to go back and share my thoughts on the Alien franchise as a whole, going through every film leading up to Romulus.

My experience with Alien (1979) was both funny and one to remember. The first time I watched it was a weekend night back in the 80s. My parents were passed out in their bedroom. I was seven years old and was experiencing the joy of Star Wars. I loved Star Wars, it was arguably my favorite movie at the time, with nothing coming even close to it. Then came this commercial about this space film that was set on a spaceship that resembled the Millennium Falcon, or an Imperial Destroyer. Me -a naive kid- thought this new movie was the fourth of the Star Wars saga: “A continuation to Return of the Jedi!” – I innocently believed. Boy was I in for a ride. This movie freaked me out so much, I had to sleep with the lights on and FM radio playing dance music for about two months. Eventually as I grew older, I had the opportunity to rewatch Alien, this time from a more adequately mature perspective that allowed me to appreciate its greatness as an art form.

Alien works in so many levels that it is not challenging at all to properly contextualize why it is so great. The first reason I always name is the atmosphere. Right from the start the film’s mood feels unsettling. It takes less than a couple of minutes for the viewer to realize that something is not right. Not even a single line of dialogue is spoken. Instead, Ridley Scott slowly pans the camera throughout a series of hallways, rooms and corridors of a ship that is perfectly designed to convey a sentiment of hostility that will only be matched by the creature the ship’s crew will eventually encounter. The Nostromo is dark, almost silent, and barely features any comfortable amenities. This atmosphere is consistent through the film, which helps in building the tension within the crew of seven who simply want to do their job and get out of the ship as soon as possible. Then you have the crew.

The second reason why Alien is such a memorable film is the realism driven by each character. Contrary to other films in which a member would be given a specific trait (mostly a physical element associated to them), each character relies on their own persona to stand out and imprint an image of their personality on your brain -an image that will always be there-. Take for instance Friday the 13th. I mention Friday the 13th because at its core, they are both the same: slasher films. However in Friday the 13th, it’s almost impossible to name any of the characters, because they are devoid of any personality. They are just there to be killed and that’s it, with the exception of Tommy Jarvis. It should be noted that this is the case for all Friday the 13th films. In Alien however, each character feels like a real person because of how well constructed they are:

  • Dallas is the ship’s captain: he is a guy who wants to do his job. He does not stand out, nor he believes he’s the best pilot in the galaxy. He knows he is the equivalent of a space truck driver.
  • Kane is the second officer in command: he is similar to Dallas, only that he is more of a risk taker. You can see this by how inclined he is to investigate the findings around the Space Jockey’s spaceship.
  • Lambert, the ship’s navigator: a smart crew member who is shown to be an expert in her field, yet someone who is very emotional on matters out of her expertise. You can see this on every scene that features this palpable tension. Lambert is not a good decision maker, but an emotional decision maker.
  • Mechanics Parker and Brett: the former Lambert’s male equivalent emotional persona. He’s the outspoken and gets easily emotionally involved, in contrast to Brett’s quietness. They both only care about money, but they also care about taking care of the Nostromo, because they understand the ship is what provides them with money.
  • Ash, the science officer: completely passionate about anything related to science. An expert in his area -like Lambert- but unemotional, which is only due to the eventual reveal.
  • …and finally Ripley: the ranking officer after Dallas and Kane. A strong straight-forward thinker, she represents the voice that always makes the right decision. Even if sometimes her voice is ignored, you know that she made the right call.

As you can see, not a single character has a weapon, or an item to distinguish themselves from each other. The only thing they have is themselves.

And then the third and final reason why Alien works, is of course the film’s execution led by Scott’s direction: the camera angles, the lighting on the set, the music, the editing. Everything is done so impeccably, there is not a single flaw throughout the entire film (at least not one worth mentioning).

So there you have it. Alien (1979) in a nutshell. 10 out of 10.

HR

USTA League Final Results

Our first season just ended last weekend, and what a run it has been.

Starting with an 0-9 record until we were finally able to win our first court, we kept practicing, learned from our opponents, built a few strategies, all of which led us to start winning courts left and right. We even beat the #1 seed 4-1!

In the end, the newcomers, the new kids on the block, the underdog team, the Tennis Knights ended on third place without even having it as a goal. My co-captain and myself are very proud of what the team achieved and will be looking for more improvements in the next season.

Of course, special thanks to each of our players: Chet, Chris, Furkan, Harish, Jaren, Karthik, Kyle, Mark, Naveen, Swapnil, and our co-captain Arvind.

See you all next season!

HR

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