Brain Thief by Alexander Jablokov

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Brain Thief by Alexander Jablokov seems like the type of book I would love. It has a lot of quirky characters and a road trip. But for some reason it never clicked for me. Jablokov took a decade off from writing novels to pursue a career (apparently feeding his kids and family is important to him for some reason) and this was his return venture

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How to Train Your Dragon review

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Went to see How To Train Your Dragon in 3-D and was mediocrely surprised. It’s apparent that it wasn’t designed for 3-D and it was just added on after the success of Avatar. The 3-D was mediocre at best and the animation was passable if not decent. They made pretty much every viking look alike except for the hero and his band of merry men and women. But was it worth the money?

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Voice of the Fire by Alan Moore

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Voice of the Fire is Alan Moore’s first prose novel. It’s probably his second published prose story (after A Hypothetical Lizard (published in volume 3 of Liavak collections and republished in 1988 The Year’s Best Fantasy).  Voice of the Fire was originally published in the UK in 1996, but didn’t get a US version until 2004. It’s a more of a collection of 12 short stories, than a true novel, with each story set in Moore’s hometown of North Hampton, England and set in a different era from 4000 BC to 1995 CE.

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Caprica mid season review

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I really want to like Caprica. It has an interesting premise, good actors and some wonderful characters. But when they spend time on uninteresting characters who have storylines that don’t make sense, it makes it difficult to keep watching. But there is a lot of promise that the show needs to capitalize on before it’s another failed show. Let’s take a review of the show now that it’s reached it’s mid-season break.

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Older Books You Should Read – Stranger in a Strange Land by Robert Heinlein

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Stranger in a Strange Land by Robert Heinlein was the start of a new era for Heinlein. His previous book Starship Troopers finished a series of 19 novels published between 1947 and 1959 (18 if you don’t count Sixth Column which was serialized in 1941). To celebrate, Heinlein took a year off and nothing was published in 1960. Stranger in a Strange Land is very different than previous Heinlein books and I don’t think anyone suspected the success that followed, not only in science fiction circles but in the growing counter culture as well.

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High Society by Dave Sim

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High Society (Cerebus, Volume 2) by Dave Sim captures the first 25 of an amazing 125 issue run of comics (unfortunately it kept going for a mediocre to bad additional 150 issues).  This collection shows Sim starting to master his satire of politics, religion and comics that made Cerebus such a successful comic. In High Society, Sim starts pulling together the characters he had created in his first 25 issues and sets the stage for the rest of the series.

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Older movies you should watch – Brazil

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Brazil by Terry Gilliam has nothing to do with the country of Brazil. The title comes from the memorable repeated song “Aquarela do Brasil”. And the story behind the movie is almost as compelling as the movie itself. But it should be noted that Brazil is one of the science fiction masterpieces that had fans whispering to each other “Have you seen Brazil?”

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The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot

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The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot is the first non-fiction book that I’m reviewing. And as the healthcare debate is winding up, The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks deals with medical research and ethics and the impact of technology on people’s lives. And as the author traces the history of Henrietta Lacks cells through the medical world, many issues are raised where there are no answers (easy or hard).

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The Merchant Princes series by Charles Stross

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The Merchant Princes series by Charles Stross is the best use of science-fiction, the real world and fantasy since Magic Kingdom For Sale/Sold by Terry Brooks. Unfortunately Stross has the same problem that Brooks did, the longer the series goes the worse it gets. Stross does do some interesting and new things in the book which make it start off wonderfully for a couple books. Then the rot slowly seeps in and drags the series down.

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Veracity by Laura Bynum

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Veracity by Laura Bynum is the author’s first book. She has always had an interest in how language and words can shape perception and allow people to cede control of their lives. And this is a major theme in her novel. The book is an interesting twist on Margaret Atwood’s novel The Handmaid’s Tale, but with a different goal in mind.

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