I’d dropped the blog ball over the weekend. I’ve got less than a week before the Hugo Awards Ceremony announces the winners and about three days before the 1939 Retro Hugo Award winners are revealed. No use crying over spilled milk, though, so on to the novelette category: Continue reading “Hugo Awards Voting Adventure: Best Novelette 2014 and 1939”
Tag: reviewing
The Red Knight by Miles Cameron (5 stars)
This us next up in my ebook reading queue, after I finish Red Seas Under Red Skies. In the meantime, enjoy my uncle’s thoughts on The Red Knight by Miles Cameron, which also comes highly recommended by Stefan Raets at his Far Beyond Reality blog.
Book Review: City of Bones by Wells (3.5 Stars)
Read in November 2011
Synopsis:
In a place where an ancient holocaust devastated civilization and caused most of the world’s water to evaporate, a new civilization has arisen–where sand ships cross the deserts between city-states, where bones are used to work magic of all kinds. Charisat is the greatest of city-states, the Imperial seat where your status is determined by how high up the tiers of the city you live. Khat is a trader and sometime thief, one of a race genetically altered to survive in these new conditions. Elen is a scholar and a lady who is investigating the ancient ruins, looking for the secrets of their magic. Together they must solve a mystery involving a fanatical cult whose members are trying to unleash an evil that will topple Charisat–and from there, destroy the world again
My Thoughts:
I enjoyed Martha Wells writing, Continue reading “Book Review: City of Bones by Wells (3.5 Stars)”
eBook Review: Hollow World by Sullivan (4 out of 5 stars)
Hollow World by Michael J. Sullivan
Read in November 2013
Synopsis:
The future is coming…for some, sooner than others.
Ellis Rogers is an ordinary man who is about to embark on an extraordinary journey. All his life he has played it safe and done the right thing, but when faced with a terminal illness, he’s willing to take an insane gamble. He’s built a time machine in his garage, and if it works, he’ll face a world that challenges his understanding of what it means to be human, what it takes to love, and the cost of paradise. He could find more than a cure for his illness; he might find what everyone has been searching for since time began…but only if he can survive Hollow World.
Continue reading “eBook Review: Hollow World by Sullivan (4 out of 5 stars)”
Audiobook Review: King of Thorns by Lawrence (DNF)
King of Thorns by Mark Lawrence
Fantasy Book Club selection August 2013
Attempted to Read/Listen: August 2013
I tried reading, or rather listening, to this in August 2013 for the GoodReads Fantasy Book Club. We previously read Prince of Thorns as a group in October 2011 and I actually liked the first book of the series. But I had to give up listening at around twenty percent. I may come back to it at a later date, but right now I need something a lot less bleak.
Continue reading “Audiobook Review: King of Thorns by Lawrence (DNF)”
Audiobook Review: Low Town by Polansky (4 Stars)
Read in December 2013
Publisher’s Synopsis:
Drug dealers, hustlers, brothels, dirty politics, corrupt cops . . . and sorcery. Welcome to Low Town.
In the forgotten back alleys and flophouses that lie in the shadows of Rigus, the finest city of the Thirteen Lands, you will find Low Town. It is an ugly place, and its champion is an ugly man. Disgraced intelligence agent. Forgotten war hero. Independent drug dealer. After a fall from grace five years ago, a man known as the Warden leads a life of crime, addicted to cheap violence and expensive drugs. Every day is a constant hustle to find new customers and protect his turf from low-life competition like Tancred the Harelip and Ling Chi, the enigmatic crime lord of the heathens.
Continue reading “Audiobook Review: Low Town by Polansky (4 Stars)”
Book Review: A Highly Unlikely Scenario by Cantor (3 Stars)
A Highly Unlikely Scenario or, a Neetsa Pizza Employee’s Guide to Saving the World by Rachel Cantor
Read in February 2014
Suggested reading for the Kansas City Public Library Adult Winter Reading Program “Stop Me If You’ve Read This One”
Publisher’s Synopsis:
In the not-too-distant future, competing giant fast food factions rule the world. Leonard works for Neetsa Pizza, the Pythagorean pizza chain, in a lonely but highly surveilled home office, answering calls on his complaints hotline. It’s a boring job, but he likes it—there’s a set answer for every scenario, and he never has to leave the house. Except then he starts getting calls from Marco, who claims to be a thirteenth-century explorer just returned from Cathay. And what do you say to a caller like that? Plus, Neetsa Pizza doesn’t like it when you go off script.
Meanwhile, Leonard’s sister keeps disappearing on secret missions with her “book club,” leaving him to take care of his nephew, which means Leonard has to go outside. And outside is where the trouble starts.
My Thoughts:
I read this new novel with every intention of joining the local real-life book discussion group. I try to participate in at least one or two book discussion groups during the annual adult winter reading program at the Kansas City Public Library. Continue reading “Book Review: A Highly Unlikely Scenario by Cantor (3 Stars)”
Movie Review: Seven Days in Utopia (2.5 Stars)
Watched in February 2014
Synopsis from IMdb: After a disastrous debut on the pro circuit, a young golfer finds himself unexpectedly stranded in Utopia, Texas and welcomed by an eccentric rancher.
My Thoughts: Friday night after a short but long week at work and a wicked day of firefighting on the IT front line at a large law firm, I came home to an enjoyable dinner of tasty tacos with my hubby. He had scheduled a band practice for the evening (the second one of the week), so I attempted to read, but couldn’t concentrate. I switch to surfing through my Netflix streaming queue and stumbled across Seven Days in Utopia, seeing that Robert Duvall starred in the movie. You can rarely go wrong watching Duvall, so I started watching while the band in the basement practiced classic rock covers.
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Book Review: The Discovery by Dan Walsh (5 Stars)
I’ll be adding this to be ‘short list’ of to-be-read ebooks based on my uncle’s review and recommendation.
Book Review: The Smith of Wootton Major by Tolkien (4.5 Stars)
The Smith of Wootton Major
by J.R.R. Tolkien
Read in September 2009
Synopsis:
Every twenty-four years in the village of Wootton Major a special edition of the The Feast of Good Children was held. This was a very special occasion and to celebrate it a Great Cake was prepared, to feed the twenty-four children who were invited. The cake was very sweet and rich and entirely covered in sugar icing. But inside there were some very strange ingredients and whoever swallowed one of them would gain the gift of entry into the Land of Faery…
Continue reading “Book Review: The Smith of Wootton Major by Tolkien (4.5 Stars)”