Blue Moon and Dune

Blue Moon

To be sure, I am behind the curve when when it comes to knowing good beer. So you will have to bare with me when I discover what’s already a well known fact. Blue Moon is good beer. If any of you haven’t yet had a chance to try it then you are missing out. I am a fan of blondes both the ladies and the beers. I like brunettes and redheads too, when it comes to women I’m not really picky. As for the beer though I only really like it when it’s light in color and easy on the palate. That’s exactly what Blue Moon is, and lately I have been having a hankering for it. Something about the smooth flavor with a slice of orange squeezed over the top is perfect on a hot summer day. This is a reasonably priced beer and you won’t look like either a snob or a dunce when you order one (something I’m in sore need of). All the varieties are great but the old standard Belgium White is what I usually order.


Dune

What is there to say about this masterpiece, that hasn’t already been said? This is hands down the greatest work of science fiction written in the english language (I don’t read russian or chinese, so who knows if they have better? I doubt it though). If you have seen the movie directed by David Lynch, before reading the book, don’t be put off. Personally I liked the movie, but to most it’s an incomprehensible mess. It only really rings true if you have read the book. Even then Lynch made a strange movie that’s not quite in sync with the book.

The story: young Paul Atreides is the ducal heir. His father and whole household has moved to Arrakis... Dune, desert planet. There Paul encounters the geriatric spice, or melange. The spice is the most prized resource in the universe. Used by powerful factions both to expand their minds and chart safe courses through space. There are many powerful factions fighting for control of Dune and the spice. Soon though they will come to loggerheads with Paul and the mysterious Fremen.  I won’t say more as I have no desire to ruin this book for anyone. I will say this though, If you haven’t yet read Dune you are missing out.

I feel like I should have more to say about Dune. All that really needs to be said is this: READ IT.

Shadows Linger

Shadows Linger
By Glen Cook
(2nd novel in the Black Company series)



Plowed through this one in about two days. May indeed be one of my favorite books I read this summer. I love the notion that you can write a fantasy novel without having to have this epic quest be the center of the drama. The characters in this novel fight for their right to survive, while murdering each other and backstabbing anyone who gets in their way. Rarely do I champion crazy murderers but this book really crossed my wires. I found my self rooting for an evil criminal half the time and rooting against him half the time.

Love hearing more about Croacker and Raven too. Very, very good tale.


Buy it here: Amazon

Chronicles of the Black Company

Just finished Chronicles of the Black Company by Glen Cook.

I’m sure many of you have already read this book, but I thought I’d throw this review out there for those who haven’t. The book had been on my books to read list for years, but I had just never gotten around to it. I’m baffled as to why it kept getting pushed back. The book delivered on every aspect.

If you are like me and hadn’t gotten around to this book do yourself a favor and buy a copy today. I’m serious… get this book. Amazing characters, great combat on a micro and macro level and a very singular perspective on high fantasy. I don’t think authors are brave enough to run with high fantasy and when you see an author like Cook do it you have to tip your hat to them.

Buy the book here: Amazon

Scifan: Cook

Wiki page: Wiki

The Way of Shadows

The Way of Shadows
by Brent Weeks

The Way of Shadows is the first book in the Night Angel Trilogy. This is a dark story of assassins or I should say wet-boys (assassination is a term for thugs as far as wet-boys are concerned). The story starts out with young Azoth an orphan and street urchin in a large city. We follow  our hero Azoth as he navigates this difficult world., finding a precarious balance in order to keep himself and a small group of friends alive. Without spoiling the story for you though this balance is soon overthrown and the young boy finds himself apprenticed to Durzo Blint, by far the most accomplished wet-boy in the city.

I have to say I was thoroughly engrossed throughout this book. I found I couldn’t put it down, often staying up late into the night reading into the wee hours of the morning. If I read for one more hour I can still get 4 hours of sleep before work... was a common refrain in my head. Though 4 would become 3 and 3 would become 2 and so on. Till I would groggily climb out of bed, still not wanting to put down the book. I wouldn’t say the plotting or character development of his series is the best. Or the love story to be honest. But the whole series is fun. He blends fun adventure and tragedy well. Though none of the individual elements of this series are the greatest, his series overall combines to be very entertaining. With some wonderful set pieces of great action and side characters that you just can’t get enough of (Lantano Garuwashi is a badass!! Vi is hot and sexy and tragic).

The series is on my re-read list. I hope to get to it in the next couple months so I can experience the wonder of the Night Angel terrorizing people and reawaken my love for Durzo and his brutal-seeming ways. Its a great series to get yourself lost in for a few weeks (or days in my case) from a new author to the genre. I can’t wait for him to finish up his next series. I have already read the first book, The Black Prism and the second book will be published soon. I have to say Weeks has done a masterful job with the plotting of The Black Prism. His writing seems to get better and better. I especially like how he plays with typical fantasy tropes (fat hero, good guy/bad guy dichotomy). The magic system is very unique too.

Purchase the book here.

Visit the author's site here.

Night Angle Trilogy
The Way of Shadows
Shadow's Edge
Beyond the Shadows

Lightbringer Series
The Black Prism

Assassin's Apprentice

Assassin’s Apprentice
by Robin Hobb

This is the first book in the Farseer Trilogy. The series follows the adventures of Fitz a royal bastard who’s father chose to abdicate his claim to the throne when knowledge of Fitz existence comes to light. Tales of royal bastards abound in fantasy from King Arthur himself to Jon Snow (eerie similarities between Fitz and Jon! Especially given that George R.R. Martin is a Robin Hobb fan). Unlike most fantasy though which tend to be skim the surface of real emotion, Hobb delves deeply into the psyche of her characters. Her writing is such that you really feel what’s going on with Fitz. So much so that at times I have found I had to set the books down and sort through my own complicated emotions with the books and characters.

The world of the Farseer Trilogy is in its infant stages throughout the beginning of this series but it really expands and comes into focus in the second book. With later series taking characters all around the continent. I have yet to real Hobb’s latest trilogy which is just finishing up, but it is on my list of books to get to.

Besides the wonderful characters within this first trilogy (and I can’t stress enough how wonderfully flawed they are) the magic systems are great and mysterious, as magic should be. The Wit and the Skill are two different and yet eerily similar forms of magic. The Wit is a beast magic (again strangely similar to Martin’s wargs) while the Skill is the hereditary magic of the Farseer’s. The line of kings and their progeny who rule the kingdom.

The best part about Hobb’s work’s are how prolific she is. If you like her books check out her other works under the pen-name Megan Lindholm.

Visit her site here!

Purchase the first book in the series here!

The Farseer Trilogy
Assassin’s Apprentice
Royal Assassin
Assassin’s Quest


Review by Brendan

The Heroes
By Joe Abercrombie

The Heroes is set in the period after the First Law series and is unfreaking believable. After reading this book I grew a beard and set out to make a name for myself. It did not take me long to become a named man. Yet somehow I think “Barile Bubble Belly will” not strike fear in the Union troops or the named men of the north.

The Heroes does an amazing job of filling in the details of the north. The combat is great, the tactics are amazing, and the characters… oh the characters. Just thinking about this book makes me want to reread it. If the coffee shop were open right now I would ride down and crack the book open and start ingesting caffeine and carbs!

Even if you haven’t read the first three books you could sneak this book in and be satisfied, but why cheat yourself. You deserve it, go get The Blade Itself and take a holiday. When you plow through all of Abercrombie's books and get to the Heroes you’ll thank me.

Buy the book here!

Read the author's web page.


Review by Cordell

The Name of the Wind

The Name of the Wind
By Patrick Rothfuss

I’ve never seen an author take such a course and create such a masterpiece. Rothfuss gives Freytag the finger and ignores traditional narrative structure. Some may not like the lack of rising action, climax, and falling action, but I decided to stand and applaud Rothfuss for not conforming to the standard and still being able to spin an amazing tale. Of course, for me, this proved to be a bit awkward as I ended up standing and applauding in bed while my wife was sleeping. After forty hours of counseling, a trip to the state hospital and my new special sleeping blankie (it has straps) we decided I am now no longer allowed to read in bed.

Enough about plot and straitjackets. Rothfuss has a few signature aspects to his writing that make The Name of The Wind a brilliant novel. Every novel I am ever going to review is going to have amazing characters. If your characters are boring then there is no way your story will make my list. So needless to say his characters are amazing and you will fall in love with their personalities. That is a given but the character development is so good I feel I have to at least mention it.

Along that same vein, the world is great. Again, if you have an unimaginative world then you aren’t going to make this list, but I do feel it is worth mentioning. Primarily because I can’t stop thinking about it. We even played a D&D campaign set in the world for a few months after everyone in one of my gaming groups plowed through The Name of The Wind.

When @writerbrendan and I sat down to write a book after years of being apart one of the things we focused on was the magic system. Everyone has their own magic system and there are thousands of fantasy books out there that have cool systems with virtually no character development or plot to speak of. Rothfuss has an amazing magical structure. A good part of the book is set in a school of magic (not going to say more than that because I don’t want to tip the hand of the plot) and the system of magic alone would make this book a worthy read.

Finally, the thing I appreciate the most about Patrick Rothfuss is he is a gods damn word smith. Every word in this book is worked over and over until it shines. I can’t imagine how much… nevermind… I know exactly how much work he put into this book and it shows. The writing is beautiful. I love to just sit and reread sentences over and over. My wife has taken to putting a napkin down my collar to catch the drool.

I would recommend these books to anyone who is a hardcore fantasy geek, as well as those who know nothing about the genre.

The Kingkiller Chronicle
The Name of the Wind
A Wise Man's Fear 


Review by Cordell

The Lies of Locke Lamora

The Lies of Locke Lamora

Scott Lynch did something that I wish more fantasy authors would do, which is spin a tale that doesn’t involve the world coming to an end or an invading army. Don’t get me wrong, I love a good doomsday read and who doesn’t like the boy destined to become king? But I feel the evolution of the fantasy genre will be authors that are comfortable writing stories that parallel the themes of modern day fiction novels. That, in my opinion, will be what propels the genre to greater heights in the American marketplace.

Lynch writes about conn artist's in a fantasy setting. Just reading about how the cons are set in the fantasy setting is worth reading this novel alone. If Lynch didn’t throw in some amazing characters, a fun and detailed world, and some good old fashioned ass kicking I would still have loved The Lies of Lock Lamora. Since all the previously mentioned aspects are present, this book becomes a top shelf selection.

As you know from reading my other reviews I don’t like to get into plot or detailed character descriptions. I want the author to have a fresh crack at you. I will say when I started “Lies” I felt like I was reading The Sting meets Oliver Twist with just the right amount of blood and violence. This is another book I bought for a couple friends and obsessed about getting a hardcover for.


Reviewed by Cordell Barille

The Prince of Nothing

The Prince of Nothing series
by R. Scott Bakker

The Darkness that Comes Before is the first book in Bakkers fantasy series. Bakker has studied philosophy and its clearly evident in the thought provoking concepts this series deals with. Scarred by an apocalypse that happened centuries before, with another apocalypse dawning on the horizon this is a world that is relatively stable, until Kellhus a man with mysterious powers enters it. The world was years in the making as any reader can tell. The one thing I really like about Bakker, similar to Erikson, is that he doesn’t waste time explaining his world to readers. Various factions, philosophies, and histories are fleshed out and as a reader you wait hungrily for more details to flesh the world out in your mind. He jumps right into it and lets you figure the world out as the book progresses. The characters are realistic, full of flaws and contradictions just like real people. Bakker has definitely taken a page from the “Martinesque” book on fantasy writing, in that his world is not for the faint of heart. This is a dark and cerebral series.

The titular main character of the series, Kellhus is a wonderful realization of the remote monk who uses his unmatched intelligence to triumph over enemies. His power of the “Logos”, a system where in one tries to achieve mental perfection, is new and wonderful. My one major problem with the series is there isn’t enough of Kellhus. After reading three books I never felt that the character was fully fleshed out. He remains as remote to the readers as he does to the characters whose perspectives he is often viewed through.

The “wizard” character in the series is Drusas Achamian. He is both an example of what is wonderful and terrible about the series. The character Achamian is beautifully flawed. A man of unquestionable magical power who is hamstrung by his love for a prostitute and his own flawed sense of inadequacy. The character of Achamian is perfectly human and I love seeing a character this flawed endowed with such power. But damn! He is such a whiner sometimes! The internal dialog (of which Achamian is just an example) where he over analyzes every single thing is very annoying. I don’t mind the fact that Achamian does his over alanysis and second guessing, that what makes him great. I just don’t want to read 20k words about it in each book.

The love stories made me uncomfortable, I can’t say anything else without giving away spoilers (should be covering it in a podcast at some point).

Besides Kellhus’s badass powers the best part of the series are two characters.

Cnaiur: awesome barbarian/homicidal maniac. gotta love this dude. You also would never want to meet him in real life.

Ikurei Conphas: basically Alexander the Great. If Alexander had to contend with powerful wizards and insanely intelligent monk-priests like Kellhus.


If you would like to purchase the book head here.