Hi there and welcome back to Hugos There 2.0 and this is another Seth's picks episode where in the recent past we did one of these episodes and it wasn't even science fiction. This time it is science fiction. Furthermore it's an award winner kind of because the author here is a Nobel winning author and that author is José Saramago and the novel is Blindness which was published in 1995.
So the novel was originally published in Portuguese and so I had the perfect person in mind for talking about this not because he speaks Portuguese but because he's doing a study of science fiction from around the world and that is Andy Parry. Hi Andy. Hey Seth, how are you? Good, good. And Andy and I actually got to meet in Scotland this year which was fun. He was one of the chosen few who attended the Tech Me Tea Reader live recording.
Yeah, I know that was really good for. Yeah, it was intimate crowd. So how's it going with science fiction around the world still plugging away? I think you were in the 20s with the countries covered? Yeah, yeah, probably in the 30s now and reading a lot more African science fiction which has been really cool and that was the great thing about WorldCon. There was so many panels and table talks from African authors.
And there take on science fiction is really quite different to Western stuff. I mean, definitely a WorldCon. I mean the panels that you could get there were extremely diverse. I mean so many different topics and I didn't get to go to the one about the African science fiction. Yeah, no, it was great. And the best thing I went to was on the laws of space and how it impacts kind of hunter gatherer tribes in Africa. And it was just called the laws of space.
So I thought this was going to be like the three laws of robotics and kind of more science fictiony kind of fictiony. And it wasn't. It was done by a lawyer who specializes. So it was an international law kind of stuff. Yeah, but and space law. Yeah, you know, you know, government can own a celestial body, but that doesn't include private companies.
And it was absolutely fascinating. And I kind of sat like I'm in the wrong thing. I didn't want to come to this, but the lady that hosted it was just brilliant. And it was fascinating. There was some of this space law covered in a city on Mars, which was one of the related works. Okay. So talking about history with this book, this was one that I did you not know about this until I sent you a
thing about it never heard of it never heard of Jose Jose Jose. Yeah, yeah, I'm Portuguese. I was doing Spanish wrong. Exactly. I this was I learned this week. How to pronounce the name. Okay. And I'm probably still not getting it quite correct.
But, but yeah, they do they do pronounce the the J differently. Yeah, yeah, not quite a J. It's like a J kind of, you know, you have a name like João, which is their equivalent with to one. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, I discovered this one from the library. And I think I saw a trailer for the movie when it came out.
Yeah, and I don't remember. I guess it must have come out in 2008, 2009 and looked up the movie and saw that it was based on a novel and then saw that the novel was from a Nobel winning author. And I thought, well, I haven't read many Nobel winning authors. And so I picked up the book. And I almost quit it for for a reason and we'll talk about it.
But, but ultimately got really sucked into it and really, really enjoyed it. And then I reread it about 10 years ago when it came by as a cheap book on the nook. And so, and then and then this time I had it from audible just because I thought that being an interesting way to take it in. It is a different experience. And we'll talk about that as well.
I did say at the top that this is a science fiction novel and technically, you know, kind of falls into the post apocalypse, something like, you know, day of the trifids where, you know, people are struck blind by the astronomical events or whatever. And then and then the plot happens, right. But the rest of the plot isn't very science fiction. It's really just about the sociology of the whole thing. Yeah. Yeah. This is borderline science fiction.
Yeah. And it definitely falls into that literary science fiction, right. Yeah. Yeah. And, you know, I looked up sort of mangoes work. And he definitely has stuff that that straddles the line between fantasy and magical realism. He has one, for instance, I can't remember death with interruptions, I think, is the novel where essentially death is like, OK, I'm quitting my job. Nobody gets to die.
And so, you know, that's that's definitely not just straight fiction, right. There's there's a fantasy element to it. Yeah. No, quite a few of the international books have read recently. They've all been kind of post apocalyptic. I was like, is that is that science fiction? It's just, you know, a war's happened. Yeah. Yeah. You know, what's, what's why's that science fiction?
So let's let's talk about just like sort of overall impressions on this. And then, and then we'll just kind of dive right into the discussion because I want to, you know, I definitely recommend the book with with some caveats, trigger warnings and that kind of stuff. Because there's some pretty rough content in it. There's there's violence. There's sexual violence. And it does not really flinch away from some of that stuff. Yeah. What did you think? Yeah. I mean, it was dark.
Yeah. But I like, I quite like dark stuff. I don't like really graphic stuff. And I think this was on the, you know, the more graphic side of things, which doesn't appeal to me. So it wasn't, it wasn't a comfortable read. Yeah. It's not, it's not, you know, I like quite, I like aliens and spaceships and laser fights and those kind of things. That's why I like science fiction. Yeah.
So reading this was challenged me personally. And it's a book I wouldn't have naturally picked up. So, you know, you've expanded my book vocabulary. So yeah. But yeah, it's dark. But I really like the way it, everything's really well described. You know, he's clearly, you know, obviously, his warden Nobel Prize. He's a great writer.
And, but yeah, the content itself was, was challenging. Yeah. Yeah. And, you know, when you talk about like reading dark things that are about alien invasions, not kind of stuff, right? There's an enemy that, that you can focus against there, right? Where in this, the enemy is sort of human nature. Yeah. And, and the way we don't care for the marginalized and, and the, you know, the way we can be so indifferent. Because, and let's, let's talk just, you know, briefly about the plot of the book.
There's essentially an outbreak. It's, it's sort of a, it's almost a pandemic novel. I can't remember if we mentioned it in the, in that episode.
But there's this outbreak of what they call the white sickness because people go blind, but they don't see dark. They describe it as, you know, a thick fog or a mist, right? And it just starts with one guy driving his car on all of a sudden he goes blind. And then everyone kind of who he touches becomes blind. And it kind of focuses around this doctor's office where he goes to the eye doctor.
And then everyone in that office ends up going blind as well. And then bad things happen, you know, because the government overreacts and starts interning people in essentially camps, you know, they put them in an old asylum, they put them in old arenas and things like that. And then they just sort of throw them to the wolves. And say, look, if anything bad happens, you deal with it. We'll provide some food, but, but we're not going to, we're not going to come in there for any reason.
No, they kind of protecting them. It's got a military ran. Yeah. So, yeah, it was quite, it was really, um, oppressive. You know, you kind of, you've gone blind, you're quarantined. And that's it when, yeah, we're just going to throw food over our offense. Yeah, like the, it's the place where the main characters are interned. And I want to talk about the characters, because it's one of the interesting things about the style of the novel.
They're interned in this old abandon asylum, which, you know, is unfortunate. And it's, it's not really equipped to handle the number of people that get put there. And then, you know, we, this is where the sociology part comes in, where there's more than one ward in here. And it happens that one of the wards is closer to where the food is delivered. And if they decide, you know what, we're not going to share the food. The government isn't going to step in and they have to handle it themselves.
Yeah. And that was it. It was kind of, you know, very much, uh, Lord of the flies. Yeah. Exactly. It reverted very quickly to, you know, self-interest and tribalism and all those things. It was fascinating to read. And some of it you kind of go, this is really, you know, it's difficult to read. And you feel that people are just horrible. But then some of it was so unbelievable. You know, that I couldn't relate. I couldn't say this. I couldn't see how people would go that bad and that depraved.
Yeah. That quickly, which made it slightly easier, because then it was quite clearly fiction. It wasn't, it felt less real. So, which helped. Yeah. It made it easier to read because it was less real. And obviously with all the blindness and the white blindness. Yeah. Yeah. So it took it one step away from reality.
Yeah. See, I'm not sure that I agree that it didn't feel real because I can see this kind of thing happening, right? Where, where there was a joke from a comedian who was talking about apocalypse preppers, you know, people who are like, you know, the closets full of food and stuff. And the guy said, all you're doing is collecting stuff for someone stronger.
Yeah. And more ruthless, right? If somebody comes along and they're, you know, they're not about humanity as a whole surviving there about themselves surviving. And they come and take your stuff. Then what are you going to do? Yeah. Yeah. Let's see. Let's talk about the style of the novel. And this is why I wanted to talk about. I highly recommend if you're going to read this book reading it in print.
However, based on what I describe, you may decide, no, I'll go audio because a son of a go has a style, which I understand is in several of his novels. I wonder if it was unique to this one, but I've looked it up. And it seems to be the thing he does where he very much limits punctuation and line breaks, quotation marks. And so there's just this breathless quality to the way it goes by because you don't even have periods at the end of sentences sometimes just to comma and then it keeps on going.
And characters will be talking and it's just offset with a comma. And that's all. There's no quotation marks. There's nothing, nothing to kind of call out that there's dialogue going on. And so it requires a level of attention that I think some people are like, I'm not, I'm not ready for that. And so if you're not ready for that, I'd say, well, OK, the audio will, will serve you better because you're going to miss that.
But you're also missing to my mind that the level of immersion that you get where it pulls you into the plight of these people. Yeah, I'd say because I read probably 50, 50, I read most of the book on imprint and then listen to a lot of it on audible as well. But when I was reading in print, you know, I couldn't just read for 10 minutes and then put it down like a chapter before bed or a few pages before bed.
I saw that you had to sit there and commit a good half an hour to an hour to sit and read it to get into the, just the way it's written. And then I said it's, it's, it's a challenging, physically, it's a challenging read. But when you get into the pace and the way he writes, it's great. And it's really draws you in and it's really immersive. And that was clearly his, he craft, you know, his crafting of physical writing is brilliant. Yeah, it's great.
You know, from this part forward, I'm just going to say we're going to be inspoilers and and we'll just, we'll start talking about more of the specifics of the plot. I like these conversations and not be super, super structured just because, you know, this is a book that that I've really enjoyed and I just want to just want to talk about it with Andy.
And one of the other interesting things is that the characters, there are no named characters in the novel. So, yeah, so it does not pass the back deltest. Yeah, when I first started reading it, I think I was in like the first chapter, I'd like message you and said, like, no one's got a name yet. And you were like, don't expect any names.
And I was like, okay, and that was really, and that that also found it, found it, I found it hard to relate to the character that was the doctor or the lady with the glasses. And it was just like, again, you eventually break that barrier and you just go, all right, that's the lady in the glasses. Right, right. That's the boy that's just writing.
And the old man with the eye patch, right. And it's fascinating too, you know, in a book about blindness that so many of the character, you know, not names, but the way the characters are described are something physical, right, something visual, right, the girl with the dark glasses, right.
And then, you know, there are, of course, like the blind hoodlums, that's what they call the other ward that won't share the food. And, and you know, the doctor and the doctor's wife and the first blind man and first blind man's wife and the car thief. Yeah, yeah. And, and yeah, it's really fascinating. And then even toward the end, when a dog comes in, right, the dog doesn't get a name. It's the dog of tears.
Right. And I think that was only thing one of the things I didn't like about the book is when they said, oh, blind people don't have names, you know, because I think there was one point where someone said, oh, what's your name? And they made the right and they kind of almost pointed out that blind people don't have names in this in this book. And I think that was unnecessary.
I think if you could have quite happy left that out and drawing your own conclusions to that, I never have never had to comment on that conversation when someone goes, oh, what's your name? Because that would have happened all the time. Yeah. You know, the first thing you do is someone who comes in, you're like, hey, who are you? And that never happened on any of the first meetings, apart from once. And then they kind of made this comment about blind people not having names. Yeah, yeah.
It does kind of set you back at one remove because you think in conversations, right, people would need a way to refer to each other. Yeah. And, and yeah, that doesn't, that doesn't really happen here. And it's, it's part of the style. And I still, I still really appreciated it. It's, it's, it's interesting. Yeah, it's different. And, you know, but yeah, I'm glad to read the book because there's so many different things about this book.
Yeah, I've never come across in, you know, in any of the book. And so you have, you know, the lack of the character names and then the lack of the punctuation in the novel. And so like, you lots of times, you're like, I'm pretty sure I know who's talking, but I'm not totally sure. And to me, that was like, would that be what it's like? Or do you like, would you learn people's voices well enough? So do you, you would know? And, and I'm not sure. And I'm not sure it was going for that either.
No, no, no, no, no, I don't know. I've not done any research into, you know, written any, read any papers on him in this book. You know, any, so I've just read it as a book and not done any background. There is a direct sequel to the, to this novel called Seeing. And I haven't, I haven't watched it. I haven't read it yet. Oh, okay. So that would be interesting. Yeah, especially as, you know, the last line. Yeah.
Yeah. Well, almost, is it the last line of the book, but almost the last part of the book? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I've got the book in front of me. Was it the last line? No, it's not the last line. But that last twist. Yeah. One of the quotes that I liked early on where the, the doctor, you know, he's fascinated by the fact that he, he sees this patient. And he's like, well, there's no, there's no lesions. There's no obvious reason for you to be blind.
And, and so he's approaching this from a very medical standpoint. And then the next day he goes blind, right? And then he starts contacting the health authorities. And, you know, he, he gets basically stuck talking to a mid-level bureaucrat somewhere who's not really interested in helping him. And doesn't, doesn't, doesn't really care. And the doctor says, this is the stuff we're made of, half indifference and half malice.
And that, that is very much described the life in the wards, right? Because the indifference is on the part of the government. And then the malice is on the part of the other, the, the blind hoodlums. What, what else you want to talk about? Um, I suppose we could go into the, the more triggering stuff. Yeah. But go inside of things and, yeah, my issues with that.
Yeah, yeah, because at some point the, the blind hoodlums, the people in the manual ward three, I think it was the food is being dropped near where they are. And so they decide, you know what, we're going to keep the food. If you want the food, you have to buy it. Yeah. And so they shake everybody down for all their possessions. Not that possessions mean anything.
No. And this is what, this is like, you know, like, if you're totally blind, you're not going to worry about having someone else's watch or someone else's cash. Right. And, and so, so the, um, the first guy to go is blind's wife could still see, you know, not the first guy, the doctor's wife. Well, yeah, of course, yeah, the doctor's wife. So the doctor's wife could still see, but she was pretended to be blind to get into the asylum with all the other blind people.
And so she could stay with her husband. Um, you know, why she was not just collecting it all up and just hiding it. It's, you know, it's must be very easy to hide something from someone who's blind or a group of people that are totally blind. Yeah. And so that bit for me just seemed unrealistic or I couldn't empathize with that. I was just like, no, that wouldn't happen.
No. And, and because this book is written so realistically, you kind of plot holes like that really not one plot hole, but some of that I couldn't find realistic. I was just like, no, no, no, no, that wouldn't happen. Yeah, yeah. And I mean, she didn't reveal the fact that she could see for a long, long time until deep in the novel, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah, even I think that was when she was outside, I think it was back when they went back to her home.
I think it was earlier than that because it was, I think it was essentially when they had to go to war. But she did, she did hide one thing, if you recall. She'd remember she hid the scissors. Yeah, not that they were necessarily available. And the interesting thing too is on the side of the blind hoodlums, they have somebody in their ward who was born blind. Yes.
And so he has an advantage of being of a comfort level with being blind and tools, for instance. Like I think it said he was an accountant and he had some kind of way to sort of punch braille figures in. Yes. Yeah, yeah, he was. And so he was the one who was accounting for all the, the possessions that people were bringing. Yeah, and yeah, I think he had a stick as well.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, a cane, right? Yeah. And so then, you know, that's where it gets to the, they're like, bring us all your stuff and then we'll decide if you deserve food. And then later on, they're like, well, you don't have any possessions left back. So now we want your women. And, and that's where it gets really, really rough. Because I, and I tend to put myself into this and I think, no, we're not doing this.
Okay, this is the time we fight. It's interesting because the women get a fair amount of agency, right? Where essentially they decide, yes, we're going to go. And it's quite a masculating to the men who are left behind. Yeah, that was a really, yeah, strange. Again, another really quite disturbing thought pattern that went through those scenes. Yeah, the men were left with a woman had gone. And, and you know, one of the women is very badly mistreated and ends up dying.
Yeah. And the movie actually does a good job of, I will not, I won't say a good job, but it emphasizes that part a little better. There's some change to the wording that I thought were really effective. And we can talk about the movie. Have you watched it? Yeah, I did. Yeah. Yeah, because I couldn't remember if we were doing this for a few guys there or TV to your reader. Right. I watched the movie just in case.
Yeah, yeah. Yeah. And yeah, it was good to, it was good to, you know, and it was interesting to watch the movie as well. Yeah, it's quite a straight adaptation as well. Yeah, yeah. But there's, there's the one of the blind hoodlums comes over and says, you know, there's one lady who was, who's here the other night, who was kind of a dead fish, don't bring her this time. And, and that's, that's when the, the doctor's wife says, well, she died.
That's not really a big deal. She was kind of a dead fish. And you can, you can see on the face of the, of the blind accountant, then he's like, oh crap, we might have, might have screwed something up here. And, and yeah, you know, like you, like you say, right, the, how realistic is this that, that entire ward would go along with it. Yeah.
Yeah. And on the other hand, like, you know, we see in politics, right? So what a demigod, a demagogue arises and is able to sway people over to their side and make them do things that you wouldn't think people would do. Yeah. Yeah. Maybe that's not a self-preservation that we're trying to think that we wouldn't be like this in those scenarios. Yeah. Yeah. That would, you know, that we're better than, than the people in the book.
Yeah. And it's worth mentioning that the, that the main hoodlum, I can't, I can't remember what the, if he ever got a name. All right. A label anyway. You think I would know I've read it three times, but he had a firearm, right? And, yes. Yeah. And, and that's one of those things where even after even when the, the doctor goes over to deliver their, their goods, right? And, and tries to argue, no, no, no, you owe us the proper amount of food and gets threatened with the gun.
And then he regrets that he didn't try to take the gun away. But it's the kind of thing where in the moment, right? Your survival instinct kicks in and, and you're not thinking of anyone but yourself. Yeah. I think that, that's one of my favorite points in the book as well. I think when there's a conflict and they start shooting wildly and the doctor's wife, you know, starts, you know, raising hair and giving him lots of information.
Yeah. Giving him lots of abuse and he goes, I'll remember your voice. And she says, I'll remember your face. Yes. And he's like, what? What? And it was just, yeah, and everyone's kind of like, hey, and it was like, you know, she didn't reveal that she could see. But, yeah, it was just, it, it, it sold the seeds of doubt. Yeah, I thought that was a very clever part of the book.
Yeah. And you know, I really enjoyed that because it showed that kind of almost like, you know, stepping up and, you know, taking control and becoming powerful and all those things. I thought that was a real, you know, key change point for the, for that word. Yeah. Yeah. And, you know, she had, she had had that role of taking care of everyone already. Yeah. Yeah. Even to the point where like her husband finds his way to the bed of the, the woman with dark glasses, right?
The girl with dark glasses. And they, they sleep together and, you know, she sees it. And, and she just is very compassionate about the whole thing. Which I thought was interesting. Strange, but yes. Yeah. Yeah. I know the way it part of the, you know, the story, but yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And I think the movie does actually talk about this a little bit because the, the doctor is, I just played by Mark Reflow. And, you know, he's basically saying, look, I'm not a man anymore, right?
Like, like, I'm, I'm, you, you deal with me like a child, right? And you're, you're wiping my backside and, and, and, and trimming my, and shaving for me, you know, you know, all these things and it's, you know, can't live like this. And so I don't know if that led to that, that situation, but, but I was, I was impressed with how compassionate she was toward both of them about that. Yeah. And again, she, yeah, she had choices. She could leave. Yeah. Abandoned them all if she chose.
So she, yeah, she, she made that definite choice to stay and take on that role of guide and mother and. Yeah. And it was rough too, because she, it says several times she was, that she could not see. She, she wished she would lose her sight, so she wouldn't have to see what she saw. Yeah. Because, because she did wish for that. Yeah. Dead bodies and excrement everywhere and, yeah, yeah, stuff. I like the moment where she realizes she's forgotten to wind her watch. And so, yes.
Time, time for her has ceased to be a thing. Yeah, yeah. And then, and then of course she gets to, she gets to wind it again when the, when the old man with the, the eye patch comes in and he has a radio. And, you know, at the tone, it will be four o'clock. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Winding the watch. Doesn't sure if it's AM or PM. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. But. Yeah. No, it was good. Yeah. It was really nice. Moments have quite, you know, lightness in the, in the whole book.
But I just think the whole concept of going white blind was just fascinating. That really, that was, I think that was the most science fiction part of the entire book. Mm-hmm. Is that when you go blind it's a, it's a whiteness rather than a darkness. And it was just thinking like how, how different and terrifying that would be. Yeah. You know, because when you close your eyes, you know what it's like, you know, it's black and it's dark.
But when something's totally white, that's really alien, that's really, you know, something that you can't. You're very, you know, you're very rare to have that kind of experience. Yeah. Yeah. You know, less, you know, you, you know, unless you're getting whited out in, you know, at the snowstorms and things like that. Yeah. I've experienced that. But, you know, I could still see my hands and, and it's just, I couldn't see any features.
It, it, it happens when you, if you go skiing at all, you eventually will find yourself in, in that kind of situation. You're like, well, I hope there's no big dips in this, in landscape, because I can't see any of the topography. But you just go really slowly, try and get out of the cloud bank. Let's see. So I guess that the book progresses to them being abandoned. Yeah. And that, that, you know, they realize that the soldiers are no longer looking after them, no longer providing food. Right.
To the extent that they were ever providing anything, right? Because you have the, you have the situation with the car thief, right? Where he's, he's kind of our most perfidious person who's in the ward with the good guys. Yeah. Where, where he took advantage of the first blind man, Stolars car. But he, he gets his due punishment by, by also going blind. And, and the funny thing is, like it was, you want to believe that it was a kind impulse, where he was just trying to help this guy out.
And then he just decided to steal the car. And it kind of positions it that way. Yeah, it was kind of more, um, kind of like the word spur of the moment, you know, it was just kind of like opportunistic. Yeah, taking it to steal the car. Yeah. Yeah. And then, you know, it was kind of like a professional coffee. Right, right, right, right. And not, not a good man, right? Because then when, when, I think they all lined up at some points to try and make a procession down to pick up the food.
And he found himself next to the, the girl with dark glasses who I think is a sex worker or, and the source. Yeah. And, and, you know, um, he discovers that she's curvy and he likes it. And she does not like his advances. And he goes to him that gets infected. I think she has heels on or something and stops him. Yeah, ultimately kills him. Ultimately kills him, right? Yeah. And that's, that's where the indifference of the government authorities comes in, right?
Because he, he hear just some antibiotics and he's fine, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. And, uh, and he does kind of work his way around to apologizing, right? And, and the, and the girl with dark glasses is not thrilled that she's killed this man. That was not what she was trying to do. Um, but, uh, but just the way things have gone, that's, that's the reality that they're in. Um, and he ends up, I think, surprising as soldier and getting shot. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Um, yeah, and the, and the, the woman, the dark glasses ends up kind of looking after the young lad, the boy with a squint as well. And, you know, it becomes, you know, his foster mom. Yeah, more or less. And, and, and, you know, she, she gives up a lot of her food. So, yeah, so that he won't complain. Um, that's his main role is to complain and ask for his mummy. Yeah. Um, but yeah, this is kind of everyone has like redemption stories. Yeah, yeah, yeah, really in a lot of ways.
And, and you know, the, the hero is definitely the, the doctor's wife, right? She's the one who takes care of them. She's the one who, um, you know, ends up, uh, taking out the bad guy. Yeah. Um, yeah, that was, that was a brutal scene, a brutal free pages in the, in the, um, in the book and in the film as well. It was, yeah, yeah, yeah. It was good. It was good. Yeah, and that was a good scenes, but yeah. Yeah, tough, though. Yeah, tough.
Yeah. Um, and the thing is I'd pick, I'd picture that when I read the book, I'd picture the scissors very differently. So, you know, like the scissors, you don't, you only see the scissors that they used in the movie for hairdressing. So, they really ship long and pointy and purely metallical, metallic. I was thinking of more of, uh, like, paper scissors, you know, with big, stick handles and so when I saw them in the film, I was just like, Oh, yeah, okay. Those are dead. Yeah, that's a weapon.
Yeah. That's not just a, yeah. Yeah, very much. Um, yeah. And then she's the one who, you know, when, essentially, like you said, right, eventually they're entirely abandoned because the rest of the world has gone to hell.
And, um, you know, all the soldiers have gone blind and, um, and there, there was the, uh, the blind or dead, the dead are blind, you know, the thing that happens where there's the, like the head of the soldiers who's, who's basically saying, look, step out here, we'll shoot you and that'll solve the problem. And then he goes blind himself and just off himself. And like, well, you was consistent in his convictions.
Yeah. Yeah. But yeah, the kind of, you know, because this book must be, must be, yeah, I've got obviously predates the, the COVID pandemic. Yeah. But yeah, we'd played for our lives, and people were panic buying and becoming selfish, right? So you can see, um, parallels, obviously it wasn't as dramatic, but yeah, it was tough.
Yeah, and wanting to find someone to blame as well, right, because, because, you know, when, when the, at some point, the first blind man and the car three, They're the same ward, and they both blame each other. You stole my car while you made me blind. Yeah, it doesn't help. No, yeah, it doesn't get anyone anywhere. And those kind of arguments just aren't fruitful. So yeah, eventually they're abandoned because all those soldiers have gone blind, the government has essentially fallen.
And this is where the protests from the blind community were about, you know, would everything really go to hell for this? And I feel like people don't understand how fragile society is. And things can push us over the edge. And a pandemic can cause all kinds of upheaval. And something like this that all the sudden, all the tools for society are built around being cited. And when all of a sudden, everyone no one's cited anymore. Yeah, things electrical grids would go down.
Plumbing would cease to function. Yeah. You know, there's more automation now. But I feel like they'd have to be very swift action to safeguard anything. And I think the pandemic showed us that swift action is not something that we're really suited to. No, no, I mean, obviously we couldn't set up for everyone going blind. Yeah, no one's got that plan. Right, right. Somebody probably does this book. Some crackpot somewhere does.
But yeah, so they venture out into the city looking for a place to stay. And this is where you have the hope of the girl with the dark glasses that her parents are still alive. And they make their way back to her place and find the woman who's developed a taste for raw meat. And is eating the chickens and rabbits in the back garden. Yeah, but they brought the dog. Yes, the dog of tears availed himself with one of the chickens.
But the doctor's wife is able to find in a store that there's a door to a storeroom that the folks have not found, right? Which I found a little surprising, unless there was some kind of lock on it. Yeah. Because you'd think somebody would have gone around the perimeter and gone, oh, there's a doughnut here. Yeah, yeah. Although it does show that also after she finds that place, after she finds that storeroom and comes out with food, they do find it.
And then a bunch of people fall down to their guests. Yeah. Yeah, I couldn't visualise in the book what was happening at that point. And I think even in the movie was the refire, I think in the end of the book of the movie there was a fire in the store. And it ended up killing lots and lots of people. And she felt terrible for it. Because she'd essentially opened the door where the blind hordes had gone in there and then either fallen or burned to their deaths.
So she had again that guilt of killing lots of people. Yeah. I mean, there was definitely a fire in the ward, in the asylum. Yeah. Yeah. Okay, maybe that's what I'm confusing. I haven't seen the film in a number of years, so I'm not sure. Yeah. I didn't rewatch it because we weren't doing, take me to your reader, but I thought we'd talk briefly. Yeah, I just think I finished the book and then watched the film almost within a week of each other. So there's a lot of crossover.
Yeah. Yeah. Well, yeah. And being a pretty straight adaptation, it's, you know, there's not a lot of unique things to the movie that don't exist in the book. No, no, no, yes, it's really faithful. Yeah. Yeah. I think the movie Yadda is a little bit about some of the power infrastructure and plumbing and that kind of stuff. But where the book seems to be like, you know, people are essentially waiting for it to rain in order to be able to go out and get fresh water to wash and that kind of stuff.
And those are lovely scenes actually in the book where it talks about them going out and helping each other wash. Yes. Yeah, downpour. Yeah. And the guy with the mic, chiming a bath. Yeah. Yeah. Cold bath could still have a bath. Yeah. And someone helping him and he's not sure who. Yes. Yeah. And there's that kind of lovely relationship that it was between him. He's called the Old Man with the Black Eye Bath, or with the eye bath, right? And the girl with the dark glasses.
And you know that there's quite a difference in their ages, but they sort of bond together. Yes. And he realizes that, well, if we ever get our sight back, she's going to see that I'm an old wrinkly man. And isn't going to want to be with me. Yeah, but they did have that conversation. And yeah. And she was like, yeah, that's fine. Yeah, I mean, blind dating, right? Yes. Yes. That should be the sequel. Yes. Well, I guess the only thing is the final thing where they start getting this sight back.
Right. And that's, you know, everyone's, you know, because he was patient zero, he gets his sight back first. So the white sickness or the blindness has a finite time. And I'm, yeah, I couldn't work out how what the timeline of the whole book was whether it was all in a week or all in a month. But, you know, I'd say it was probably a month or maybe less. Yeah, I pictured longer than that.
OK. Just because I guess when you think about the fact that they started, when they started losing out on the food, you know, I had remembered that happening much earlier. But they're in the wards for quite a while before the blind hoodlums start to assert themselves. Yeah, OK. So yeah, I pictured it over the course of a number of months. But, OK. But I could be wrong. Yeah. I mean, it doesn't. Yeah. It just depends how quickly you think society would agree. Right. What is the curve?
What does the curve look like for the infection rate? Because essentially, it presents that it's a virus, right? Yeah. Or something. You know, they couldn't, they never worked out why whether it was just looking at somebody or touching somebody. Right. Was it transmitted visually that they do talk about that, right? Which doesn't make sense. It's not. No, but it's science fiction. Right. Right.
And so, you know, you kind of wonder if the doctors who I've seemed, seemed that she was one of the ones who was immune, right? She was like one of the people who would get COVID and never have any symptoms, right? And you'd think there would be some rate of that, right? And you never do get in this book. The book is not at all interested in talking about the situation in the rest of the world.
No. Because you would think that if this was happening in Lisbon, you know, that perhaps folks in Spain would be like, hey, maybe we should help them out, you know? And, you know, the rest of the world would help out. But it could also be the kind of thing where it was everywhere. Yeah. Yeah. Because the first blind man was a businessman, so it's possible he had flown recently and, you know, he was just patient zero in Portugal or wherever. It does not say what city they're in.
No, or what country. I think. Yeah. Can't remember. Can't remember any references to countries or? Yeah. I think at some point there's like a ministry of something that is mentioned and some like, okay, this is not the United States. Yeah. Because we don't use those terms except for, you know, churches, which I did want to talk about churches as well. Because at some point they take shelter in a church. And someone has gone and put blindfolds on all the images. Yes. Yeah. Well, it wasn't, yeah.
It was a sentence that the priest may have done this. Yeah. Yeah. That was an odd scene. Yeah. And I wasn't sure if there was, I couldn't think of any religious significance to blindfolded imagery. I mean, I would, to me, I just looked at it as a religious person. I looked at it as a symbol of a loss of faith, right? Where, where, you know, in, when you see sicknesses happening, right? It can be hard to square with, with, with, with it, you know, omnipotent, benevolent God, right?
Well, why does this happen then? And it's, it's one of the oldest questions, right? For, for people who are religious or non-religious, right? And, and so yeah, I, I just took it as, as more or less, that kind of thing where it was. Someone was losing their faith. Yeah, okay. So, like, so Paul Damascus, all that kind of stuff. Yeah, yeah, really. Oh, interesting. So, the blindness aspect of that as well, right? Yeah, that's, yeah. You know, the scales falling from his eyes.
Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah, I wasn't sure. But, yeah. But the kind of the visual of putting blindfolds or, or, or, covering the eyes of the, you know, the pictures and the saints. Yeah. It was, but then I guess, you know, obviously Portugal must be a, a big Catholic country. Yeah, I think so. Yeah, I'm sure they're Catholic. So yeah, I think religions are a very big part of everyday life. Mm-hmm, Portugal, if it, you know, if, most, in Spain it is, and France and places like that.
So, I think it's a predominantly Catholic country. Yeah. So, that was, that was, that was a good point when, when the patient's zero starts to get his eyes, you know, his vision, you get his vision back in. And it just, it happens just as quickly as he, as he lost it. Right. And it was then in order of the people that went blind, they started to get their sight back. Mm-hmm. Yeah, we pretty much were the bookends as well. Yeah, yeah. The way it's described too is, everything goes dark.
Yes. And that's, that's the symbol that he's gotten his, his sight back. Yeah. Because, because the insides of his eyelids are now dark instead of light. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, that was strange. I, I do think that the idea of, of the, the white blindness, right, is kind of terrifying, like you said, right, where, where, it's like, well, how, how do you sleep, when, when you can't shut the, the light out?
And, you know, I grew up in Alaska, so like, I, I, I was used to going to sleep when it was light outside and waking up when it was light outside during the summer, you know, and, and opposite in the winter. But, kind of as, as I've gotten older, I, I have a lot less tolerance for like a lamp being on when I'm trying to go to sleep. Yeah. And, and right now, you know, with my, with my shoulder situation, I'm in a sling, and so I'm sleeping in an easy chair. On right under a big lamp.
And I've got it, I've, I've got it on a timer to turn on at a particular time. And, and I keep going, man, I got to change that timer. So it's not quite so damn early. Because, because I wake up and I'm like, oh crap, there's a little lamp shining right in my eyes and directly overhead. I've rejored to my phone and turn it off. Yeah. So, yeah. So one of these days, I'm going to have to, maybe, I'll, maybe I'll pick up the, the sequel and see what I think of it and, and do it.
Yeah. I will, I'll look at it. Oh, I'll probably get that unordable. Yeah. Yeah. I'll commit the time to another, uh, Sarah Manga book. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, some of his other books do look really interesting and I haven't read any of them. Um, but, uh, but this one when I looked back, I, it took me a couple of weeks to read it. Um, and, and I, I tended at that time to be a book a week kind of person. Um, and so, so two weeks is, it's a pretty gradual and it's not a super long book.
Maybe, maybe 300, 400 pages. Yeah. 400. Okay. Yeah. 300 pages. Yeah. Yeah. And so, so it, it is a bit of an undertaking, um, just because of the, the way it's written and, and the commitment that it takes to actually sit down and like, I'm going to read until I come to a stopping point and you just have no idea when there's going to be a stopping point. Yeah. Um, because you can't, like, even just, uh, flipping ahead in the book, sometimes I'd be like, where is the next paragraph break?
It's three pages over, you know, um, and, uh, and then, you know, chapters which is sort of randomly end, there was, there was never really any, uh, you know, we're going to end this chapter on a cliffhanger and move into the next one that was all continuous. There are little breakaways. There was like a breakaway when they were talking about, I think there was a big eye convention with all the eye doctors. Right. And then the lead guy was just talking, the OS isn't such a big problem.
And then he went blind on stage. Right. And so, there are little snippets of what's happening in the wider, our side of this cool group of characters. Um, so that's about the only time you can put the book down. Yeah. When it breaks to another snippet. But they're quite sure. It might be a paragraph at the beginning of the chapter. Yeah. Yeah. Um, I think I'm about done with my notes. Yeah. And then the other thing is that, uh, the doctor's wife suddenly goes blind at the end.
Is that the way you read it? Yeah. That's not how I read it. This is, she's, she's heard it. It, and now it's my turn. Huh. I thought there was the big twist. I thought that she went blind. I've, I've never taken that away from, from the ending. Now I'm going to have to look. Oh, wow. I thought she thought that she was going blind. And, but, um, yeah, it's not, I don't think it's explicit, but it's interesting in the, in the novel that I have it doesn't even have, you know, on my e-reader.
It doesn't even have chapter breaks. No. Yeah. There's no, no, no. It says, it says, right, um, I'm on the last paragraph. She, she lifted her head up to the sky and saw everything white. It's my turn. She thought, if you're in the air quickly lower her eyes, the city was still there. So she thought for a moment that it might be her turn. Yeah. I guess you could read an ambiguity there, right? The city is still there, but she can't see is.
Um, but I, I've always read that as, as, you know, for a moment. It's kind of like if you've ever, um, been in a really dark room where there's one tiny pinpoint source of life, light, light, and you just look away from it. And you think, are my eyes open or are they closed? And then you look over and you see the little prick of light. And genuinely thought, you know, that it's that last, it's those last five words the city was still there. Mm-hmm.
I've just blanked them out and just assumed she was going blind. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Well, she thought so too, right? So yeah. And I just, I thought, oh, that's great. She's going to go blind. And I thought that was a really good twist to the book that I've just made up. Yeah. Well, I'll have to see if either as check out the, the sequel, maybe we can reconvene for a, for a 10 minute discussion. Or, or, or get in the original Portuguese to make sure that's the, yeah. There we go. There we go.
You know, I have a friend, I have a friend from work who's, who's from Brazil. Okay. Yeah. But weirdly, I read a, the Brazilian book I read was a, a dystopian book as well. And it, it's very similar. It's kind of, it's dark, it's miserable. And it follows the life of one guy. He just has the worst life. He just has the worst look and things go wrong for him all the time. And it's written, it's quite similar in the way that everything's really well described.
Like there's a, there's like four or five pages just done. Because he's so thirsty, he has a drink of water. And it's just his body reacting to having a, a gulp of water and all it feeling it down is thrown into his stomach and feeling rejuvenated. And it's just incredible. And it's, again, it's really well written. But you know, the story's a bit, you know, not much happens. Oh, what's the, what's the novel? And still the earth. Okay. Anything else you want to say about this novel?
No, no, I, I, yeah, I think we've covered everything. I think the, you know, the style and the, yeah, content. Great. Do you recommend it? Depends to who. I think, you know, you know, it's kind of, I think someone who reads more literary stuff than yeah, yeah, to a science fiction fan, probably not. If, well, a science fiction fan who wants to read something more literary and challenging, then yeah, yeah, I'd recommend it. But, yeah, I'm glad you recommended it to me.
And this isn't my kind of book. All right, good. So, yeah. So yes, I would recommend it. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. You don't like it then. It's not my fault. I'm kind of the same way. And this is why we haven't covered it for Take Me To You Reader because I think Colin would hate it. And I like, he hates so much of this stuff we do anyway. I'm like, I don't want to inflict this on him.
And some of the, some of the triggering content, I think, you know, I, I, I know him as a friend and know, you know, this wouldn't be good for you. And on the other hand, like, I think the book's absolutely brilliant. And, and so I do recommend it to people, but, but you do have to have those big caveats about, oh, by the way, you know, there's no punctuation.
And so my, my friend J.W. who's been on the podcast a few times, he reads so many books and he was, he was lamenting on a discord that we're both on about this book that had a super lack of punctuation. I'm like, oh, if you think that's good, you should read blindness and you know, no pass. So yeah. So it's cool. Yeah, no, I think. Yeah. Yeah. I would recommend it to certain people. Yeah. Yeah. So yeah, it's really great to see you. Yeah, definitely.
And let's talk briefly about the movie because I do feel like it's, it's quite a straight adaptation. It, it feels shorter than, than the, than the book, right? If the timeline feels shorter as well. Where it's, it's pretty quick that the, the blind hoodlums start to assert themselves. And, and everything goes all lower to the flies. But like the depictions of the squalor of the place are very good in, in, in the movie. And, and I feel like it's still not quite what was described in the book.
Like it, it's an order of magnitude, even worse in the book. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Very descriptive. And the, it's a pretty good cast here too, because we, you have Mark Reffelow as the, the doctor and Julianne Moore as the doctor's wife. Yeah. And then Danny Glover is the, the man with the back eye patch and, yeah. What is her name? Alice. Alice Braga. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And, and she plays the, the girl with the dark glasses. Um, and so, so yeah, pretty, pretty good cast.
And you know, it's not a movie that did much business at all. I think it, I don't know if it was a film festival kind of thing or, or what. Yeah. I guess, yeah. Yeah. I can't, I can't remember it being released. Yeah. I guess whoever, you know, the act is most of really like the book or really like the script. Yeah. Yeah, I don't think this book that the movie was ever going to be a big money spinner. No, I don't think so.
And so like, I would also say to people who are like, I'm not sure that I'd enjoy this book. Well, I mean, you could watch the movie. It's, it's, it's an abridgment of it, but it hits the major points. Yeah. And I can't see anybody watching the movie and then going, I really want to read the book now. Right. Right. Did you, did the book have the moment in it?
I remember in the, in the movie at some point, the Mark Reffelow character is, is like, all right, well, you know, if you want to volunteer for this, raise your hand and then he's like, sorry, that was stupid. I can't, I can't, I can't actually count your hands because I can't see. Yeah, I don't know. Yeah. I can't remember if that was in the book or not, but I remember the scene in the film. Yeah, that's good. Yeah. Yeah. So, so yeah, I think it's definitely a novel worth reading.
And this is one that, you know, I had on my list just because I've, I'd kind of wanted to cover it for Take Me To Your Reader for a while, but, but just, yeah, I, you know, I, I know, Colin well enough that, I think, no, maybe, maybe we won't do that one. So, so thank you for doing a, a mini Take Me To Your Reader with me. It works. Yeah. It's a crossover of three podcasts. Yes, yes, absolutely. Oh, you said, you said you had some remaining quiz from, from Glasgow that you wanted to give me.
So there was three rounds that we didn't have time for. All right. And let me just pull that up. So the three rounds are stopped doing that. So people, people listening to this, you have to, you have to let me know if you do better than I do. Yeah. And there's this big bonus round. I'm going to put in a couple of bonus questions, which get you big, big points. Oh, all right. All right. Yeah. So the rounds are weapons, numbers and time travel. Okay. 42. Sorry. That's, that's, that's question one.
So I'm going to give you a number. Okay. And you have to give me what the, what that refers to. Okay. Now, there's a point for this question. Mm-hmm. Or there's nine bonus points. Oh. If you get it as the book, that, you know, most people give the, the, the generic answer, but that's, that's slightly inaccurate. Okay. There is a more accurate answer to that. I think I know what you're, what you're going for. Oh, go on then. 42. 42. 42. The ultimate answer to life, the universe and everything.
Is that not quite right? It's the answer to the question. The question. The question of life, the universe and everything. It's the five points. Okay. Okay. Okay. Because you know that it's the answer rather than it's, most people say it's the meaning of life. It's not the meaning of life. It's the answer to the question of the meaning of life. 88. 88 miles per hour. Back to the future. Yep. Yeah. Perfect. 1984. I mean, I'm assuming that's George Orwell.
Yeah. Yeah. The year in which George Orwell's book is set. 2001. A space Odyssey. Yep. I, most of them were dead easy. This is the easy round for the, for the World Conquist. Nice. There's only one hard one, which is 3720 to one. Oh, that's the odds of successfully navigating an asteroid field. That was word perfect. Thank you. Empire, sorry. I've seen that movie so many times. Sorry. The answer is successfully navigating asteroid field. There are approximately 3720 to one.
Yeah. So I wasn't sure if anyone would get it. I felt that it might be too hard to get. Yeah. No. Good work. So we're going on to a weapon. So I'm going to give you the name of a weapon. OK. You need to tell me the film book or TV series that is from. OK. The noisy cricket. That is men in black. That is men in black. I feel like I'm a break this damn thing. The law giver. Judge Dred. Judge Dred. I don't, my pronunciation might be wrong on this one. OK. Bat left.
A bat left is a pointy object from a cling on water in Star Trek. The next generation. Yeah. Again, the pronunciation might be wrong on this one as well. But Moyniah. Oh, that's Thor's hammer. Right? That is Thor's hammer. A sonic screwdriver. That is Dr. Who. I have seen sufficient, you know, like three episodes of Dr. Who. Enough to know that. So perfect. That's 100% so far. Sweet. Yeah. And four bonus points. So this is time travel machines.
I'm going to give you a device which allows you to time travel. You need to give me the film or TV series. I feel like I should do well with this book. A British police box. Call box, right? Yeah, that's Dr. Who. That is Dr. An American telephone box. That is Bill and Ted Zexel and Adventure, Bogas Journey and, you know, whatever. Perfect. Yeah. A GMC Delorean. That's back to the future. I don't think I knew it was GMC. Yeah, GMC. Interesting.
Do you know the, for a bonus point, what's the license plate? Out of time. Yeah. Okay. A hot tub. Hot tub time machine. Yeah. Okay. I don't know. If I'd have said jacuzzi, would you have got hot tub? Yeah. Would you have got that? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I should have said jacuzzi. Yeah. And the way back. Oh, this is, um, this is like a kids show, right? It's animated. Yeah. It's animated. I can't come up with it. The professor, um, P-body? Yeah. Um, he's not a professor.
I can't quite come up with it. Um, uh, Professor P-body in Sherman. Sherman. Okay. All right. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And the bonus point for this is a cooling cup of coffee. This is a 10 pointer. A cooling cup of coffee. It depends how much Japanese science fiction time travel you've read. And not very much, evidently. Um, it's not, uh, all you need is kill, I imagine. It's before the coffee gets cold.
It's, uh, it's a really good, it's a book of five series of, um, really quite emotional time travel books about, you know, you go sit in a cafe and you order a coffee and before your coffee gets cold, you can visit somebody that was already in that cafe. Really, really cool books. Oh, nice. They made me cry. They're really, really moving stories. Yeah. Really good. So, um, you did something you did for your, your podcast?
Um, no, I just, I haven't done it for the podcast, but I probably will choose, there's so many Japanese science fiction works. Yeah. Um, and these were, the first one in the series was available and audible. Mm. So I downloaded it and then I bought a few more. Mm-hmm. And then my, my son's really into Japanese stuff. Mm-hmm. So he recommended the book as well. So yeah, he read, he read like books two and three and I read one and four and stuff.
And they do all into connect and it's really, they're really quite clever. You can read them as individual stories. Yeah, I love that though. The father and son of a dynamic. Yeah, yeah. Um, so yeah, you got 100% on the quiz. All right. I should have made, I feel like I made it too easy. You saved the hard ones for, for, uh, I did do the hard ones. I was a world cup because I was thrown off by the way you pronounced La Forge.
You said La Forge and for some reason it did not compute and I'm like that. Oh, yeah. I just, my wife's French. Oh, no. Okay. So any time she's, there's a French word, she says it in full French mode. Ah. Yeah, she, she doesn't speak English with an accent at all. Mm-hmm. But yeah, when she says a French word, it's full French mode. Yeah, yeah. So La Forge, it's, I, I naturally over pronounce things in French. Right, right, right.
Where we, uh, I don't know if this is common in the US, but, um, we will often, um, kind of kind of riffing off of, uh, keeping up appearances. The British comedy show. Yeah. The Bucayie dotting, you know, um, uh, we, you know, and we don't go to Target and we go to Tarjet. Yeah. So yeah, same thing. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That's brilliant. Nice. All right. Well, thank you. Thank you for the, the remainders of the quiz. So no, that's fine. Yeah. Yeah. All right. Where can people find you, Andy?
Um, you've recently published enough one particular, uh, yeah. Yeah, I made it off Twitter because, um, oh, I asked because I, I found Elon Musk. Quite distasteful. Yeah. Recently, so I'm not giving him any, any of my internet space. Nice. Nice. Um, so I'm on Blue Sky and it's just S F A T W at Blue Sky or how have you, do you have Blue Sky? I'm still not there. I'll put a link in there. Slowly getting used to it.
Yeah. Anything you're working on right now for the, for the podcast, anything, anything, any, um, upcoming stuff that's going to be coming out in, you know, November. Yeah. So probably before this, I'll have done one with, uh, Demo, we're going to do. Oh, fun. Yeah. So, uh, we're going to do cloud of desolation, which is a really, I've just had a series of really bleak dystopian sites, fiction books from around the world.
So when I read Blindness, it was just like, oh, God, I just want to read something with spaceships and aliens and, you know, different planets. No, is this, is this a book from Ireland or is this, uh, yeah, yeah, nice. And it's, there's, there's very few and, and the books, it's a really rare book and Demo was like, oh, I just sent you a copy of my book, you know, and just sending me back. And in the end, I did find a book online, a second hand copy. But yeah, they're really rare.
Yeah. And it, but it's just bleak and miserable. One of the cool things about the, the podcast is like, um, is seeing people who, I know, like, know each other because of my podcast or because of my podcast and others. Oh, yeah. And it's, it's cool to get to see people interact. And so it wasn't, it was nice that you guys hadn't met before WorldCon, right? No, no, no. Yeah, so it was great. Yeah, so after the, after your, uh, life podcast, we went and we went and sat in the bar for a bit.
Nice. Yeah, had a great time. Cool. Yeah, he's a good fun. He's really good. Yeah, yeah. And he just knows his stuff as well. Yeah, he's really good. Yeah. Yeah. But yeah, he can find me on, on that, and I'll send you a link to my website because I can never remember what it is. Yeah. Even searching for it, I don't find it. All right. And I know exactly what it's called. Yeah. All right. Well, Andy, thank you so much for doing this, um, and being flexible.
I, uh, I think I've been stringing along for a couple of months. I'll get to that. I said you're paying, I think, uh, right when I got back from Scotland and I was sick. Yeah. And, uh, that's fine. I'm super flexible as well. So it makes the world. Awesome. Cool. All right. Well, talking again sometime. Yeah. Yeah. It's really quite different to, um, to Western stuff. Can you hear my cat? You have a visitor behind you. Yeah. Yes. I guess it's like, it's too annoying. I'll just kick around.
Okay. Yeah. So let me out that microphone. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I'm going to kick around. She's been paying up. She's just not going to stop. Well, folks, I hope you enjoyed that discussion with Andy, um, you know, kind of a different discussion when we do the Saths, episodes, um, don't do quite the same structure as, uh, as the normal award winners. Um, but, you know, blindness is a book that I definitely do recommend with caveats and and the caveats are in the discussion. So let me know.
If this is a book that you've read, if it's a movie that you've seen, um, when what, what you thought about it. So do make sure to check out Andy's podcasts, Sathai around the world. I have been on it one time and then we, Andy and I talked another time on my podcast about his podcast.
And so if you want to check out kind of what he's doing there, you can look back in my feed for Sathai around the world and, uh, or just search Andy's name, uh, on my, uh, on my website, Neil, and you'll find that episode. Uh, as always, if you want to support the podcast, uh, support things that I do in my other podcasting as well, you can go to patreon.com slash Hugo's podcast and sign up to support there if you would like.
Um, you can also buy me a coffee at buymeacoffee.com slash Sathie's, all those links are in the show notes. And, you know, of course, uh, share the podcast with your friends posted on social media if you're, if you're enjoying it. Um, and, you know, if you're out there and you've never reached out to me and you'd want to say hi, you'll find that I'm a pretty affable guy. Uh, shoot me an email and I will respond, uh, feedback at Hugo's podcast.com.
Um, unless you just want to tell me that you don't like my podcast in which case, you can keep that to yourself. Um, and if you'd like to leave a review, uh, especially a good one, then, uh, go for it. That'd be great. Although I never do read them out on the show and I very rarely look at them, but I appreciate it when anybody does leave one. All right. I think that's going to do it for this time. So thank you so much for listening and until next time, bye.
The theme music for the Hugo's Their Podcast was composed and performed by Tim Kuski.