What We Are Reading Today: ‘The Tetris Effect’

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Updated 01 October 2024
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What We Are Reading Today: ‘The Tetris Effect’

  • Ackerman walks us through what the mathematicians say, discussing among other things the limitations of the Z shape in the classic Tetris game

Author: Dan Ackerman

In the 2016 book, “The Tetris Effect: The Game that Hypnotized the World,” author Dan Ackerman, a radio DJ turned tech journalist, assembles pieces of a fragmented narrative into a neat, fast-paced story.

Each chapter is almost like a tetromino (a single Tetris piece). The story is layered, technical, nerdy and a tiny bit quirky.

Perhaps the most recognizable video game yet made, Tetris has a definitive story all its own. Ackerman, who is an editor at leading technology news website CNET, brought that animation to life.

In the chapter “Bonus Level, Tetris into Infinity,” Ackerman asks: “Is it possible to ‘win’ a game of Tetris? The idea of what constitutes a winning state is an ongoing source of debate among game theorists.”

Ackerman walks us through what the mathematicians say, discussing among other things the limitations of the Z shape in the classic Tetris game.

He asks: “An attentive player with lightning-fast reflexes could easily keep the game going for a very long time, but based on the rules established above, is it possible to continue forever?”

It’s a good question.

If you have been alive during the past four decades, you will have most likely played it yourself or know someone who has. The book deemed it to be “a game so great, even the Cold War couldn’t stop it.”

But how did that come to be? Why?

The book considers a question many have been wondering: How did a quiet, obscure Soviet software engineer create the game on, even at the time, antiquated computers in 1984? And how is it still so popular 40 years later?

Tetris earnings have exceeded $1 billion in sales, the book states, and peppered within its pages, readers will notice additional facts scattered around to make it even more interesting. One such fact states: “Guinness World Records, recognizes Tetris as being the ‘most-ported’ game in history. It appears on more than 65 different platforms.”

Another reads: “The Nintendo World store in New York has on display a Game Boy handheld that was badly burned in a 1990s Gulf War bombing. It is still powered on and playing Tetris.”

That Russian programmer, Alexey Leonidovich Pajitnov, did not change the world, but he did change how we interact with it, by creating that game. Pajitnov was 28 when he developed Tetris in Moscow. Now 68, he is still a significant figure in the gaming world. While he did not initially receive any royalties due to strict Soviet laws at the time, he later got what was owed to him when he formed The Tetris Company in 1996 to manage the licensing rights for the game.

 


What We Are Reading Today: ‘The African Revolution’

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Updated 03 April 2025
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What We Are Reading Today: ‘The African Revolution’

  • The African Revolution demonstrates that “the Scramble” and the resulting imperial order were as much the culmination of African revolutionary dynamics as they were of European expansionism

Author: RICHARD REID

Africa’s long 19th century was a time of revolutionary ferment and cultural innovation for the continent’s states, societies, and economies.

Yet the period preceding what became known as “the Scramble for Africa” by European powers in the decades leading up to World War I has long been neglected in favor of a Western narrative of colonial rule.

The African Revolution demonstrates that “the Scramble” and the resulting imperial order were as much the culmination of African revolutionary dynamics as they were of European expansionism.

 


What We Are Reading Today: "Beautiful Ugly"

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Updated 03 April 2025
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What We Are Reading Today: "Beautiful Ugly"

  • Alice Feeney is a New York Times bestselling author. In addition to “Beautiful Ugly,” she has also published “Rock Paper Scissors,” “Sometimes I Lie,” and “His & Hers”

Author: Alice Feeney

“Beautiful Ugly,” released in January, is a novel by British author Alice Feeney.

The story concerns Grady Green, an author, who is on the phone to his wife while she is driving home. During their conversation, he hears the screech of brakes as she spots an object on the road ahead.

Green’s tries to prevent his wife from leaving the car to investigate the object, before she mysteriously disappears.

To cope with his depression and grief, Green travels to an island in search of solace and perhaps a way to restore his life, particularly after losing sleep and his appetite for writing.

On the island, he is shocked to encounter a woman who resembles his missing wife, and the story takes another dramatic turn.

Although the novel has been rated by more than 87,000 users on Goodreads with an average of 3.6 out of 5 stars, some readers found the pace a bit slow.

“It’s a bit of a slow-burn mystery, which I feel is difficult to pull off since it doesn’t keep you on the edge of your seat the whole time,” one of the reviewers commented.

Despite being a work of fiction, another reader found the narrative unreliable and unrealistic, making it difficult to connect the events. Nevertheless, most readers appreciated the author’s writing style and imagination.

“All in all, I don’t hate the book, but there is too much melodrama and theatrical antics for a thriller. Since this is my favorite genre, I tend to be quite particular about how I like these novels to be constructed,” another reader said.

Alice Feeney is a New York Times bestselling author. In addition to “Beautiful Ugly,” she has also published “Rock Paper Scissors,” “Sometimes I Lie,” and “His & Hers.”

 


What We Are Reading Today: ‘Shooting an Elephant’

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Updated 02 April 2025
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What We Are Reading Today: ‘Shooting an Elephant’

  • While Orwell’s self-awareness is commendable, some readers may find his portrayal of the Burmese people overly passive, raising questions about perspectives that remain unheard in this narrative

Author: George Orwell

George Orwell’s “Shooting an Elephant” relates his experiences of a police officer in Burma who is called on to shoot an aggressive elephant that has broken free from its handler.

However, the essay — first published in 1936, and thought to be autobiographical — quickly turns into a searing indictment of power’s corrosive grip, with the unruly creature becoming a metaphor for the absurdity of empire.

Orwell sets the stage with quiet tension: the heat, the hostile stares of the Burmese, and the weight of his uniform. He is a man trapped — despised by those he governs, yet bound to the system he serves.

When the elephant rampages through a village, the crowd’s expectation becomes a noose around his neck. Orwell’s prose, stripped of sentiment, lays bare the hollowness of authority. He does not pull the trigger out of duty, but out of fear of appearing weak in the eyes of the villagers.

The essay’s brilliance lies in its ruthless self-exposure. Orwell refuses to cast himself as hero or even victim. Instead, he is complicit, a puppet of imperialism, forced to enact its violence in order to maintain the illusion of control.

Yet, one wonders: Does his introspection absolve him, or merely sharpen the hypocrisy? The dying elephant, gasping for air, is not just an animal, but a truth Orwell cannot escape.

Unlike traditional anti-colonial critiques that focus solely on oppression, “Shooting an Elephant” exposes the trap facing the oppressor.

Orwell’s shame is palpable, his confession unflinching. There is no redemption here, only the sickening realization that power does not liberate, but enslaves.

While Orwell’s self-awareness is commendable, some readers may find his portrayal of the Burmese people overly passive, raising questions about perspectives that remain unheard in this narrative.

The elephant falls, but the real tragedy is that no one — not the crowd, the empire, or even Orwell — walks away clean.

The bullet that kills the elephant also shatters the myth of imperial righteousness. And in that destruction, there is a terrible truth: Tyranny corrupts both the oppressed and the oppressor, leaving both bleeding in the dust.

 


What We Are Reading Today: Republics of Knowledge

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Updated 02 April 2025
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What We Are Reading Today: Republics of Knowledge

Author: Nicola Miller

The rise of nation-states is a hallmark of the modern age, yet we are still untangling how the phenomenon unfolded across the globe. Here, Nicola Miller offers new insights into the process of nation-making through an account of 19th-century Latin America, where, she argues, the identity of nascent republics was molded through previously underappreciated means: the creation and sharing of knowledge.

Drawing evidence from Argentina, Chile, and Peru, Republics of Knowledge traces the histories of these countries from the early 1800s, as they gained independence, to their centennial celebrations in the 20th century.

Miller identifies how public exchange of ideas affected policymaking, the emergence of a collective identity, and more. She finds that instead of defining themselves through language or culture, these new nations united citizens under the promise of widespread access to modern information.

 


What We Are Reading Today: The Mechanics of Earthquakes and Faulting

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Updated 01 April 2025
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What We Are Reading Today: The Mechanics of Earthquakes and Faulting

  • Focusing on brittle fracture and rock friction, this book will appeal to graduate and research scientists in seismology, physics, geology, geodesy and rock mechanics

Author: Christopher H. Scholz

A massive earthquake hit Myanmar and Thailand recently. Humanitarians are struggling to deliver assistance.

Why do earthquakes happen? “The Mechanics of Earthquakes and Faulting” offers a study on connections between fault and earthquake mechanics, including fault scaling laws, the nature of fault populations, and how these result from the processes of fault growth and interaction.

Focusing on brittle fracture and rock friction, this book will appeal to graduate and research scientists in seismology, physics, geology, geodesy and rock mechanics.