Wednesday, January 28, 2009

January '09

SHADOW OF THE HEGEMON
-O.S. Card-scifi
-442- a sequel to Ender's Shadow. All the Battleschool children, except Ender, are back on earth. Achilles kidnaps a bunch of them to take over the world, tries to kill Bean. Bean hooks up with Peter Wiggins, who reveals himself and the world changes. I doubt I will read any of the novels after this one. Ender's War and Ender's Shadow were engrossing, not this one. Just politics "in the future", oooooohhhhhh.

RESERVOIR CHRONICLE TSUBASA #16-19
-Clamp-manga

OH MY GODDESS! #30
-K. Fujishima-manga
-151

ACORNA: THE UNICORN GIRL
-A. McCaffrey & Margaret Ball-scifi
-254-this was much more YA than I remembered. I doubt I'll read this again for a very long time.

THE THREE MUSKETEERS
-A. Dumas-classic
-738-I enjoyed this. A tale of swashbucklers and mindless bravery. Unfortunately, the immorality was so blatant and so mixed with "christian" ideals that it was ridiculous. What scares me is the fact that a national character can change so drastically over a couple hundred of years. The French were fighters. Now? Look at them. What about us Americans? Brrr...

ONE PIECE #19
-E. Oda-manga
-210

ACORNA: ACORNA'S QUEST
-A. McCaffrey & M. Ball-scifi
-282-Acorna goes to find her homeworld. 4 linyarri find humanity. Humanity meets, fights and sends packing, the kleevi. Done with this series.

THE COUNT OF MONTE CRISTO
-A. Dumas-classic
-618-Wow! This was gripping, well told, fascinating and almost perfect. The way it was told just sucked me in. A man is unjustly accused and throught several people betraying him, ends up in a prison left to die. Befriends another prisoner, escapes, gets a fabulous treasure and returns to wreak his vengeance. The emotions portrayed were so good, so true. The only thing I didn't like is that one of his vengeances is explained almost as a sidenote and you never really find out what happened. But other than that, awesome. If I couldn't read another book this year, this one would be the perfect one to end on. Incredible!

DRAGON BALL #1
-A. Toriyama-manga
-175-Bulma meets Goku and they start out looking for the rest of the Dragon Balls. Crude, childish humor and for a 34C, Bulma sure is flat.

ADAM
-T. Dekker-suspense/thriller
-400- an investigator goes after a serial killer who turns out to be demon possessed. This was disturbing. There was very little of the power of Jesus involved. Dekker also seems to be trying to include Islam in his "appeal to those of faith" approach. I did not like this book.

THE PRINCE OF NOTHING: THE DARKNESS THAT COMES BEFORE
-R.S. Bakker-fantasy
-577-this was a callously cold and brutal book. Some of the violence and most of the graphic sex seemed to be there just to shock the reader at how pathetic the characters were. Gods, wizards, warriors, politicians, all coming together for another apocalypse 2 thousand years after the previous apocalypse. Nothing in this book made me want to read the next book in the series.

THE DRAGON KEEPER CHRONICLES: DRAGONSPELL
-D.K. Paul-ya fantasy
-334-a young girl finds a dragons egg and is sent to the Hall of Learning to serve under Paladin, the earthly representative of Wulder, the one true God. She gets caught up on a quest before she ever gets to the hall and ends up saving a special dragon egg. This lady is a Christian and she sets her fantasy in a world very similar to ours in regards to God and satan. This was geared towards young adults and not really toward adults. Had a hard time paying attention because it was "simplified". I doubt I'll be reading any more of her YA stuff.

THE LAST RUNE: BEYOND THE PALE
-M. Anthony-fantasy
-622-2 people from earth are whisked away to another world where magic, etc, etc, is real. An evil king from a millenia ago is on the rise and it is up to the 2 travelers to stop or slow him down. I enjoyed this book. It is a finished series, with 6 total. Sadly, the libraries do not carry any more. Glad I got to read this one anyway.