I recently finished the first Riverworld novel, To Your Scattered Bodies Go, by Philip Jose Farmer. I haven’t read much in the way of Farmer before this, but I really enjoyed The Dungeon (inspired and edited by Farmer), and now I better understand the inspiration. At a high level, I enjoyed the book – it presents a very interesting situation and ideas. On the other hand, it failed to keep me engaged at certain points, which occasionally made it a bit longer of a read than I would have liked. Continue reading To Your Scattered Bodies Go
Tag Archives: Books
Second Stage Lensmen
So, if you’ve read any post on my blog with “Lens” in the title over the last year, you know what this one is about – I recently finished Second Stage Lensmen by E. E. “Doc” Smith. Though the title is plural, the story really focuses on Second Stage Lensman Kimball Kinnison, though, to be fair, Worsel and Nadrek both have their part to play (I can’t remember Tegonsee making an appearance at all, however.) A bit of a summary below the fold. Continue reading Second Stage Lensmen
Read the Book or Watch the Series?
I recently heard about the SyFy TV Series, “The Expanse,” with a close friend of mine mentioning that it was very well worth watching. When I learned that the show was based on a series of books, I found myself in something of a dilemma – do I make the time to read the books and then watch the series, or do I find time to watch the series and then read the books? Continue reading Read the Book or Watch the Series?
The Demon Awakens
A long while back, I saw The Demonwars series by R. A. Salvatore on audio book on the Humble Book Bundle. Now, I really like this series, so I picked it up even though I already own a copy of the physical books. A few weeks back, when I was looking for something to listen to on my way to Grand Junction, I stumbled across the MP3s; even though I didn’t listen to them on the trip (I had a passenger then), I dropped them in one afternoon while I was hanging around the house, and in a little more than a week, I had listened through the entire first book. Continue reading The Demon Awakens
First Lensman
I recently finished reading First Lensman by E. E. “Doc” Smith and I found that, as a sci-fi space opera, I really enjoyed it. I read Triplanetary last year, but wasn’t able to continue reading the series because, even after doing a used bookstore circuit, I couldn’t find a copy of First Lensman anywhere. When I was looking for stuff to read earlier this year, I decided I would check online, and I found a nice anthology containing all the Lensman novels I picked it up and added the rest of the series to my queue. Continue reading First Lensman
Ready Player One
I recently finished reading Ready Player One by Ernest Cline as part of my normal reading routine. I heard about this first on the Machine Readable podcast some time ago, and Jessa even bought a copy, but it never made it to the top of my reading list until recently. Generally speaking, it was a worthwhile read, and I’m glad it finally made it to the top of my list. More specifically though, there were a couple of things that nagged at me throughout. Continue reading Ready Player One
Empires of EVE
While I missed the kickstarter, I picked up a hardbound copy of Empires of EVE: A History of the Great War of EVE Online via preorder as soon as I saw it come across, then eagerly waited for my copy to arrive. By the time I had ordered it, I had already heard/seen Andrew Groen talk about his research a couple of times, and I was excited by the prospect of a book written by someone who wanted to research and document this history of EVE with appropriate rigor (and then did it!) Continue reading Empires of EVE
Fire from the Wine Dark Sea
My reading material of choice lately has been Fire from the Wine Dark Sea by S. P. Somtow (then, Somtow Sucharitkul). As you may have heard from me before, S. P. Somtow is one of my favorite authors, so a collection of his short stories was right up my alley. I initially picked it up for The 13th Utopia, a short story that takes place in the Inquestor universe, that I had only ever gotten the chance to read in the bowels of the library from an old issue of Analog. I thought I’d never get the chance to read it again, until I saw this collection on Somtow’s publications page, and I knew I should pick it up. Continue reading Fire from the Wine Dark Sea
The Doomfarers of Coramonde
A friend of mine recently loaned me his copy of The Doomfarers of Coramonde by Brian Daley. This was relatively new ground for me as it was a book and author I had not heard anything about before, nor was it really on my to-read list. However, I was glad I gave it a shot, as it was a pretty enjoyable read and I wanted to share a few thoughts here on my blog. Continue reading The Doomfarers of Coramonde
The Darkling Wind
In reading the Chronicles of the High Inquest, I always end up looking up this image at various points during my read through. Continue reading The Darkling Wind