The Truth Shall Make Ye Fret - 15: The Long Utopia Pt 1 (Wildly and Astrophysically)

Episode Date: June 27, 2026

The Truth Shall Make Ye Fret is a podcast in which your hosts, Joanna Hagan and Francine Carrel have emerged from Discworld and are now exploring the worlds of speculative fiction. This week, The Long Utopia part 1! (Chapters 1-24)Silver beetles! Wooden steeples! Pioneering peoples! Find us on the internet:BlueSky: @makeyefretpod.bsky.socialInstagram: @TheTruthShallMakeYeFretFacebook: @TheTruthShallMakeYeFretEmail: [e-mail]: www.patreon.com/thetruthshallmakeyefretDiscord: https://discord.gg/29wMyuDHGP Want to follow your hosts and their internet doings? Follow Joanna on BlueSky @2hatsjo and follow Francine @francibambi Things we blathered on about:Heterotopia (space) - WikipediaNatural Six - YouTube There Are No Green Stars, But ‘Green Galaxies’ Are Real Deiseal agus tuathal – Omniglot Blog North Star to Freedom (U.S. National Park Service) Music: Chris Collins, indiemusicbox.com

Sentient crystal creatures have taken over a mine. Really? What about the Chartists? So I made the mistake of during a horrific heatwave going to central London. I don't recommend that. Oh yeah, why did you do that? My partner got me ballet tickets for my birthday, which was lovely. I went to go and see Sleeping Beauty. I'm celtied.

I love ballet. Are you? Do you? Lovely, I'm glad. I'm sure you didn't know. You didn't know this about it. I probably did at one point, but I've learned so many more interesting things about you since. I am just generally so incredibly so incredible.

fascinating. No, there was a, I very, very panickedly tried to figure out a way that we could be doing this whole thing that would keep me mostly in air conditioning, including parking at Westfield to take the Elizabeth line, because that one is fully air-conditioned. However, I planned this and my partner booked a restaurant based on the fact that he thought we were going to the Royal Opera House, and he realised we were in fact going to the Royal Albert Hall about an hour before we left the house. Which, well, that mix up, I can understand. What actually happened, which is much funnier,

is that he knew we were going to Royal Albert Hall. He just somehow thought the Royal Albert Hall was also the Royal Opera House in Covent Garden. Understandable. Yeah, so to the point where he was excited to see the Royal Albert Hall in person because he's not been there before. And, you know, the steps that the Spice Girls run up in the movie, all right, that's more me. And it didn't incur to him that we walked around Coven Garden together extensively many times,

and he has never noticed the Royal Albert Hall there because it's not there, it's in fucking Kensington. Yeah. So that was a fun rework. Managed to make it and still go out for a nice meal and not die mostly. I wore stupid shoes that completely shredded my feet to bits when I walked through High Park,

but apart from that, it was all fine. But I've also learned the lesson that if you're going to park at Westfield, you have to check if, say, there's a take that gig on that night that'll be letting out just as you want to get out of the car park. Specifically that, yeah. Yeah, specifically. that yeah there was so we sat in stationary traffic in the car park for an hour was it at least a bit cooler by then no not even a little bit and none of the other

drivers seemed even slightly delighted by my hilarious bit of playing songs about driving really quickly while we were stuck in stationary chat traffic like what Tokyo drift sure but out of hell fast car by Tracy Chapman and then I started running out of ideas. I think highway to the danger zone was definitely in there. Fun, fun, fun, until the daddy took the teabode away would be a good one. Oh, that would have been a good one. The Venga bus I should have put on. I didn't get that far. Eventually we did make it out of the car park. Next time this happens, you'll know. Yeah, next time. Now I know. We've really got to get some like specific playlists down ahead of time. It's hard to know what

specific situation you're going to be in, but something like stuck in traffic we should have been on top of. Ballet was good, though. Oh, good. Yeah. I booked a night in a hotel on the Offington White Horse. Oh, cool. Like that thing. And I've ended up booking that on the night of my birthday because that was the only night they had left by the time I got around to it. So I need to find stuff to do on the days leaning up to it, not the days after the horse, which is my original plan.

So I'm thinking probably I'm going to go Shropshire away and down. Oh, nice. You're not far away from Cheddar Gorge there as well, if you fancy it nice. Yeah. Well, maybe I'll stop it to Gorge. There's some cool caves you can go and look around, which also, if it turns out to be really bloody hot again. I don't love being underground.

Oh yeah, no, you're not a big cave person, are you? I think I've got a lower threshold than most people for. Yeah, that's fair. A small cave can be before I consider it a coffin. Not to be dramatic, but I'm absolutely dramatic about being underground. I won't do it. No, that's right. I forgot you.

I like the underground. You're not as much of a fan. I'm trying to get over my fear of heights and things, and eventually I'm going to have to address the claustophobia because it's getting worse as I'm getting older, and I'm starting to feel nervous about getting on the tube, and I can't deal with that, really. I've been having a funny thing.

recently where, because I've never used to have any kind of problem with heights, but like in the last year or so, I'm starting to find myself really struggle with heights a bit. When I went to Q Gardens, there was like this big old Victorian glass house and there's like a higher balcony you can walk around at the top. And obviously I went straight up there. I thought, oh, it would be amazing to have the bird's eye view over this and then got up there and had like a proper, oh, I feel a bit dizzy. And I'm going to not walk to the railing. I'm going to walk as close to the wall as possible. Interesting. And then add some thing. I haven't been on a roller coaster a long time

and I'm curious with this how I would now cope with going on a roller coaster Right, okay There's nothing for it We're just going to have to go and find one of those huge catapult rides that you made me go on when we were 80 That'll clear it out of our systems

Get all of the fear, horror, screaming, oh my God, why are we doing this? Just out in one here. Yeah, and I'll be sober. Oh God, you will be? And I would suggest you be sober as well just for this one. Maybe we do need to do that sort of

once every one to two years sort of clear the pipes. Clear out the fear pipes. Yeah. That's a horrible type of phrase. It is, isn't it? And what a shame I probably won't use it in the main episode because that would be a lovely title. The fear pipes.

It sounds like, it sounds a bit of Magnus Archives, isn't it? It does, yeah. All right, well, I'm going to go and start a cosmic horror podcast called The Fear Pipes. Okay. Do you want to have a cigarette while you're doing that? Yeah, I was going to say, before I do that, do you want to make a podcast? Okay, yeah, let's make a podcast. then get on with the beer pipes

and by the time you finish that, I'll probably finish editing the episode, you can look sorted. Awesome, perfect. It's so efficient. And then we'll go and get in the catapult. And then we'll go and get in the catapult. Hello and welcome to the true show,

make you fret, a podcast in which we were reading and recapping every book from Terry Pratchett's Discord series, and now we're strolling down the corridors of speculative fiction. I'm Joanna Hagan. I'm Francine Carol, and I hope we're not going to try and keep up that pace through the entire episode, Joanna. No, probably not. And this is part one of our discussion of the long utopia.

Yes, we're here. Book in the Long Earth cycle. Number four. That's the one. We're talking about chapters 1 through 24 today, inclusive, Francine. Yep, I got there. I got there. I put in the bookmark ahead of time these days. I've read a physical book this time.

Oh, nice. Because I had it. Nice. I've only got it in hardback, so I didn't do that. I did it on Kindle. Not on spoilers before we crack on. We are a spoiler-light podcast, obviously heavy spoilers for the first 24 chapters of the book The Long Utopia, but we'll avoid spoiling the rest of the Long Earth books because we can't

remember what happens. And we won't spoil any major disc world stuff either, probably, so you dear listeners can be on the journey with us. Steffing sideways into a pre-dug mine shaft to get out of trouble. Excellent. But before that, we've got a quick bit of follow-up, Francine. Oh, okay. Because our last episode was our adaptation pitches episode, and we put out of poll. Whoa, I just stopped myself swearing. I've forgotten what I'm doing. Incredible. Fucking hell.

No, this doesn't sound as good now. No, it doesn't. So, the results are in. So I won the Discord poll. Okay. You won the Instagram poll. Yes. It was a drawer on Facebook.

And it was a drawer on blue sky. Okay. So a draw? If we actually count the votes, the winner is. Drum roll, please. me by three votes. Well done. Well done, Your Honor.

I thought you clinched it. As soon as the Muppets came into the picture, I think we knew where it was going. I'm surprised it was as close as it was. I am surprised it's as close. No, I'm not surprised. Everybody loves horse girl movies. It was genuinely when it came down to it.

I think it was everyone was choosing between Muppets, guards and the Pegasus Horse Girl movie. Which says so much about our wonderful, wonderful listenership in case we haven't said it recently. We love all of you and your dear little legs. There's nothing for it. If we're going to do it, we're just going to have to build a film studio together and then get sued by everybody. Excellent. Well, no, Pegasus is public domain, surely. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

We'll get sued by the interchangeable lemma community. Yes, quite possibly. Right. We'll get right on that. But first, that's podcast about this book. Do you want to introduce the long utopia to us, Francine? Yeah, sure. So this is the long utopia. It is the force, as you say, in the book of five, bracket five. long earth books. I don't have a lot to say about this one really. It was published on the 23rd of June 2015, which makes it the first in this series that was published after Terry Pratchett's death. I remember this one coming out, realizing it was the fourth of fifth, fourth of five. Yes. Went Leonard Cohen there for a second. And being delighted,

because I hadn't realized there was yet another practice book to look forward to. No, I don't remember this coming out. I don't know if I was making sure I read these as soon as they came out. I was living in the flat below you at the time, so I imagine you were. Oh yeah. No, I would just clear my brains. I wouldn't let you not. Yeah. Yeah. I can't remember 2015, Francine. It was 11 years ago. Oh, my God, yeah. It was a difficult year. I was a weird year. Anyway, not for this reason, because it's a fine book. It is a fine book. Um, so I'll tell you what, I didn't have, I didn't read a lot about, I didn't learn a lot about the book coming out and things like that. I did, because of that, click through on the Long Earth Wikipedia page to the word heterotopia,

which is a concept elaborated by the philosopher Michael, Michelle Foucault, to describe certain cultural, institutional and dicursive spaces that are somehow other, disturbing, intense, incompatible, contradictory or transforming. I haven't got any further than that yet, but I'm really looking forward to the rest of this Wikipedia page. Yeah, that's good. So then, and then I believe everyone can come on the unsettling journey with us. Yeah, let's get really weirdly obsessed with that for a bit. Yes.

Also, see also evolution of the horse, which I didn't end up using in my orf, so I can mention it now. Cool, right. So we're also going down the rabbit hole of horse evolution at some point. Yes. Cool. Some of which were small enough to go down quite a big rabbit hole. I'm now picturing tiny little horse bunny hybrids. and I don't have space in my brain for that right now,

Fruncy. Well, no, imagine how high they'd jump. Right, carry on. And on that disturbing note, should I talk about what happened in this first half of the book? Yes. Cool. So there's a beetle in the Paulson cellar,

and this will be important later. Right, by 10. Joshua goes on sabbatical, gets a headache, and returns to the lower earths just in time to be present for Lobzang's demise. At the funeral, the not entirely, dead lobzang, now going by George and Agnes, make a plan, as in he's going by George. By George, yeah, this would make sense if we had the requisite punctuation.

Yes. Some time later, and I'm not working out the years, everything happens, because as I've written in my notes, it's too hot. It's Joshua's 50th birthday, and he decides to cross 100,000 Earths back to the datum. He spends the first part of the journey with a semi-estranged son, Rod, travels on with Sally, and closes things out with Nelson. And Nelson offers to seek out Joshua's long-lost father, and he does, he uncovers the story of Louis Valiente, a Victorian era, waltzer. It's a much nicer word for stepping. It is lovely, isn't it? Yeah.

After I heard waltzer, I tried briefly to remember the name for Stepper, and I couldn't get past Skipper. Oh, yeah. Also, still nicer than Stepper, I think. Anyway, so the story of Louis Valiente, he's recruited by Oswald Hackett, joining the Knights of Discorporia, a group of Walters, working on behalf of the British government. And after some time assisting with the Underground Railroad,

Louis and his fellow knight Burden take advantage of the whaleigh, the twain drivers. Louis and his fellow knight burden take advantage of the gold rush. And having made it rich, Louis marries, lives an easy life until Hackett arrives, pulling him back into work. However, in a cavern under Windsor castle, the knights learn they are to be eradicated and they make them escape.

Tell me more about this narration job you speak up. Yeah, it's amazing. Meanwhile, in the book, there's a kid called Stan Berg out in a Stepwise Florida who discovers season next and is invited to the Grange. Also, meanwhile, Sally introduces George Agnes and their adopted son, Ben, to their new home, and they enjoy their pioneering life, but Agnes isn't sleeping well. A few years later, when young Ben comes home with a silver bracelet,

but Agnes and George asked Nikos to show them the old Paulson cellar where they meet the Beatles and take a funny step north to see a strange new sky. On arriving home, Shimi, the cat has proven that the day is running short. The pioneering fun is over and Lobzang needs Joshua, but as Nelson's discovered, Joshua is nowhere to be found. Curiosity kills the cat is quite a common phrase. I wonder if scientific method killed the cat would also be a... Yeah.

Scientific method distressed the cat, I suppose. The scientific method distressed the cat, which is fair. I'm scientific method is quite stressful. Yeah, but doesn't alliterate very nicely, so never mind. No, very much so. Right, helicopter and loincloth watch. Oh, God. It's been a while.

Yeah, we do it in these ones. Yeah, no, I'd forgotten. For helicopters, I'm going, stars so big that they look like big discs spinning in the sky. Is that in the planetarium? Yes. Yeah. Nice. Oh, and for loincloth.

I've gone with Oswald Hackett's shirt out, because I didn't know what a cert out was. I missed that, tell me. He was in a handsome looking shirt out, specifically Oswald Hackett was wearing. It's a kind of overcoat, and it was a 17th century term used to describe a coat worn over another coat, like say a waistcoat. Oh. And that's a new name before, prior to, this is just from Wikipedia. Prior to 1684, it was known as Suravit on account of the Sir Habit, which is an older word for overcoat. coach. But cert out is also a French term that translates as above all.

Certeux? Certeau. Yeah, I wasn't going to try and. I might speak French. Quite right too. Those charists have it. Bloody charists. Oh, I've forgotten all my history. I wish I could make some really good quips about the chartists that's been so long since I read about that period. And I thought about reading about it a bit more for this.

And then again, my brain just sort of fell out of my ears like soup. Mm, nice. Yeah, have you got a favourite quote fron soon? Other than that, obviously. Yeah. Yeah, a very short one. Midnight was a foreign country to farmers. That's lovely.

Just talking about the fact that they were past their bedtime. Poor things. And I can confirm, with a husband who goes to bed at 10 o'clock, not after. Mine's also a short one, the description of Winter Castle, an intimidating pile, an excrescence of centuries of wealth heaped up on a core of medieval brutality. Lovely.

What a good line. Someone was grumpy about the monarchy that day. Well, I think it's fair to be a bit grumpy about the monarchy. I don't know. Right, should we talk about characters? Yeah, okay, let's. Should we start with our dear Joshua? Yeah.

So we don't see a huge amount from Joshua today, apart from his, um, his first excursion. What do you think of his, yeah, let's say midlife crisis, because he may well make it 200. Yeah. I kind of respect it. I feel sorry for him because in Chapter 1, he's out on his sabbatical and he is having a very, what's it all about? And why did it have to happen to me? And, oh, God, I've got a headache again. And we know what Joshua's headaches mean. I can understand how feeling like that would put you on to the midlife crisis 100,000 earth journey path. Yeah. I suppose it's not that much of a midlife crisis, is it? It's just a...

Yeah, I mean, he's not gone out and got a sports car and an even more inappropriately young girlfriend. Yeah. Yeah, no, you really can't go any more inappropriately young without it being a major character, a ruin. Yeah, yeah. I like that Helen's been allowed to live. But Joshua's, yeah, I, it's kind of a realistic ageing for Joshua, really, isn't it? He's had a pretty traumatic few decades of it.

He's had a very intense few decades. He's come out a bit, pretty withdrawn, not socially great still, not connecting very well with his son. Yeah, I thought the Rod stuff was interesting, especially the Rod himself, like, taking on that name because he was Dan and Rod was his middle name for the cousin

the brother that was left behind his uncle yeah which again we have to like I must underline again and again every time I start feeling like some kind of sympathy for Helen's parents I'm like what the fuck

yeah still really horrific you've got a kid that can't go without dying you don't get to go yeah like obviously when you get to the like yellow stone evacuations of it all

absolutely But before that, no, you just don't go. Yeah. That was all really very horrific and lovely to be reminded of. But I thought Rod was quite interesting in that he's taken on that moniker, but he's not taken any of what, I don't know how much he knows of the attitudes of his long-lost uncle. I assume he is aware. I reckon he must have learned about it by now because it must be on public record.

So choosing to take that name, even though he has very much embraced the long-earth life in a very specific way. Yeah. When you're 20, I imagine that makes a lot of sense. Yeah, you get kind of fire brandy. Yeah. Interesting too that his career as Twain Driver has petered out pretty much, isn't it? Yeah, and the Twain stuff in general has very much petered out. Like that whole industry has passed away again. There's a lot in the book overall, actually, this very interesting idea of,

because in the first few books, it's humanity newly spreading out across the long earth, and it's very exciting. We've now got to the point where, the long earth has opened up, that humanity spread out and started abandoning stuff again. There are like old, I mean, the old Paulson place being something. Yeah. Yeah. And there's another bit where I think Roberta's hiding out in abandoned houses in one of the West Miami's.

Yeah. Yeah. No, it's great, isn't it? It does, especially in the outside of datum, it's realistic how quickly everything would be retlaimed by nature and even in data, obviously, like, you know, you leave a building for a decade. It's amazing how that's up it gets. I've not bothered to look after my front garden for a couple of weeks because it's been too hot. And that's already being reclaimed by nature.

Well, there it is. Someone's dug a well into another dimension. Bloody wells. Yeah, so I thought Joshua's journey was quite interesting. The way he chose to do it as well, he kind of picked the three big people in his life. I guess him and Nelson have become quite close off screen. Yes, yeah. and yeah Sally being a part of it always very funny

just how little time she has for his shit very much so and yet turns up and yet does turn up despite having I would imagine a pretty busy schedule yes she's going out and doing all sorts of stuff now with she sort of made herself for hire for getting people started

on a new pioneering lifestyle but with this side of vigilantism which you get to do if you're the only person in your industry I suppose yeah creating a niche carving out a niche for yourself carving out a niche for yourself with being a bit of a chaliena you can make an insufferable podcast about this can you we are I mean but you know specifically about carving out niches universe yeah yeah described as sally as well when she's sort of at the funeral

george describes them as king and queen of the long earth her and Joshua which I thought was just a very nice visual. Yes, even if slightly sarcastic. Very much sarcastic. But yeah, I like how she's described as kind of hardening down to a nub. Yeah. tougher than ever. Absolutely brilliant. Helen as well seems to have strengthened up.

The book is a lot nicer about Helen, I found. Obviously, we only see her quite briefly, but she was strong, strong and competent. Yeah, well, we don't have to see her through Sally's eyes. Yes, that's very true. There is actually in the bit where Sally and Joshua are walking together. I think she still gets in a little dig at him and being a bit of a mouse. Yeah. She's not a mouse and she's not mine.

Anyway. Anyway. Yeah, and then Lob sang. Lobang slash George. Flash, George. George, Abraham's. George. popped up in one of the other books.

Did he? Yes. Flying around in a Zeppelin twain. And stopped to help the military people because Shimi got off of his ship and onto the military ship. Oh, yeah. I'm a bit confused about timelines.

Well, that would have definitely all happened before this. Yeah, so maybe it was a practice run. Yeah, yeah, quite possibly. or well yeah I guess he's just used george abrahams as an alias quite a few times in his life then that makes sense yeah yeah yeah um I thought the death was quite interesting the description of it you know the noise and invisible machines and fans and pumps all stopping and it's quite interesting how much it's it is a death yeah although he still very much exists and is running around as george abraham's and is in his ambulance unit he has he has closed down a lot of

the bigger lobzang of it all. Yeah. Yeah, he doesn't have the omniscient. Yes. And this is, like, this is his midlife crisis as well. Joshua went through his, with his 50th birthday long journey. Lobzang's midlife crisis is being rejected by the next at the end of the last book. Yeah. And deciding, right, I don't need to be omniscient at all then. Yeah. All right, fine. I'm going to become one robot. Yeah. The kind of petulant move you can only pull off of your lobzang. I just like the idea of that's how I'm going to react to every mind. or inconvenience from now on, I'm going to become one robot. Yeah.

Really? What about the chartists? Right. But I thought Joshua being very understanding and accepting. I think Joshua knows that George O'Brien still exists because Joshua's not stupid. Yeah. And doesn't seem to have that as part of his breakdown. No. Like he did the first time he went missing.

Yeah, yeah. Lobzang's come back from the dead before. He's already emotionally been through this loss once. So I think now he's very. accepting that Lob Sang will do as Lob Sang does and he's like grown enough to accept that for what it is which I think is interesting. It is yeah. He's somebody who's had most of the characters in his life have been fairly transient haven't they so. Yeah. Or it's not completely transient than of very rare appearances like Sally. Yes, which does bring me to something actually

which feels a little bit, plot holes probably too strong a word. Lob Sang dies. George Abrahams goes off. Agnes goes off with him. Which I assume, this is the other reason I assume Joshua is fully aware that Lobzang still exists in some form, because no one's going, well, where the fuck is Agnes now? Agnes didn't fake her death.

She has just gone off with George and adopted a son. Yeah. Yeah, probably just a missed sentence there where she said that Agnes told them they'd gone off to yeah. I feel like that felt a little bit missing. I like the Newton quote in the

funeral as well just because I love that idea. Remind me. I know not how I seem to others, but to myself, I'm but a small child wandering upon the vast shores of knowledge every now and then finding a small bright pebble to content myself with while the vast ocean of undiscovered truth lies before me. Spoken like a man who kept staring at the sun to see how long he could do it for. Yeah. All right.

There were some problems with Newton. I like, yeah, not saying he wasn't smart. It's just whenever I think about how clever Newton was, start to get dazzled in my head. I'm like, and then... He's dead at the sun a lot. But I like thinking about how big and vast and unknowable the universe is sometimes. Yeah, makes us feel a little bit better about not being able to animate medieval illustrations. Exactly. Yet. I'll develop that skill set later. Right, speaking of Agnes and also other quotes at the funeral. She managed to get in her own.

Did I hear that? Something about being like a sinner at Heaven's Gate and crawling back to me. I had that on in the car when I was driving mum and Roy to the airport the other week and mum was saying Oh I remember listening to this with Diana I had friends and our neighbour when I was little As we were on our way to a meatloaf concert I was like fuck

Cool Your mum is cool Yeah About a bit about your age God damn it you were cooler than me We're really cool It's just we drive to Folklore festivals and conventions listening to Disney

We can still listen to bat out of hell I'll add that to the Disney playlist. Thank you, please do. But it will still mostly be Disney, right? Yeah, yeah. Yeah, cool. Anyway, Agnes, yes. I like the built-in Catholic guilt has not gone away.

Oh, yeah. The stab of Catholic conscience when she sort of says, oh, it's best to be open and feels really guilty about lying to all these lovely people around New Springfield. Yeah. Yeah, there comes a point, though. we're trying to tell the truth is just how do you really start that conversation so right the thing is

okay I was a nun and then I was resurrected so you know the Tibetan concept of reincarnation you know robots I'm going to become one robot I also like that she spots this Nikos carrying around some kind of secret

to do with the old Paulson place because she's really good with kids because that's what she did at the home Yeah. And I just... Yeah, you've got to be able to identify a kid walking around with like a troubled idea and has had, for sure. Yeah, Nicos is a sweet one.

I would die for Nicos and Rio. Yeah. Faithful hound. Yeah. As always, read that way faster than I should to make sure the dog was all right, went back, read it again. Yeah. And it was a Bernie's Mountain dog,

and I really love Bernie's Mountain Dogs. They're so pretty. God, imagine every one of them in a forest, though, the amount of time you're going to spend combing it. Yeah, good point. Burrs. Many birds. Burrs in the Bernies.

And yes, small little Ben as well. Not really much to say about him. I've got something to say about him. His surname was Oglevee, Ogilvie. Oh, yeah. As always, I try and check out names that Pratchett chooses because they quite often connect to something. And I wonder if it's got anything to do with David Ogilvie,

the very famous tycoon founder of Ogle via Mather, you know, the marketing, the advertising firm, yeah. But who had a very interesting life, which included at one point living among the Amish after the Second World War, eventually admitted his limitations as a farm removed in Manhattan. As one does. Yeah, yeah.

I'm just, I'm going to read more about him later and then read the rest of this book and then decide if it was on purpose. Yeah, I can see some parallel with that they've decided to move and go to farming, and then they've decided actually there's a bit more they've got to get on with. It absolutely could and probably a coincidence. But if nothing else, I'm learning about somebody.

What a delight. He does become a tycoon, so I imagine when I get further down this page, we're not going to like him very much. Yes, now I assume capitalism will be the villain on along and there'll be all sorts of horrors. Right, okay, closing that tab for now. Put down the history of espionage, Wikipedia page, please, Francine. Oh, the history of espionage,

the evolution of the horse. Stan Berg. This is like the weirdest series of romance-sy novels. Okay, I'll get on with writing that after the podcast. However, first, let's talk about Stan Berg and his pal Rocky. Yeah, Stan Berg's a pretty good name. Yeah, that is a good name. I like Berg.

I like the immediate setup as being annexed, the apparent curiosity with which even Baby Stan inspects the world. and I just like that his mother is immediately present to be incredibly loving and devoted and caring beyond anything else. Yeah. Just because, like... Slightly despairing. I'm slightly despairing, but we spent the entirety of the last book with Sally and the worst father ever. So it's just nice to see a really loving parent.

That sounds like a children's book title. Sally and the worst dad. Jesus Christ, Willis, Lindsay. What the fuck? I blank most of that out from my mind. I wish I could. I wish I could. But Stan is a very human next.

I thought it was very interesting because most of the next we've seen have grown up, like from the last books, were growing up around happy landings. Of course, yeah. So it was sort of within their own community from the beginning. And, you know, there's a lot of descriptions of coldness and staying away from it. And there was like some very messed up stuff that not all of which I can remember in great detail. Yeah, definitely some hostages and such.

Yeah, yeah. But then you have Stan, who has grown up in a completely human community, even if he is the smart, sharp one. And he is jumping in and trying to stop them from beating up the cobalt. He is demanding they go for him instead. That fucking scene. I was very hormonal reading that. And I almost stopped me reading the book for the evening.

Yeah. I also, I've been watching this D&D podcast, like actual play series that I'm really obsessed with. One of the characters is a cobald and has had quite a big storyline recently. And I love this cobald so deeply. So I couldn't help but be picturing, like, I, the Cobalt Rogue, and I felt extra emotional. What's the podcast? Natural Six. It's really good.

It's got Ben Starr, who's very well known in lots of stuff, and Doug Cockle, who's the Witcher. God Cockle, who's the Witcher. What's his name? Doug Cockle, who voices... Doug Cockle, that's a lovely name. It's a great name, isn't it? He voices Geryl in the Witcher games. He's a dragonborn druid.

He's great. In another generation, Star and Cockle would be a fantastic musical double-act. Excellent. That is true. Cockle and Star. Cochle and Star. Needs to be a seaside, vaudeville. Yes.

Definitely a seaside ford-Flewitle Act. But we don't have time to... Cockle and Starfish. Sorry, obviously. Oh, Cochle and Starfish. But I think you'd just have to call it Star for the rhythm of the thing, unfortunately. But that could be the... The imagery.

Cochle and Star. I think Cockland Starfish has got a nice rhythm to it. I like, you know me, I like a sadding end to a metre. Oh, yeah, that's true. Did it, did it, did it. Yeah, that's fair. Oh, and before we move on Rocky as well, this interesting perspective of Stan where he's...

Clearly very clever friend, but... Yeah, it wasn't just friendship or loyalty. He was starting to realise it was something more than that, a kind of dazzling. This idea of Stan being, yeah, like being fascinating and hypnotic and kind of drawing you in and how that being like something quite sinister

something that could be quite sinister. Could be, but isn't in this case. Absolutely. I mean, it's a very magnified version of something I think most people have probably been through in real life where you meet somebody who's so much more clever or charismatic or both than you. Yeah, and you're like,

or hypnotised by them. Like, I'm glad you don't have any ill intent towards me because I'd fall for it. Yeah, I'm probably like you destroy me a little bit. Yeah. And then, yes, Louis Valiente and the Knights of discorporia. Discorporia. Discorporia, it's a horrible name.

It is horrible, isn't it? Ah. I think I'd have picked a different word for discorporation. I can't think of what it might be. All right, no, never mind. I'm going to look at a thesaurus and that feels like cheating, so I'll think about it later. We shall. The Greater Lusivow, he also goes by, which, like, I mean, I guess what else

would you use this kind of thing for it? It would be thieving or a magic act. Yeah. Well, I was thinking about that. Gold Rush, apparently, is one thing. Yeah. Can you think of what else you'd use to get rich using this power? I don't know. I mean, Oswald Hackett mostly used it for getting laid, which fair, I suppose. Yeah, yeah.

He's a castan under of the situation. There's the thing, I'm too lazy to go into the sort of the gold rush and forging who owns what and how we've gone about it and the long-lost cousin and all of that. Yeah, and I'd definitely miss a step somewhere. Yeah, I'm not a very convincing liar, all of this. Yeah, exactly. I think it would be like bank vaults and like a very subtle, slow growing of wealth. From a bank vault. Well, yeah, but popping in and just taking like little handfuls of cash at a time.

Oh, okay, yeah, yeah, yeah. Or, you know, working on a way to get into something technologically, but I'm not sure how you could use stepping for that, really. What,ologically, sorry? Technologically, sorry, yeah, yeah. Move some decimal points around somewhere. Yeah. Or, but realistically, I'd just go and live in the woods. Francine and then get very bored after about two days and...

Yeah, we'd absolutely be wandering off into the green, wandering into villages. I said, I like the idea that the England just didn't go out and colonise the long earth in the same way and it was mostly just a series of allotments. Yeah, yeah. That is pretty much what I've done the colonisation thing. Yeah, I'm just going to go and have a really big garden. Yeah. That's all we ever wanted, really, was an allotment.

Yeah. Like quite a big allotment, but I would basically be going for the allotment. Yeah. Would you, realistically, I think we probably, because we are quite going down tangents and rabbit hole people, I think we would have been on the side of kind of exploring how far we could go with it rather than the odd limitations of Louis Valiante's imagination. Yeah, no, I think I would definitely be pushing out a bit more. But then I'm also a little bit of, oh, I don't want to get stuck. I feel like I'd always want to keep the tether. So I don't know how far I would push out. I think it would be.

like slowly going further and further and further and testing limitations. Yeah, that's a good point. I also don't really trust my own geography skills and like ideas of space and time to have done what Burden did and build a mine shaft as my escape route. Oh yeah, no, absolutely not. I'm very impressed by it. Also, he did that by hand. Yeah.

Like, it must have been completely by hand because he wouldn't have taken a metal shovel over. I think you can bring like copper bronze kind of but even so I mean you know there's a reason I imagine a reason we switch to iron and not just for aesthetics sidebar in the

already in such a sidebar but yeah carry on oh yeah less sidebar more wandering vaguely back towards the book we're meant to be discussing oh good there's stuff with Louis and Oswald when they first meet they go out for the oysters

together oh yeah and there's a this just nice line eating with a fellow always built up a certain degree of trust, especially if said fellow was doing the buying. And they, by the time they've eaten all these oysters, they're sort of allies. That's very Joshua as well. I was thinking about Joshua and Lobzang on the original long earth journey, eating, like cooking together. Definitely. That's obviously such a common troop for good reason, but that does seem very very practical influence, doesn't it? Just a, I think he likes the breaking bread together.

Yes, very much so. And the, trying to then look for more parallels between Louis and Joshua, I think there was also the kind of he had no choice he'd have to go through with this fast school operation, striving to keep his own head and see what came of it next. This very, right, well, fuck it, I guess this is happening now energy. That feels very Joshua. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. Weirdly passive somebody with the entire multiverse at his fingertips. Very much so. And I do think burden, as much as, you know, I know he runs in and cuts the throats of a few people, but I'm quite charmed by burden. Yeah, apart from then, he puts all his money into arms.

Also that, yeah. From the beginning, I recognise him here as like, oh, that to me reads like a preptit special, you're a good mate for now and you are going to turn out to be a problem with the capital P, but maybe it's just the armaments. Yeah, the armaments thing, definitely. Yeah, you're really charming. Yeah, it is something very charming about him. Yeah, charmed by and like is two different things.

Yeah. But the capture stuff of it all when they're brought down underneath and they find out what they've been doing and trying to find Stepper. And the vivisection. It's very like the anti-stepper sentiment from the first couple of books, like the Long Earth and the Long War. But like way more horrific, even though it's happening on a much smaller scale. Yeah. And it brought it back from what I was starting to think was sounding a bit like, it's a little bit like one of the things I didn't love about Dodger was. kind of romanticisation of the royal family there and this, that and the other.

And they started straight forward to this and then just brought it back to reality here, didn't they? Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, no, the establishment was a real fucking problem. Anyone who was slightly different. Yeah. And it is horrific, but it is, I like that it's done that way. Yeah.

Like there's a bit, the rug pull of it, even though you can tell what's happening by the time they're taken down to that spot. Yeah. Victoria Nera is an interesting time to do it as well. because it's you're at the birth of this new brand of eugenics pretty much,

aren't you? Yeah. Kind of melding still with the old worldly, you're just wrong without trying to make it scientific. Like you're just queer in the old sense of the word queer.

Yeah. We're British by God, a manly race and we don't want your shifty, slippery sort polluting the blood no matter how useful you might occasionally be. That kind of thing. Yeah, this idea that stepping is somehow un-British.

Yeah. I'd tell you what, if you say it with enough pomp, you can make anything sound un-British, aren't you? Yeah. You watered your petunias. Yeah. Worted your petunias before 5pm. Pretty un-British.

Finnus section. FI. Although I just really love, in the midst of they have been taken, I think they are actually, like, shackled at this point, they're being told of what's going to happen to them. And one of them criticizes the Great Illusivostivot.

And Louis was like, what are you a critic? I got good notices. I'm absolutely, I'm not going to say. I'm just like, this is not the time, dude, but I really respect standing up for it. I would absolutely have done something. Yeah, no. Genuinely, I would have, but I'm not proud of it. And then Beatles.

Oh, I have one more note, actually, I've got to say about Nikos. Oh, yeah, please. The reason I really like him as a character when he's a character. first in the Poulson house and he's looking for the shoes when it's being used as like a swap house. Nico's picked out a few, he's looking at the clothes and most of it's not useful, but Nico's picked out a few colourful scraps for the latest quilted blanket his mother was making. And he hasn't been asked to do that, but he has done it because he knows it's the sort of thing his mother is after. And that made me, that really endeared me to the character that one sentence.

If anybody was in any doubt, Joanna makes quilted blanket. I do make quilted banquets and have quite a lot of fabric. Would bringing you nice bits of scrap fabric be something you'd like? No, because I've got... I think you have six... I have six boxes of fabric under this desk right now, froncene, and it's not all of my fabric. I've never bought your fabric for two main reasons. One, because the same as when anybody has a hobby or a speciality, they know what they want.

Yeah. And two, because I'm pretty sure the one, blank space in your office as the one you're sitting in now and everything else is fabrics. There's also some books. Oh, okay. Yeah, yeah, fine. Yeah, yeah. There's three bookshelves. I do buy your books. You do buy me, but I can always find space for books.

I refuse to respect your bookshelf space. Oh, God, no. I don't respect my bookshelf space. I do need to have a reorganise. Actually, I am getting short of space. Did you ever finish your A to Z rereading? No. Where did I store? I stalled somewhere around the Kim Newman and No, Dracula series, which is a weird, I love the series, but there is something. about those books that fails to grab me enough to really push through and keep reading. Fair enough.

Even though they are really interesting books and the concept is very cool. Anyway, yeah, beetles, which are really creepy. Weird, silvery beetles. Really creepy, but I like them. I like them. I do like them. But a multiple eye like a cluster of grapes. Yeah.

No, that does something to me. Not the blisters so much, just the... No, blisters fight is that it's the cluster of grapes description for the eye that gave me a bit too spidery for you. Yeah, I think there is a hint to that. Yeah. I know they move weirdly. But yes, no, I like the idea of gifts and swapping and there being this sort of sense of play existing there. Yeah.

Nobody told this smart young lad it was impossible to communicate with these aliens and so he just did it. Yep, I love that. That's such a pratchety idea as well, isn't it? Yeah. And just having a pocketful. rocks. Yeah. Would you like one?

People should offer each other shiny rocks more. Yeah, agreed. Did you like my ammonite thingy I found? Yes, that was very cool. Yes. Did you show your fossil friend? Oh, no, I meant to show her when I saw yesterday. I will show my fossil friend, your ammonite.

Sorry, locations. I call it your fossil friend, like it's somebody, A, I don't know who I now know I do know. Yes. You've hung out multiple times. He seems great. It's lovely. Right, low Britons, I noted, I've already mentioned liking the low Britons and the Long Britain in general. Yeah.

Low Earth Britain is a place of oak, wildwood, grassland and heathland, a place of water and light, where elephants, rhinos and bears mingle with badgers, deer and otters, full of wonders from humanity's lost past. I want to go to there. I want to go to there. I do want, it's impossible to know exactly, isn't it, but wonder what Britain would look like. without human intervention for a few thousand years because all of the landscapes that we have

are so, so human altered now. You go into any conservation group and there's arguments about what counts as rewilding, what counts as conservation, what we have to do to preserve what is now inescapably a man-made landscape so the heathland in Suffolk and Norfolk. It cannot survive without human intervention now

because, you know, sycamores pop up and this and the other and it becomes a forest. I think Britain reverts to forest without much provocation. Yeah, don't start me on sycamores. I have a sycamore tree that overhangs my back garden. Pulling up sycamore seedlings is just part of my life. Yeah, I like a sycamore. I love a sycamore. I love a sickenle.

But I will grant you that, God damn, they sell seed. Oh, they definitely self-seed. My garden is trying to become a forest at all times. I might just let the front garden become a small forest. Yeah, that should go well. I'm sure the landlord won't mind. No, it's lovely to sit under the shade of the sycamore and it's full of birds and squirrels.

But yes, no, England does just really want to be a forest. Yeah. And you can see why, when it gets this hot. Oh, yeah, absolutely. I fully respect it. You really feel the difference to be walking down a street that's preserved some of the trees. Yes. I really want to go to the Heath again now.

I haven't been to Nettle Heath for ages. I went with like a wild work thing in November, which was quite fun. It's one of my very favourite spots, and not just because there are horses wandering around. They've been to Dunwich, Heath. No, I don't think I have. That's done it's the one that fell out. Other locations. To the ocean.

Sorry, what? Dunnich fell into the ocean. Carry on. Right. Okay, we'll come back to that. Victoria London? Yeah. Oh, do you know what?

I'd have said there's so much more enthusiastic. I haven't been thinking about villages that. into the sea. Right. One of the few things I find more interesting. So yeah, Old London, I added this to your bullet points only because, well, A, it reminded me of Dodger, obviously, reading all of this, but because I put down the new cut as a maybe in obscure reference finials. But I looked it up and found that Henry Mayhew had written about it. So, friend of the pod, Henry Mayhew, who wrote London Labour and the London Poor. And I just really liked a description all But so the new cut is in Lambeth area and is now just called the cut, because it's old, I guess.

It's not new anymore. But it used to be a market, used to be a standing market, then became like a you have to have Barrow's market. And then in 1950 something got turned into more of a throughway. However, indeed, the scene in these parts has more of the character of a fair than a market. There are hundreds of stools and every stool has one or two lights. These with the sparkling ground glass globes of the tea dealer's shops and the butcher's gaslights streaming and fluttering in the wind like flags of flame, pour forth such a flood of light that at a distance the atmosphere immediately above the spot is as lurid as if the street were on fire. Incredible. Yeah.

Ah, I do love our palmyi. Yeah. A hell of a writer. Yes, he was. Oh, and north. Yeah. I mentioned this only because, by north, I mean the planetarium. the place with the Beatles live.

Yes, this idea of stepping north. Yeah. Because I had a quick look into, because half of the sky is green, right? Green stars. That is explained in the second half of the book. Oh. Am I, can I just say what do I think it might be? And I'll crack it out if I'm right.

Yes. Because I had to look it up. And green light in the sky generally denotes like a cataclysmic event. Like it has to get to a certain temperature before you can perceive it as green. light and so starbursts quasars dying galaxies kind of thing it's sort of but not entirely what's happening but we'll go into the green light in the sky more next week it'll be fun cool I'll leave I'll leave this in then and any listeners

who are doing the same as us in reading half and then coming to the other half please speculate wildly yes let's all speculate wildly about the weird green sky wildly and astrophysically my favourite wildly and astrophysically is the title of my memory memoir. No, I'd explain quantum physics to you. I was about saying amazingly because you hate

Astrophysics. No, astrophysics is fine. It's quantum physics I can't deal with. I know there's overlap, but I'm just... Oh, it's so hot. It's so hot. Should we take a break? Yeah. Little bits we liked. What did we like, though? There's a little Jim Russo reference

that I quite liked in... It's when the cobales being bullied. but someone says that the cable's smarter than Jim Russo. And I just love the idea that this guy has become like the long earth synonym. Like his name just means like a particular kind of awful dumbass. Do we know how he met his end? No. Or if he did.

Has he met his end? I don't know what he's up to now. I can't remember what he was up to by the end. Yeah, but that is funny. I missed that. We are getting less vignettes across the long earth as we go along now. We're quite a bit more focused. Yeah, that's true. It's the first one of these I think that we've had that doesn't have as A or B plot somebody going as far as they can into the long earth.

Yeah. Interesting. Or both long miles last time. Anyway, yeah. Yeah. What about you? What did you like? One of the things I liked were the different words for stepping east and west. Oh, yes. So Widdishins or Decile, D. Dexter or Sinister. I had a little look into that. have we before looks into those

Widdishins and so forth We've definitely talked about Widdishins and Deerceal and I'm sure we've talked about Sinister and Dexter a bit because it's very messed up that that has come like sinister and

Dexterous come from being right or left right or left handed Yeah there's more of that as well you know if you're learning French or trying to and things like A Gauche is left and Gauss is like quite a bad word

and then Adre is right and a droid and I don't know how you say it in English now God is like good anyway but yeah so Decile is like Dexter Sun Sunwise is another word for it so it's all it's Widdish ins and turnwise on Discworld isn't it yeah but I'm not supposed to do with like clockwise and anti-clockwise isn't it like but it's the same thing yeah yeah yeah but I was just briefly as a tangent wondering why it was turnwise and then I thought actually if the equivalent was sunwise, if you're on disc worlds, you're going to pick something because because the disc is, is, is a bit different astrologically. What do we just say? Just before

the break, astrologically, flailing or whatever. Yeah, something like that. Wildly and astrologically, astrophysically. Anyway, yeah, and Widdishins, another word for that is Tuatal, Tuatel. It's Gaelic, I think. So I'm definitely saying that wrong, no matter how I try and say it. Can our correspondence please correct me on postcards as always? And yeah, sunwise tangent, by the way, or clockwise tangent, I click through to circumambulation, which means moving around a sacred object. And in contrast, as you'll know, going anti-clockwise around e.g. a church is bad luck, reflected in various folk tales, including Child Rowland.

Yes. I think that's where we talked about Widdishins last when I was hanging on about child Rowland that must have been it Wittishans by the way the earliest recorded use of the word in 1513 is a translation of the unit where it's found in the phrase Widdishins start my hair and in this sense Wittishin start my hair means my hair stood on end

so it's just the wrong way I guess rather than yeah yeah interesting yes that those were the tendons I went down Thank you for our little visits to linguistics corner. It's been a little while. That's not true. We definitely do that every time. We're always at linguistics corner.

The corner is most of the room. Yeah. It's actually just linguistics. It's linguistics all the way down, France. It's linguistic allotment in the long earth. Cathedrals. What of them? I finished that one in Barcelona.

Carry on. Not going on that tangent. I really like this idea because I'm not religious but I like churches. I sort of respect them and enjoy the aesthetics and the architectural wonder. And I have very much the attitude that Stan has. Like the acoustics. And the acoustics are great. And they're quite cool inside.

So I would really like to be in a church right now. And I'm always amazed by the teamwork it takes to make cool. But I like the idea of these things becoming these little mini beacons of civilisation. So Nelson talks about the Christian missionary. is attempting to convert the pagan Saxons so they'd raise stone crosses as tokens of the church that would one day be built there. I had a little look into trying.

I tried to find something way too close to the deadline of starting recording. I couldn't find anything about that. I need to... But I like the way many of the crosses survive even today, so it's something about these symbols always remain, but sometimes the cross remains, but the church was never built,

and I think that's very wild and interesting. Yeah, definitely. This idea of new settlements across the long earth, like building some kind of place of worship is a part of that. Even New Springfield has a little chapel with a truncated steeple. And then you have this bit where Stan and Rocky go to the sort of datum VR experience. And it's Salisbury Cathedral because, of course, it is, it's Pratchett. Yeah.

And it's the idea of it, the whole place being so alien to Rocky because he's grown up in Miami, West Four, and pretty much none of the buildings are even older than he is. and what does it stand says in a place like this you can reject the answers those builders accepted you can even reject the questions they asked but you have to cherish the urge to ask such sublime questions in the first place i just think that's a wonderful idea as sort of this representation of civilization yeah yeah i mean yeah just huge and cathedrals are a great example of it just all the way back and across the whole world isn't it just the huge the huge monuments, the earthworks in America and the, you know, the stone circles, if you want to

stay in England, because stone circles are always on my mind. My mind is just a stone circle. It's just linguistics and stone circles. Yeah, it's one of those ones where you can't count the number of stones. They keep turning around and groaning and the devil's dancing weirdians around them, it's that kind of thing. Anyway, what was they saying? Yeah, the glory of humanity. Yeah. Glory of humanity, but maybe not internally for you. What was the question you put here? What would you put in your Civilisation kit?

Oh, yeah. So, Lob Sang, like Agnes was thinking, Lobang basically wants to put together like a little civilization starter kit. Yes. You know, I'm imagining, like, you remember those flannels that come about that size and you put it in the bath. Yeah.

Yeah. Except he's got livestock and seeds and things. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Seat monkeys. What would you put in yours? I don't well obviously the encyclopedia is a really good start but you have to think about what kind of media you're putting your you're putting your information on like what's the most long-lasting

the least vulnerable the most likely to be able to be read if the reading device is fucked yeah I think there's something to be said for the physical media here but I think you need to also be willing to at some point develop an ability for paper making and pen making and be willing to at some point be recopying them. Yeah. And then you have all the trouble of illuminated letters. Yeah.

But I'm doing, you know, if you're going, you need something reasonably carryable is the thing, don't you? Well, I mean, his Civilisation kit, he's got like effectively a massive RV full of stuff. Well, that's true, actually. Yeah. I was trying to think of a backpack, but you're right. If we're trying to fit it in an RV. Yeah, like I feel like we've got a decent bit of space here. So civilization kit.

Get like a cauldron. Coldron, obviously. Yeah, definitely. Coldron. Got to have a cauldron. Obviously, we're eliminating iron from this, but we can make these out of non-iron parts. Lots of different ways to make fire, I think is one of. There's got to be a few things that you've got a hundred backup ways of getting that information.

And so maybe you've got your encyclopedia, but you've also got like 10 ways of making fire. And the instructions for using them are carved into stone, are put in, like, a, scroll are the three mediums in Sanctopedia Stone and scroll. Yeah. Yes, the three genders. I think because I've got it on my brain and because I am in my sewing room, but like an old school non-electric sewing machine, if you could make one out of non-iron parts,

would be a very good thing to have because you're going to be making and fixing and doing that sort of thing. And the amount of time people used to spend hand sewing. Yeah, exactly. Not doing that. If I can get like a pedal thing. some kind of laundry kit that doesn't include maiming materials like a mangle. Yeah.

Yeah, that's the other thing, like soap and soap, like hygiene making ingredients or like the basics tools for that because that's something they talk about with New Springfield. They are making their own soap. They're making candles. A beehive. Beehive. I just, I really feel like you can get a lot going once you've got bees. I would worry about fucking with the ecosystem of it.

That's fair. security. Maybe you have a beehive, but you hope for bees to move in when you get there. Yeah, but there's got to be bees. I feel like every long earth has got some version of bees. So you bring a hive. Yeah, yeah.

Bring a hive and get them to move in. Yeah. All right. I feel like you could get your settlement, your civilization going a long way once you've got bees. Because then you've got the wax and you've got honey. Yeah. Yeah. Definitely.

All right. Well, we've got a good start. but fire bees and encyclopedias and they're sewing with fire bees encyclopedias in a sewing machine yeah yeah that's going to be all right yeah that's what we need maybe a snack oh food food all right i'll tell you what we're too hot for this listeners please tell us what you're going to put in your encyclopedia kit and we would like answers on a scroll a stone tablet and an incisiccptia kit you just said an encyclopedia kit I said what I said. Civilisation kit. I'm also bringing a crate of Diet Coke with me.

Oh, yeah. For God's sake, yeah. Okay. Right, big stuff. Let's try and think big thoughts. All right, yeah. So I put this one first on here because it kind of leads from what we were just saying. Yes.

I quite like the idea of the, what they were saying about the pioneer general. generation going across doing what we've always done, not we've always done, but what the trope is on earth about going out, starting a pioneer town, blah, blah, blah, blah, except because of this new reality, you have one generation of that and then everybody spreads out. And to me, it seems like this multi-stage life cycle almost, like, like datameth, there's a moss or a fungi or something like that that's just sporing. Yeah. And then and then and then, and then, the spores, or maybe it's like sending out seeds and then the seeds plant, but then they come out and then they spore.

Yeah. I know there are some plants, I think it might be mosses and maybe some others, where there are like two generations within a life cycle. Right. And so there's one that produces asexually and one that reproduces sexually and it goes like that. Okay, yeah. I can see that. And can you see my leap there? I can definitely see where you're leaping to.

Yeah. Because we're in a multi-dimensional, a multi-universe situation, evolution's going to be different. And so I quite like this as an idea of how you spread a stepping race as we now are and we're the newest one. Yeah. And there are a couple of interesting bits talking about that attitude because Rod has that attitude, but he very much says, don't call us comas. Yeah. Which were the first people who were doing this sort of thing. He's like, no, we're not that.

We're doing our own version of it. Yeah, yeah. Every generation thinks it's the first to invent sex and combing. But then also I quite like that this New Springfield community have done this thing, as you said, they've abandoned that pioneering, farming, everything else. But it's interesting looking at which trappings of that community they do keep. So the idea of having the Swap House, having barn dances. Yeah. The way they kind of legislate amongst each other with a lot of talking. Yeah, that is interesting.

And that seems to be very, again, you have to start looking at nature documentary stuff, don't you? Like, there's a lot of primates that kind of make all their decisions after a lot of chitch-chalking each other, yeah, yeah. And obviously, you know, if you're not going to fight it, talking really is the only way apart from flipping a coin. Yeah. But the idea of it being the, because a lot of towns,

these like frontier pioneer long earth towns do appoint like some kind of sheriff or lawmaker. The total lack of it here being very, how do I put it? It's built out of the fact that they're living this way because they're not living in one settled space. There doesn't need to be a physical presence patrolling and being in charge and looking after this. It's very anarchist. It is very anarchist actually, yeah. And yeah, definitely. And, you know, you think about police forces actually sprung up in most countries.

it all comes very much from protecting the classes that were already formed. And yeah, I mean, obviously, and the fun thing is we are seeing it in still, it's just second generation, isn't it? Yeah. You know, the guy who started it all is still only 50. Yeah, it's the logical leap from the first generation we saw in, like, the long earth and the long war into this.

Yeah, I'm not the guy who started off. You know what I mean? Our protagonist. Lindsay, I don't know what the fuck he's up to. I don't. I don't, well, actually, I have thoughts on it. God, fucking Lindsay. Sorry.

He makes me angry. Sure he's having a lovely time on Mars. Sure he is. Oh, I did just like a nice detail, sort of not thrown in with anything, that Australian Aboriginal communities are really nailing it on Mars. They're kind of already really well structured to handle Mars. Yeah, and I will deal with Mars shop.

That's nice. Yeah. It is. Yes. Also interesting that we go back to what's the word, what's word? To the abandoned townstead. Yes. And it is already so ghostly.

Like it's for the new generation, it's like, it's like us walking around Roman ruins. And it does remind me actually of those poems you read about people just a generation or two removed from the Romans. England and when everything was already so different again. Yeah, it's crazy. And I love the idea of the Palson Place becoming the old Palson Place within a generation. Yeah, yeah. Even though I assume Cassie Poulson has not like died in this time. I think it, yeah, I think it was just kind of implied that she was one of these ones. It was like, you know, I'm getting older and going back to

slightly more civilisation. And it was barely a generation, was it? I mean, it was like 14 years or something between this and that bit. Yeah. I assume she was probably age pretty quick. I assume she was part that original kind of outgoing pioneer thing that was young Helen Green going out. Yeah, yeah. But that was all very interesting to me. Oh no, she wouldn't have been that generation because she was born on Miami West 4.

So she was, so yeah, it is all very recent. Yeah. It's cool. Yeah, it is cool. But yeah, so the book itself then, because this is very much this first half has been setting up, isn't it? It's very set-up-y.

There is a very cool sense of creeping dread. It's quite difficult. There's a lot of stuff because I did read the whole book before we started. There's a lot of stuff I really want to talk about and can't. I normally when I go on about how good the setup is, I save that for the second half so I can talk about the payoff, but I am just talking about set up here. I found it really interesting.

This is sort of two-pronged, but what's carried over from the previous books and how least love it does matter. Yeah, yeah. Especially when it comes to the space elevator stuff, fucking Willis Lindsay. Yeah. Oh my God, yeah. A dreaming of his using his Martian Beanstalks

to open up access to space, a straight line path to massive industrialisation. So this was this incredible discovery in the Long Mars. Someone died for this. And I can't remember the character's name, but I remember being very upset when he died. Yeah, yeah. That fella.

That fella. Nice guy. The astronaut, you what's it? Yeah, yeah. I know, I know. Good. And then it's taken over and these space elevators have started being built

and now it's all stalled. And now it's boring and background with placards about layoffs and delays. There's something very... I love the term stalk jack, by the way. Stalk jack is great. I love like a new thing being invented. Yeah, yeah.

This new thing being invented and immediately having a language around it is also something that delights me. Yeah, but it's trying to set up this new industry in an economy that's just disintegrating. like integrating, diffusing. Yeah. Like it's all very well like,

Yes, we could be going up to space and it's much more accessible and we have this amazing thing now but we don't fucking need it because we have infinite earths. Yeah, yeah. And then also you have like these little, we briefly see Jack Green,

Helen's father, the firebrand of the Long War and he's working on a memoir about the heroic days of Valhalla's Gentle Revolution. Yeah. A brief drama barely remembered now, by Rod and his coma friends as they faded steadily into the endless stepwise green.

Yeah. And again, yeah, that was like not very long ago. No, it was really recent. Something I really like about this series, actually, is having these huge world-changing events happen in each book, and then by the next book, it's sort of, and anyway, never mind, don't worry about that. Yeah. Yeah, sometimes it's just because it was fixed before it happened.

And then sometimes it's just because humanity is so spread out now that a world, changing event is a world changing event, but that's like, doesn't love world like next door is fine. Like obviously Yellowstone was huge and has completely changed the datum. But by that point, the rest of the long earth was set up and ready to take it. Yeah. Yeah. And so it does become, and this is now part of the mundane. This is just part of how life is. I really like that about these. Yeah. Yeah. Interesting. We got the aftermath of like Yellowstone explained a little bit here as well, just that the winters kept getting worse. So we kind of get a little bit of closure on datum,

as in there can't be many people there now and his way. Yeah, I do like that we get that. And then, yeah, the setup in this first half of the book is quite interesting and subtle. It's very carefully ominous, I'd write down. Of the most important things to carry forward from a previous book is Bill Chambers having that story about someone who can't. on the cue ball and then kind of step north. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

So we know that that kind of thing exists, stepping in a weird direction and ending up somewhere you don't expect. Yeah, yeah. And that, yeah, how important, again, you know, we've gone on about it before, how important oral tradition can be. Yep, we do like the oral tradition. Listen to your weird vagrants and their stories. Yep, listen to your weird cueball story.

Listen to Bill Chambers. He seems like a good bloke to listen to. And then the descriptions of New Springfield, again, because it's sort of the opening chapter where we see Cassie Paulson starting off this life here. And there was that you could just relax about the weather and it would never bother you and there was nothing in the forest. Like this world is so comfortably kind of peaceful and undangerous and perfect to set up in. And then obviously this. Yeah. This idea of Sally kind of taking George and Agnes there and knowing that George and Agnes need to.

go there for some reason. Yeah. And this nice bit about as a reader, you can just completely trust. Like obviously, yeah, shit's going to get weird here because Sally, you know, and we trust Sally. Yeah. You might be a bit of an asshole sometimes.

Sally will deliver some plot. Yeah. We can implicitly trust that if Sally has gotten involved in some way and is also smiling a little bit, that definitely plot's going to happen to everyone, whether we like it or not. Yeah. And yeah, it's definitely, the description of Agnes's unease is very well done. Yeah.

The idea of not having a clock, which seems freeing for a bit, then immediately becomes like, but I can't keep an eye on what's happening. I want to know what the time is. And that jet lag feeling that's being described as someone who also, like, I really struggle when like the clocks change or something, less alone with actual jet lag, I can imagine that feeling of disorientation, especially when you can't point to it and know that it's happening. Yeah.

When you feel it, but you have no tangible yes, which though I completely respect Agnes's, you know, starting up her Zambucket experiment. And it'd be interesting to know how people would actually react physically and mentally to this in the real world. I expect there have been experiments to this effect. But like an hour's change within a year. Yeah. It doesn't sound like that much.

But actually, you know, we've evolved pretty comprehensively within this. We've got our circadian rhythms. Yeah. And then to suddenly just jump to that alien sky, which is just a gorgeous bit of description. stars and stars were bright, brighter than any star or planet,

brighter than the moon, brighter shards of the sun. It's just such an incredible leap from this until this point, although we've kind of seen the planetarium before through Nikos's eyes. By the time you get to that, it's just such a massive, oh God, yeah, no, things are so big, so weird.

Yeah, yeah. And then the last thing I just wanted to touch on before we go is the next, as this kind of lingering, maybe threatening, maybe not presence. This very fearful idea of, when Stan's talking to Roberta, the idea of not really having free will because you just at the logical conclusion immediately. Yeah. And so there is no other path to take.

And then this idea of the greening of the next kind of nudging humanity in the direction they are already going to sort of reverting somewhat to a prior state and then having a degree of control to turn the long earth into a long utopia with gentle nudging from their intellectual superiors. Yeah. You can see it, can't you? You can totally see it.

So I just, again, I think there is a really wonderful, ominous tone to this first half of the book, considering it's all taking place in very relaxed spaces. That's it, isn't it? And I always feel like the most unsettling starts to horror movies and things like that are the... It's very pretty. It's relaxed.

It's green. Yeah. There's a routine. Something slightly odd about the background music. Yeah. So yeah, I've enjoyed the book so far. Do you have an obscure reference finial for me, Francine? Yeah.

When everybody is. When we're in America talking about the Underground Railroad, and Abel is talking about navigating north to Canada because you get a guarantee from the good old. Queenie out there. Following the drinking gourd north and following the, I think it's mentioned in there, but the drinking gourd being the big dipper, the pole star, which has the pole star, sorry. But yeah, the drinking gourd was termed for it within the Underground Railway.

Oh. And railroad, sorry. There was an old song called Follow the Drinking Gord, which it is discussed, speculated, maybe like a coded kind of. This is how we're escaping. We're going north. follow the... Right, yeah.

But follow the drinking gourd as the now written down song was composed after the wall and based on the anecdotes of it. Oh. But kind of memorialised it, yeah, so I'll link to that. Cool. But yeah, no, it's cool. I was trying to look up if there were any other, like within those communities or sensitive names for the other constellations.

I didn't get that far. So if anybody knows anything, please tell me because it's very interesting. Awesome. Okay, I think that's everything we're going to say about the first half of the Long Utopia. We will be back next week, starting at Chapter 25 and going through all the way to the end. In the meantime, of course,

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