This has been a brutal work week. If you’re one of those “Centigrade” people, here’s a link to a handy converter for you:
Online Temp Converter
By the end of each work day, I felt like a steam roller had run me over, multiple times. In the 9hrs at work, I would drink about 3/4 gallon of water and about 1/2 gallon of gatorade.
I came home, cooled down and went to bed. I had no energy for much else. And I still have to get through today. Wish me luck!
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: Remains
Series: Galaxy’s Edge #14
Author: Jason Anspach & Nick Cole
Rating: 2.5 of 5 Stars
Genre: Military SF
Pages: 281
Words: 123K
This was exactly the same as the previous book, in that we get one chapter with some of the space opera element and the rest of the book is a Legionnaires military science fiction novel. Not at all what I signed up for. So I’m downgrading my rating because I felt very generous last time. I’m not feeling that way at all any more.
Anspach and Cole made an unspoken compact with the readers in the first series. This was Star War’esque in both it’s tone and story line. That compact has been broken, most thoroughly now, by them in this second series. I wish they had never started this and once I’m done with this series, I’ll be done with them as authors.
Once again, Indie authors disappoint me and let me down. How typical.
★★✬☆☆
From the Publisher
The Legion has landed…
The Republic world of Kima has fallen with shocking speed to the renewed forces of the Mid-Core Rebellion, and General Chhun must lead the rebuilt and enhanced 131st Legion-along with Marines, Dark Ops, Navy, and Kimbrin Resistance-onto the planet to violently check their assault.
But timing is of the essence, and Chhun can’t do it alone. Bear, working undercover, unearths the treachery of a resurgent Nether Ops still working their dark influence from the shadows. Masters has his hands full just staying alive while he evades deadly pursuers. And Keel finds himself swept up in intrigues that may make the planetary takeover of Kima all but insignificant.
The battle is fierce and hard, but VICTORY is always within reach so long as the Legion-remade to its initial purpose-remains to fight.
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: Life, the Universe and Everything
Series: THGttG #3
Author: Douglas Adams
Rating: 2 of 5 Stars
Genre: SF
Pages: 126
Words: 53K
This was stupid. It wasn’t funny, it wasn’t amusing, it didn’t tell a story. It was simply stupid and Adams completely wasted my time with this utter piece of drivel.
Don’t be like the Chartreuse Emperor and read this book, or you’ll go insane. That’s a DoUbLe BoBa FaCt PrOmIsE!
★★☆☆☆
From Wikipedia
After being stranded on pre-historic Earth after the events in The Restaurant at the End of the Universe, Arthur Dent is met by his old friend Ford Prefect, who drags him into a space-time eddy, represented by an anachronistic sofa. The two end up at Lord’s Cricket Ground two days before the Earth’s destruction by the Vogons. Shortly after they arrive, a squad of robots land in a spaceship in the middle of the field and attack the assembled crowd, stealing the Ashes before departing. Another spaceship arrives, the Starship Bistromath, helmed by Slartibartfast, who discovers he is too late to stop the theft and requests Arthur and Ford’s help.
As they travel to their next destination, Slartibartfast explains that he is trying to stop the robots from collecting all the components of the Wikkit Gate. Long ago, the peaceful population of the planet of Krikkit, unaware of the rest of the Universe due to a dust cloud that surrounded its solar system, were surprised to find the wreckage of a spacecraft on their planet. Reverse engineering the vessel, they explored past the dust cloud and saw the rest of the Universe, immediately taking a disliking to it and deciding that it must be destroyed. They built a fleet of ships and robots to attack the rest of the Universe in a brutal onslaught known as the Krikkit Wars, but were eventually defeated. Realizing that the Krikkit population would not be satisfied alongside the existence of the rest of the Universe, it was decided to lock the planet in a Slo-Time envelope, to be opened only after the Universe has ended so that the planet can exist alone. The Wikkit Gate, shaped exactly like a wicket used in the sport of cricket, is needed to unlock the envelope. However, one ship carrying a troop of robots from Krikkit avoided being sealed in, and these robots began to search for the pieces of the Gate after they were dispersed about space and time.
Slartibartfast, Arthur, and Ford transport to an airborne party that has lasted numerous generations where another Gate component, the Silver Bail, is to be found, but Arthur finds himself separated from the others and ends up at a Cathedral of Hate created by a being called Agrajag. Agrajag reveals that he has been reincarnated countless times in a wide variety of forms, only to be killed by Arthur in each life; he now plans to kill Arthur in revenge. However, upon learning that Arthur has yet to cause his death at a place called Stavromula Beta, Agrajag realizes that he has pulled Arthur out of his relative timeline too soon and that killing him now would cause a paradox, but attempts to kill Arthur anyway. In his insanity, Agrajag brings the Cathedral down around them. Arthur manages to escape unharmed, partially due to learning how to fly after falling and missing the ground while catching sight of a bag he had lost at a Greek airport years before. After collecting the bag, Arthur inadvertently comes across the flying party and rejoins his friends. Inside, they find Trillian, but they are too late to stop the robots from stealing the Silver Bail. Arthur, Ford, Trillian, and Slartibartfast return to the Bistromath and try to head off the robots activating the Wikkit Gate.
Meanwhile, the Krikkit robots steal the last two pieces, the Infinite Improbability Drive core from the spaceship Heart of Gold and a peg leg used by Marvin the Paranoid Android. They capture both Marvin and Zaphod Beeblebrox in the process.
The Bistromath arrives too late to stop the robots from opening the Gate, so its occupants transport to the planet to attempt to negotiate with the Krikkit people. To their surprise, they find that the people seem to lack any desire to continue the war, and are directed to the robot and spaceship facilities in orbit about the planet. With help from Zaphod and Marvin, the group is able to infiltrate the facilities. Trillian deduces that the Krikkiters have been manipulated, reasoning that the people of Krikkit could not simultaneously be smart enough to develop their ultimate weapon—a bomb that could destroy every star in the universe—and also stupid enough not to realize that this weapon would also destroy them.
The characters discover that the true force behind the war has been the supercomputer Hactar. Previously built to serve a war-faring species, Hactar was tasked to build a supernova-bomb that would link the cores of every sun in the Universe together at the press of a button and cause the end of the Universe. Hactar purposely created a dud version of the weapon instead, causing his creators to pulverize him into dust, which thus became the dust cloud around Krikkit. However, Hactar was still able to function, though at a much weaker level. Trillian and Arthur speak to Hactar in a virtual space that he creates for them to explain himself. Hactar reveals that he spent eons creating the spaceship that crashed on Krikkit to inspire their xenophobia and incite them to go to war, also influencing their thoughts. However, when the Slo-Time envelope was activated, his control on the population waned. As he struggles to remain functional, Hactar apologizes to Trillian and Arthur for his actions before they leave for their ship.
With the war over, the group collects the core of the Heart of Gold and the Ashes, the only two components of the Wikkit Gate not destroyed by the robots, and returns Zaphod and Marvin to the Heart of Gold. Returning to Lord’s Cricket Ground only moments after the robots’ attack, Arthur attempts to return the Ashes, but is suddenly inspired to bowl one shot at a wicket that is being defended using a cricket ball in his bag. However, during his run-up, Arthur suddenly realizes that the ball was created and placed in his bag by Hactar and is actually the working version of the cosmic-supernova-bomb, and that the defender of the wicket is one of the Krikkit robots, ready to detonate the bomb once thrown. Arthur trips, misses the ground, and flies over the pitch, allowing him to throw the bomb safely aside and behead the robot with its own bat.
Afterward, the group are taking Arthur to a ‘quiet and idyllic planet’ when they come across a half-mad journalist. Some time earlier, he had been reporting on a court case in which a witness named Prak was inadvertently given an overdose of a truth drug. Prak began to tell all truth, horrifying the involved parties so badly that they abandoned the courtroom and sealed it up with him inside. The group find him still there, hoping to learn from him the Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe and Everything. They are disappointed to find that Prak has told all the truth in existence, but has forgotten it and kept no record. The only information he can provide is that the Ultimate Question and its answer can never both be known about in the same universe. He then attempts to tell Arthur where God’s last message to His creation is, though he dies seemingly before Arthur is able to memorize the location.
Arthur ultimately settles on Krikkit, where he becomes a more skillful flier and learns bird language. He is briefly interrupted by the arrival of an immortal alien who has made it his goal to insult every living creature in the universe, but the alien realizes that he has already done so with Arthur on prehistoric Earth.
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 Amazing Mrs Pollifax
Series: Mrs Pollifax #2
Author: Dorothy Gilman
Rating: 3.5 of 5 Stars
Genre: Thriller
Pages: 173
Words: 60K
Another wonderful adventure. Oh, I absolutely ADORE Emily Pollifax. She is the kind of person I wish I could meet more of in real life. She doesn’t ignore the horrible situation that she finds herself in in this story (chased by damned commies, governmental agencies of other countries and a rogue double agent) but through it all, she perseveres. If I had been in her situation, I would have crumbled into a smear of ash and blown away into the winds.
Another thing I appreciate about these stories, at least so far, is that nothing feels outlandish. I don’t feel like Gilman pulls authorial fiat just to increase the drama. Her story telling is real and organic and I could totally see things like this happening. Things go wrong in situations and when you’re dealing with spies, counter-spies and double agents, things going wrong is a very bad thing. It just felt “real”. Doesn’t mean it is, but as a casual reader, I was never taken out of the story. Mrs Pollifax doesn’t jump down a 10 story building, shoot 50 badguys and then flap her magical wings and fly to the moon. She puts her head down, she hides with gypsies and she simply tries to survive and do her best to get the woman she was supposed to contact out of the country. And she does it! Without whining or complaining. Amazing!!!!!! Authors today could take a page from Gilman’s style, that is for sure.
★★★✬☆
From Wikipedia.org
For this novel, Mrs. Pollifax is tasked by Mr. Carstairs, her CIA superior, to go to Turkey[2][3] and contact Magda Ferenci-Sabo, a known Russian spy and secret double agent[4] who is defecting to the Free World. Emily Pollifax is to give Magda money and a passport which will enable the former spy to leave Turkey. Although Carstairs gives Mrs. Pollifax only 30 minutes to get ready, the plucky widow is ready for another adventure. She flies to Turkey and sees Magda, but is unable to make personal contact before Magda flees. In pursuing her mission, Mrs. Pollifax embarks on a wild ride, matching wits with a diabolical double agent, traveling with Gypsies,[3][5] and again surviving imprisonment. However, characteristically, she befriends unlikely allies along her way.
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 WordPresss & Blogspot by Bookstooge’s Exalted Permission
Title: The Ghost Makers
Series: The Shadow #16
Authors: Maxwell Grant
Rating: 3.5 of 5 Stars
Genre: Crime Fiction
Pages: 120
Words: 37K
A bunch of scam artists pretend to be able to talk to the dead and bilk idiots out of their money. This is only possible if you don’t believe in soul sleep. Which I doubt any of you do. So prepare yourselves to get bilked, because the Amazing Bookstoogio will now do something that no one has ever done before.
I will end this review before it even gets started. Tada!
Now give me your money!
★★★✬☆
From Bookstooge.blog
Fake Mystics from India are fleecing the dumb and gullible nitwits here in the United States. The Shadow can’t stand for that, so he steps in and sends his own gullible nitwit against the fakirs, Detective Cardona. The whole gang is wrapped up and Cardona gets the accolades.
With Solar System Alpha Prime now protected by the Solar Guardians of Sun, Moon and Earth, we now return to our on-going story of the Mad Emperor Bookstooge and his quest of dire vengeance upon the Pegleg Pirate Ninja, the Hero of the People. Last we saw Hero, he was Flying Deep into the Mountains of Night, the last stronghold on Earth3.
Hero was hoping to gain an alliance with the Spirit of the World Garden, who was so powerful that she had kept the Mad Emperor at bay by her simple refusal to have anything to do with him. An act of utter negation as it were. It was through her power that Alpha Prime had been protected. While Hero sought an alliance, to use the Mountains of Night as a base of operations, Emperor Bookstooge had sought a crack into the World Garden. He had found a thread, a crack through Hero’s flight.
It was all a charade. Hero was no more a threat to the Mad Emperor than you or I would have been. The crack into the World Garden had been sought and with Hero’s unknowing aid, it was now found.
Would this spell the corruption of the World Garden? Would its power be co-opted to slake the Mad Emperor’s thirst for conquest of the stars themselves? Or would this attack upon her power simply make her even stronger, more impervious? Destruction, Stagnation or Growth?
Once again, I must apologize dear reader, for your humble narrator has no idea. Is the future safe, are the Stars themselves about to be conquered? We are all on this adventure of discovery together. Until next month, I bid you adieu.
~the mad laughter of a Mad Emperor rolls across the cosmos~
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...
