While I was in Crete, as well as right before and even before that, I was reading books by Gromov and the Dyachenkos. For those out of the loop, they are leading Russian sci-fi authors. What follows is about Gromov, not Crete, so if you don't feel like it, don't read.
Yes, I am unable to overcome my passion for reading all kinds of crap instead of useful things. No, sci-fi is not useful, you are mistaken. What seems like deep philosophical thoughts to you is just a basic, layman-friendly packaging of bright ideas, whether they were pilfered or concocted by hand. (A writer, obviously, partly thinks with their hands, so that's not a slip of the tongue).
I am far from assigning books a purely entertaining function, but let's not overestimate them. Reading 100 works of fiction gives you as much experience as a few days of real action, and way more shitting up of your brain with useless junk. Scientific and educational books are another matter, but I personally can't bring myself to read them regularly.
If we continue this line of reasoning, a blog review of sci-fi is little more than static noise. Nevertheless, I keep this journal for pleasure, so as long as it brings me graphomaniac joy, I will keep writing.
Gromov is a person who strives for classic sci-fi, with an emphasis on the word “scientific”. Consequently, he meticulously describes all the technical intricacies and physical effects, never sinning against reality and following physics textbooks. His second idea is people caught in a difficult situation, and what they will do in it. In principle, people are in difficult situations in most books, otherwise it's not interesting for the reader, but here the author himself constantly emphasizes this in his interviews.
So anyway – Gromov is a good author, of course (here one cannot do without nasty-sounding caveats: for sci-fi, for Russian sci-fi). In places, it's boring, due to overly tedious descriptions of the setting, objects, and their interactions. Plus, there is often this feeling that the book has ended, but nothing actually happened. Also, there's a huge, and most importantly explicit, emphasis on the idea of “people in difficult conditions”. It's not the best crutch. In my opinion, a writer shouldn't so bluntly and explicitly exploit such straightforward ideas, let alone talk about it in interviews. I am, however, spoiled by postmodernism. And lastly – when the author sometimes tries to drag something vastly different into a highly realistic world, meant to show the flight of his imagination, it doesn't end well. It becomes clear that blowing colorful thought bubbles of fantasy isn't his thing; he's better off with helium balloons, or even better, hot air balloons with a basket and a burner, complete with an attached description of how they work. Because those are two different professions: to believably estimate the life of people in the future, starting from today, versus letting your mind fly free to imagine things that don't even exist in theory right now. The latter is something even few Western sci-fi authors can do. Oddly enough, the Dyachenkos can do it too. But in any case – when you create the unimaginable on paper, you have to sacrifice realism. This is again a manifestation of the dialectics of reality, as I understand it. There are things that cannot coexist due to the fundamental structure of the universe (sorry if that sounds pretentious, my thinking process is quite ordinary as I write this). As a rule, these things are connected, and if you remove one, you add the other.
The “Time to Failure” series – boring, after all, although powerful.
The Thousand and One Days series – here the author fantasized reasonably well, but lost the realism, and the ending isn't funny at all. What can you do, otherwise it's hard.
The Calculator – a novella, a successful one, similar to Lost, with a main character in the spirit of “Ben”. It's readable because the length isn't bloated.
Tomorrow Comes Eternity – it's not very clear why it was written. But I don't like techno-detectives with conspiracies and all that.
Forbidden World - an experiment in pseudo-fantasy, boring once again, although funny in places.
St. Vitus's Minuet – not bad, but damn it, boring again. I'm not asking for space empires and battles, but could you liven up the action at least a little bit?
Soft Landing – again nothing happens for the whole book, I'm sick of it.
The Feudal Lord - here the author finally had some fun and used his imagination, but even his fantasies are somehow bureaucratic, without any flight. It is comparatively interesting to read, though.
The “Icelandic Map” series – a parody of Akunin's work. A parody is, on the one hand, always a secondary genre; on the other hand, it's a surefire win if the author is a good stylist, has read a lot, and has a sense of humor. This series successfully combined Gromov's meticulousness and realism in the details, but at the same time, a total disregard for realism overall, for seriousness, and for the “people in a difficult situation” principle.
So if you ever feel ripe enough to read him – start with “The Calculator”. If you like it – continue with the Icelandic map, for example, or, if you don't like parodies, with “Time to Failure”.