Some differences I noticed between Lucifer’s Hammer and White Noise were firstly, that White Noise is told in the first person perspective. After being inside so many people’s heads and constantly being bombarded with changes in perspective in Lucifer’s Hammer, I have to say, this first person perspective was refreshing. Another thing that I noticed was that names were a big thing in LH, but in White Noise, we aren’t even told the main character, Jack’s name until the beginning of Ch.2.
As far as time period goes, White Noise is the more recent novel, written in 1985, so the ideas represented might be a bit more modern compared to LH. Some connections I saw were with the television. We discussed in class how Tim Hamner always relied on things he saw on television. Heinrich, Jack’s son, sort of reminds me of Tim in that way. He seems to have alot of scientific knowledge for someone his age. He is constantly referring to things on T.V or the radio. In one scene, Heinrich insists it will rain that night because it said so on the radio, but Jack tells him it is infact raining at that very moment, in front of their eyes. Heinrich refuses to listen to him. Babbette and Jack’s relationship might be a contrast to Loretta and Harvey’s, because Babbette and Jack are more open in their communications with each other, and seem to be on more equal footing. There are also alot of kids in this novel, and we are told many details about them through the course of the story. In LH, there weren’t really that many kids, and the ones mentioned like Harvey’s son weren’t really given many pages for the reader to familiarize themselves with the characters. The kids in WN are also very mature for their age and the kids in LH, particularly Andy are seen as becoming more mature after Hammerfall.