Dummies & Death Rays

Break://

2012-04-18T21:39:00.002+01:00

Back from a little break in beautiful Herefordshire and the surrounding area with the family. Some seriously stunning fantasy scenery, though these are dodgy mobile shots....

First Puzzlewood, which was empty when we first got there and really has a wonderful feel, it's easy to see why it's been used for TV location work (Merlin & Doctor Who recently). Just had me in the mood to sit and read some epic fantasy, which might have been possible if it were not for the two crazy girls exploring with me. :)

Followed by Goodrich castle which was just beautiful...

Read:// Wellsathon 01 - The Stolen Bacillus

2012-04-08T23:52:00.001+01:00

'Yes, here is the pestilence imprisoned. Only break such a little tube as this into a supply of drinking water, say to these minute particles of life that one must needs stain and examine with the highest powers of the microscope even to see, and that one can neither smell nor taste - say to them, "Go forth, increase and multiply, and replenish the cisterns", and death - mysterious, untraceable death, death swift and terrible, death full of pain and indignity - would be released upon this city, and go hither and thither seeking his victims.

A short and sweet one to start off, telling of an anarchist's plans to poison the water supply with a deadly disease, not all goes to plan, and after a brief chase there is a twist to the tale.

Nothing much to say, it's lighthearted despite the topic, I'm not sure it was ever meant to be anything else, though it's hard to imagine how these stories read in their time.

http://www.classicreader.com/book/1423/1/

Want:// Dinocalypse Now

2012-04-08T23:18:00.001+01:00

I've been following Kickstarter for some time now, since there are a few interesting games popping up, and I like the idea generally. A little concerned that you could drop a lot of cash on a stinker, but then I guess that is the risk you take, and that risk may be part of the appeal for some.

I'd not backed anything until I spotted Evil Hat Productions project, The Dinocalypse Trilogy. To be honest they had me at the artwork, but it didn't take long for me to watch the video and decide to pledge my money. They have already passed their target by some way, so the reward for my measly $10 is going to be a whole digital heap of ebooks filled with pulp fiction...ok it could be rubbish....but Psychic Dinosaur Invasion!

I already have a copy of the Spirit of the Century RPG which I've been meaning to play about with, I love the setting, and that whole 1930s crazy pulp thing so I'm really looking forward to reading the first book.

Check it out, I think it could be a fun little project to back.

Read:// Wellsathon 00

2012-04-06T22:58:00.000+01:00

So after nearly two years of broken nights sleep, my youngest daughter has finally started sleeping through a little more regularly, and consequently I find myself able to concentrate a little more on books and hopefully some gaming. Two years of bad nights is going to take some catching up though, so I'm not jumping into any epic books just yet, so I hunted around for some short stories to keep me entertained over the next few weeks.

I found this sitting neglected on my shelves....

...and I thought it would be a fine idea to read through the thing, a story or two at a time, in my own little H.G.Wells-athon.

Most people are more familiar with Wells' big books like War of the Worlds, Dr Moreau, and The Time Machine, but he also wrote a great many short stories, something that many science fiction authors who have followed him have continued to do. To me the short story form has always been closely tied with genre fiction, I grew up reading short stories in magazines and anthologies, and I still believe it is an almost perfect form for a science fiction tale.

Anyway, don't expect any in depth literary criticism, I'm just going to read and blog as I do. I'll try and link to the story too, since I imagine they are mostly in the public domain.

Thoughts:// Doctor Who: Solitaire Story Game

2012-03-28T14:18:00.000+01:00

In a bit of a Doctor Who mood, I've always had a soft spot for our particularly British slice of fantasy, I find it hard calling it science fiction but I guess that label fits for TV purposes.

I've always thought the whoniverse would make a great setting for solitaire adventures, since the adventures can go anywhere in time and space which gives plenty of scope for random creativity. Seems I wasn't the only one, in 2009 a chap named Simon Cogan released the free Doctor Who: Solitaire Story Game into the wild, and it has been not so gradually expanded over the last few years to contain a huge amount of material. It really is a labour of love from an obvious fan of the series, the amount of work that has gone into these books and expansions is quite unbelievable for what is a freely available game.

I'm not going to go into much detail here, but to give you an idea...

It's a numbered paragraph system split across four core books, rules, adventures, enemies, and events. During the game you will go to locations in the adventure book, perform one of a number of actions, roll for encounters which may lead you to the event book, or to a fight using the enemy book, you'll resolve plots to complete adventures, meet characters, gain and lose companions, and that's just what I can remember right at the moment. If you ever played the old game Barbarian Prince, you may see some similarities since I think there is some connection there at least in inspiration. The rules book will lead you through the system, but there is a great community at the game's yahoo group if you do need to ask any questions.

The game can be played using just those four core books, some d6 dice, and pencil and paper; although I've taken to using PDFs on my computer, dicetool, and Microsoft Onenote for this sort of thing so I may do that to speed things up a little.

Next post on this will be some sort of session report or review, and since I'm on a Doctor Who kick there are a couple of other ideas I have floating around so they may turn up too.

Play:// Party of 1: Kalgor Bloodhammer and the Ghouls Through the Breach (solo adventure)

2012-03-27T23:35:00.000+01:00

Was in the mood so I snagged myself a copy of Party of 1: Kalgor Bloodhammer and the Ghouls Through the Breach, and I've just given it a quick play so I thought I'd post a little review.

So what do you get for you hard earned Flainian Pobble Beads?.....well you get a nicely formatted 14 page, numbered paragraph adventure. It's essentially a small gamebook in the tradition of Fighting Fantasy using the OGL for the rules, of which there are few. In fact the rules are introduced as you play the game so there isn't a rules section to refer to, and it's largely simple choices and basic combat of 1d20+modifiers against Armor Class, plus the odd strength check. At least that is mostly what I encountered during my initial play, along with some objects which can be used, and a 'secrets' system for tracking your progress and discoveries.

In short, it's short, much like this review.

Is it bad? No, I enjoyed it, and I'll play it through again and hopefully win it, and possibly again to try some different paths. It will have limited replayability beyond that though, much like any gamebook, and it is short at only 73 paragraphs. It does include character sheets, which I believe you could carry over to Pathfinder proper, so I guess they may be of use for people looking for pre-generated characters.

Is it worth $2.99? Well using my balanced system of food based comparisons, it cost me about the same as a prawn mayonnaise sandwich at the local supermarket, and whilst it isn't filled with juicy crustacean goodness, it did keep me happily entertained for longer than my hypothetical lunchtime treat would. For me yes, but I love gamebooks, you could pick up some old ones on ebay for very little though, many of which will last longer than this, so maybe not for everyone.

Oh it's about dwarves.

...and I just spotted they have a second one out: Elgar Fletch and the Dark Army

Want:// Party of 1: Kalgor Bloodhammer and the Ghouls Through the Breach (solo adventure)

2012-03-21T22:37:00.001Z

OK, have some time to get posting again.

Just a little something I spotted to ease my fingers back onto the keyboard. Party of 1: Kalgor Bloodhammer and the Ghouls Through the Breach is a solo numbered paragraph adventure, which appears to be a self contained game based on the Pathfinder system.

It shall be mine.

This stand-alone adventure is designed for a single player with no GM and basic rules. All you need to play is some dice (d6, d8, and 20), a pencil, some paper, and this book.
The rules are explained as you play. Begin at paragraph 1 and proceed from there, taking notes as you go. As the dwarf hero Kalgor Bloodhammer, you'll use all your might and cunning to protect your home from an invasion of hungry undead.
Kalgor Bloodhammer and the Ghouls Through the Breach includes both a 1st level and 3rd level character sheet for Kalgor, fully compatible for use with any beginning party to continue your Pathfinder RPG adventures!

News:// Solo Tabletop Gaming Appreciation Month

2011-11-06T08:53:00.002Z

I'd completely forgotten about the November Solo Tabletop Gaming Appreciation Month being promoted over at Solo Nexus. Been really very busy with the family so I've not been keeping up with my feeds.

Anyway I'm a little late to the party so I'm going to have to have a think about what to do. I've just received a cheap copy of Avalon Hill's Blackbeard which I've been wanting to try for ages so maybe I'll have a little pirate fun and wrestle with those scary looking rules. Or maybe a B-17 Queen of the Skies campaign, that could be fun. On a bit of a vintage board game kick at the moment so it'll probably be something along those lines.

Meanwhile there are some links over at Solo Nexus as to what other people have been getting up to.

Listen:// Ready Player One by Ernest Cline

2011-10-09T20:45:00.000+01:00

Published By: Random House Audio

Buy From: Amazon.co.uk Audible.com

Just finished listening to this one and it was very entertaining. It's nothing particularly deep or ground-breaking, but it is a wonderful, fast-paced ride through 1980s pop culture and geekery. If you grew up in the 80s watching films like Wargames and playing arcade machines and Dungeons & Dragons, then you need to give this one a read or listen.

The audiobook is narrated by that geek favourite Will Wheaton, and he really is a top class narrator. I hope he does some more audiobooks, very easy to listen to, giving each character a distinct voice without descending into over the top caricatures like some actors do.

The story reads like YA fiction which is no bad thing, and stuffed with so many references to things I loved as a child that I'd find it hard to hate it even if the plot was non-existent. It's light cyberpunk stuff, with a worldwide virtual reality game inhabited by the usual hackers, geeks, and evil corporations.

Loved it.

At once wildly original and stuffed with irresistible nostalgia, READY PLAYER ONE is a spectacularly genre-busting, ambitious, and charming debut—part quest novel, part love story, and part virtual space opera set in a universe where spell-slinging mages battle giant Japanese robots, entire planets are inspired by Blade Runner, and flying DeLoreans achieve light speed.

It’s the year 2044, and the real world is an ugly place.

Like most of humanity, Wade Watts escapes his grim surroundings by spending his waking hours jacked into the OASIS, a sprawling virtual utopia that lets you be anything you want to be, a place where you can live and play and fall in love on any of ten thousand planets.

And like most of humanity, Wade dreams of being the one to discover the ultimate lottery ticket that lies concealed within this virtual world. For somewhere inside this giant networked playground, OASIS creator James Halliday has hidden a series of fiendish puzzles that will yield massive fortune—and remarkable power—to whoever can unlock them.

For years, millions have struggled fruitlessly to attain this prize, knowing only that Halliday’s riddles are based in the pop culture he loved—that of the late twentieth century. And for years, millions have found in this quest another means of escape, retreating into happy, obsessive study of Halliday’s icons. Like many of his contemporaries, Wade is as comfortable debating the finer points of John Hughes’s oeuvre, playing Pac-Man, or reciting Devo lyrics as he is scrounging power to run his OASIS rig.

And then Wade stumbles upon the first puzzle.

Suddenly the whole world is watching, and thousands of competitors join the hunt—among them certain powerful players who are willing to commit very real murder to beat Wade to this prize. Now the only way for Wade to survive and preserve everything he knows is to win. But to do so, he may have to leave behind his oh-so-perfect virtual existence and face up to life—and love—in the real world he’s always been so desperate to escape.

A world at stake.
A quest for the ultimate prize.
Are you ready?

Initial Impressions:// Mytherian Heroic Fantasy & The Goblin Skullkeeps of Rendaria

2011-10-05T23:53:00.000+01:00

Have been incredibly busy lately but life appears to be returning to normal so hopefully I'll be getting some more reviews and things up here over the next few weeks.

First up is just a few initial impressions of Mytherian Heroic Fantasy, a pen and paper RPG for 1-6 players along with the first adventure setting for it, The Goblin Skullkeeps of Rendaria.

I first spotted this over at the solitaire gaming Solo Nexus blog, and I'm always interested in RPGs with solitaire mechanics, so I bought a copy as soon as it was available as a PDF. I'm only now finding a little time to look into it and hopefully I'll get a play in and review or session report up. The author Erik Goodwyn has kindly released everything required as reasonably priced PDFs, and you can find those plus the hard copies over at Lulu.

First is Mytherian Heroic Fantasy: Rules of Play, Perils and Treasures weighing in at a hefty 211 pages, you really do get plenty to read for your money. It has to be said the sheer amount of detail and data contained within is pretty impressive for product like this, there are some extensive tables and lists which leads me to believe that there is a fair amount of replayability to be had here.

The general layout and design is great too, it's clear, well written and the illustrations whilst mostly public domain are well chosen, and help set the mood for heroic adventure. Actually I really like some of the illustrations and I'm going to have to hunt some of them down, Erik has done a great job on finding and editing suitable stuff.

It looks like character creation is a straightforward affair, with a number of takes on classic fantasy heroes

from the pious Sylmaran Paladin, to the boastful
Brendanian Blackwolf Knight, to the deadly Avithainian Ronin, the crafty Velian Ranger, the mysterious Londruinic Knight, the proud Sathenite Warrior and the mighty Svoedic Viking.

Each comes with a small history, starting stats, items and one of those previously mentioned extensive lists of skills to choose from. It's great detail and Erik has obviously been working on this world for a long time, it really helps to create an interesting world to play in. The damage system is nice and simple too with everything having six wounds, but obviously some things are much harder to wound than others. As the author points out this makes wound tracking easy since a single die can be used for each character in combat.

Next is a section on magic or sorcery which Iv'e only skimmed over, and I don't have much to say on it yet. It does again have a nice long list, this time of spells available. I'm starting to think this game could really benefit from some cards to replace those lists, something I may look into if I enjoy it.

After that we have an explantion of how the adventure is played. On a brief read through it plays out like an RPG board game. You can move, explore new tiles, search for treasure and hidden exits, and of course encounter enemies and engage in combat. There is a neat looking system for wandering foes, using a number of warning dice which track enemies which might be getting closer until they attack.

The combat section is pretty meaty and I've only skimmed it, but it looks like there are a number of choices that can be made.

There is also a section on winning or losing and what happens next, like character advancement. Plus rules for a confrontational version of the game where one player takes on the role of an 'evil GM' and controls the enemies in order to beat the other players.

The second half of the book 'Perils & Treasures' contains what look like a set of campaign rules for stringing adventure together, and providing a load of city events and items to buy, plus some huge tables to roll on for random treasure.

The second PDF The Goblin Skullkeeps of Rendaria contains the setting for the first published adventure. This is required to play the game and contains the tiles to print, though you'll need to supply your own dice and miniatures or tokens. It's a shorter PDF at only 85 pages but it's pretty packed with events and enemies for the adventure. The board pieces could be more printer friendly, some contain large areas of black and they are quite big and one per page too. I've been doing a little photoshop work to try and create something a little smaller and I noticed they are not all the same size either.

Anyway this is all much longer and rambling than I intended. I think I'll give it a play and get some sort of session report up which will probably be more use than a review retreading the same ground.

Initial impressions...looks good, but I need to get it on the table and see how it plays. Great looking product for an independently produced game though. I really do think this would do better on RPGNow/DriveThruRPG though, Lulu isn't the best marketplace for this sort of thing.

Not Dead....

2011-10-05T17:31:00.002+01:00

...just busy.

Service will resume shortly.

Bought:// Victory Point Games

2011-07-30T22:32:00.000+01:00

Look what arrived along with my wife, following a business trip to the US...

In case you are wondering, that's the boardgames Legions of Darkness, and Nemo's War plus it's expansion, both from Victory Point Games.

Victory Point Games are a small desktop publishing games company based in California, who do a great job of getting new designers and games published. No big boxes with tons of plastic, it's all bagged like those old wargames you could pick up pretty cheap. They make a lot of solitaire games which both of these are, and I've been meaning to try them out for some time. A business trip, great exchange rate and opportunity to avoid Royal Mail's handling charges was too tempting so I managed to get these ordered.

My thanks to Alan and Terry at Victory Point Games for helping to get these to the right place at the right time. Just about to put one on the table, hopefully I'll get some reviews up soon.

Pictures:// Dalek Daughter

2011-07-30T22:12:00.000+01:00

I'll make a geek out of her yet...

Listen:// The Man Who Folded Himself by David Gerrold

2011-07-25T22:27:00.000+01:00

Published By: Iambik Audio & BenBella Books

Buy From: Iambik Audio

I've been working my way through some audiobooks I bought recently from a fairly new (at least to me) company, Iambik Audio. They sell everything DRM free at really good prices so it's worth having a look around. They also provided some excellent support when I had some issues which were probably my fault anyway, so I'll definitely be buying from them again.

First up is The Man Who Folded Himself by David Gerrold. Not someone I'd heard about or read before, but it turns out he wrote the 'Trouble with Tribbles' Star Trek episode so I guess I am familiar with at least one piece of his work. It tells the story of Daniel Eakins, a not particularly motivated college student who inherits a 'time belt' after the death of his Uncle Jim. Daniel discovers he can travel backwards and forwards through time, and shortly after this does the obvious thing and starts placing bets on horses accompanied by a future version of himself. He's soon jumping all over the place, visiting historical events, changing the past and the future, and creating paradoxes all over which are explained away with a multiple universes idea. As the book progresses there are more and more versions of himself, interacting in all sorts of ways, until both Daniel and the reader start to question his identity.

It's hard to say much more about the plot without giving away too much, but it is a wonderfully convoluted yet neatly resolved plot. So the time travel probably doesn't make much sense, as time travel rarely does, but it can be such a great concept to explore if done well, and this is among the best examples of it in my opinion. Gerrold looks at both practical issues such as the restrictions of travel due to languages and customs, and also things like sexuality, and identity, topics that rarely enter into the majority of wish fulfilment time travel stories. It's short and sweet like many of my favourite novels, we seem to be living in the age of the epic tome, and I don't think novels are any better for being five times the length they need to be.

Narration of the audiobook is by Charles Bice, who does a great job, nice clear reading without tons of crazy voices, yet enough personality to keep things interesting. If I can forget about the narrator and just enjoy the tale, then I consider it a success.

It's not for everybody, and it's likely to offend some people with the exploration of sexuality, but I'd recommend people interested in time travel tales at least give it a try.

Watch:// Pulp Fiction - The Golden Age of Sci-Fi, Fantasy & Adventure

2011-07-18T11:07:00.000+01:00

Spotted this at the always interesting Black Gate Magazine blog...I'll have to get a review up of one of their issues as they are well worth a read. It's a documentary about pulp fiction and the golden age of science fiction, quite interesting in places, and streaming free on youtube.

Play:// With Myself

2011-07-06T10:58:00.000+01:00

I can still remember the joy of playing with myself as a young boy.

Sorry I really couldn't help myself. I am of course talking about solitaire gaming, solo gaming, whatever you wish to call it. See whilst this is a rather new obsession for me, I was always interested in gaming as a child but it kind of morphed into my interest in computer and video games, and it's only now that I'm rediscovering the joy of fondling cardboard.

Board games were for a long time, something my family did at Christmas when we'd run out of other things to play, and had nothing left to argue about. I loved playing them, the rest of my family were not so keen. Still I remember playing a lot of Monopoly (with a lot of bad rules) and I still have my much loved 'Deluxe' edition along with my copy of Scrabble that I never did seem to convince my family to play. I loved playing board games, and I'd play pretty much any board game with anyone who asked. I always wanted games as Christmas presents but they were never played as much as I would like as my family and friends simply were not interested most of the time. So apart from looking longingly at those ridiculously expensive wooden monopoly sets, my interest in board games died for the first time.

It was the Fighting Fantasy gamebooks which rekindled my interest in gaming. I loved the idea of role playing games, and once again finding myself in the position of wanting to play them and having nobody to play them with, gamebooks provided me with the next best thing. I still read RPG books and at the time there was a little hobby store in my home town and it was browsing here that I came across a board game I could play by myself...

That game was Curse of the Mummy's Tomb by Games Workshop. It really wasn't a great game but I played that thing until the stupid cardboard pyramid was practically falling apart. I wish I still had it but I think it made it's way to a charity shop and is probably sitting on ebay right now for some ridiculously inflated price. I don't think it was long after this that I got an Amiga 500 and once again board games became a distant memory.

Until now that is...and it just happens that my reintroduction was via another solitaire game, Zombie in My Pocket. It didn't take me long to find out there are now loads of options for solitaire gaming, and not much longer to realise that I still really enjoy playing solitaire games. I'm probably going to write a post soon going into more detail about why I play and love solitaire games but I just wanted to post this little introduction because I think it's a theme that will appear regularly here. I have more options for playing board games with other people now, hell I'm raising a couple of future opponents, but like a good book or film I really enjoy spending a few hours absorbed in a game by myself so I'll be sharing some of my reviews and thoughts on the topic here.

Try it out. It really won't make you go blind.

Reboot:// The New Dummies and Death Rays (Now With Added Dice!)

2011-07-05T22:50:00.000+01:00

Like the vast majority of new blogs, this one died a quiet death. I didn't mean to let it die, I started with good intentions, had a lot of ideas for interesting content, and was generally enjoying the whole process. Things change though and towards the end of last year I found myself reading less and less and so there seemed less and less reasons for me to keep a blog active that relied on me reading constantly. There are a number of reasons behind the lack of reading, I think I just burnt out a little, my youngest daughter's lack of sleep didn't help with my concentration in the evenings, but the biggest reason was another, newer interest that was slowly pushing many others aside.

So what was this new interest which had surreptitiously crept into my thoughts, and slowly grown to push aside my love of reading? Well it was gaming...

...no not video games, I've been playing those regularly as far back as I can remember. I even found the old console I started on recently, one of those old pong/racing/tennis things where every game involved a number of white squares on a black background and the controllers were two little knobs you could turn on the console itself.

No the games that have been consuming my thoughts are board games, and not just those old traditional games of Scrabble and Monopoly that everyone seems to have played growing up, but a whole plethora of games that I had very little idea existed. Sure I knew a little of strategy games and wargames, and I had dipped my toes in the gaming waters back in the Games Workshop years, but I was largely unaware of the huge number of interesting games available until I stumbled across something last year which would lead me on to this fascinating new obsession...and I call it an obsession with good reason.

That little something I stumbled across was Zombie in my Pocket. I'm not sure where I found it or how, it might have been a Boing Boing post or just the result of a random search but somehow I found it, this game about zombies I could print...and play. That in itself blew me away, that there were people creating games that I could then print out and play, but the fact that the game was actually fun was the tipping point. I had to know what else was out there and it wasn't long before I found myself poised on the edge of the rabbit hole that is BoardGameGeek. I fell in and some eight months later I'm just climbing out, blinking at the sunshine and coming to the realisation that my life will from this point on always contain board games. Actually my wife came to this realisation a lot quicker, after opening a cupboard containing my exponentially expanding collection and exclaiming "by Jove don't these boxes consume a large volume of space" but perhaps in slightly more colourful language.

So like a not particularly impressive Phoenix rising from some barely cold ashes, I'm resurrecting Dummies and Death Rays. The themes here remain fairly similar, I still love science fiction, horror and fantasy, I still love the pulps, comics, and b-movies, but I will be shifting my focus from mostly books to include board games and gaming in general. I'll still be reading and reviewing when I can but I'm expecting this new interest to play a big part in the content available here. I'm not going to make any promises I can't keep about updating this blog but I'm hoping to at least keep the old thing active.

Thanks for reading, more to follow shortly.

Magazine:// Salon Futura

2010-10-13T21:46:00.001+01:00

Missed the launch of this one which is surprising given it's exactly the sort of thing I like to read:

Salon Futura is a new online non-fiction magazine devoted to the discussion of science fiction, fantasy and related literature.

I've rushed through the first issue, just started looking through the second, and am now looking forward to the third. They provide an epub download so it can easily be read on an ebook reader, though the website is a nice simple design which makes for easy reading. Some interesting articles and interviews, some audio and video content, altogether a really nice new online publication. I really hope they are successful with the magazine, there is definitely a space for something more structured than your average genre blog and this could fill it quite easily.

Free Read:// Free ebooks from The Black Library

2010-10-08T18:18:00.001+01:00

I've not read any of the Warhammer stuff but I might just try some as they are giving some free ebooks away for the next few weeks. It's a promotion for their soon to be launched ebook store and first up is First and Only by Dan Abnett which I believe is the first in the Gaunt's Ghosts series.

Head over here and snag a free copy, looks like DRM-free epub and mobi.

To celebrate the launch of Black Library Digital, October 8th and the following four Fridays have been designated Free eBook Fridays. Be sure to point your browser in our direction at noon GMT on each of those days to find out which gem from the BL back catalogue – or digital exclusive – will be yours for the grand sum of zero pounds, dollars or yen.

Listen:// Sherlock Holmes - The Last Act

2010-09-23T13:57:00.000+01:00

Buy From: Big Finish

It is 1916 and Sherlock Holmes has returned to his rooms in Baker Street after attending the funeral of his long time associate, Dr John H. Watson. Holmes reflects on the old days and comes to realise that not only was there so much that he had shared with Watson in his lifetime but also there was so much that he had not revealed to him: things he had kept hidden, including his deep affection for his friend. Imagining that Watson is present, Holmes addresses this failing and touches on aspects of past cases and the various characters he encountered during his investigations, including ‘The Woman’ Irene Adler and of course Professor Moriarty.

Holmes delves deeper into the darker aspects of his own history, revealing at last a shocking secret. Realising now how lonely and isolated he is without his old comrade, adrift in a new modern and war-ravaged age, he comes to wonder whether, like Watson, he too has come to the end of his time…

Besides all the science fiction and fantasy I read, I count the Sherlock Holmes books among my all time favourites so I'll often digest anything I find set in that universe. Whilst I love the originals, I don't have any particular problem with people playing in that world. I know some people can get obsessed with canon, and keeping things true to the originals, but I think it's such a great character and setting it deserves to be reinterpreted, rebooted, and generally messed around with.

I'd vaguely heard of the stage play of The Last Act but I've never been able to make it, so I was pleasantly surprised when I spotted that the Big Finish Sherlock Holmes series would be kicking off with a audio production of that play. It's a single actor piece starring Roger Llewellyn as Sherlock Holmes performing a monologue to a deceased Watson. It's incredibly well written, and manages to squeeze a huge amount of detail from the original books in, indeed it would server as a great introduction to anyone who has not yet read the books. At the same time as the 'Sherlock for beginners' detail we are also getting an insight into the mind of the great detective who proves to be a little more flawed than he seems at first glance.

Roger Llewellyn is outstanding as Holmes, I really would love to see him in one of the original stories now I've heard this. He has that exacting tone, slightly dark, very funny in places, and full of emotion. It's a performance worth hearing. He also plays the other characters, or more precisely plays Holmes playing the other characters, and jumps between them seemingly with ease. I'm not so keen on some of the others voices, though it is supposed to be Holmes playing them so the fact that they tend towards the exaggerated probably makes sense.

I can't say much more without spoiling the plot, it's a relatively short listen at 2 hours and definitely worth it. I'll leave with a clip of the stage play...

Received:// Countdown to Armageddon / A Stranger in Paradise, by Edward M. Lerner

2010-09-14T22:26:00.000+01:00

Well better late than never, this one was sent through from the nice people at Wildside Press, but since I disappeared I never managed to post anything up. I know zero about Edward M. Lerner, and whilst that red cover is fugly as hell, it is tempting to have a read. I may just dive into the short story collection side of the book instead.

In the tradition of the old "Ace Doubles" two-in-one books (flip one over to read the second title) -- here is the second Wildside Double . . .

"Countdown to Armageddon," by Edward M. Lerner:

Hezbollah has obtained an atomic bomb and a would-be martyr eager to deliver it-and that's the good news. The bad news, unknown even to Hezbollah, is that their physicist has also found a way to take his new bomb back to a turning point in European history.

Harry Bowen, an American physicist, and Terrence Ambling, a British agent turned historian, are determined to stop Abdul Faisel and prevent the nullification of all Western civilization. Their mission can be accomplished, if at all, only in the darkest of the Dark Ages-

And there, too, time is running out.

"A Stranger in Paradise," by Edward M. Lerner, collects five of the bestselling author's science fiction stories: "The Night of the RFIDs," "Two kinds of People," "Better the Devil You Know," "Small Business," and "A Stranger in Paradise."

Service:// Interrupted

2010-09-14T22:13:00.000+01:00

Well my plans for productive blogging didn't work out too well. Went on holiday, had some nights out, didn't sleep much, done some web design on the side, been far too busy with the family. In short, I've rather neglected things.

I have managed to get some reading done, and I've also made it through the rather long reading of Justin Cronin's The Passage so it's not all bad.

Rambling will continue shortly.

Listen:// The Blade Itself - Joe Abercrombie

2010-08-06T23:47:00.001+01:00

Published By: Orion Publishing

Buy From: Audible.co.uk

Inquisitor Glokta, a crippled and bitter relic of the last war, former fencing champion turned torturer, is trapped in a twisted and broken body - not that he allows it to distract him from his daily routine of torturing smugglers.
Nobleman, dashing officer and would-be fencing champion Captain Jezal dan Luthar is living a life of ease by cheating his friends at cards. Vain and shallow, the biggest blot on his horizon is having to get out of bed in the morning to train with obsessive and boring old men.
And Logen Ninefingers, an infamous warrior with a bloody past, is about to wake up with plans to settle a blood feud with Bethod, the new King of the Northmen, once and for all - ideally by running away from it. But as he's discovering, old habits die hard . . .
. . . especially when Bayaz gets involved. An old man with a terrible temper and a pathetic assistant, he could be the First of the Magi, he could be a spectacular fraud, but whatever he is, he's about to make the lives of Glotka, Jezal and Logen a whole lot more difficult . . .
Striking debut novel with all the cynicism, realism and punch the fantasy genre has been missing. Read by Steven Pacey.

Been away for a bit but I did have a chance to listen to some more audio. Joe Abercrombie is one of those authors I've been meaning to catch up with but just haven't got around to. I have actually read this book but I never managed to catch the rest of the series or his newer books so I thought I'd start again at the beginning with the newly released audio.

There's probably not much more I can add to the reviews of the actual book, it was and is an impressive debut fantasy novel. If you like your fantasy gritty and full of flawed characters you'll probably like this. It's largely character driven and the characters are all your typical fantasy fare, with heroes, wizards, apprentices and so on yet the darkly humorous, noirish telling means it never slips over into the ridiculous epic fantasy parody that lazier examples of the genre have become.

As for the audio book, well, say one thing about Steven Pacey, say he's a bloody good narrator. The reader can make or break an audiobook and Steven Pacey does and outstanding job on this, creating clear voices and accents for each of the characters and switching between them with apparent ease without any of them being overdone.

One issue common in audiobooks is narration that doesn't tie up with the actual text, so the narrator will read a character line in a plain voice followed by "he hissed" or "he shouted angrily" and it'll be completely wrong and clearly nobody cares enough to edit it. Thankfully here through editing, careful reading or whatever means the delivery ties up really well with the text and took me by surprise in a couple of places. Pacey's lisping delivery of the almost toothless Glokta in particular is excellent and really suits the part, he's my favourite and possibly most flawed character and Pacey's delivery really suits some of those wonderfully sarcastic lines. There's much humour to be had from the book and throughout, Pacey's delivery and timing is excellent with a couple of real laugh out loud moments.

All in all highly recommended, I have the next one lined up for listening right after I get through the thirty something hours of Justin Cronin's The Passage....more on that one soon,

Read:// Tides From the New Worlds by Tobias S. Buckell [ebook]

2010-07-25T00:12:00.000+01:00

Buy From: Amazon.com (Kindle Store)

It's taken me a little while to get through this though that's down to life and children rather than any problem with the book which I enjoyed more for the leisurely read.

If you didn't know Tobias Buckell was Caribbean born and raised, you could probably guess by the time you finished reading Tides From the New Worlds, a collection of his short stories. Influences from his life spent growing up in a different culture are clearly evident in many of the tales here and they are all the better for it. This is not the heavy-handed insertion of token 'ethnic' characters that often seems to happen in fiction, or the use of 'generic low tech culture' as a tool to show how much more advanced and therefore civilised the other cultures in a story are. This is speculative fiction written with very real feeling characters and places which just happen not to be white people living in America or America-in-space.

Not all the stories here are science fiction, if labelling is required then this would definitely sit under a speculative one but there's a real mix with alien contact stories and space habitats sitting alongside airships (gotta love airships), fantasy and what I guess people like to call magical realism though I've always thought that's just what we used to call fantasy before the Orcs took it over. Likewise not all the stories have that Caribbean flavour but for me some of the best stories are those that combine both science fiction and that clash of cultures like the quite brilliant opener The Fish Merchant.

The standard of fiction definitely doesn't rely on those elements though with my favourite story being A Green Thumb, one that reminds me of the sort of stories that got me into science fiction, it has that light hearted sense of wonder I associate with stories from the science fiction magazines I devoured whenever I could get my hands on them. It might not be considered the best story here but it puts a big grin on my face. For very different reasons I loved the moving All Her Children Fought which brings to mind Ender's Game, though it's brevity means it packs more of an emotional punch in my opinion. There's also an interesting little introduction to each story so you can get a feel for the things that inspired or influenced each of them.

Coming from a mixed background myself, I'm drawn to science fiction written with and from different cultural views. I have grown up British though I clearly don't look it, yet I don't know much of my roots abroad apart from what my father has told me so I'm always interested and slightly envious of people who have a clear understanding of where they come from. Tobias obviously has a real understanding and sense of pride in his Caribbean roots, I've read a couple of interviews and blog posts where this is obvious and it shines through in the last story in the collection Toy Planes which reads like Caribbean advocacy, it's brilliant.

I didn't like everything, The Duel whilst an interesting setting didn't grab me maybe because I know little of American history, likewise Smooth Talking didn't seem to hold my attention. The ones I liked far outweigh the odd few that didn't appeal to me though and all in all Tides From the New Worlds is the best single author collection I've read in a long time. I'd love to own that beautiful looking hardback but at this price the ebook is a steal, it's cheaper than most of the fiction magazines you can buy and way better value for money given the number of stories and overall quality.

I really, really have to hunt out his novels now, knowing that they include that seemingly effortless mix of different cultures and science fiction...and I'm pretty sure someone mentioned there were more airships. :)

Free Read:// The Choir Boats by Daniel A. Rabuzzi

2010-07-22T22:14:00.000+01:00

Spotted this a bit late but Wowio currently have a decent looking fantasy ebook free for July. Chizine publish some interesting short fiction online so I might take a look at this once I've cleared a few things from the top of the pile. PDF only like most of Wowios ebooks, wish they would do epubs too.

As many of you know, we’ve been offering a free download every month since the earliest days of WOWIO, and we always do our best to pick intriguing titles that will pique the interest of our readers and new visitors.

This month, in honor of our site relaunch, we’re doing something really special — we’ve teamed up with publisher ChiZine Publications to offer one of their critically acclaimed fantasy novels — The Choir Boats by Daniel A. Rabuzzi — as our July Book of the Month.

Described as “vibrant” and rich with “verve and wit,” it’s a seagoing fantasy yarn that is like “Gulliver’s Travels crossed with The Golden Compass and a dollop of Pride and Prejudice.”