Sunday, June 27, 2010

June '10

RIYRIA REVELATIONS: THE CROWN CONSPIRACY
-M. Sullivan-228-epub
-fantasy-a king is killed, 2 scoundrels blamed, a prince kidnapped, a princess indicted, a rogue magician let loose after 1000 years, and a royal uncle with a thirst for power. All come together in this engaging tale and it even ends happily. It is very obvious that this is the start of a series [6 books in fact, stated by the author], so some of the elements are more setup than storytelling, but overall, a nice light medieval era magic'ish novel.

DISCWORLD: CARPE JUGULUM
-T. Pratchett-227-epub
-fantasy-Verence, king of Lancre, invites lots and lots of people to his and Magrat's daughter's naming. Including some vampires, who are progressive, ie, they don't ravage and pillage, but treat humans like cattle. Ends up as a battle between the vampire family and the witches, with a slice of Omnian priest thrown in. I really enjoyed this. Except for the bits where you can tell he's actually writing about Christianity, not Omnianism. Man, I hate authors who displace their feelings like that.

ELSEWORLD: SUPERMAN: DARK SIDE
-Various-137-cbr
-E graphic novel-superman never makes it to earth, but instead ends up on Apokolips, and raised by Darkseid. Darkseid uses Supes as his final weapon against the new gods of New Genesis, and the fight ends up on earth where Supes turns good and defeats Darkseid. I have to admit, every story I've read that deals with the new gods really sucks. They are lame, lame lame. This was an ok story, but about on par with Elseworld: Superman: Distant Fires. Supes in black armor looked wicked cool though!

DRESDEN FILES: SUMMER KNIGHT
-J. Butcher-241-epub
-fantasy-Dresden gets into a major scrape in which the White Council wants his head, as does the Vampires AND both the Fairy Courts of Summer and Winter. He muddles through and survives. Nothing really was exceptional about this at all.

DOPPLEGANGER
-M. Brennan-UNFINISHED-epub
-fantasy-a world where witches exist. When a witch is born, so is a lifeless doppleganger, which is immediately killed. One isn't though. She becomes a great hunter and the witch, as her initiation into witch'hood, must hunt her down and kill her. This was pathetic. It was all about feelings and relationships, etc, etc.

THE LOST FLEET: VICTORIOUS
-J. Campbell-331-dtb [dead tree book]
-scifi-a good wrap up to the Lost Fleet series. Geary takes the fleet home, then turns around and hits the syndics so hard that they capitulate, while starting to deal with the alien threat. The getting home arc is over. There is enough mystery about the aliens that I can easily foresee 4-6 more books about the adventures in dealing with them. If so, I'd hope Campbell uses another character than Geary. The poor guy finally gets together with the other captain, and he needs a break.

THE FOURTH REALM: THE TRAVELER
-J. Hawks-330-epub
-thriller/scifi-a world not to far from our own in which two groups are at war. One group is made up of people who can travel out of their bodies into other 'realms', which give them wisdom and insight into our world and who, upon their return, always change our world for the better. The other side is an organized group dedicated to bringing the world under complete domination so that things run exactly how they want it to. A mix of the Matrix with an agnostic Frank Peretti. It was so weird how things from Revelations are mixed in with libertarian ideas alongside scifi things.

PRIDE & PREJUDICE & ZOMBIES
-S. Grahame-Smith-UNFINISHED-epub
-drek- take a classic, gut it completely of all things that make it great literature, keep the outershell, fill with crap. And voila, this is what you get. All the great writing was gone. The bare character outlines were there, and zombies and violence were tacked on. This sub-genre is a despicable thing, and if I ever meet the author, or others like him [for I know that other classics have had such eviscerations], I will do bodily harm to them. They have taken great literature and ruined it, completely. Made it palatable to a group of readers who couldn't recognize great literature if it bit their heads off. Which is sad, because now those readers will never go on to read the real thing, and stay in their cesspit of ignorance instead of being raised up.

STAR WARS: LOST TRIBE OF THE SITH: SAVIOR
-J. Miller-27-epub
-scifi-the Sith consolidate their hold on their adoptive world.

STAR WARS: CLONE WARS: WILDSPACE
-K. Miller-279-epub
-scifi-a direct sequel to Traviss' Clone Wars. Really has nothing to do with the Clone troopers though. Basically Anakin whines about Padme and his new apprentice while Obi-Wan and Bail Organa go off on a goosechase to a Sith Planet. Which turns out to be an ambush. And Obi-wan and Bail bond while surviving. Does do a good job of showing the desolate and empty condition of a sith world, and by extension, what a sith galaxy would be like. Nothing special overall though, certainly not worth buying.

STAR WARS: CLONE WARS: NO PRISONERS
-K. Traviss-175-epub
-scifi- about a spy who Pellaon is involved with. And Anakin and his apprentice, a group of jedi[the offshoot branch Callista is in]and some troopers from the 501st rescuing her. I think it can be summed up with this quote "Emotions are our programming...and help us understand what's right and wrong". More complete and utter bullshit from Traviss. Lots of handwringing and saying how bad the Republic is and how "right" the CSI is. Once again Traviss focuses on the Jedi and the Republic to the exclusion of the Sith and the machinations they have for Galactic Domination. She is such a bitch.

BONESHAKER
-C. Priest-416-dtb
-steampunk-an inventor's machine runs amok, releasing a gas from the ground which turns people into zombies and in the process dies. So Seattle is walled in. Now, the man's son goes back into the city to clear his father's name. His mother, who knows what her husband was really after, chases after him to rescue him. Very much more of the mother's story is told than the young man's. Kill zombies, meet people, go through horrible experiences, bond and come out the other side all energized to live life to the fullest. This wasn't a horrible story, just dumb. As for the over-arching elements in it, ie, Steampunk overall, please visit the following blogpost to see what I really think of Steampunk

RANMA 1/2 #32-33
-R. Takahashi
-manga

KARE KANO #1-8
-M. Tsuda
-manga

TEARS OF ARTAMON: CHILDREN OF THE SERPENT GATE
-S. Ash-420-epub
-fantasy-the finish the Tears of Artamon trilogy. Two of the drakhouls, Gavin and Tielen's emperor's, work together to keep the Lord of the fallen angels from coming into the world. As a result, Kiukiu sends all the 'eaten' children peacefully into the after-life and because of their sacrifice, the drakhouls passover also and are at peace. An interesting trilogy, but not an author I have a desire to go out and read more of her stuff or talk about it to others.

THE FOURTH REALM: THE DARK RIVER
-J. Hawks-368-dtb
-thriller/scifi-Maya makes bad decisions, Gabriel crosses over to find his father, Michael is slowly gaining influence/taking control of the Tabula [while completely espousing their ideas] all mixed in with praise for loser type people who are "brave" enough to live off the grid. The problem is, those people aren't really living off the grid, just using others to do their dirty work for them. Once again Hawks presents the awfulness of the Tabula, but we have yet to see anything of significance come from the Travelers. And the Tabula just becomes more and more unbelievable, with its completely dedicated minions. Something that big, that insidious, always rot and fall. I think we are seeing the cracks though, with what Michael is doing in taking control.

MONTHLY SUMMARY
11 Novels
2 Unfinished novels
11 Manga/Graphic novels
3042 Pages