Dude is built like a brick! If he was shorter, I’d say “Hey look, it’s me!”. But he’s way too tall to be me. Plus, I’m rocking the goatee while he’s got the evil villain mustache thing going. And my abs don’t “quite” look like that. Maybe if you squint though.
Been a couple of years since I last reposted this. Good for all the new people who have joined the band since then. Cheers!
Since Star Ratings can by mysterious beasts to some, I thought I would explain what each Star Rating means, roughly, to me.
5 Stars:
An Epic read that I will buy in hardcover and read again and again or a book that has profoundly changed my life.
4 Stars:
A book that I thoroughly enjoyed but am not sure I will read again. It ‘might’ not hold up to the Me I’ll be in 10 years.
3 Stars:
A completely average book that I enjoyed. Nothing really special but nothing bad to note either.
The majority of what I read falls into this category.
2 Stars:
Did not enjoy this book. It might have been grammar, editing or plot issues. It might also have been Religious and Philosophical in nature.
1 Star:
Crap. Probably could not finish. Most likely Blasphemous in one way or another. Could also be that the skillz of the writer were of a 3rd grade level.
Half Stars:
Whenever a book is a Strong or Weak X Star Book, I tend to go for the half stars. They make my life so much easier!
Besides his Archmage, the Hidden King was also protected by his Soul Guardian. Knowing he was vulnerable to attacks powered by the Tree of Day and Night, the Hidden King had broken his soul up into five parts. Four of them he entrusted to his Soul Guardian, who had the power to hide from the Tree of Day and Night and whoever might use its power. The fifth part of his soul though, the Hidden King had decided to hide it away where only HE would know of it. Thus was born his name, the Hidden King.
The Mad Chartreuse Emperor was driven to frothing fits of pique in his search to destroy the Hidden King’s soul. With his entire pool of power tainted by the Tree of Day and Night, even the power stolen from the Spirit of the World Guardian wasn’t enough to allow him to find the soul aspects. The Soul Guardian was doing his job of protecting the King’s four soul aspects perfectly. The Chartreuse Emperor sat in his Forest Refuge, brooding, planning, seeking a way to destroy his foes. He knew his destiny, that this world would belong to him and him alone, and nothing would prevent that.
In recent months I’ve been trying to wean myself away from drinking diet soda, mainly because of all the chemicals in them that I KNOW aren’t good for me. As a diabetic, drinking regular soda with it’s 3 day supply of sugar in one can just isn’t an option, so I always went diet. But as I’m getting older and my midlife is staring me full in the face, I’ve realized I have to take better care of myself, even if in small ways. A friend of mine from my Bibleschool days always talked about how he just drank seltzer and so I began that. It has worked. I get my bubbly without the thick, cloying sensation of artificial sweetener and I don’t feel like I’m pouring something down my throat that can clean toilets. But I have to admit, the “flavor” of seltzers is so light that at times it is really nonexistent and I just crave some flavor.
I was browsing Amazon one day while looking for deals on Rockstarenergy drinks and saw Liquid Death. I thought it was a new brand of energy drink to be honest and so I bought a case to check it out. Imagine my surprise when I found out it was only flavored sparkling water. More flavor than seltzer though! And it comes in 20oz cans, which is a big plus for me, as I like to have something to sip all evening long as I read on the couch or write up my latest masterpiece for the blog.
I later found out that Liquid Death is marketed towards Metal Heads, to try to get them to drink more water and stop being dumby heads. There’s a whole marketing scheme about selling your soul to the Company, etc, etc. That doesn’t bother me at all because I’m sure the Company believes in your soul about as much as I believe that you can sell it. So as I’m typing this, Thursday evening, I’m eating some french bread pizza and sipping on a Mango Chainsaw Liquid Death. Eat, Drink and Blog is a great way to spend your evening!
And on to this week’s part of the My Week post.
Bupkiss. Doody. Nothing. Voido. Entropy!
Oh wait. I ate some cold cereal for dinner one day. That counts as exciting and exhilarating blog material right? Sigh, yeah, I didn’t think so either. That’s the problem with being me. I crave the bland weeks, the weeks where nothing happens. I WANT my days to blend into each other, where I literally can’t tell one from the other. Because that means everything is going smoothly, that there are no hiccups. Hiccups in Life always means bad things in my experience.
Like thinking your eye doctor appointment is just a checkup and so you make plans with Mrs B to go to IHOP afterwards to have breakfast for dinner (because that IS exciting news and blows having cold cereal right out of the water) and then finding out that no, you’re scheduled to get injections in both eyes that day. Now THAT is a hiccup. Because all you can do afterwards is get driven home, take 2 extra strength Tylenol and collapse into bed and hope you feel better by the next morning. Things like THAT are not what I look forward to. If you do, you are a sick fether and I’ll gladly put you out of your misery.
See, weeks that have things like that are not cool. So I just pretend that that didn’t happen this week and thus nothing happened and I am entirely happy and you get a vanilla post about nothing. Which I’m ok with too, because really, just who do you think you are that I have to entertain you? YOU should be entertaining ME in the comments section. So get cracking.
Or you could always buy me some more Liquid Death. I wouldn’t say no to that…
ps,
the featured image for this post is the side of the box of Liquid Death. Yep, that’s what the box looks like…
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: Counterstrike
Series: Empire Rising #11
Author: David Holmes
Rating: 3.5 of 5 Stars
Genre: SF
Pages: 458
Words: 180K
This is where Humanity tries to turn things around and go on the offensive against the Karacknids (giant xenophobic space spiders). So far, Humanity has been playing nothing but defense but here, Emperor Somerville and other top notch Space Commadores take various fast attack groups behind the front lines and attack the support structure enabling the Karacknid War Machine. It works well, very well. The only problem is, unknown to Humanity, the Karacknids are moving in a massive space fleet from another front and they plan to use all 10,000 ships to absolutely crush Humanity and the Alliance.
This was another chunkster of a book. Every time I pick up one of these Empire Rising novels, it always surprises me just how long they are. But then I start reading and I’m never bored, never.
It was quite the interesting dichotomy as a reader, knowing from the get-go that the Karacknids had a massive fleet on the way, while we are reading about the successes of Humanity in the war on their infrastructure. It was hard to be excited for the victories because we knew the giant hammer was looming, just out of sight.
The book ends with humanity once again on the back foot and all is in doubt. Now, we know that isn’t the truth because every chapter starts with a saying from the book Empire Rising, written in the year 3000, which chronicles the history of the rise of the Human Empire. So I know that Humanity is going to win, eventually, against the Karacknids. I think it is a testimony to Holmes’ skill as an author that I can still feel trepidation about the outcome even while knowing the eventual longterm outcome.
I can’t remember if I’ve stated it before or not, but Holmes has passed from the realm of mere writer/scribbler into the realm of Author in my opinion. He writes real, different, compelling characters (everyone is not the same character with just a different name), with exciting scenarios that do not feel repetitive. My only niggles are that he really needs to tighten up his prose (450+ pages is long, period) and he needs to make his characters actually grow. While distinct in voice, they remain the same. James is pretty much the same now as he was in the first book, The Void War. Like I said, minor quibbles.
Otherwise, I remain quite happy to keep reading this series a couple of books at a time. Holmes has been writing this series since 2015 and book 19 just came out this past March. I’m ok with that given the quality shown here.
★★★✬☆
From the Publisher
The Karacknid invasion of Human space has been temporarily thwarted. A window of opportunity has opened up. Through it Emperor Somerville hopes to strike deep into Karacknid territory to buy Earth and the Varanni Alliance the breathing space they need to replace their losses. On the other side of the Karacknid Empire, Rear Admiral Becket and the Conclave species are planning a pre-emptive strike of their own. With relatively undefended borders, Becket has seen an opportunity to hit the Karacknids where they least expect it.
Yet the Karacknid’s power is far from diminished. After the series of defeats the Karacknids have suffered, their Imperator has now focused his full attention on destroying Humanity and the Varanni Alliance. Nothing short of the total conquest of Humanity’s colonies has been ordered. The full might of the Karacknid Navy has been tasked to bring it about. For James, Christine, Lightfoot, Becket and all the others, their own lives and the future of the Empire is at stake.
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: Farsight: Crisis of Faith
Series: Warhammer 40K: Tau
Author: Phil Kelly
Rating: 3 of 5 Stars
Genre: SF
Pages: 281
Words: 93K
Well, this wasn’t QUITE as bewildering as Farsight was. This was almost a direct sequel to that novella, so I was building on that foundation. I say a direct sequel, but some big events and some matter of time has passed since then. At the end of Farsight the main character, Commander Farsight, has figured out how to beat the orks and is on the brink of taking back the planet Arkunasha, when he is commanded by the Celestials, the highest level of Tau politics, to abandon the planet. Then the Empire of Man attacks the Tau home system and Farsight is tasked with defending his race. Another battle of greater import draws off the Empire and for morales’ sake the Celestials claim it as a great Tau Victory. Everyone involved knows the reality however.
So that is the background of this novel, which is woven into the ongoing story, bits of puzzle pieces that we the reader are expected to pick out and figure out on our own. I’m not a fan of that style of writing any more. The Wheel of Time series and the Malazan Book of the Fallen series both cured me of that.
The current story is about the Tau sending a fleet to reclaim the worlds that the Empire of Man recovered in that unwritten battle. Only politics are involved and lots of highly placed Warrior Caste characters are either sidelined or sent into impossible situations to probably fail and cast doubt on them. The Celestials definitely are NOT good guys.
We also have the Tau really facing the Chaos Gods for the first time. One of them is actually possessed by a daemon and works at undermining the entire fleet. Since the Tau have almost zero psychic ability, they are pretty blind to that aspect of the Universe they inhabit, even after having it rubbed into their little xeno faces when the Psykers from the Empire of Man really let loose.
Overall, I understood more of what was going on but I can’t say I actually enjoyed this any more than its predecessor. The Tau politics are just as dirty as anything seen in the Empire of Man and I do not enjoy that in my fiction. Even in a grimdark universe I need some good guys, not some backboneless wimp.
Not for the Uninitiated or those beginning their exploration of the Warhammer 40K universe.
★★★☆☆
From the Publisher
The tau are a mysterious alien race, diametrically opposed to the Imperium of Man in every possible way — in their mastery of technology, methods of warfare and social structure. Yet in galactic terms they are a young race, and naive when it comes to the manipulations of Chaos. When promising young Commander Farsight is promoted to lead a crusade across the Damocles Gulf to reclaim the tau’s lost colonies from mankind, the mood is one of optimism. With their mighty fleet, and superior weapons and machines, how can their endeavour possibly fail? However, despite a parade of early successes, Commander Farsight soon faces enemies he wasn’t anticipating, and finds not only his courage but also his soul tested to the very limit.
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: Mary Poppins Opens the Door
Series: Mary Poppins #3
Author: Pamela Travers
Rating: 3 of 5 Stars
Genre: Middlegrade Fiction
Pages: 256
Words: 55K
Same old, same old. Mary Poppins comes back, has adventures with the Banks family and then leaves, only for good this time around.
It is very formulaic, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing for the age group this is aimed at. Mary Poppins takes the children to meet an eccentric family member of hers. Mary Poppins takes the children out and they have an adventure. The children go to a dream party of sorts where they find out Mary Poppins is the guest of honor. Thankfully this time around none of the children felt naughty and acted out, thus bringing the wrath of Mary Poppins down on their heads.
It really was the same as the previous two books, so if you liked those, you’ll like this and conversely, if you didn’t like the previous books, you won’t like this either. It’s also a natural ending place if you are on the fence and don’t want to continue reading any more in the series. I’ve got an omnibus of the first four stories, so I’ve got one more and I have enjoyed my time enough that I think I’ll go ahead and read it. But I won’t be seeking out the next four books.
★★★☆☆
From Wikipedia
On Guy Fawkes Night, Mary Poppins arrives in the wake of the last fireworks display by the Banks family. The Banks children, Michael, Jane, the twins, and Annabel plead with her to stay. She reluctantly agrees to do so “till the door opens.” When an anxious Jane points out that the nursery door is always opening, she clarifies “the other door.”
Mrs. Banks has Mary and the children find a piano tuner, who happens to be Mary’s cousin, Mr. Twigley. When Mary and the children visit, Mr. Twigley tries to unburden himself from seven wishes given to him when he was born. Besides pianos, Mr. Twigley also specialises in songbirds such as nightingales, one of which he releases when he’s finished. He also provides music boxes for Mary and the Banks children to dance to. When they return home later, the drawing room piano is playing perfectly, and when the Banks children ask Mary what happened, she sharply rebukes them.
Other adventures in the book include Mary telling the story of a king (implied to be Old King Cole) who was outsmarted by a cat (known as “The Cat That Looked at a King”), the park statue of Neleus that comes to life for a time during one of their outings, their visit to confectioner Miss Calico and her flying peppermint sticks, an undersea (High-Tide) party where Mary Poppins is the guest of honour, and a party between fairy tale rivals in the Crack between the Old Year and the New. When the children ask why Mary Poppins, a real person, is there, they are told that she can be considered as a fairy tale that has come true. The next morning, Jane and Michael find definite proof of the last night’s adventure, and this time she does not deny it, simply telling them that they too may end up living happily ever after.
Finally, after Mary and the children have a non-magical (but nonetheless wondrous) afternoon playing on the swings at the Park, the citizens of the town as well as many other characters from the previous two books turn out in front of the house to have a farewell party. Before going inside, Mary urges the children to be good and remember everything she told them, and they realise that it is Mary, not the other characters, who is departing. They rush to the nursery to see her open and the nursery door’s reflection in the window. Mary Poppins then opens her parrot headed umbrella, and it soars up into the sky, taking her with it. The Banks Children are happy she kept her promise by staying till the “door” opened. Mrs Banks arrives afterwards, and sees the children alone. Mrs Brill tells her that Mary Poppins has left again, and she is distraught about what she is going to do without a nanny for the children. Mr Banks is distracted by the music playing outside, and encourages his wife to just forget about it and dance with him.
When he has finished dancing with his wife, he sees what he thinks is a shooting star, (though it is really Mary Poppins flying away on her umbrella) and they all wish upon it. The children wish to remember Mary Poppins for the rest of their lives, and they faintly make her out in the star. They wave and she waves back to them. The narrator remarks, “Mary Poppins herself had flown away, but the gifts she had brought would remain for always.”
They promise to never forget her, and she hears this and smiles and waves to them, before the darkness hides her, and they see her and her umbrella for the last time ever.
The Banks Family sigh that Mary Poppins has gone, but happily decide to sit by the fire together. (This presumably meaning that the parents have decided to spend more time with their children thanks to Mary’s lessons).
You just KNOW something wicked creepy is hiding in the shadows, just out of sight.
This second dvd of the anime Cardcaptor Sakura, contains the following episodes:
This time around I watched these twice, once on the dvd with the subtitles and once on the bluray with the dubbed version. I must say, I did not care for the dub. Sakura sounds like a teenager, not a 10 year old, the pronunciation differences are more glaring (“Clow” is pronounced like “Glow”, not “Plow”) and references are more NorAm oriented than strictly Japanese or Chinese. I must also admit, that with my eyes and my old tv, I couldn’t tell the difference between the dvd and the bluray for resolution. It all looked the same to me.
The stories were just as saccharin as the previous ones and that’s why I skipped a month between reviews. Only so much concentrated sweetness I can handle at one time. But they were fun and I enjoyed them and that’s all that really matters when it comes to watching something on the tv.
Next time I will talk about the episodes themselves (hopefully).
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 Dragon’s Den
Series: The Metaframe War #3
Author: Graeme Rodaughan
Rating: 2 of 5 Stars
Genre: Urban Fantasy
Pages: 219
Words: 85K
This is where I DNF the series and add Rodaughan to my list of Authors to Avoid
This read exactly like some mindless action video game, with “missions” and “side missions” that don’t make ANY sense if you give them more than a cursory examination.
In the previous book the Leader of the Order of Thoth (one faction of super humans who are fighting against the Vampires) was kidnapped by the Vampires and this book was all about the main characters trying to rescue him.
Once again, the author just doesn’t know how to write effective, mature leaders. The guy who Anton (the main character, The Chosen One) is following is as effective a leader as one of the Minions from the Despicable Me movies.
He doesn’t lead, he doesn’t plan, he doesn’t do anything other than say obvious things like “Ok, we have to rescue the boss” or “Ok, we have to attack the vampires”. When Anton goes off the rails, he doesn’t corral him in any way. At the end, when his wife dies, he just gives up and Anton takes over as leader. We’re not talking about some jamoke with an office job here. This is supposed to be a guy who has successfully fought vampires for possibly decades. And he is a complete and utter joke.
In this same area, the other leaders are as much a joke as he is. There is a military guy working for the Vampires who totally gets outsmarted by Anton, in a helicopter duel. Then the kidnapped leader, while being corrupt, is also monumentally stupid and every decision he makes is bad. And finally, a group of Super Assassins from the Red Empire (another faction of super humans fighting the Vampires) are led by a guy who decides that keeping his word to a Vampire General is the thing to do even when she turns him and his entire team into vampires. They literally become the thing they were created to destroy and they don’t instantly kill each other in a death pact? That’s stupid. That’s beyond stupid, it’s 100% asinine.
Now we come to the biggest reason that I am stopping the series. Anton Slayde, the main character. He’s reckless, impulsive, anti-authority, selfish, self-centered, ignorant (which I can forgive, because ALL teenagers are ignorant, it’s why they have to be taught) but worst of all, he’s stupid. He’s beyond even asinine stupid. I’m debating whether it’s worth it to list all the things that led me to that conclusion.
1) His best friend is captured while allowing the rest of the group to escape the clutches of Shadowstone (the human military wing of the Vampires). So Anton insists on rescuing him with no real plan and puts everyone in jeopardy all over again.
2) His “plan” to rescue his friend involves hijacking a super tank and driving around the compound shooting stuff while looking for his friend, forcing the group to back him up or risking him being captured as well.
3) When that rescue doesn’t happen, he decides he still needs to rescue the guy, this time from an armored convoy that has four military equipped helicopters attached to it. He jumps out of the tank and onto the prison truck, once again forcing his team mates to follow or risk him being captured too.
4) All of this happens WHILE the leader of the Order is captured and being interrogated by Vampires. What’s the best way for a Vampire to interrogate a human? To turn him into a vampire of course, which then means his loyalty is now to the Vampires. Does Anton consider ANY of that, at all? Nope. Operational security, secrets, codes, it can all go take a flying leap because Anton has to rescue his friend, WHO VOLUNTEERED KNOWING THIS COULD HAPPEN IN THE FIRST PLACE!!!!!
5) Anton’s real goal is to kill the Vampire, General Armitage because she killed his parents. He can barely face a regular vampire, but fully expects to just waltz in and kill the most talented Vampire ever? He’s seen her in one fight, where she killed his mentor, who was about 100 times a better fighter than Anton. He has no idea of her style of fighting, her weaknesses or disposition. He knows nothing but is convinced by Plot Armor that he will be The Chosen One, to kill her.
6) I’m getting myself worked up, so I’m just going to stop.
I have a strict “No Stupid People” policy when it comes to the characters I read. I don’t mind if a minor side character is stupid, that just makes them fodder and I’m ok with fodder in my books. But for the main character to be like this, that’s only ok for 12-15 year olds. Anton is not in that age bracket.
The series has been toe’ing that Line of Stupid ever since book one, but it crossed it completely in this book. So I am done. I simply don’t care how the story ends because Plot Armor will overcome everything and I won’t read more Stupid.
★★☆☆☆
From the Publisher
IT’S A TRAP! – Anton Slayne knows it’s a trap. One laid for him by his most powerful opponent – Chloe Armitage, rogue general of the Vampire Dominion.
The chase is on. Agents of the Red Empire and the Vampire Dominion have abducted Ramin Kain, the Head of the Order of Thoth. Anton and the Mirovar force team are the only ones in a position to act. They know Ramin is bait, but have to rescue him before he’s forced to reveal everything he knows to the Order’s sworn enemies.
Will Anton and his friends in the Mirovar force team rescue Ramin Kain, or will Chloe Armitage discover the secrets of the Order of Thoth, destroy the Mirovar force team, and enslave Anton to her will?
