According to Richard Bleiler, authors seek to write compelling and unique stories that are not only informative but interesting and educative (66). This best describes science fiction novels which invent stories and make unreal and unbelievable stories more real and believable. This can be said about the novels Projects Gods and Brainchips by Stephen P. Naghdi and Pattern Recognition by William Gibson. These two writers have embraced modern technology to bring out stories which show how the human mind has been programmed to influence decisions that shape the path that humans take in trying to find solutions to problems that affect humanity. It is through this stories that one can get to see how science and scientific inventions influence the way people think and act.
There are some similarity that can be drawn in the two novels. There is a quest to understand some issues by the central characters in these two novels. In the novel Projects Gods and Brainchips, there is a progression by the main character, who grows from one level to another in the understanding of the truths that surround family, life, and God. The story tells of a history of the development of human life for a period of time seeking to explain the happenings on political, spiritual and on social spheres of life. Pattern Recognition in the other hand, portrays a main character, embodies methods of translating history, culture as well as brand names. The novel revolves around the examination of a people’s desire to find out the meanings of things and goes further on to find the meaning of symbols and desires. These two novels seek to find answers and reasons why things happen the way they do. The point at which they meet is seen is where both seek to find answers engraved in their central themes.
Even so, they are different in some other aspects. This is true when their central themes are put into perspective. To begin with, in Pattern Recognition, the story is told from the third person narration where as in Projects Gods and Brainchips, the story is told from the first person narration. Aside from these, the former uses the September 11th, 2001 attack element as a motif and this is reminiscent of the 2oth century challenges with regard to what technology has led to. There are actions too that take on the importance of history in seeking to understand how to go about modern challenges. The desire to find meaning is what dominates the entire novel. The latter on the other hand takes on issues affecting the social lives of people on matters God, politics and social life in general and the impact, the past histories have had on the ways in which governments have made decisions with regard to their intelligence. It takes on a more religious path in understanding societal operations.
The two novel stake on more different perspectives, one, uses real life issues and people who have made history in their lives while the other takes on abstract and imaginary personalities. This notwithstanding, the bottom line is that they take on the role that science has played in shaping how people think and do thinks. Through hem it is clear that scientific inventions define the path that human beings take in solving problems or finding solutions to issues that affect the people’s ways of life.
Work Cited
Bleiler, Richard. Science Fiction Writers: Critical Studies of the Major Authors from the Early Nineteenth Century to the Present Day. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan. 1999
