>> I probably should not be as surprised as I am that somebody actually knows what I'm talking about.

I mean, I read it on impulse years ago, so it's not like it's beating out obscurity by a big margin, but even so. It is the kind of book you think about every now and again, though.

>> and the Empire seems to be fairly proactive

True. That just makes it *stupid* and incompetent.

>> I caught on fairly quickly that there was more to the Mind than it was letting on

I think I wasn't really paying attention - note the opinion from extrapolated distant-past-me but it didn't seem like the most interesting thing going on until it got reveals.

>> But protagonists don't count

They do not. And his life choices always struck me as weird anyway ;)