Yellow Blue Tibia. Adam Roberts.
Adam Roberts is incredibly clever and especially with his writing
skills. He can imitate or create apparently any style and in this novel,
he has chosen droll humour with frequent misunderstandings and non
sequiturs which I occasionally found tedious but after about half way
through this ceased to annoy.
This novel explains the contradictory facts about UFOs.
1) UFOs have been seen and are believed in by millions.
2) UFOs don’t exist.
The plot begins in 1946 with a plan devised by (Joe SF) Stalin, to
ensure the future of the Soviet Union by bonding the populace through a common enemy. Because he believes the Americans won't last long as an
enemy, he commands a group of science fiction writers, (all Russian Jews except for one, a "Slav"), to invent and provide details of these alien invaders. Forty years on in 1986 Konstantin meets the other surviving
writer from the group, the Slav, now a 'government employee', who thinks their fiction has always been reality.(I would love to give examples but
that would ruin surprise easter eggs.) Things become delightfully crazy
with lots of droll humour. Much of the humour is directed at the
stereotyped propaganda image of Russians under the Soviet Government and
he keeps coming up with their automatic behaviours usually involving
avoiding the KGB, fear of authority and hive behaviour.
"Why would you take a car from Moscow to Kiev? That's what trains are
for." It is a lot funnier than I am describing but if it was written
about some other nation, it would probably be vilified. There is little
in the way of serious politics so it is not an alternative history but
some events have been now correctly attributed to Aliens.
I can't say too much without perhaps decreasing your reading enjoyment
but it involves influence of alternate reality selection.
"Yellow Blue Tibia" sounds like the Russian for "I love You" for reasons explained later but this is no soppy love story. For me it was mainly a comedy with fascinating science fictional ideas. 4 of 5 stars.
"Yellow Blue Tibia" sounds like the Russian for "I love You"
On 2025-08-20, Titus G <noone@nowhere.com> wrote:
"Yellow Blue Tibia" sounds like the Russian for "I love You"
That's a stretch. In particular the stress of tíbia vs. тебя́
doesn't work at all.
that you are saying I love you in Russian."
Titus G <noone@nowhere.com> wrote or quoted:
that you are saying I love you in Russian.""Я тебя люблю" (transliterated: ya tebya lyublyu), IPA:
ja tʲɪˈbʲa lʲʉˈblʲu.
"Yellow Blue Tibia", IPA:
ˈjɛloʊ blu ˈtɪbiə.
Maybe "yellow tibia blue" would be closer to the Russian?
On 2025-08-21, Titus G <noone@nowhere.com> wrote:
From the novel:
"So I told her then how to say I love you in Russian. It involves
putting together three English words: two colours and a human bone - as
it might be, the colour of a fading bruise, and the colour of a fresh
bruise, and a bone in the arm: just those three English words.
They think the tibia is in the _arm_? Oh boy.
From the novel:
"So I told her then how to say I love you in Russian. It involves
putting together three English words: two colours and a human bone - as
it might be, the colour of a fading bruise, and the colour of a fresh
bruise, and a bone in the arm: just those three English words.
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