Reading – Page 10 – The Warbler Books

The Great Bazaar & Brayan’s Gold – Peter V. Brett

May 31, 2015 1 Comment

You may recall my less-than-stellar review of the best-selling first novel in Peter Brett’s Demon Cycle series, The Warded Man. In that review, I complained that there were too many clichés, too many fantasy tropes that felt weak, too little that made the book really stand out as exemplary. There was a significant caveat to those statements, you may also recall. I emphasized that many of the issues I took with the book were most likely caused by the Graphic Audio production, which left me confused more often than not, and generally whitewashed the characters by making nearly everyone a boorish country bumpkin. Ultimately, I found the story beneath the sound effects, accents, and ear-splitting shrieks to be one that I knew I would enjoy if I’d read it myself. I haven’t read The Warded Man on paper yet, but I will, and soon. Why, you ask? A few

Ready Player One – Ernest Cline

May 27, 2015 No Comments

Okay. I don’t know why I waited so long to read this. The title stared at me from the glowing screen of my kindle for months, and I kept thinking I’ll get to it when I get to it and moving on, reading other books, the majority of which were excellent. But why did I wait so long for this one?! Ready Player One is Ernest Cline’s first novel, and it’ll be a tough act to follow. Fortunately, he seems up to the task with Armada, his forthcoming novel which appears to be about an alien invasion that reminds the intrepid protagonist of his favorite video games and sci-fi. Cline may have a certain theme he likes to work with, but that’s fine by me, given how much I liked Ready Player One. A love song to the 80s by way of Willy Wonka, Dan Brown, and Snow Crash, Ready

Love in the Time of Cholera – Gabriel Garcia Marquez

May 18, 2015 3 Comments

Based on some cursory research of reviews of this book, it appears that those who’ve read it fall very neatly into two camps: absolutely hated this book, or were completely changed by it. Keep in mind that the “research” I conducted was looking at Love in the Time of Cholera’s Goodreads page and skimming the comments, most of which were either 1-2 stars, or 5 stars. Love in the Time of Cholera by Nobel prize-winning author Gabriel Garcia Marquez is, if anything, an artful high-prose novel which desperately seeks to proselytize the Truth that Love is the single and solitary motivating emotion. It does so in a way that, truth be told, I found difficult to care about. Cholera is a timeline-jumping, whiny tale about unrequited love. Its cast is composed of adulterers, jealous husbands and wives, controlling parental figures; vacuous souls consumed with petty selfishness and greed which masquerades as

Out of the Mouth of the Dragon – Mark S. Geston

May 17, 2015 No Comments

In the weeks leading up to my departure from Seattle, I made a habit of stopping by Opheila’s Books, which was about a 10 minute walk from my apartment, almost every day. It smelled of old books, and was staffed by a funky, lovely lady and her friendly cat, which would loudly meow if you stopped rubbing him behind the ears. It dealt primarily in used books, so there ended up being a relatively regular rotation of titles coming through. One day, giddy with excitement, the lady informed me that she scored a great collection of old pulp sci-fi novels from the late 60s through the late 70s. Based on the covers alone, I selected three. Among these was Mark S. Geston’s Out of the Mouth of the Dragon, predominantly because its cover reminded me of a darker version of Hayao Miyazaki’s Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind. The

Legion: Skin Deep – Brandon Sanderson

May 8, 2015 No Comments

In my last review I mentioned that right after reading Altered Perceptions, the final 20% of which was composed entirely of an early draft of Brandon Sanderson’s The Way of Kings, I read Brandon’s (second) most recent novella, Legion: Skin Deep. (I say second there because in the intervening week I noticed he released another novella.) Legion: Skin Deep is the sequel to Legion — which I read, thoroughly enjoyed, and didn’t review — both of which feature the same rather peculiar protagonist. Stephen Leeds is a man with multiple personalities. The catch? His personalities aren’t quite hallucinations. And he uses their help to solve mysteries. Sound fun? It is! In the first book, he takes catches a flight to Israel to recover a camera that can (presumably) take photos of the past. It’s action-packed, fun, quirky, and leans heavily on one of the most unique character dynamics I’ve read

Altered Perceptions Anthology – Various

April 26, 2015 1 Comment

I heard about this anthology through the twitter accounts of the hosts of Writing Excuses, a podcast I’ve mentioned before on the Warbler, of which I’m rather fond. You’ll notice on that image of the cover that it was edited by none other than Brandon Sanderson, whose novels I’ve reviewed before, a few times. The anthology features the work of some 30 authors, alongside essays detailing their personal experiences relating to mental illness. I suppose that’s how I should have started this review. Altered Perceptions was compiled as a fundraiser, to help author Robison Wells out of a financial hole caused by four debilitating mental illnesses. Authors clamored for the opportunity to partake in this campaign, which ran on Indiegogo and raised over $120,000 toward the cause. I hadn’t heard of almost all of the writers from this anthology, and truth be told, I probably won’t be buying many

Passport to the Cosmos – Dr. John E. Mack

April 19, 2015 No Comments

And now for something completely different. Many of you, my adoring fans, are fully aware that I have a casual obsession with UFOs and “aliens.” I haven’t been abducted — and my general feelings on the abduction phenomenon are complicated at best — and I think I’ve seen a flying object of unknown (read: non-earthly) origin, but I like to maintain a healthy skepticism about the UFO/ET community, lest my hair begin to rise and I start declaiming that I’ve been given an honorary doctorate, and suddenly I get the privilege of a television program on which I deliver some nonsensical ramblings on how the only way primitive cultures could have survived without modern science is through alien intervention. The creation of megalithic structures that we still don’t fully understand notwithstanding, there’s definitely something fishy going on here. At the very least, it is mathematically (scientifically) impossible that we are

Kafka on the Shore – Haruki Murakami

April 11, 2015 No Comments

There are occasions when I find that I have to take a break from Fantasy, and I lean toward other fiction in the hopes of broadening my horizons on many levels, most specifically the level of my own writing. So imagine my combined elation and dismay at discovering that Haruki Murakami’s Kafka on the Shore is definitely fantasy-adjacent, ripe with magical realism and metaphysical meditations. It is exquisitely written, deeply intriguing, and simply good reading. It is complicated and thought-provoking, and is an altogether outstanding read. Easily one of the best books I’ve read in a while. As I read through Kafka on the Shore, I realized that I very rarely read work by authors outside of the US or greater British Commonwealth, and I think that’s a tragedy I desperately need to mitigate by making some changes to my to-read list. (Fortunately, I’m currently reading Carlos Ruiz Zafon’s The

The Farseer Trilogy – Robin Hobb

February 22, 2015 No Comments

Time and again I’ve had Robin Hobb’s Farseer Trilogy recommended to me, and I can’t recall who it was that finally persuaded me to pick up and read Assassin’s Apprentice. In truth, it was probably Mark Lawrence, whose twitter feed I find delightfully entertaining. Anyway, I had just finished reading a short story he’d penned called During the Dance which, while it was a tiny morsel of a thing, was nevertheless an outstanding reading experience. Enormously different from his other work. Just after I finished it, Mr. Lawrence, announced on twitter that he can’t praise Robin Hobb highly enough, and so it was that I picked up the audiobook of Assassin’s Apprentice, and started my journey in the Six Duchies with Fitz Farseer. The world Robin Hobb has built in this trilogy (and in 12 subsequent books, I’ve since learned,) overflows with character and life. Told as it is, in first person, it is tinted with

Abomination – Gary Whitta

February 9, 2015 1 Comment

A few weeks ago I was contacted by Adam from Inkshares, who wanted to know if I’d be willing to review an upcoming book from a Mr. Gary Whitta. Obviously, I accepted, because that is awesome. I hadn’t heard of Inkshares, so I headed to the site to check it out, and I was very pleased with what I found. So pleased, in fact, that as soon as I’ve got a finished project, I’m going to be submitting it to Inkshares for hopeful publication. The two-word pitch for Inkshares: crowdfunded publishing. Now, before you scoff and say “oh no, another Kickstarter clone,” let me assure you that Inkshares is doing this right. It seems to me to be the perfect intermediary between self publishing and going through the traditional agent/publisher route. If your book/article/whatever gets funded, Inkshares will provide editing, design, and publication services in both print and digital formats.

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