Spectre’s Sayings

Yesterday, I finished reading The Summer Palace by Lawrence Watt-Evans. It’s the third of a trilogy (The Annals of the Chosen), not a stand-alone novel. But it was a fun read, and it brought the series to a close nicely.

If you like books in the fantasy genre, check this trilogy out.

     

I’ve just finished reading two of Terry Pratchett’s Discworld books: Going Postal and The Colour of Magic. Wacky, and slightly humorous. I rate them a strong “OK.”

Not sure this is necessarily a good thing: Amazon to acquire Audible.

Recently, I re-read four books by Harry Turtledove (writing as Eric Iverson): Werenight and Prince of the North (bound together under the title Wisdom of the Fox), King of the North, and Fox and Empire.

I had read these books years ago, but had forgotten much of them. As Turtledove is wont to do, he plucks situations out of our own history and transplants them into a fictional land. In this case, his premise is the invasion of the Roman Empire by barbarians. At the outset of this fantasy work, Gerin the Fox is a frontier baron on the northern edge of the Empire of Elabon. When the barbarous Trokmoi invade from the north, the empire cuts off all communication with the Northlands, leaving the barons of that province to fend for themselves.

The cunning of the Fox allows him to survive several crises, including men who turn into beasts when the moons are full, commerce with gods, two separate barbarian invasions, divorce and remarriage, monsters from below the earth, and other situations.

It’s rip-roaring good fantasy.

I just finished Beer: Domestic, Imported, and Home Brewed by Eve Adamson. As you can probably tell by the title, the main topic of the book is beer. It has two chapters about beer, its history, its types and styles, and how to enjoy it. The lion’s share of the book, however is a region-by-region look at the beers of the world. Each of these chapters has a historical overview of beer production in each of those regions, along with who the brewers are, and a breakdown of individual products to try based on style within that locality. The final chapter is a brief overview of how to brew your own beer.

It’s a nice overview for someone who enjoys beer tasting and beer drinking.

Author Terry Pratchett was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s.

This sounds like a fun book to read.

Dawn of the Dinosaurs: Life in the Triassic is not for the faint of heart. It’s not a book that “popularizes” science. It lacks too much in the way of description and illustration for that. And it’s not really a scholarly work that argues a thesis. It’s more of a catalogue of triassic fossils from around the world, or a superficial glance at the state of the science in the field. The illustrations by Douglas Henderson are exquisitely done, but are too infrequent to be of much aid to the text.

If you want to learn something new about the animals of the Triassic, you may just want to look for a different book.

Today is the birthday of the late Oxford don, writer, and Christian apologist, C.S. Lewis.

The stories of the Amber series (10 novels and 6 short stories) by the late Roger Zelazny are classics of fantasy literature. John Gregory Betancourt has already written one trilogy to serve as a prequel, and is now starting on another series, which takes place between his prequel and Zelazny’s original stories. Shadows of Amber is the first of this new series.

It’s a good story, and stands well with the other works. Betancourt’s style does differ from Zelazny’s, with a somewhat lessened emphasis on a sense of mystery, and a somewhat heightened sense of adventure and swashbuckling. However, the writing is good. There were several typographical errors, however. I expect these will probably be corrected before the book hits paperback.

Gigi Reynard posted a review of her Cybook here, just in case you were as interested as I was.

Oh, I forgot to mention that Bookeen’s new third-generation Cybook electronic book reading device went on sale over the weekend. It uses e-ink technology, rather than an LCD screen. I want one, but I’m not sure how I’ll be able to cover the cost.

 

Story here.

Buy it here.

Update 10/30/07: Well, it appears Cybook demand is overwhelming the supply.

Earlier this week I finished Fatal Revenant by Stephen R. Donaldson. Fatal Revenant is the second book in “The Last Chronicles of Thomas Covenant.” I enjoyed the first and second chronicles, and have thus far really enjoyed the Last Chronicles. Both Runes of the Earth and Fatal Revenant ended in cliffhangers, of which Donaldson has inexpicably become a master. It’s going to be difficult to wait the three years before book 3 comes out.

The other day, I finished L.E. Modesitt’s Natural Ordermage, a book in the “Recluse” series. It was good, as expected.

Update: I noticed that the picture above has red text. The dust jacket on my hardback copy has blue text. Odd, that.

I just finished Out of Thin Air: Dinosaurs, Birds, And Earth’s Ancient Atmosphere by Peter Douglas Ward. In it, the author argues that the most powerful force in Earth’s history driving the evolution of animals is the level of oxygen in the atmosphere and in the seas. I must admit, he makes a compelling argument, and I was mostly convinced. It’s an interesting read, and is especially useful for providing an overview of animal evolution over the past 500 million years. I recommend it.