Book Blog
September 14, 2025
‘d hung onto this book since 1986, given how I remembered enjoying it. And only when I located it again during the great termite disaster of ’25 did I realize that the author was none other than George R.R. Martin, famed for his “Game of Thrones” series. What did I remember? That cats. So this series of short stories begins with Haviland Tuf, a huge, hairless and chalk-white man of refined vegetarian tastes, aboard his tramp freighter (of the starship variety) with two cats (who are rare in this future galaxy). His current job is to ferry a number of […]
September 7, 2025
kay, it’s the reader’s osculation, I suppose, for lack of a better phrase. You read a bad book and limp to the conclusion, then follow it with a good book, which becomes a delight (perhaps, in no small part, by comparison). But after limping through a mediocre book, I hit on Gareth L. Powell’s Embers of War and suddenly I have a book I found myself making time for. This story is told from various points of view and begins when five battle cruisers (the Trouble Dog among them – they form a pack of human/canine stem-celled AI to control their ships) […]
August 31, 2025
ince I now have $500 in store credit at a used bookstore, I decided I had to start spending, so yes, I got a new (used) book. The Last World War was published in 2003 by Dayton Ward. In it, aliens engaged in a civil war find a portal technology that allows them access to Earth (no messy spaceships or giant Martian guns to muck around with). Just walk on through like a door frame (more on this in a bit). One of the portals pops open in a Marine training base in the midwest, where reservists are engaged in […]
August 16, 2025
ve read another one of Author Mitch Albom’s books, The Five People You Meet In Heaven, and that was an interesting novel that I really enjoyed (read before I was reviewing everything, like now). Anyway, in this book (with the secondary title of “an old man, a young man, and life’s greatest lesson”) was a curious thing. At the time it made a big splash. A barista at the coffee house told me she cried while reading it. As for me? Well… To start, Morrie Schwartz is an old college professor who discovers he has Lou Gehrig’s disease, a degenerative […]
August 10, 2025
ne day, I came into Framework Coffee and found all the baristas agitated. They’d discovered a new fantasy novel and were racing through it, eagerly chatting about the crazy and wonderful plot. Jacob and Maddy both were loving it and knowing my own passion for books (I go to that coffee shop more times with a book than my wife, and when I do go with the wife, I bring a book) they implored I read it too. So that day I picked up a copy. And now I have a strong contender for Best Books of 2025. As mentioned, it’s […]
July 27, 2025
his is one of the classics from the year I left high school, a watermark novel about a futuristic mercenary tank group, their armor no longer obtainable as economies falter (but the need for them growing, for the same reason). So the Slammers move from planet to planet, signing contracts and squishing rebels, militias, and other poorly-armed rabble. The thing is, Drake really did a good job charting out what futuristic combat might turn into (and it’s borne fruit in the half-century since this book’s release). These massive hovertanks are monitored and guided from orbit, swatting down artillery shells with […]
July 20, 2025
o here’s an interesting concept from 1977, an alien world where flying humanoid reptiles have been preying on fish people. And since these fish people can’t fight for shit, they make a contract with the March People (cats, it appears, what with the fur, sliding claws and quick tempers) to fight their wars for them. So these fish somehow figure out how to build nimble biplanes (I’m thinking Newport 11s) and, quickly, dart-driven machine guns to protect everyone. So that’s the set up; cats in planes dogfighting (catfightng) with spear-throwing bats. Author S. Kye Boult (not his real name) produced […]
July 13, 2025
nd we’re done! It’s been a long fifteen books about the plucky little destroyer, the USS Walker, chased by the Japanese out of World War Two and into this alternative world where velociraptors and lemors evolved to sentience, where English Indiamen, Spanish conquistadors, a boatload of American artillerymen from the Mexican-American war, a battle group from a fascist Europe and even a Q-ship from World War One came into being. Yes, a long slow slog against baddies so bad they made your teeth hurt. And all through this, I kept waiting to find out that the series had ended prematurely, […]