Review – Page 29 – Robert Raymond’s Blogtorium

November 16, 2025

Will Eisner: New York City (Review)

ack when I was a pre-teen, I started reading The Spirit by Will Eisner. The Spirit was a superhero whose costume was a mask and a blue suit, and whose only powers were his fists, his stamina, his constitution and his charm. And also he was clever – he could outsmart villains and bring them to justice. But what made The Spirit so very amazing to me as a young kid were the backgrounds. Oh, it might have been “Central City” but everyone knew it was New York City. The streets were filled with litter, the brick buildings were worn and leaning, the […]

December 14, 2025

Counting the Cost (Review)

‘ve been a bit remiss in my book reviews lately, largely because I’ve been remiss in reading in general. I’ve been limping through a Carl Sagan book as of late. This isn’t to say it’s a bad read. It’s just not as riveting as fiction. So, to get something out (and to take a break) I grabbed a novel from David Drake (of Hammer’s Slammers fame), Counting the Cost. Had it since 1987 (when it was published) and as soon as I opened it the ancient covers (from and back) broke off. So it’s literally now a paperback. Anyway, the world it takes place on […]

January 4, 2026

Wizenbeak (Review)

hen the novel Wizenbeak came out, you’d probably walk into any mall, look through the one or two bookstores housed there, go to the fantasy section which was greater than the current Barnes and Noble, pick through the many selections and buy it (likely with cash). That’s a period piece of when this book was released (1986, currently forty years ago). Well, most books either come from Massive Amazon, pathetic B&N, or, in this case, a used bookstore. But enough of that. The titular character of this book is a wizard, complete with a troll-bat, who wishes to use his own water […]

January 25, 2026

The Last Enemy (Review)

he Last Enemy is the third book in The Enemy Papers trilogy. You’ll remember that I reviewed the first two, Enemy Mine and The Tomorrow Testament down those links. The entire body of work forms the Human-Drak war. And by the end of the second book, we learn that another alien race (smaller and sneakier) set us up on a collision course for the major powerhouses on the planet Amadeen. There, like the West Bank and Northern Ireland, the war has become splinted and hateful, with groups fighting in the memories of old atrocities. It is so hopeless that thirty years ago […]

February 1, 2026

Flying Fury (Review)

his one took me back – Flying Fury is the war diary of Major James McCudden, English World War One pilot, holder of the VC and victor of 57 air combats. And it was quite the book for me back in my teens – a guy flying about in his SE5a scout, deviling the Hun and fighting from everywhere from tree-top level, all the way up to 20,000 feet (without oxygen, a heated suit, or a parachute). Having been a pilot myself, the thought of fighting it out at my Cessna ceiling of14,000 feet, with nothing but plunging death facing you […]

February 8, 2026

The Cold Equations (Review)

ell, this was a strange way to find a lost story. Was watching an Anime (it wasn’t that good) and in it, the idea of airlocking someone comes up. One of the characters makes a crack about The Cold Equations. I have to admit I was curious and found it online – it’s a scifi from Tom Godwin, published in Astounding Science Fiction in 1954. And that made me dizzy – think about it. A lost story from before I was born ends up noticed in Japan, where it gets a shout out in an anime, which comes back to me through […]

February 22, 2026

Day Zero (Review)

icked this up at a used bookstore in Norfolk on my sister’s store credit (which I cleared out). The cover is interesting – a young boy and some sort of ratty tiger robot looking out over ruined skyscrapers. So when she asked if she could borrow it from me, I pretty much had to agree. But she only got about halfway through before dropping it (she drops easier than I do). “Wasn’t for me,” she explained. So C. Robert Cargill’s novel, Zero Day, is a story about a young boy and his nanny robot that looks like a tiger, who suddenly […]

March 1, 2026

The Warrior (Review)

he Warrior is a David Drake novel, following along in the tank tracks (not correct, since they are hovertanks) of the feared and respected Hammers Slammers, a mercenary tank battalion in the far future. I’ve mentioned a couple of novels from this series, including the titular Hammers Slammers. The thing is, the author is a combat veteran and it shows in the novels. People don’t question, don’t ponder life’s strange events, they simply act. And the tanks they act in are the largest and most dangerous machines in the galaxy. As witness in the three short stories that make up the central […]

March 8, 2026

When the Moon Hits your Eye (Review)

ong time John Scalzi fan, from Old Man’s War to Redshirts to Starter Villain. So when my best friend (and fellow Scalzi fan) told me about this book, I had to immediately say… “What?” Okay, so stay with me. One day, for reasons not given or even hinted, the moon changes… to cheese. It is first noticed in various museums and lunar rock storage areas, where now all they have are lumps of cheese. But it is quickly noticed in the sky – so as not to throw off the tides and wreck havoc, the moon is much bigger (since the mass of cheese […]

March 15, 2026

We’ll Prescribe You a Cat (Review)

he Japanese love cat stories, specially ones that deal with cats interacting and improving their owners. And this book is nothing short of that. Kyoto (as I remember from my trip there) is a town arranged in a neat grid, everything lined up nicely. Further, there is the old geisha quarter just across the river, still active. So, interesting place. What I didn’t know is that is an alley that can only be located if you really need to locate it, one that leads to a run-down building. At the top of five flights of stairs, a large door. Go […]