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Showing posts from September, 2015

REVIEW: THE MARTIAN

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INTRODUCTION Science Fiction is a genre full of possibilities. It can be as wild or as grounded as an author wants their work to be. You can even see traces of it in sub-genres like Dystopic YA books and Super Hero fiction. There's just a lot of variety to enjoy as a SciFi fan and it's books like Andy Weir's THE MARTIAN that really drive that point home. HOW I CAME UPON IT I'd heard about THE MARTIAN from a number of sources on Goodreads and BookTube (YouTube). Ultimately, I picked it up for the BookTubeSFF readalong which ran during August. I wound up finishing it a little later than I wanted to so I am just now getting around to the review. The book itself has a really interesting story in that it was first indie published online, chapter by chapter, then was put up as a cheap Kindle book and recently got picked up by a publisher AND there is now a movie soon to be released based on it starring Matt Damon. Needless to say I was very excited to dive into this on

MINI REVIEW: THE MEEKER AND THE ALL-SEEING EYE

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INTRODUCTION  Every now and then, I come across something that resonates with me in an unexpected way. Sometimes this is due to a plot unlike any other, a particular narration technique that  would only work for that specific story, or perhaps just a nice twist at the end. In any case, I really enjoy being surprised by works of fiction and Matthew Kressel's short story, "THE MEEKER AND THE ALL-SEEING EYE" is certainly a story that gave me that sort of satisfying bewilderment which I look for in science fiction and fantasy. HOW I CAME UPON IT  This is one of the stories up for the Best Short Fiction award in the BookTubeSFF Awards. I've been putting it off since I knew that it would be a short read, but since September is nearly at its end, I figured it would be best to finally experience the phenomenon that is "THE MEEKER AND THE ALL-SEEING EYE." HOW I RATED IT  4/5  I would not go so far as to say this is the best short story ever, nor is entirely

REVIEW: THE STRANGE LIBRARY

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INTRODUCTION I like trying new things. New foods, different videogames, new TV shows, new ways of doing things. You get the idea. This is also true of my approach to reading and writing. I've always been one to want to delve into something that's unique or different in some way. One of the ways I've been doing that is by participating in the BookTube SFF Awards where I've been reading some of the nominees in different categories. One such book was Haruki Murukami's THE STRANGE LIBRARY . I didn't really know what to expect other than that this would be a weird one and I was excited to see just what this book had in store. HOW I CAME UPON IT Like I mentioned before, this is one of the BookTube SFF nominees. Prior to seeing this book on the shortlist, I'd never really heard about either this book or even the author in general. The only other thing worth noting is that I bought this as an eBook since I kind of waited till the last minute to make my purcha

BOOK TALK: GRIM'S FAIRY STORIES

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Fairy Tales are basically synonymous with childhood. I grew up with them being told to me, seeing them re-imagined in Disney movies, and read re-written versions of these classic tales. But much later in life, I realized that I didn't actually know the original versions of the tales that filled the early years of my life. I think what was most interesting about reading these is that I am of the opinion that retold or otherwise modernized versions are just so much better than the Grimm Brothers' original iterations. Am I aware that this is an entirely unfair and liberally subjective statement? Yes, yes I am, that's why this is a Book Talk and not a Book Review. I think some works of fiction fall into such a classic status that they truly are beyond reproach. This work is one of them, but I am still allowed to have certain feelings towards it. I think that fiction like this should be read by everyone, especially if you have fond memories of the more recent works that it

UPDATE: AND THE WINNER IS...

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With a few months left to go in 2015, I am very happy that I have already completed my 2015 Reading Challenge on Goodreads. Most people probably won't be impressed that I only had a goal of twenty books (especially those who can read that many in 1-2 months), but for me that seemed like a rather daunting challenge. See, I've had sort of a sour taste for reading for a long time. This is largely because of large quantities of required, academic reading. While I won't go into a deeper criticism of the education system, I will say that school, both at High School and University levels really killed my passion for reading. I'd come to think of reading as a sort of chore or burden and that's something I wanted to try and overcome. Having recently struggled with a bit of a reading slump, I think I may have had a bit of a relapse in this mentality, but I pulled through and can now happily state that my goal has been met and I can look forward to pushing myself to see

REVIEW: BROODING CITY

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INTRODUCTION  Mysteries have always been a bit of a love/hate deal with me. When done well, I find myself in a world of conspiracy, intrigue, lies, and carefully crafted investigations that navigate the webs of deception which are spun by a host of parties with different secrets to hide. Unfortunately, the mystery genre is also a rather saturated one. Between all the crime dramas on television and the large quantities of murder mystery literature that are readily available, I tend to find mystery stories to be a bit predictable and a tad formulaic. There are certainly a lot of ways to mix it up though and one method is to throw in a bit of the paranormal. That is largely what Tom Shutt has done with his debut novel BROODING CITY .  HOW I CAME UPON IT Tom Shutt is an indie author who offered ARC copies of this novel prior to it's launch. I already rated and left a temporary review of it on Goodreads and now I have composed my complete thoughts on what was fun about this pa

BOOK TALKS: AN INTRODUCTION

What is a Book Talk? Why do one? Why not just stick with standard reviews? To be totally clear, reviews won't be going anywhere. They will continue to be the major attraction of this blog and my favorite part of running it. Book Talks are a new feature coming up because there are certain books I'd like to post about but might not feel comfortable or inclined to do a full review for. These might include books that are considered classics, books I read a while back and may not remember all of the details on, or books that I didn't care for due to my own preferences rather than by any fault of the work itself. Ultimately these will just be a less formal sort of post about my reactions to Fiction that would feel weird to review. The first of these will be on Grim's Fairy Stories. While I may still post a short review of this on Amazon and Goodreads in regards to the audio book edition, it definitely feels rather bold to write a full review on these beloved and classic t

UPDATE: FILLING A VOID

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It's been a while since I made a post of any kind regarding books. It might seem strange then that this post will actually be about a computer game. It may even seem blasphemous to post about such a thing on a book blog, but I've discovered some things about myself as a reader during my time with this game and so I figured I'd make a post about it. Before jumping into the wild world of Guild Wars 2, an online fantasy MMORPG (Massively Multiplayer Role Playing Game) I found myself falling into a bit of a reading slump. At the time I really couldn't say why. I've had a fantastic reading year so far, maybe the best I've ever had. And as a previous post stated, I was very nearly done with the Goodreads 2015 Reading Challenge. I felt extremely excited to wrap this up and had four books already in the works, but I just stopped feeling compelled to read and suddenly downloaded Guild Wars 2 which I had purchased and played a good while ago, but really didn't t

UPDATE: IT'S BEEN A LITTLE WHILE

It has been a very long time since my last post. I've fallen into a bit of a reading slump in addition to having things that have absorbed a lot of my time. Family stuff, a recent trip, and general busyness have slowed down my reading progress a bit, but there will be a number of posts coming up very soon. If you ever follow me on Goodreads then you'll know that I did recently complete my 2015 Reading Challenge so the review of that book will be coming up shortly along with a short reflection on my experiences with the challenge. I also have a brand new type of post coming up where I will be giving a Book Talk rather than a Review. Before I post that I might just deliver a short entry explaining the difference between the two within the context of this specific blog so that there isn't too much confusion. I also have a rather lengthy post explaining how I fell into my reading slump, things I learned while in it, and how I hope to bounce back a little from it. All this t