I heard almost immediately from friends and friends of friends that this was really sad, so I waited months to read it, when normally I’m all over new Saga like cat hair on black pants. It’s like, I get there are going to be sad installments of this series. I do. This is the story of Hazel’s life from beginning, to, well, I don’t know if they’ll end with her being old, but certainly with her as an adult. And there is no way that […]
Just Made That Way
Ancillary Justice by Ann Leckie (2013) – Well, I see what all the fuss is about now. I read a lot of space opera. It’s my favorite genre. But, I have to admit that sometimes it gets a little formulaic. There’s a hero, some political situation, big space ships, possibly aliens, and blasters. Ancillary Justice is anything but predictable. In fact, when it started out, I wasn’t sure who the narrator was. Is he or she the ship? The servants assisting the people in power? […]
Timothy Zahn is back, y’all. And, damn, he gives good villain.
It is quickly coming to the point once again, as it did for me in the early 2000s, where it is simply not feasible for me to read every new canon Star Wars book that comes out. For a while there I was keeping up, but I feel I must concede defeat earlier than my younger self might have: there are too many, and I am too old for all of this. I shall read the ones that my people say are must-reads and I […]
Second Time Around
Leviathan Wakes by James S.A. Corey (2011) – It’s terrible getting halfway through a 750-page book and realizing you’ve read it before. The good news is that the story is so good that I didn’t care. I like a good spaceship crew story and this one combines space opera with a good mystery and a love story. The story is told by the two strong male protagonists, Miller, an alcoholic policeman on Ceres, and Holden, an executive officer aboard an ice mover. When Holden’s ship […]