Love's Labour's Lost ★★☆☆☆

This review is written with a GPL 4.0 license and the rights contained therein shall supersede all TOS by any and all websites in regards to copying and sharing without proper authorization and permissions. Crossposted at WordPress, Blogspot & Librarything by Bookstooge’s Exalted Permission

Title: Love's Labour's Lost
Series: ----------
Author: William Shakespeare
Rating: 2 of 5 Stars
Genre: Play, Comedy
Pages: 98
Format: Digital Edition

Synopsis:

King Ferdinand, 3 of his lords and a Spaniard, all take a vow to study, fast and avoid women for 3 years. Of course, King Ferdinand forgets that he's supposed to be welcoming a French Princess into his court. She and her ladies arrive, are forced to decamp outside of the city and all the men fall instantly in love with the ladies.

They write love letters, lie to each other, all catch each other out, unsuccessfully woo the ladies as Russians (I kid you not) and then, just when they are about to successfully win the ladies as themselves, the Princess's father dies and the ladies all retire for a year.

Throw in some mouthy servants and smart ass pages and bob's your uncle.

My Thoughts:

A lot of the humor of this play was based on the reparte between the men amongst themselves, the ladies amongst themselves and then amongst them all as a group. They cut, they swipe, they're snide and pompous. It didn't work for me at all.

The servants should have been whipped to death for their insolence or at least muzzled. The men were idiots for taking such an oath in the first place and then to watch them each perjure themselves was just disgraceful. The women were cold and playing it all as a game when they should have been much more serious.

All in all, if a dragon had walked on stage and eaten every character, I would have stood up, cheered my head off and then run off as fast as I could before the dragon ate me. I am beginning to suspect that I don't like Shakespeare's style or sense of humor.

★★☆☆☆

• Previous Shakespeare Reviews

Ghostly Echoes (Jackaby #3) ☆☆☆☆½ DNF@22%

This review is written with a GPL 4.0 license and the rights contained therein shall supersede all TOS by any and all websites in regards to copying and sharing without proper authorization and permissions. Crossposted at WordPress, Blogspot & Librarything by Bookstooge’s Exalted Permission

Title: Ghostly Echoes
Series: Jackaby #3
Author: William Ritter
Rating: 0.5 of 5 Stars
Genre: YA Fantasy
Pages: 353/DNF@22%
Format: Digital Edition

My Thoughts:

[Miss Rook] “Miss Lee was really a boy, wasn't she? Underneath”
He slowed and then came to a stop and looked me square in the eyes, “That's up to her to decide,”

~page 56 

Yep, I'm done with this author now. Ritter's going to push the SJW line about gender and cross dressing down my throat, forget it. As much as I enjoyed the previous 2 books, no amount of enjoyment is worth listening to lies for.

By the by, cross dressing is a moral deviancy that indicates some real brokenness inside. It isn't normal and it shouldn't be treated as such. It's an indicator and Christian professional help should be sought. Just like you wouldn't tell a man with a broken leg that he's ok. Even if you can't fix it, you can tell him to go to a doctors. But denying that there is anything wrong is the height of foolishness.

Man, this is NOT the way I wanted to start out a new month...

☆☆☆☆½

• Jackaby (Book 1)
• Beastly Bones (Book 2)

Path of Doom (Superman Action Comics #1) ★★★★☆

This review is written with a GPL 4.0 license and the rights contained therein shall supersede all TOS by any and all websites in regards to copying and sharing without proper authorization and permissions. Crossposted at WordPress, Blogspot & Librarything by Bookstooge’s Exalted Permission

Title: Path of Doom
Series: Superman Action Comics #1
Author: Dan Jurgens

Artist: Patch Zircher, et al
Rating: 4 of 5 Stars
Genre: Comics
Pages: 144
Format: Paper Edition

Synopsis:

Some dummkopfs are holding some people hostage and Lex Luther, wearing an armored suit emblazoned with an “S” comes to the rescue. He is then confronted by the real Superman, father of Jon and husband of Lois. The REAL Superman. They begin to duke it out when suddenly Doomsday appears from a container and begins his rampage from almost 30 years ago all over again. Lex and Superman team up and manage to get Doomsday out of Metropolis. Lex is left behind to help the citizenry in need and Wonder Woman shows up to help.

Superman has learned from his last fight to the death with Doomsday, at least so he says. But basically it turns into yet another slugfest. Jon is watching on tv and gives a super shout that alerts Doomsday to another Kryptonian and Doomsday sets off to hunt down Jon. Supes convinces Wonder Woman to take Lois and Jon to Watch Tower, the JLA space fortress while he has a plan to deal with Doomsday.

Before he can enact his plan though, a group of humans with some sort of super tech appear, open a gate and begin using energy weapons to push Doomsday through the gate. They almost succeed but then Doomsday simply rips through them all like tissue paper.

With some timely intervention by Wonder Woman, Supes manages to get Doomsday into the path of a Phantom Zone Projector and the world is safe. Or so everyone thinks.

During all of this, a mysterious narrator has been watching everything on screens and at the end, he intercepts the Phantom Zone Projector and captures Doomsday for himself. Who he is, what he wants and pretty much everything about him is a mystery.

My Thoughts:

Well, I'd like to first thank Bookwraiths for reviewing this book this last year. Gave me some hope that maybe DC hadn't totally destroyed Superman. Superman: Doomed was truly an epic fail in the saga of Superman and left me reeling.

This was a return to the Superman who was and always should have been. This was the Superman who fought Doomsday to a standstill and gave his life for those he loved. This is the Superman who clawed his way back from death and kicked the ass of every single other Pretender. This was a Superman who was facing death again and yet would NOT turn away. I have to admit, I almost cried.

So while I loved this return to form for Superman and I had no problems whatsoever believing he and Lois now have a son, the rest of the DC comic world has moved on and made some huge changes and I just can't accept those changes and enjoy them. This whole multiverse thing? That was supposed to have been dealt with back in the 80's with Crisis on Infinite Earths. The fact that DC has hashed things up so badly that they have just as convoluted a multiverse AGAIN doesn't tell me anything good about the state of the plan for storytelling.

The second thing is that I am used to getting a completed story arc in a graphic novel. If you can't tell a complete story arc in one book, then you have no business telling that story at all. It's DC's new business model of selling a whole years worth of comics and all associated comics to get a complete story. I won't buy into that practice.

I think this is going to be my last comic for the foreseeable future. It used to be that comics were in our world and if you knew the origin of the Hero you could pretty much slot into whereever you started reading. Not any more. With things like Flashpoint, New52, Rebirth, things are so complicated that you can't just jump on board.

I enjoyed this particular set of comics a LOT and feel like it is an almost circle in regards to Superman and Doomsday. But with everything else I stated, I can't and won't be continuing.

Adios Kal. You've always been the example of True Manhood to me throughout the years and I'm glad to see you being returned to that state. The world nowadays needs real heroes and I hope you can survive our worlds current penchant for destroying heroes with a sneer and glib mockery.

★★★★☆

• The Death of Superman
• World Without a Superman
• The Return of Superman
• Superman/Doomsday: Hunter/Prey
• Superman: Doomed

The Fortress in Orion (Dead Enders #1) ★★★☆☆

This review is written with a GPL 4.0 license and the rights contained therein shall supersede all TOS by any and all websites in regards to copying and sharing without proper authorization and permissions. Crossposted at WordPress, Blogspot & Librarything by Bookstooge’s Exalted Permission

Title: The Fortress in Orion
Series: Dead Enders #1
Author: Mike Resnick
Rating: 3 of 5 Stars
Genre: SFF
Pages: 306
Format: Digital Edition

Synopsis:

Nathan Pretorias, a secret agent for the Democracy, has returned from yet another impossible mission. Well, parts of him returned. Now he has been tagged to carry out a truly impossible mission:

replace the war chief Michtag, the universal dictator of the aliens fighting humanity with a clone raised by humans and trained

Nathan assembles his own team of specialists, all misfits in one way or another. They make their way to the super secret fortress on the super secret planet deep in the Coalition. They kidnap and replace General Michtag and successfully make their way back to the Democracy.

Where Nathan's superior presents yet another impossible mission, a mission only the Dead Ender's can take on.

My Thoughts:

While I absolutely loved Santiago and the Widowmaker series, this reminded much more of the Starship series. Space Opera at its most mediocre. There simply wasn't any tension. While Resnick excels at telling a myth style story set in the future, he's not so good at just telling a character story.

For an impossible fortress and impossible mission, everything went off without a hitch. No matter how good your team is, something is going to go wrong and everything is going to be flubbed up. That just didn't happen here and so like I said, there was zero tension. If there had been a lot of action or something else, even that could be gotten past, but there really wasn't much else.

Resnick seems to be very hit or miss for me and I have a feeling this Dead Enders trilogy is going to be a miss. I hope I am proved wrong, but I'm very much getting the same vibe from this book that I got from the middle Starship book. That does not bode well. I'm still giving this 3stars for the newness of the story but if the second book is just as blasé, I'll be dropping the rating accordingly.

★★★☆☆

Rites of Azathoth ★★☆☆½

This review is written with a GPL 4.0 license and the rights contained therein shall supersede all TOS by any and all websites in regards to copying and sharing without proper authorization and permissions. Crossposted at WordPress, Blogspot & Librarything by Bookstooge’s Exalted Permission

Title: Rites of Azathoth
Series: ----------
Author: Frank Cavallo
Rating: 2.5 of 5 Stars
Genre: Urban Fantasy/Horror
Pages: 420
Format: Digital Edition

Synopsis:

Diana Mancuso, FBI agent, is carrying on an affair with her boss, one of the Assistant-Directors of the FBI. She is assigned to a high profile murder case of a potential vice-presidential candidate. The profile indicates a man who up until 24hrs ago, was 1000 miles away in a maximum security prison. He has mysteriously disappeared. It turns out that the VP candidate has ties to all the previous victims, who were ritualistically murdered.

Doctor Carter, former protege of Gamaliel a discredited historian who dwelt on Elder gods as the true history of mankind, has been invited to join a mysterious group headed by a reclusive billionaire. Carter has been recruited to translate an elder language that he was taught by Gamaliel.

The ritualistic murderer is acting as supernatural conduit for Azathoth, who the billionaire is attempting to awaken. Said awakening will grant all knowledge to those involved but might destroy all of creation as well. Luther Vayne is acting on Azathoth's will to prevent this awakening.

Everything comes together, a gateway is opened by Carter, Mancuso and Vayne prevent Azathoth from awakening, the occultic group is destroyed and Carter is taken into the realm of Chaos and he thinks how wonderful it all is.

My Thoughts:

I feel like I am being rather generous in giving this 2 ½ stars. Mancuso was a very unpleasant character. She's just a jerk to everyone, even her so-called friend. This friend covers for her, breaks the law for her, lies to FBI agents for her and said friend tosses it off as “Oh well, that's what friends do”. And Mancuso takes it as her due instead of as the huge thing it is. Then comes her affair with her boss. He's married and trying to fix his marriage AND keep Mancuso on the side. She's pissed off that she's the side woman and is always put out that he won't toss his rich, beautiful, young wife for her. She's the very definition of an angry bitch. It was NOT amusing or enjoyable.

Carter was an arrogant ass who was divorced and failing at pretty much everything, including being a dad. He stays arrogant, assuming and overbearing during the whole book and his little “Oh, how wonderful the other side is” comment at the end was completely out of character and had NO place in a horror story about eldrich horrors beyond mortal ken.

The horror side of things worked pretty well. Demon children adopted by a cabal of women, hunted down by a supernatural blind killer, a half demon billionaire who sacrifices the blood of virgins to his own mother, it was fantastic. It was what you'd expect from an HP Lovecraft themed story. So the whole thing about Azathoth using Vayne to prevent the end of everything didn't fit. Elder gods don't care. And Carter saying how beautiful the chaos of the other realm was? That was complete bollux. The other realm drives men mad, period.

So unlikeable characters and an ending that didn't fit with the theme made for a rather bleh read. There was also a lot of profanity.

★★☆☆½

War Master's Gate (Shadows of the Apt #9) ★★★★★

This review is written with a GPL 4.0 license and the rights contained therein shall supersede all TOS by any and all websites in regards to copying and sharing without proper authorization and permissions. Crossposted at WordPress, Blogspot & Librarything by Bookstooge’s Exalted Permission

Title: War Master's Gate
Series: Shadows of the Apt #9
Author: Adrian Tchaikovsky
Rating: 5 of 5 Stars
Genre: Fantasy
Pages: 737
Format: Digital Edition

Synopsis:

The 8^th Imperial Army marches on Sarn, the last surviving Ant City. With the help of knowledge from previous encounters, the military leaders of Sarn have a ghost of a chance of surviving.

Collegium is facing the 2^nd Imperial Army, “The Gears”. Having fought off the Gears twice before, the citizens are certain they can do so again. After the decimation of the Imperial Air Force in the previous book, Collegium now rules the air and that might be their chance to survive.

General Tynan,general of the Gears, now allied with the Spiders, must overcome Collegium and gain access to its library, which holds texts that Empress Seda has commanded him to take. But without an airforce, with “allies” known for betrayal and facing technology from the brains of Collegium.

Seda has found a wellspring of power, the tomb of Argastos. Argastos was a moth sorceror-warrior from the Age of the Inapt, the War Leader of the Host of all the Inapt. They all came together to fight against the Worm kinden but were unable to truly defeat them. So their sorcerors all came together and sealed the Worm away. They also sealed away Argastos and his war-horde, as “guardians” of the Seal.

Che is chasing down Seda to prevent her from getting her hands on this power of Argastos. In the world of the Apt, a sorceror-Empress would be something the world wouldn't know how to deal with. Che must prevent Seda from becoming all powerful.

In the end, Che and Seda both gain Argasto's power but in the struggle break the Seal of the Worm, a kinden that want to to make every kinden into their own kind. The Gears capture Collegium and all those who resisted are either killed or in hiding. Sarn drives off the 8^th Army but the Empire and the Spiders have a falling out that prohibits any further advances by the Imperial forces.

My Thoughts:

Hmmm, where to begin? Well, knowing that there is only 1 more book after this one, unlike last time, I could appreciate this particular story arc a bit more. I wasn't constantly thinking about “what was next” but could focus on the here and now.

The other thing was that I had forgotten it took this long in the series for Collegium to finally be conquered. For some reason I thought it happened earlier in the series, even though I'm reading this series all over again. Just goes to show why I need to re-read things!

The end of the Felylal, the mantis kinden taking shelter in Collegium, that was heart breaking. What is left of a whole nation, men, women, children, grands, all throwing themselves against the Gears and dying. It really hit me hard this time around and honestly, I'm not even sure I noticed it last time. Kids. I actually put off writing this review for quite a few days just to deal with that.

On a “magic” note, Che and Seda's journey was just as interesting, if not more so than the fight between the armies and cities. Last time I kind of just skimmed it. This time, I considered it to be the main part of the book. We see how much Che has changed through the eyes of those who are now in her entourage. Instead of being dragged around, or sent off, or somewhere on someone else's behest, she is here because of her own will. Seda on the other hand is shown to be more afraid than ever, even while having more power than almost any other woman in the history of the world.

This is the kind of series that is complex enough that new things will emerge upon every re-read. I bumped it up a full star from last time because I enjoyed it even more than last time and have no doubt that when I get around to re-reading this series yet again that I'll enjoy it just as much then.

★★★★★

• War Master's Gate (2014 Review)
• Previous Shadows of the Apt Reviews

The Dead Town (Frankenstein #5) ★★☆☆☆

This review is written with a GPL 4.0 license and the rights contained therein shall supersede all TOS by any and all websites in regards to copying and sharing without proper authorization and permissions. Crossposted at WordPress, Blogspot & Librarything by Bookstooge’s Exalted Permission

Title: The Dead Town
Series: Frankenstein #5
Author: Dean Koontz
Rating: 2 of 5 Stars
Genre: Urban Fantasy
Pages: 447
Format: Digital Edition

Synopsis:

Everything begins falling apart for Victor Immaculate. His vat grown creations once again transcend their genetic coding and that transcendance is always in the form of breaking. Builders take on non-biological matter and can't reproduce properly, the replacement clones begin to obsess and lose sight of their mission.

Through it all, Michael and Carson begin helping the townsfolk defend themselves while Deucalion hunts Victor down. Deucalion snaps Victor's neck, the creations fall apart upon their creator's death and Deucalion can now walk quantumly through the Light instead of skulking through the Shadows.

My Thoughts:

Even while I was expecting this story to turn out like this, it was still disappointing to have it actually happen. This followed the exact same pattern as the first trilogy but without any finesse or style. Evil simply falls apart and the good guys win by default.

Also, I already wrote this review, forgot to post it online, forgot I hadn't posted it and deleted the hard copy from Open Office. So I'm writing this all over again. That always ruins things.

Basically, I didn't enjoy this book or this series overall. I wouldn't recommend it but I am going to continue dipping my toes into the Koontz universe. I've got 20 of his books available so I'm going to go exploring and see what I find. I hope I find better things than this book.

If anyone has read some of his standalone stuff, feel free to make recommendations in the comments, otherwise I'm just going to start picking stuff randomly.

★★☆☆☆

• All Frankenstein Reviews

Critical Failures (Caverns & Creatures #1) ★★☆☆☆

This review is written with a GPL 4.0 license and the rights contained therein shall supersede all TOS by any and all websites in regards to copying and sharing without proper authorization and permissions. Crossposted at WordPress, Blogspot & Librarything by Bookstooge’s Exalted Permission

Title: Critical Failures
Series: Caverns & Creatures #1
Author: Robert Bevan
Rating: 2 of 5 Stars
Genre: Fantasy
Pages: 284
Format: Digital Edition

Synopsis:

A group of RPG gamers have put an ad out to a Cavern Master, as none of them want to do the hard work. A man shows up at the Chicken Shack, in cape and with all the other accoutrements a Cavern Master could need.

These gamers are jackasses. So they hassle the guy for wearing a cape and take their game playing very casually. This enrages the Cavern Master and has each of the players roll his special dice. This transports them into the game as their characters. The Cavern Master is interrupted by the sister of one of the players and her boyfriend. They too are transported into the game.

Shit happens and the gang gets separated, some in jail, some in the forest, more hijinks, mixups, etc. They all eventually get together, find out that the Cavern Master has done this to other people and trick him into a situation where he has to release them or die. Unfortunately for them, he dies and they're stuck in the game world with no way to get out.

The end.

My Thoughts:

Swords and Spectres has been reviewing this series and I thought I'd try it. He did warn me about the profanity and folks, he was NOT kidding. These are 20 something losers with the accompanying attitude. Self-absorbed, filthy mouthed, caring about no one or anything but themselves. I was actually rather glad that they got theirs by being pushed into the game. Unfortunately, they are just as horrible in game as they are out of the game.

The humor was right up my alley and I kept snorting and laughing out loud but honestly, it was wicked crass and relied on a juvenile humor about death and body functions.

Even with that, I'l be reading the next book. However, since I'm pretty sure it is just more of the same, I expect to stop the series then.

★★☆☆☆

Queen Bitch (Kurtherian Gambit #2) ★★★★☆

This review is written with a GPL 4.0 license and the rights contained therein shall supersede all TOS by any and all websites in regards to copying and sharing without proper authorization and permissions. Crossposted at WordPress, Blogspot & Librarything by Bookstooge’s Exalted Permission

Title: Queen Bitch
Series: Kurtherian Gambit #2
Author: Michael Anderle
Rating: 4 of 5 Stars
Genre: SF
Pages: 258
Format: Digital Edition

Synopsis:

Bethany Anne must begin cleaning up the mess left behind by Michael. She has to start cleaning up the Forsaken who are starting to make inroads in North America due to Michael's absence. She has to start putting Michael's “good” children back on the straight and narrow and have them go back to their duties of keeping the supernatural outside of the purview of the normal world. She also has to put the Council of the Were in their place, as several members are thinking that without Michael around they can begin shoving the humans around, perhaps even ruling them.

While ALL this is going on, Bethany Anne also has to keep in mind that the overall threat is so much greater and her final goal must be to get humanity into space and ready to fight off potential hordes of ravening aliens.

Sometimes, being Queen Bitch just isn't worth the hassle.

My Thoughts:

This was F-U-N!! Nothing deep, nothing worth a re-read but my goodness, Bethany Anne kicks some serious butt. She is pretty much a Mary Sue, but only if Mary Sue was a psycho violent vampire who was trying to protect the planet. I can handle that.

Even through all of this, Bethany Anne is still planning on just how she is going to save the planet. She might be violent but she's not at all stupid. She's beginning to make more and more use of TOM and she's already thinking about how she can use its knowledge to grow humanity's knowledge AND give her the funds necessary to build the space stuff that will be needed.

Thinking about this book, I would compare it to the earlier MHI books in terms of action and violence. I'd compare it quality-wise to the first MHI book as well. The thing that gives me pause is that Anderle has a bajillion books while Correia has a steady output of steadily increasing quality. I'm kind of afraid to find out where Anderle plateaus or even nosedives. That's the only problem and that is all in my head.

I almost started in on the next book right away but thank goodness my inner core of self control kept me safe. Nothing is worse than having too much of a good time all at once.

★★★★☆

• Death Becomes Her (Book 1)

No Worse Enemy (The Empire's Corps #2) ★★★☆½

This review is written with a GPL 4.0 license and the rights contained therein shall supersede all TOS by any and all websites in regards to copying and sharing without proper authorization and permissions. Crossposted at WordPress, Blogspot & Librarything by Bookstooge’s Exalted Permission

Title: No Worse Enemy
Series: The Empire's Corps #2
Author: Christopher Nuttal
Rating: 3.5 of 5 Stars
Genre: SF
Pages: 431
Format: Digital Edition

Synopsis:

Mandy is on a spaceship to get more training from the Rockrats when her craft is attacked by pirates. is captured and because of her space engineering knowledge, begins working on a spaceship for the leader of the pirates, The Admiral. She is put through her pirate paces and gains their loyalty but has secretly stolen a bunch of explosives that she then plants around the ship.

At the same time, The Admiral sends a ship to Avalon to take it over and the marines are able to take the ship over. They head out to other star systems and help free them and try to make some sort of entity that all the various planets in their systems can participate in. The beginnings of a political system other than the Empire.

The Admiral needs Avalon and its HE3 scoop for fuel, so he gathers his fleet and his mercenaries and attacks. The Marines and some others hold him off for a bit but things aren't looking good until Mandy detonates her explosives and puts The Admiral out of commission.

The Admiral's ship is to become the new head ship and Mandy is chosen to help run it. Captain Stalker must now act like the Empire is truly gone.

My Thoughts:

I bumped this up half a star from the previous one because of lack of sexual scenes (even though Mandy does have to sell herself to a pirate commander to stay alive) and because Nuttal drops scenes and ship names from a LOT of old and not so old Science Fiction. If you don't recognize the stories you won't miss out but knowing them showed that Nuttal has a good SF foundation as well. I find that important in an SF author.

Mandy is the main character this time around while Jasmine, now in charge of a troop of Marines, is the main viewpoint of the military side of things. It worked well and we'll see if Nuttal uses them again or switches to yet another viewpoint for each future book.

★★★☆½

• The Empire's Corps (Book 1)