This week it’s time for another book review, as I continue to make my way through James Blish
Category Archives: Books
This week I’m reviewing an urban fantasy mystery novel – Ben Aaronovich’s book “Midnight Riot
This week I’m taking a look at another Science Fiction novel – John Scalzi’s literary remake of H. Beam Piper’s Little Fuzzy – Fuzzy Nation
Little Fuzzy can be found on Project Gutenberg here.
John Scalzi’s Blog can be found here.
Book Review – Red Storm Rising
Book Review – Rendezvous With Rama
Arthur C Clarke in his home office in Sri Lanka (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
This week I’m taking a look at Arthur C. Clarke‘s classic SF novel, Rendezvous With Rama.
Gamers Against Bigotry’s IndieGoGo Campaign can be found at http://www.indiegogo.com/GAB648
Their web page is http://gamersagainstbigotry.org/
The campaign ends on August 1st, 2012 – so donate now!
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Book Review – Leviathan Wakes and Among Others
It’s book review time, as I get the two Hugo Award Nominees for Best Novel that interested me, out of the way. Specifically, Among Others by Jo Walton, and Leviathan Wakes by Daniel Abraham and Ty Franck writing as James S.A. Corey.
Video Review – The Quantum Thief & The Avengers
This week I have a review double feature – the science fiction novel The Quantum Thief, and the film The Avengers. Continue reading
Book Review – They Shall Have Stars (and my thoughts on the Hugo Best Dramatic Presentation Nominees)
This week I’m quickly giving my thoughts on a short novel – James Blish‘s They Shall Have Stars (Part 1 of Cities in Flight), and then taking a look at some more of this year’s Hugo Nominees.
Book Review – Black Blade
Cover of Black Blade
This week I’m finally getting back to book reviews, with a look at the horrible novel by Eric Van Lustbader – Black Blade. Continue reading
Book Review – The Ruby Knight
This week I have a review of the second installment of David Eddings’ heroic fantasy series, the Elenium, The Ruby Knight.
Book Review – Deal Breaker
This week I have a review of the first Myron Bolitar mystery novel – “Deal Breaker“. Continue reading
Book Review – The Bourne Identity
This week I have another book review, as I look at Robert Ludlum‘s classic conspiracy thriller, “The Bourne Identity” Continue reading
Another week, another review – and this time I’m doubling-up on the book reviews with my take on another of this year’s Hugo Award winners – The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms.
Book Review – Blackout
Another week, another review, this time covering the 2011 Hugo Award nominee, Blackout, by Connie Willis. Continue reading
Book Review – The Dervish House (and my Definition of Cyberpunk)
I’m finally getting topical for once, with my review of the Hugo Award nominated novel, The Dervish House, by Ian McDonald. I also give my definition of what I define as cyberpunk.
This week I have another book review for you, covering one of David Eddings’ fantasy novels, “The Diamond Throne” – part one of the Elenium.
Book Review – The Rough Guide to Anime
Finding a “canon” of important works in any field is generally difficult to settle on. Do you go by popularity, artistic merit, influence on other works, early works of prominent creators, or a combination thereof?
The Rough Guide to Anime, by Simon Richmond – in Penguin Books Rough Guides series, probably has the best “canon” list of anime titles available, and certainly makes for the best English language primer to anime currently in print in the US, and makes for interesting reading for long-time fans and newcomers alike. Continue reading
Book Review – Knight: The Medieval Warriors Unofficial Manual
Get Knight from Amazon.com
So, I enjoy historical books, particularly those about the middle ages and the renaissance, so when I saw this book on display on the library, it caught my eye. Since I’m going to an SCA event this weekend, this is probably the perfect time to put this review up.
The book is meant as sort of realistic and semi-cynical guide on how to be a medieval knight, covering everything from tournaments to warfare to economics. The book is generally a fun read. Because the tone of the book is meant to be for a “person of the period”, it definitely not very dry. The book’s tone uses a lot of humor, but it doesn’t resort to the sort of romanticism of works of the time. Additionally, the book does reference actual works of the period very regularly for the sake of demonstrating that the advice is actually practical. Continue reading
Book Review – Game Over
Buy this book from Amazon.com
As I’ve mentioned in my review of The Soul of a New Machine, I enjoy reading about the history of the computer industry. As you’ve probably gather from all my magazine recaps, I also enjoy learning about the history of the video game industry. Consequently, I enjoy books that fall in the category where the two Venn diagrams overlap. They do so with the book I’m reviewing this week, Game Over: How Nintendo Zapped an American Industry, Captured Your Dollars, and Enslaved your Children. Continue reading
Book Review – The Black Hole War
Purchase this book at Amazon.com
So, last week I talked about the documentary about Stephen Hawking, “A Brief History of Time”. This week I have a book review taking an alternative approach to Stephen Hawking’s theories of Black Holes, and how they are wrong. The book in question is The Black Hole War by Leonard Susskind.
Essentially, the plot of the non-fiction book is pretty simple. Stephen Hawking comes up with his theories of how Black Holes work, and how nothing can escape them. Well, sort of – Hawking Radiation is emitted by black holes (that’s one of the ways we can find them), but the amount of radiation emitted is not equal to the amount of material that is captured by the black hole. Thus any “information” captured by the black hole (from light to anything else) is lost. Continue reading
Book Review – The Soul of a New Machine
Get "The Soul of a New Machine" from Amazon.com
About 6 years ago, a sort of scandal rocked the gaming industry related to a blog post by a woman known as “EASpouse”. The blog post criticized EA’s labor practices at the time, which required employees to work massive amounts of unpaid overtime, as they were salaried employees. By massive, I mean about 12-16 hour days, 6 days a week, regularly. This was a big deal among gamers, because very few of us had ever had the opportunity to peek behind the curtain like this. It was likely that most of us viewed game development with a variation of the way that Roald Dahl as a child imagined the inside of the Cadbury Chocolate Factory near the boarding school he attended (which later led to Charlie & the Chocolate Factory). Continue reading
Book Review – Devil May Care by Sebastian Faulks
Get Devil May Care from Amazon.com
It’s been a while since my last book review on my blog, in part because it’s been a while since I finished reading a novel. But, finally (okay, after two weeks), I’ve finished the most recent James Bond novel, by Sebastian Faulks, which continues where Ian Fleming’s last Bond Novel left off. Is Faulks a worthy successor to Fleming (or at least the other non-Fleming writers to take on 007 – John Gardner and Raymond Benson)? If he isn’t, how good is the book?
The Premise:
It is the dawn of the “swinging ’70s”. James Bond has been on leave for 3 months since the events of The Man With the Golden Gun (the novel, not the film). However, he gets pulled off his leave early to investigate an heroin smuggling cartel which is suspected to be run by pharmaceutical mogul Julius Gorner, a man who has a unique deformity, one hand is large and furry like an ape’s – but it doesn’t have an functioning opposable thumb. He also has a passionate, fervent hatred of the UK, and only 007 stands in his way. Continue reading
Adaptations I’d like to see made.
My last couple articles, on the opera Doctor Atomic, and on Wired’s recent article about Max Butler’s hacking scheme got me thinking about adaptations, and stories that I’d like to see adapted from fiction or non-fiction to another medium, be it film, television, or even the stage. This is a topic I’ve thought about in the past on other forums, from “Movie’s you’d most like to see re-made” threads to “Novels you’d most like to see turned into movies” to “Anime adaptations you’d most like to see.” However, with all of these threads, they’ve been generally been tied to some sort of video media – anime, film, TV series. I’m expanding this list to address materials that aren’t video – the stage. My list of projects is below the cut.
Book Review: The Atrocity Archive
Well, I’ve just finished reading Charles Stross’s espionage horror book The Atrocity Archive, which contains both the titular book, as well as a semi-short story sequel, “The Concrete Jungle”. Overall, the book is a very enjoyable work of fiction for those interested in semi-Lovecraftian horror, dark bureaucratic comedy, and/or espionage fiction.