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Book Recommendations for a Nine Year Old

I was recently asked by a friend for book recommendations for a nine year old with a middle school reading level. No sex, but some violence. Series are nice. I can help with that! I thought it would be an interesting cross-section of American juvenile adventure fiction over the last

The Last Archon: Atlantean Knights Book 1 by Richard Watts Book Review

Richard Watt’s The Last Archon [Silver Empire affiliate link] offers us the Heroes Unleashed version of a classic tale: a grumpy old guy and his impetuous protege. Together, they clean up the streets of Atlanta. Then Watt adds in a pretty young girl with the gift of prophecy, a

Clock's Watch II: Daughters of the Black Moon by Michael Reyes Book Review

When I reviewed the first volume of Clock’s Watch, I said that I looked forward to seeing what kind of trouble Jerry Clock was going to get himself into in the future. Now I have seen [Amazon link], and I am both fascinated and horrified. This is the second

Timothy Zahn interviews with The Portalist

Timothy Zahn has a recent interview with The Portalist, advertising for his newly released book Thrawn Ascendancy: Chaos Rising [Amazon affiliate link]. I read this interview in a hermeneutic of continuity with the series of Facebook posts Zahn made reminiscing on his journey through the world of Star Wars book

La Danza de la Muerta by Donald Uitvlugt Book Review

Donald Uitvlugt describes this collection as haiku short stories: small stories with big impact. I like reading, and reviewing, short story collections, but this one is so exceptionally compact that I will have to strive to match it by not writing a review longer than one of the stories in

Red Heroin by Wade Curtis (Jerry Pournelle) Book Review

In Red Heroin [Amazon affiliate link], a thrilling tale of espionage set in late Sixties Seattle, engineer Paul Crane finds himself sucked into a plot involving drug smuggling, student activists, fast cars, and hot women. This was Jerry Pournelle’s first novel, and it is a remarkable start to a

Cugel's Saga or The Skybreak Spatterlight by Jack Vance Book Review

Cugel’s Saga [Amazon affiliate link] and The Eyes of the Overworld are both described as picaresques, but in my mind, a key element of a picaresque is to take the absurdity and dial it up to eleven. Cugel as portrayed in the 1966 short stories has a kind of