Monday, June 16, 2025

Helm of Chatzuk - MTG 4E

 

You think that mug is ugly looking? Wait until you read the rules for Banding!

Any creatures with banding, and up to one without, can attack in a band. Bands are blocked as a group. If any creatures with banding a player controls are blocking or being blocked by a creature, that player divides that creature’s combat damage, not its controller, among any of the creatures it’s being blocked by or is blocking.

Wow, that is some seriously ugly wording. And that is why Banding fell out of favor, and for good reason I might say.


Sunday, June 15, 2025

The Voice of the Mountain (Silver John #5) 3Stars

 

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 by Bookstooge’s Exalted Permission

Title: The Voice of the Mountain
Series: Silver John #5
Author: Manly Wade Wellman
Rating: 3 of 5 Stars
Genre: Folk Fantasy
Pages: 182
Words: 56K
Publish: 1984



This was probably the most action’y of the Silver John books. John actually hits someone (he has in other books, but it is always very down played) and in the process tosses him over a cliff edge and kills him.

Up to that point, right at the end, this is a book of building the villain up to be a threat to the whole world and throwing folksy spells at each other. Oh, can’t forget the name dropping of the Mystical Books of Power *insert eye roll

The villain of the piece, Ruel Harpe, has built up his evil mystical credentials with the help of a talisman and several books of evil. All he needs to complete his collection and set his plans in motion is to find, read and use the Gospel of Judas. He finds it, uses John to steal it and is in the process of making full use of it when John does his thing and puts paid to Harpe.

There are several women involved, for their evil witchy powers and not for their sex appeal, and John redeems them all, even to the point of the witch with the black powers professing she’ll only use the power of white witches now. Syncretism at its most ridiculous.

But this followed the exact same pattern as all the previous Silver John novels so I knew I wasn’t getting a masterwork of literary import. These are what they are and Wellman makes no apology for that. This was also the final Silver John novel, as Wellman died within a couple of years of releasing this. All I have left are a collection of the Silver John short stories that I believe come chronologically before most of the novels. I have a feeling the short story format is going to work much better than any of the novels.

★★★☆☆


From the Publisher & Bookstooge

Silver John - so named for the lithe and powerful strings of his ever-present guitar - is back. In this fifth and most exciting novel in the series, Manly Wade Wellman's popular hero is called by the voice of Cry Mountain... into a confrontation with his most threatening adversary.

There are a wealth of cryptic stories about Cry Mountain, and as John listens to the tales of eerie, hostile animals, of brave daredevils who fared up the slopes never to return, and hears the enigmatic, unnatural keening voice emanating from the mountain, his adventuresome spirit is aroused. Too curious and intrigued - some might say foolhardy - to be dissuaded, John begins his long, perilous trek up the steep mountainside. There he finds mystery and danger enough for any man, and eventually meets the courtly, assured Ruel Harpe, descendant of the infamous Micajah Harpe. John soon discovers the darker side of Ruel Harpe's hospitality and finds honesty and courage the only weapons against powerful sorcery and temptation.

Harpe has a mystic talisman that gives him his powers. John snatches it away and Harpe goes over the edge of a cliff and dies. All of his magically powered things stop working or disappear and John and Co leave the mountain, having made the world a safer place for everyone.


Friday, June 13, 2025

My Week XXVI

 

This post is going to encompass last week as well, as Life and Stuff has been on the spin cycle and I've still not found my footing.

As I noted in my Excerpt, work is just chaos. Between the workload not getting any lighter to people taking time off, every day is a new adventure. I never know who I am working with or what job I'm heading to. Even though work itself isn't getting harder, I'm coming away each week more tired because of the chaos and uncertainty. And this would appear to be our new normal. I am at the point of living week by week now. I can't take thinking about a month of this, or even two months of this, or more!

Church has added its own little melange to the mix. Our SDA church has held an End Times seminar the last two Sabbaths. We experienced one of those at our previous SDA church and this had all the same hallmarks so we decided to avoid it altogether. Which meant picking some random Sunday church to go to over the weekend (church attendance is one big checkmark for the health of a Christian as far as both Mrs B and I are concerned. We've seen too many people stop going to church for any and all reasons and before you know it, they're denying Christ altogether. We don't even want to step NEAR that precipice). One Sunday we went to a big baptist church that one of Mrs B's friends attends and then the next we chose some random one that she had had a Ladies Tea at and had been invited. Both times were nice and I was glad to hear the sermons, but the worship time for each was nothing but contemporary christian worship and just reaffirmed to me that I'll keep going to the SDA church for the hymns alone! Going to a different church might not sound like a big deal, but it really is. Church going is not some solitary activity that you do "to be good". It is commanded by Scripture and it brings us into fellowship with other Christians and brings us, together, closer to God. It is hard to have real fellowship with people who you don't know. That takes time and effort. It takes going to the same church week after week after week and BEING involved. So not to have that for two weeks was just unsettling, and coupled with work, was a bit too much.

Thankfully, home life has been the same. I've been extra vigilant about that! Church, work and home, they are my three spheres of activity and they affect each other. But just like any tripod, it doesn't take much to upset the stability. But with us returning to the SDA church tomorrow, and me being so vigilant about the homesphere, stability will reign in at least two of the three spheres. Not perfect by any means, but survivable anyway.

One of the ways Mrs B and I have "vigilantly" kept the homesphere intact is by playing Munchkin on the weekend. While it is intended for at least 3 players, we have found that as long as we don't use the "backstabbing/betrayal" cards, the game works relatively well with just the two of us. It is an RPG-lite dungeon crawler and gives both of us that fantasy fix we want from a game. And it's all cards that only needs one die to roll. We love it. The artwork is wacky and silly and makes Mrs B extremely happy. I just like that I get to stab and stomp and poke and kill things :-D

And today is now over with for me. It's 5pm, I am home from work, I have eaten something yummy, drank something cold and am now chilling on the couch until I'm ready to fall asleep at the extremely late hour of 9pm (if I'm lucky!). I am steadfastly looking forward to the blessing of the Sabbath as it fast approaches. Blessed Sabbath to you all!

Thursday, June 12, 2025

Acia (The Russians) 3Stars

 

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 by Bookstooge’s Exalted Permission

Title: Acia
Series: (The Russians)
Author: Ivan Turgenev
Translator: Constance Garnett
Rating: 3 of 5 Stars
Genre: Classic
Pages: 76
Words: 20K
Publish: 1858

The spelling for this, ACIA, is the old time translation by Garnett. More modern translations call it ASYA, as seen on the cover I am using. I would be upset, except new time’y translations all call Dostoyevsky “Dostoevsky”, so screw them. They are stupid gugenheimers and deserve to choke to death on a hotdog. WITH mustard! See, I’m not upset at all about this ;-)

The more I read these smaller works, the more I realize just how completely different the Russian mindset is in comparison to the American. I read a Shadow novel soon after this and in it, two characters were talking to each other but one of them left a sentence unfinished and yet I still knew exactly what he meant. That happens in Russian stories and I simply haven’t a clue what is being left unsaid or meant. I can tell there IS meaning by that silence, but I can’t fill in the gap. It frustrates me to no end and yet I enjoy the heck out of it because it shows me, in no uncertain terms, that humans can think differently. I don’t mean have different thoughts, but think in ways that the others can’t comprehend easily. It reminds of the conversation in Dune when Paul is talking to Chani about water and she just can’t comprehend it falling from the sky. She never would have thought of that idea on her own, but even that isn’t as alien as what I experience with some of these Russian reads.

AND THAT IS WHY I READ THEM!

Even if I don’t understand the meaning of the silences, simply being exposed to them and knowing there is something there that I am not getting expands my overall comprehension, of the written word, of others, of the world as a whole.

That being said, I still want to take the narrator and shake him until his head falls off. He’s an idiot and doesn’t know what he actually wants until something is suddenly out of reach, THEN he wants it and pines for it the rest of his life. He’s too spineless and wimpy to decide what he wants, so things just pass him by. How does a culture that is like that produce a Lenin, a Stalin, a Putin? It just leaves me scratching my head.

See? More questions, more thoughts, more things I never would have thought about without the prodding of a novella like this.

★★★☆☆


From Wikipedia.org

The narration is told on behalf of an anonymous narrator (Mr. N.N.). He remembers his youth, his stay in the small town of Sinzig. on the banks of the river Rhine. One day he is ferrying a boat and follows the sound of music and noise from a festival, he crosses the river to the neighboring town of Leubsdorf. Here the narrator meets two Russians: a young man named Gagin, who wants to become an artist, and a girl named Asya (Anna), whom he introduced as his sister. Asya's mood changes rapidly from being happy to sad, and is often eccentric things such as climbing the ruins of a castle to water the flowers. The hero begins to suspect that Asya is not Gagin’s sister due to the extreme difference between their personalities.

A few days later, the narrator befriends Gagin and learns that Asya is really his sister. At the age of twelve, Gagin was sent to St. Petersburg to study at a boarding school while his widowed father remained in the countryside. After the death of his father, Gagin came to know that his father had another child, a daughter named Asya, whose mother was Tatyana, a maid at the Gagins' house. Gagin is forced to raise the thirteen-year-old girl alone. He sends her to a boarding school for some years. However, due to them facing social stigma due to her illegitimate birth, he finally decides to go abroad with Asya.

The narrator feels deep pity for Asya - be believes that it is her unclear social position (the daughter of a serf and a master) that causes her to have nervous breakdowns. Gradually he falls in love with Asya. Asya writes him a letter asking him to meet. Gagin, who knows about his sister’s feelings, asks the narrator if he would agree to marry her. The hero, unsure of his feelings, cannot fully agree and promises to reject Asya's love at the meeting (if it takes place).

The narrator's meeting with Asya takes place in the house of the burgomaster's widow. After the confession of her feelings, Asya finds herself in his arms, but then the narrator conveys his disappointment to her for ruining everything by confessing to her brother, and now their happiness is impossible. Asya runs away. Hero and Gagin look for her. In the end, the narrator realizes that he truly loves Asya and wants to marry her. The next day he plans to ask his brother for the girl’s hand in marriage. But the next day it turns out that Gagin and Asya left the city. The hero tries to catch up with them, but loses their trail in London.

The narrator never meets Asya again. There were other women in his life, but now, on the threshold of old age and death, he understands that he truly loved only her, and that even the dried flower that she gave him will outlive both lovers - reflecting on the fleeting nature of human life.



Wednesday, June 11, 2025

Brotherhood of the Wolf (Runelords #2) 3Stars

 

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 by Bookstooge’s Exalted Permission

Title: Brotherhood of the Wolf
Series: Runelords #2
Author: David Farland
Rating: 3 of 5 Stars
Genre: Fantasy
Pages: 559
Words: 213K
Publish: 1999



Farland has some really neat ideas with this series. Unfortunately, he doesn’t have the same skill at creating fleshed out characters. This felt like reading 500+ pages of a Terry Brooks book. If you’ve ever read Terry Brooks, you’ll know what I mean. If you haven’t, don’t worry about it.

By the end of the book I REALLY wanted to know what happens next, but I didn’t care what happened to ANY of the characters. That’s not a good combination.

The reavers (another species that might be the up and coming species that displaces mankind, as mankind has done to other species) were a great addition and we get some really broad hints at what their end game is. But they are, once again, a generic threat without being “characterized” to my satisfaction. They should have remained beasts and not sentient beings.

I can see why this was as popular as it was at the time of publication. The Wheel of Time series was taking the world by storm but had slowed down to molasses and Farland was putting out these books every year to 18months and he kept the plotting much tighter than Jordan was doing. But my goodness, I can also see why this never became a Fantasy Behemoth.

I was looking ahead and according to Wikipedia, there is a narrative break in the story after book four, when the story moves on to Gaborn’s son (Gaborn is the Earth King). I think I’ll read up through book four and just let things go after that.

I rated this 3stars, but it was skirting the edge of the 2.5, really closely. I also know myself well enough that now that I’ve decided to read through book 4, I will. Call me pigheaded!

★★★☆☆


From the Publisher & Bookstooge

Raj Ahtan, ruler of Indhopal, has used enough forcibles to transform himself into the ultimate warrior: The Sum of All Men. Ahtan seeks to bring all of humanity under his rule-destroying anything and anyone that stood in his path, including many friends and allies of young Prince Gaborn Val Orden. But Gaborn has fulfilled a two-thousand-year-old prophecy, becoming the Earth King-a mythic figure who can unleash the forces of the Earth itself.

And now the struggle continues. Gaborn has managed to drive off Raj Ahtan, but Ahtan is far from defeated. Striking at far-flung cities and fortresses and killing dedicates, Ahtan seeks to draw out the Earth King from his seat of power, to crush him. But as they weaken each other's forces in battle, the armies of an ancient and implacable inhuman enemy issue forth from the very bowels of the Earth.

The Reaver Mage is killed, the rune of destruction of man is destroyed and Raj Ahtan and Gaborn are still enemies. They go their separate ways to deal with the overall Reaver threat. Gaborn has the blessing of the Earth removed from him for Choosing Raj and then allowing him to be attacked.


Tuesday, June 10, 2025

Mrs Pollifax on the China Station (Mrs Pollifax #6) 4.5Stars

 

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 by Bookstooge’s Exalted Permission

Title: Mrs Pollifax on the China Station
Series: Mrs Pollifax #6
Author: Dorothy Gilman
Rating: 4.5 of 5 Stars
Genre: Thriller
Pages: 174
Words: 62K
Publish: 1983



Absolutely delightful! I have been alternating Mrs Pollifax with the Alphabet Mystery series and I must say, it is a true delight to return to the adventures of Emily Pollifax.

She is calm, poised and while not always “in control”, she never allows the circumstances around her to impede what she must do. In this book near the end, she has to face down an armed Russian sleeper agent and ends up karate chopping him to death. Scenes like that are why this isn’t “cozy”. She’s also old enough not to fall to pieces after such an act. She’s in no way stupid and I for one appreciate that Gilman actually writes her character to be intelligent.

Another successful foray into the underbelly world of the CIA. Mrs Pollifax hasn’t failed me yet and I doubt she’d fail you either.

★★★★✬


From Wikipedia.org

Mrs. Pollifax is thrilled when Mr. Carstairs, her boss at the CIA, gives her an assignment in China to help rescue a prisoner from a labor camp. As luck would have it, she has recently completed a course in Chinese history, so she is primed and ready to go. She joins a tour group and is told that one of the other group members is actually a CIA agent who will become her partner later on. She tries unsuccessfully to detect her future partner and is very surprised when the agent's identity is revealed. As the action speeds up she finds the labor camp, rides a runaway horse, and encounters some rough stuff from a Russian spy.



Monday, June 09, 2025

Healing Salve - MTG 4E

 

It's amazing to me how just having armless hands and that funky red background gives this whole picture a djinni, arabian nights vibe. 


Sunday, June 08, 2025

Calendars & Scheduling the Bookstooge Way

 

I have talked about scheduling before, and mention it randomly in posts and comments. I touched upon it in my Blogshido series of posts and randomly sneak attack you by suggesting maybe you should try scheduling. Many people are intimidated by Schedule-Fu, while others just don't want anything to do with it. If you don't have any interest, this post is not for you. This is a post to help Masters of this discipline increase their mastery and to help those who have not started yet down the path but who are wondering about it. But I would like to say that ANYONE can master Schedule-Fu and make it their own.

The single most important tool that a master of Schedule-Fu has available to him or her is a calendar. I use three calendars myself, because of the amount of things I keep track of and it would be wicked messy to put it all one one calendar. I use the calendar above to keep track of real life things, like doctors appointments, car things, social engagements, etc. It's on the wall next to our door, so I see it every morning and evening as I come and go. As long as I write stuff down (and so does Mrs B), we never forget things happening in real life. That's important, because you know, Real Life.

The next calendar I use is the Protonmail calendar. I use this calendar as a widget on my phone. The reason I've put it on my phone is so that when I go to look at it, I don't get distracted from my purpose and end up not reading my Bible. This is a chart for what I'm to read each day. I used to use little paper charts, but the print was so small on them (because they were trying to fit a whole years worth of stuff on one 8.5x11) that I had to abandon them. This has one purpose alone and it's not cluttered up. Now, it was a lot of work setting it up, as I had to enter each day individually and click the "repeat annually" for every day. But once it was done, it was set for the years to come.

Finally, and the most used and most relevant for blogging. is my google calendar. This is where I plan out everything blog related. The blue posts are the ones I've written and scheduled. The red ones are unwritten ones but are there to show me when I want a post. As you can see, when I took the screen capture, I hadn't yet written this post. By the time this goes live, most of June should be a sea of blue. The nice thing about using red and blue is that I can rearrange the red posts however I want should something come up. It gives me the comfort of still using the schedule but also the freedom to rearrange things should that one iota of "artistic" me strike :-D

I realize scheduling like this just isn't for everyone. It can bring more stress to others and become a weight that drags them down. But if you want to become a disciple of Scheduling, these tools, or ones like them, can help you tremendously. I know of people who keep a planner journal and use that.

There you go. Now you too can become a Scheduling Guru! 


Friday, June 06, 2025

[Journal] Pear Garden

 




This is the blurb about this journal from Paperblanks:
"During the Tang Dynasty (618–907), the Emperor Taizong founded an opera school called Liyuan (Pear Garden). Chinese opera reached its pinnacle under the Qing court (1644–1911), giving birth to what is known as Peking Opera. Reproduced here is a piece of beautifully embroidered opera skirt from that era."

When I was deciding which 8 Journals to buy last year, by the end I wanted something that looked completely different from all my others. This Pear Garden option worked a treat. You can't see it in the pictures, but it has a little bit of sparkle to it. I'm gonna sparkle like a bloody Twilight Vampire!

Hope you have a great weekend and feel free to tell me how you feel about the journal, Twilight, vampires or just life in general. "I'm Listening"

Thursday, June 05, 2025

Bone Swans 2Stars

 

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 by Bookstooge’s Exalted Permission

Title: Bone Swans
Series: -----
Author: Claire Cooney
Rating: 2 of 5 Stars
Genre: Fantasy
Pages: 236
Words: 95K
Publish: 2015



Last year Bookforager reviewed this collection. In her review, she sounded exactly how I felt when I would read a Patricia McKillip book. As McKillip is now dead and will not be writing any more stories, I was hoping that maybe this Cooney girl could pick up the slack. Saying I had high hopes was putting it mildly.

Things got off to a rocky start. There was an introduction by Gene Wolfe, as he knew Cooney. I despise Wolfe’s writings, so when he praises someone, that’s a big old warning sign to me. I knew that biased me so I went into the actual stories determined not to let Wolfe ruin this for me. No fear on that account, Cooney did that all by herself with no help from anyone.

I have described McKillip’s writing as fire and silk, rounded stones in a small brook creating that soothing babbling sound. Her writing was poetry in lyrical form. Cooney had that same poetical format and even I could appreciate it. However, Cooney was rotting granite (if you have ever come into contact with rotting rock, you know how vile it is) in the midst of a swamp of effluent. Every story set my teeth on edge. My back was completely riled. I hated this collection. I’m not going to go into specifics in this review because I don’t want to give any more of my time to even thinking about Cooney. I know nothing about her beyond the introduction by Wolfe and I want to keep it that way.

If you are curious about the book’s contents, read Bookforager’s review. She did an admirable job and I have no hesitation about recommending her review.

★★☆☆☆


From the Publisher & ToC

A swan princess hunted for her bones, a broken musician and his silver pipe, and a rat named Maurice bring justice to a town under fell enchantment. A gang of courageous kids confronts both a plague-destroyed world and an afterlife infested with clowns but robbed of laughter. In an island city, the murder of a child unites two lovers, but vengeance will part them. Only human sacrifice will save a city trapped in ice and darkness. Gold spun out of straw has a price, but not the one you expect.

Introducing C. S. E. Cooney

Life on the Sun

The Bone Swans of Amandale

Martyr’s Gem

How the Milkmaid Struck a Bargain with the Crooked One

The Big Bah-Ha


Wednesday, June 04, 2025

Currently Reading: Batman/Shadow: The Murder Geniuses

 

I am a fan of The Shadow. Lashaan is a huge fan of Batman. He read this way back in '19 and it caught my eye then. It has just taken a little bit of time for me to get around to it, hahahahaa. I do like that cover and you know what? The Shadow's schnozz isn't huge, amazing!

I just wanted to showcase the cover because while I like it a lot, there is no way it'll ever make the Cover Love category.

Cheers!

Tuesday, June 03, 2025

Monster Hunter Siege (MHI #6) 4Stars

 

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 by Bookstooge’s Exalted Permission

Title: Monster Hunter Siege
Series: MHI #6
Author: Larry Correia
Rating: 4 of 5 Stars
Genre: Urban Fantasy
Pages: 348
Words: 137K
Publish: 2017



A couple of books ago (Alpha) we were introduced to a character named Jason Lococo. He was a big ol’ brute who had a heart of gold and helped the boss of Monster Hunter International stop a werewolf invasion from taking over the United States. He got sucked into the Nightmare Dimension in Legion and was making the main character, Own Pitt, feel really guilty. So Owen sets off to rescue him and some other survivors. It snowballs into a massive multi-Hunter Company taskforce and they basically attack a Russian island with US military level power. Then Owen has to go through the gate to the Nightmare Dimension and save everyone. He has to fight off a High Hunt and he does so with Lococo’s help. He rescues the other guys and Lococo disappears. Only in the end to find out that Lococo was just a meat suit for a super demon named Asag who wants to destroy our world and that Asag needed a meat suit to get back to our dimension. Just like the Smoke Monster in LOST.

So this whole book was a longcon game by Asag, who was manipulating Owen the entire time. How cool is that?

All the fighting monsters was cool too. But I liked getting to the end and realizing that Owen, the Chosen One, was fooled like everyone else. I love this series but I don’t love Owen. Almost everybody else I enjoy reading about. But Owen, while I don’t hate him, I don’t actively enjoy him as a character at all. It’s too bad, since he IS the main character, hahahahaa.

Reading this MHI series months apart (as opposed to the years between initial releases) makes the overall big picture storyline much clearer. I can put pieces together now that I didn’t even realize were pieces back on my first read. I like that, a lot. It’s fun, it’s engaging and it is good writing. Also makes me realize that I could never BE a series writer. Not that I want to be an author mind you (I’d rather poke your eyes out than become an author), but knowing I don’t have that skillset is reassuring. No accidentally becoming an author for me! (crisis averted)

★★★★☆


From MHI.Fandom.com & Bookstooge

GO BIG OR GO HOME

When Monster Hunter International's top hunter, Owen Zastava Pitt, was given a tip about some hunters who had gone missing in action, he didn’t realize their rescue mission would snowball into the single biggest operation in MHI's history. Their men are being held prisoner in a horrific nightmare dimension, and the only way to reach them is through the radioactive ruins of a monster-infested war zone.

As if that wasn't bad enough, it's also the home base of the powerful creature behind the devastating attacks on the Last Dragon and Copper Lake. It turns out ancient gods of chaos really hate trespassers. But this god picked a fight with the wrong crew, and now MHI wants payback. Calling on their allies, a massive expedition is formed, and with the odds stacked against them, a legion of hunters goes to war.

It's D-Day at the City of Monsters.

Pitt rescues the survivors and even makes it back himself, against all odds. But just like in LOST, Asag needed a dead meat suit to escape the Nightmare Dimension and now he’s in our world, free to cause chaos and destruction to his heart’s content.



Monday, June 02, 2025

Grizzly Bear - MTG 4E

 


OR....

...........you can knock your friend down and hope the bear eats him instead! Worth a shot, right? 


Sunday, June 01, 2025

A Choice of Evils 4Stars

 

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 by Bookstooge’s Exalted Permission

Title: A Choice of Evils
Series: ----------
Editor: Alfred Hitchcock
Rating: 4 of 5 Stars
Genre: Crime Fiction
Pages: 343
Words: 134K
Publish: 1983


In March of ‘24, I read “Portraits of Murder”, a large collection of short stories that I assumed would be my last hurrah with the Alfred Hitchcock Presents series. I tried a couple of issues of the Alfred Hitchcock Mystery Magazine, but the less said about that, the better. Portraits was the 28th volume I’d read and I had assumed I had pretty much drained the well dry. Therefore imagine my surprise when I came across a website dedicated to the “Alfred Hitchcock Presents” books that listed them all out. Turns out there were at least another 22. So let the screaming recommence!

One thing that I have come to realize about these collections vs the magazine is that I “need” a lot more stories all together than the magazines can provide. Each story is like a little cream puff of villainy and one or even four will just leave you wanting more. You need a surfeit of them, a gluttonous feast that leaves you in a food coma for the next 8-12hrs. THAT is what these collections attempt to do and definitely succeeded here.

With collections like these, I never even attempt to take notes for each story. There are 34 stories here. Can you imagine the size of this review if I tried to write out notes for 34 stories? I could probably do a short story review for the entire month if I reviewed one short story a day. Maybe some month I’ll do that if I don’t feel like reading. I hear that reading slumps still exist in our world, so maybe it will hit me too. You could only be so lucky ;-)

The one story that did really stand out to me was “Knight of the Road” by Thomasina Weber. It’s about a conman who travels up and down the major highways of the East Coast of the US looking for women to bamboozle and steal their money. He gets conned himself and the story ends with him looking forward to meeting that woman again so they can team up. It just had that self-effacing, ironic biting humor that can appeal to me. It was also one of the few stories that didn’t involve murder or violence in one way or another. It was clever.

So Alfie’s back baby and he’s here to stay until you’re sick of him.

*slow clap

★★★★☆


Table of Contents:

The Battered Mailbox by Stanley Cohen

Center of Attention by Dan J. Marlowe

Lesson for a Pro by Stephen Wasylyk

Aftermath of Death by Talmage Powell — AHMM 8(7)

Enough Rope for Two by Clark Howard

A Change for the Better by Arthur Porges

A Killing in the Market by Robert Bloch

Do It Yourself by Charles Mergendahl

Lost and Found by James Michael Ullman — AHMM 18(8)

Passport in Order by Lawrence Block

Moonlight Gardener by Robert L. Fish

Courtesy Call by Sonora Morrow

Restored Evidence by Patrick O'Keeffe

The Standoff by Frank Sisk

A Fine and Private Place by Virginia Long

Dead, You Know by John Lutz — AHMM 13(1)

A Certain Power by Edward D. Hoch

Hunters by Borden Deal

The Driver by William Brittain

Class Reunion by Charles Boeckman

Mean Cop by W. Sherwood Hartman — AHMM 13(11)

Kill, If You Want Me! by Richard Deming

Welcome to My Prison by Jack Ritchie

Come into My Parlor by Gloria Amoury

Lend Me Your Ears by Edward Wellen

Killer Scent by Joe E. Hensley

Dear Corpus Delicti by William Link and Richard Levinson

Knight of the Road by Thomasina Weber — AHMM 8(9)

The Truth that Kills by Donald Olson — AHMM 17(12)

Where is Thy Sting? by John F. Suter

Anatomy of an Anatomy by Donald E. Westlake

Murder Me Twice by Lawrence Treat

Not a Laughing Matter by Evan Hunter

The Graft is Green by Harold Q. Masur




Saturday, May 31, 2025

May '25 Roundup & Ramblings

 


Raw Data:

Novels - 17 ↑

Short Stories - 1 ↑

Manga/Graphic Novels - 1 -

Comics - 1 -

Average Rating - 3.10 ↑

Pages - 4195 ↑

Words - 1376K ↑


The Bad:

City of Stairs - 1star dnf of the now-typical usual suspects

Blades of Damocles - 2.5stars of the Hated Astartes, aka Space Marines


The Good:

Blood Debt - 4stars of Victor the Assassin being Victor the Assassin

The Final Deduction - 4stars of Death and Taxes ;-)


Miscellaneous Posts:


Personal:

First and foremost, my "Bookstooge's Criteria" post was the top post for this month and this year. even topping the hits for my "About" page (who can resist that lovable Mr Zip after all?). It even tops all but 5 posts from 2024, and that is in this month alone. That kind of post only happens once or twice a year. But I am glad it resonated with so many of you, as that is a good feeling as a blogger. And that's enough bragging from me ;-)

Mrs B contributed a post midmonth and that always makes me happy. She read my review of Austen's "History of England" and decided to do her own farce of a farce based on the fictious land of Bookstoogia.

Work was all over the place. New Guy is now fully in the Environmental Department so I got bounced around with Tall Guy (he's over a foot taller than me), by myself or with whoever. It was a very unsettling time. I knew it was coming though, so I just rolled with the punches. I have a feeling this whole summer is going to be like this.

Mrs B and I have started attending the Seventh Day Adventist church full time this month. It's a bit of a change, but with how I was dealing with the contemporary worship music at the Sunday church (ie, I wasn't, I had to sit out in the vestibule because I couldn't stand to even listen to it any more), something needed to change. Thankfully, it's an amicable change and we still have our circle of friends from the Sunday church. They are a real blessing to us.

My reading for May was insane. 20 books/comics are the kind of numbers I would expect to pull down if I had two weeks off from work. But I was just insatiable and tore through the books like a beast. My average rating went up quite a bit too. After last month's 2.86 fiasco, getting back to 3.1 feels good, real good!


Cover Love:

This actually had THREE contenders, first time that has happened in years. There was the Warhammer 40,000 novel about the Necrons (immortal but insane ultimate killing robots), called Reign. Next was the Shadow novel, Shadowed Millions. Finally, and the winner in my books, was the fantastically despicable Mystery of Dr. Fu-Manchu. Like I wrote in the review, the Arcane Casebook vibes were superduper strong with that cover and I couldn't resist.


Plans for Next Month:

Because I read so fething much this month, I am going to ease WAY back on that. Which in turn means less posts, so I'm going to go back to taking Saturday's off again. I was ok with posting this month, but it was ALL because of how much I read and I don't foresee that happening again.

Going to watch and review the final story arc for the Yu Yu Hakusho anime. Since I stopped reading the Demon Slayer manga, I hope to sneak in a graphic novel in it's place. Not sure which one though. Probably either the Shadow/Batman: Murder Geniuses recommended by Lashaan or the next Usagi Yojimbo, which is the samura rabbit that I started last year :-)


Friday, May 30, 2025

The Blades of Damocles (Warhammer 40K: Tau) 2.5Stars

 

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 by Bookstooge’s Exalted Permission

Title: The Blades of Damocles
Series: Warhammer 40K: Tau
Author: Phil Kelly
Rating: 2.5 of 5 Stars
Genre: SF
Pages: 292
Words: 104K
Publish: 2016



When I read Farsight: Crisis of Faith back in August of last year, I noted how some big events had happened between Farsight and Farsight: Crisis of Faith. It bewildered me and I was convinced that Black Library (the company, I think, that produces the Warhammer and Warhammer 40,000 books) were a bunch of jackasses who deliberately messed with their readers. Well, this novel is the missing link! It explains everything hinted at in Crisis and explains all the background.

But it is listed as an Astartes novels (the Astartes are the Space Marines, the boys in blue, the gigantic freaks who rule earth as absolute tyrants and are as evil as Chaos itself in my opinion. I HATE the Astartes, hatehatehatehatehate them!) and hence I never would have read this book, not touched it with a 10foot pole, not even glanced at it, if it weren’t for Dave suggesting it as a buddy read, since he knew both Mark and I were interested in Tau stories. I am extremely thankful for that suggestion.

I still hate Black Library though. They are as disorganized as you can possible get. I shouldn’t have to rely on another fan’s information to be able to find out what books are related. That is just fething wrong. So that was my mind set when I started this. Happy that I was finding out what I had missed (in Calibre I am calling this WH40K: Tau 1.5) but pretty angry at Black Library.

Then I find out WHY it was listed as an Astartes novel, because over half the story revolves those fething tyrants. Not just generic ultimate fighters on super steroids, but Named Characters. Who banter and quip while still being ultimate dumb meatheads. I hated them with a passion and I raised a victory cry every time one of the boyz in bloo died. Sadly, the named characters didn’t die, but I can’t have everything. On the Tau side, it was almost as much politics as it was action. Commander Farsight didn’t have nearly enough page time and when he does appear, like I said, politics. It really got under my skin.

The thing that saved this book from being a total loss was the incredible action. When things get going, they REALLY get going. I enjoyed that aspect a lot and if this book had just been about that, probably would have gotten close to 4stars. But, Astartes. That just sank this ship before it even took off.

This was a buddy-read with Dave and Mark, and you can find their reviews here:

Dave’s Review

Mark’s Review

★★✬☆☆


From WH40K.Lexicanum.com

The Imperium of Man takes its bloody revenge upon the expansionist Tau in a war of dizzying spectacle. Chainsword and jump pack is pitted against cutting edge battlesuit technology, whilst the Codex Astartes is matched against the tau Code of Fire. For the first time, the daredevil warriors of the Ultramarines Assault Company go to war en masse, fighting in the skies, in the streets, and even in the prototype testing facilities of the Earth caste. Sergeants Sicarius and Numitor must overcome their hunger for glory as the brightest stars of the Tau Empire, Commanders Farsight and Shadowsun, hunt them to the brink of disaster. As a white-knuckle ride of conflict sees the Space Marines fight through one lethal ambush after another, they must deal with conflicts from within the ranks as well as from without. Tempers run short as battle-brothers fall, ammunition runs out and the course of the war takes ever-darker twists and turns. With two warrior cultures struggling for a vital edge and the body count spiralling towards a terrible conclusion, can notions of honour and duty survive at all?

Only with the advent of a tyranid swarm fleet approaching the Blue Bro’s sector planet do the Astartes retreat.


Thursday, May 29, 2025

The Glass Carafe (Groo the Wanderer #40) 3.5Stars

 

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, by Bookstooge’s Exalted Permission

Title: The Glass Carafe
Series: Groo the Wanderer #40
Author: Sergio Aragones
Rating: 3.5 of 5 Stars
Genre: Comics
Pages: 26
Words: 2K
Publish: 1988



Groo is trying to get a job but there is a very long line. Rufferto decides to “help” and it actually works! What do you say when a dog is smarter than his owner? Groo!


★★★✬☆


From Bookstooge

Groo is hungry and wants a job to earn some kopins to buy a meal. So he goes to a glassblower factory (without realizing what it is) and accidentally breaks a glass carafe. The owner tells him he will give him a job if Groo can replace the glass carafe.

So instead of making a new carafe in the factory, Groo goes on a quest that takes him months, to find a carafe. Every time he does though, it breaks through circumstances, and hence the quest goes on. Finally, Groo gets a carafe back to the owner, who immediately throws him out the front door. Ha!


Wednesday, May 28, 2025

Hell Divers (Hell Divers #1) 3Stars

 

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 by Bookstooge’s Exalted Permission

Title: Hell Divers
Series: Hell Divers #1
Author: Nicholas Smith
Rating: 3 of 5 Stars
Genre: SF
Pages: 290
Words: 104K
Publish: 2016



Normally, I add links to other bloggers’ reviews at the end of my review, but I wanted to make sure that the two bloggers who inspired me to read this got their credit. So bear with me as I digress momentarily.

Dave read this back in December ‘24 and put up his review earlier this month. He talks about his own little journey of discovery with this book and the video game that came after. It’s the kind of “journey” review that I enjoy reading.

Both Dave’s and my own journey began with Swords and Spectres’ review of the book in 2019. He gave it 5stars and it sounded really good. So it was on my radar but not quite enough to get on my tbr list. Then in January of this year Swords reviewed an audio version and downgraded his review to 3stars. I still liked what he wrote so between his and Dave’s reviews, I added it to my tbr and I finally got around it to it this month. That’s actually a pretty quick turnaround, as my tbr is about two years long.

Ok, now to the important part, MY PART. I read this book and gave it 3stars. The end.

Hahahahaha, just kidding. Yeah, yeah, I know, I’ve done that in the past, but not today. Today you will read every word I write, no matter how long winded I get or how off topic I go, because I AM BOOKSTOOGECUS!!!! (parades around with a gladius upraised)

The (yawn) post-apocalyptic setting is offset by the fact that there are only 1000 humans left (approximately) and they all live in two giant skyships. These skyships were the original instruments of doom that delivered the bombs that destroyed the Earth as we know it back in World War III. Originally, there were a lot of these skyships, but now, roughly 250 years after dooms day, there are only two left. The others have all fallen to the Earth through various issues, whether mechanical or societal. They are nuclear powered and thus mutation is at play, and it’s not the X-Men kind of mutation, but REAL mutation that leads to death. Things are desperate and have been since the beginning.

In this story one of the two ships crashes in the worst place on Earth, called Hades, because it was desperate to recover some nuclear thingamajigs so it could stay aloft. The other skyship attempts to come to its rescue, but by the time they arrive, the other ship has already crashed. The problem is that in attempting to reach Hades, “our” skyship sustained damage, necessitating that a group of Helldivers go into Hades on a do or die (for everyone) mission. They need Power and Parts.

Our main character is named Xavier but goes by X. It is almost like the author WANTED this to get turned into a video game with a nameless protagonist for the gamers to step into his shoes. He’s been on almost 100 dives, while the typical life span of a Helldiver is 15 dives. He goes on one dive and is the only man to survive. It pretty much breaks him and THEN the other ship crashes and everything I said before comes to the forefront. So X has to lead a new team and all the other teams to Hades, the worst place in the world, to recover stuff. Half of them die on the dive down, alone. Then they come across mutants that reminded me of the various zombie things in the Resident Evil movies. Lots of running, shooting, jumping and chasing. Eventually, they find what they need, get the supplies back to the dropship, send it back up to the skyship and the surviving Helldivers also ascend. Only X is left behind. And there is no way for anyone to know that he is still alive on the ground.

Like I said, VERY video-game’y. Not necessarily a bad thing, but one that kept it from being a real novel in my opinion. It read like those novelizations of games or movies. So there was 1star knocked off for that.

The second knocked off star was because of how things were setup “in book” that didn’t make sense to me. Helldivers are putting their lives on the line every time they jump, so they get special privileges the night before, ie, booze, drugs and sex. Why? Having your divers go into a mission hungover, strung out, whacked sideways is a recipe for disaster. You have all that crap AFTER the mission, help motivate them to come back alive. And you train them in small group tactics!!!!! They train for jumping, etc, but every time a group jumped, once they hit the ground, they always, ALWAYS split up to cover more ground, even though they knew how dangerous everything was. With absolutely predictable results of people dying by the bucketload. It made me gnash my teeth, especially when the number of people left is dwindling so fast. And of course, it is at this EXACT moment in time that a revolution by the Underdecker’s takes place. It was too much happening all at once, all of it bad, for me to accept. I just rolled my eyes, muttered “stupid writer” and kept plowing through to the end.

Now I know that’s a lot of bad and you might wonder why this wasn’t 2stars or even a dnf.

The action and the corrupted Earth. That Resident Evil vibe I got was more than enough to keep me going. I love those movies to pieces even while I know what absolute pieces of trash they are. But they are fun and awesome. Which leads into the action. The dives themselves were fraught with peril and with teams getting fried by lightning or smashing into buildings when their paraglide chutes don’t work right or monsters eating them as soon as they touched down, the tension for each dive until the divers returned was dialed up to 7, maybe even 9 every time and then the final dive into Hades at the end was an 11 from start to finish.

I plan to keep on reading this series. I’ll read a couple more, take a break with a different series, then come back. Keep things from getting stale, or overdone. Nothing is worse than an overdone action series.

★★★☆☆


From the Publisher

More than two centuries after World War III poisoned the planet, the final bastion of humanity lives on massive airships circling the globe in search of a habitable area to call home. Aging and outdated, most of the ships plummeted back to Earth long ago. The only thing keeping the two surviving lifeboats in the sky are Hell Divers - men and women who risk their lives by skydiving to the surface to scavenge for parts the ships desperately need.

When one of the remaining airships is damaged in an electrical storm, a Hell Diver team is deployed to a hostile zone called Hades. But there's something down there far worse than the mutated creatures discovered on dives in the past - something that threatens the fragile future of humanity.

The Hell Divers, led by X, get what they need to allow their airship to survive, but in the process X is left in Hades and that is where the book ends.