Review: One-Fifth Dragon

One-Fifth Dragon by Shami Stovall
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

This is a 2-star review. I made it through 10% of the book. Chapter 4. Then I entered the Dorothy Parker book throwing Olympics.

Pretty good start. Generic Asian/Japanese-inspired culture focusing on ninjas. Various clans with unique magical abilities. Some early examples of how those abilities interact and compete.

The student is learning from the master. The master is a bit young to be a master and (until now) too young to accept a student. They are assigned this student who has been poorly trained up until now by a different master.

They go on a training mission to assassinate someone from a dominant clan. The student encounters trouble. The poor training becomes evident. Perhaps the student's attitude is wrong as well. The master saves the student. The targeted clan experiences many deaths. The student and master get away.

And then ...Record scratch.... they go to an inn where the student seduces (partially) the master across several pages of narrative. It turns out that the main clan had adopted the master many years ago. The master has a unique form of magic, but no one wants to marry them. The student came from a clan that had been almost wiped out. The student was similarly adopted by the main clan. They want someone to breed with the master. The student agreed (despite serious risks) and does everything possible to consummate the arrangement while they are on the run from committing an assassination and multiple murders.

The master...again a very stoic person...resists temptation with the obvious implication that when the cultural rules permit it, they will be actively participating.

4 chapters in!! No serious character development up to that point. Bubbly student. Stoic master. Rough sketches of the culture. That's it. A good start, but only a start. Let's get our freaky-deaky on!

I'm not a romantasy fan. This smacks of romantasy in so many ways. I've read Peter V. Brett, N.K. Jemisin, and Robert Heinlein - each of whom have extended sex scenes included in various works in ways that are carefully integrated into the plot. It isn't the sex that is the issue. It is the romantasy trope of making the entire story about a romantic relationship.

Couple that with the fact that the entire scenario as written would be "problematic" in any other setting. One person makes a secret deal to have sex with another person. That second person was already feeling manipulated and vulnerable. And their sexuality is bartered away without their consent.

Rhetorically chucked across the room and started something that I hope will be better.

2-stars only because the writing was pretty good. Grammar/spelling were solid if not perfect. It has the bones of a good story early on.


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Review: Sisters of Mercy

Sisters of Mercy by Yuval Kordov
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

This 4.5-star review is a fair representation of my experience.

The premise is that there is a mysterious quasi religious order who is raising girls to be embedded in a sort of android/mech. The mechanical body protects them from harm (mostly) while their consciousness and vital organs ride along. They roam in a dystopian wasteland hunting the remnants of a conflict fought ages ago.

It was a thrilling ride as the new "Sister" was being trained by an older "Sister". Discovering the things that haunt fallen cities and military bases. How to hunt them. How to kill them. Learning about the secure waystations used by the Sisters to rearm and recover from prior battles. Ultimately finding and defeating a relic of the old war.

My only complaint is that this is a novelette. That means that there are plenty of world building details that have been omitted.

I'm inclined to read the mainline Dark Legacies series by the same author.


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Review: Waffle Irons vs. the Horde

Waffle Irons vs. the Horde by Dr. Insensitive Jerk
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This 3.5-star review is a fair representation of my experience.

The premise is that Earth is about to be invaded by malicious aliens. Another group of aliens precedes the destructive ones. The second group has come to save humanity by taking captives and forcing them to train to fight the malicious aliens.

Our "hero", such as he is, employs malicious compliance to obtain the best living conditions possible. Think about the 60s era sitcom "Hogan's Heroes" as a reference point. I'm old. Sorry.

There were plenty of jokes along the way. Cultural misunderstandings twisted for our hero's benefit and our amusement. Consider this funny version of "Ender's Game".

This was a light and entertaining book. I laughed more than a few times. The subtext is mildly small-L libertarian which is odd given the conclusion of the book.

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Review: The Utterly Uninteresting and Unadventurous Tales of Fred, the Vampire Accountant: Fred the Vampire Accountant #1

The Utterly Uninteresting and Unadventurous Tales of Fred, the Vampire Accountant: Fred the Vampire Accountant #1 by Drew Hayes
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

This 3-star review is a fair representation of my experience with the book. Perhaps this is closer to 3.5-stars

The premise is that Fred has been turned into an vampire. He was an in accounting before becoming a vampire. So he just changes his working hours to suit. There are other paranormal creatures running around. And an agency focused on containing bad actors. Light hearted. Easy read. Amusing at times.

I was not convinced that I should read any further installments.

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Review: Auntie Heroes

Auntie Heroes by Rita Beeman
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

This 5-star review is representative of my experience with the book.

This is a collection of short (and short-ish) stories that are predicated on an older woman (or women) who are surprisingly capable in unusual situations. Some situations are outright physical based on a thriller, spy, or military component. One story involves an older lady marking her last few years of government service in an overseas embassy that is attacked. The story nicely balances certain capabilities (such as shooting and weapons knowledge) with the reality that a woman (an older woman no less) probably lacks the physical stature to manhandle a group of terrorists. Tossing in a series of stun grenades until they surrender is a nice combination of those two facets.

Other stories lean more heavily into fantasy/sci-fi mode. One story leans into a Lovecraftian mythos where a group of old ladies is prepared to defend the local town from someone attempting to summon an unspeakable horror. A second story involves an older woman who thinks she is about to fight werewolves. The flamethrower comes in handy in any event. A third story involves a local group of women who find their overseas experience combatting a species of electrically active plant useful when the neighbor decides to plant some new botanicals.

All of the stories are inventive and a touch humorous.

Raconteur Press is an exciting entry into the genre publishing space. Well worth everyone's attention.



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Review: Red Seas Under Red Skies

Red Seas Under Red Skies by Scott Lynch
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

This 3-star review is representative of my experience with the book.

I read the first book in the series and loved it, 5-stars. This one...not so much.

Where the first book involved a lot of character growth and world exploration, this one relied more on withholding facts from the reader and deceiving the reader at every turn. It then ends in a cliffhanger with important plot points left unresolved.

Consider this a reader's test for this series. If you liked book 1 and like this book, then continue on with the series. Otherwise, move on to something fresh.


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Review: A Kiss for Damocles

A Kiss for Damocles by J. Kenton Pierce
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

This is a 5-star review. This book was great.

A Kiss for Damocles received this year's Prometheus Award for the work of fiction that best illustrates libertarian principles. And boy does it. I bought the book when nominations were announced.

Our protagonist is a young girl who lives in a small underground village. They live a slightly better than subsistence life because they lack any technological growth.

Both of those are odd conditions until you learn that there is an orbital system of gravity weapons controlled by a mid-level AI that takes a very dim view of any electronic signals that might indicate a technological capacity on the planet. At any whisper of a coherent electronic signal, Damocles drops a little gift from above that obliterates everything in the area.

Our young hero, Shai, is also a scavenger. She looks for wreckage from past millennia that can be used by her village either locally or as a matter of trade. She finds the jackpot - a largely intact warship that landed in the war that Damocles had finished many years ago. She ends up leading the trade mission to the local town to obtain supplies and negotiate access to her find.

Because it is her find! She found it. She owns it.

What follows are a predictable series of events orchestrated by politically powerful people who want to expand their control over the region. Shai and her village prefer the traditional form of government that existed before their planet was invaded millennia ago. That system of government traditionally was more respectful of individual liberty and local control. The larger town has fallen under the sway of a sort of proto-fascist ideologue who uses propaganda, currency manipulation, and outright violence in turn to concentrate power under his control.

We meet a variety of characters and groups through Shai's travels. One group appears to be quasi-mystical but in reality they have been collecting technology and resources with the objective of eventually going back into space so they can dismantle Damocles. A leader of the town's guard ends up being sympathetic to Shai even though the proto-fascist is running a successful campaign to bring the guard under his control.

There are many political themes underlying the book. Respect for diverse population groups. The plight of the individual against the collective. The use of fiat currency to control a population. The use of "education" to influence the next generation. Private property rights. Limited vs. unlimited government. Etc.

But while these themes are present, the author wisely never permits that subtext to upstage the text of the book which is an entertaining tale of a young woman discovering the potential key to liberating her culture from the legacy of foreign invaders.



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Review: The Thirteenth Hour

The Thirteenth Hour by Trudie Skies
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

This is a 3-star review which is a fair estimate of my experience with the book. I picked it up because it was a SPFBO finalist. That contest generally provides some good reading.

I'm not partial to steam punk, but this book had a ton of potential. That potential was wasted.

In this world, everyone is tied to one of 12...well 13...gods. Their lives are ruled by the whims to those gods. When they die, their souls return to the gods who then are able to experience those "human" lives.

There is a hub that is called Chime. Each of the domains of those 12 deities is tied to Chime. In theory, the gods cannot meddle in Chime. In theory, the humans (sort of) can be "recalled" from Chime back to their deity by praying to that deity and thereby attracting the deity's focused attention. This recall is called "death", because that is what happens.

There are other rules. I guess they make sense within the context of the book.

Chime is split into three levels. The top level is reserved for the upper class. The mid-level is reserved for the upper class and associates. The lower level is reserved for most everyone else. A lot of lower class folks want to dissociate from the gods.

As the title suggests, there is a 13th god. The book is the tale of those lower class folks, how they seek to liberate themselves from the gods, and the discovery of the 13th god.

The story is pretty good. There are a few plot holes. Two major ones being the focus and tolerance of class-based biases by everyone involved, and the fact that no one leaves Chime for the hinterlands. They all just accept that they have to stay close to Chime.

No one opts to ignore classes. No one opts to head for the hills.

Other plot holes include the invisible

The book leads off with a strong anti-capitalist vibe that suggests that capitalism causes slavery (or some sort of compulsory servitude). Capitalism is the single strongest motivator against slavery.

The book also features a bit of gender identitarian nonsense. It isn't enough to get in the way of the story, but it's still there.

If you like steam punk, acceptance of class-based structures, and a surfeit of tea, then this book is probably for you.

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Review: American Paladin

American Paladin by Larry Correia
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

This is a 3.5 star review which is a fair appraisal of my experience with the book. But Goodreads doesn't allow 3.5 stars. So why did I go with 3?? I acquired the book via the author's Kickstarter campaign.

Here we go. The book is centered around Mike Spears. As a teen, he went to "the other side" or "the other world". A world populated by people who would make the Aztecs and their murderous religious practices seem almost peaceful. Normal people are kept as slaves there. Used for labor, food, and/or religious sacrifices based on the whims of the "gods" and those who worship them.

There are other creatures there as well. Equally dangerous and perhaps a bit more so.

Mike randomly made it back to our world and lost his family, lost his girlfriend, and lost pretty much every human/family connection in the process. He now lives and trains for the day when he encounters the monsters from the other world again.

We pick up with Mike after he has spent years training, wandering from place to place, and killing the human monsters from our world who our justice system sees fit to release back out into the world to victimize others once again. Mike has a code. So far, he hasn't killed anyone who was innocent.

Then he runs across someone being hunted by the monsters from the other side. The story is about hunting those monsters and saving the girl. If you can shut off certain critiques, then this is a fine book. Give it a try. It might scratch a certain literary itch for you.

If you are a fan of Larry's Monster Hunter novels, then I suspect that this book might be for you. I've not read those books for reasons that I think this book confirms. Alternatively, if you like Alistair MacClean novels, then this might be up your alley. It's not quite as good as Mr. MacClean's books but it's close enough.

I have read his Saga of the Forgotten Warrior Series and the first book of Servants of War series. I heartily recommend both as being outstanding on their own merit and vastly superior to this book.

I also want to point out that I have followed the author's career and controversies within the genre. His perspective is generally pointed in the right direction in most cases, IMO.

So why the round down to 3 stars??

- Gun porn. The author has a penchant for describing guns and ammo in loving detail. I'm familiar enough with weapons to know what he is describing, but it's really just wasted detail, in my opinion.

- Putting the subtext ahead of the text. Almost every author includes some sort of underlying theme or moral value in their story. But that subtext is covered by the text; the story narrative. Early on, the author discards the text of the story in favor of trashing Joe Biden, leftist judges, and the leftist modern politics. Again, I think his personal perspective is generally correct, but in 15-20 years, no one will know or care about those specific issues. He could have been a bit more generic and still served the interests of the narrative.

- Modern cultural references. One or two major references are probably fine. Anything more than that and the book will not stand the test of time. I have a hard time believing that all of our modern cultural references will survive the next 50 years.

- Too much showing, not enough telling. We learn about Spears' history and development via a series of brief vignettes at the start of each chapter. We are told that he has done a ton of training. We are told he experienced horrors. We are rarely shown either of them.

- Over competent character. Spears is a one-man wrecking crew. He can pick locks, shoot accurately with every weapon he encounters, is an expert grappler, and knows how to make bodies disappear. The only challenges he experience are when facing multiple humans or something from "the other side". He is The Terminator. He pursues relentlessly.

- Which leads to the lack of character development. There is no hero's journey. We are dropped into a crisis where the main character's major challenge is how to use the skills and resources he has already developed.

I was disappointed. I am a sometime Hugo nominator and I was hoping this book would make the cut. I know he doesn't want one. That doesn't mean that his superior writing (when it occurs) shouldn't be recognized. This one didn't measure up.

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Review: Mushroom Blues

Mushroom Blues by Adrian M. Gibson
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

This is a 2-star review. I'm categorizing it as a plain "DNF" rather than a full on Dorothy Parker DNF.

This book came in second in SPFBOX. I read the winner. It was much better than this.

The premise of the book is that humans have conquered a world populated by mushroom people. They are just like humans except they have various fungi growing out of their skins including a huge mushroom on top of their heads. Everything is made of something fungal. They eat fungal foods. They build with fungal bricks and cables. They communicate partially via fungal spores. And the author reminds the reader of this fungal basis for life every other paragraph.

The book begins early on with heavy doses of racism, colonialism, and sexism. The subtext bleeds over the text pretty quickly. The native mushroom people exude a sort of language and culture that reads as "Asian" which as odd choice for people that would otherwise have no contact with an Earth Asian culture.

Within the book's narrative, there isn't any explicit reason for the humans to have conquered this planet. The impression given is that humans just love to conquer other places. There aren't any specific resources of interest nor any motivation due to expanding populations. The Terran presence on this planet is an excuse for humans to beat up on a native population...for fun?

The plot centers on a detective story. Our "hero" has a serious case of fungal-phobia and is assigned to solve the mystery of disappearing and murdered fungal children.

One feature of the story is that humans and mushroom people can make babies. How a species could evolve based on a fungal-centric biology that would be genetically compatible with humans is never explained. Do mushroom people have all the same sexual organs as human? If so, why when fungi reproduce via spores.

I made it 37% through the book before giving up. I might have lasted longer if I preferred detective stories. Belief is supposed to be suspended, not terminally broken.



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Review: Drones Above Hell Below

Drones Above Hell Below by Eric Kay
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

This is a 3-star review. I was invited to beta-read this book. While that is a fair estimate of my experience, this could easily be a 4+ star book with a bit of editing/clean-up.

The book is the story of our hero Killian who is part of a prospecting/exploring team on an alien planet. Most of the team either dies or is captured (it's unclear). Killian rescues one of his teammates and escapes back to their homebase planet via a jump drive.

Ordinarily, the jump drive creates a near instantaneous transition. But something went wrong and the jump drops them ~50 years in the future. The future is controlled by an AI that uses a social credit system to control/shape human behavior.

The humans have been back mining the planet for most of 50 years.

If you think this sounds a little like the set up for the movie "Aliens", you are right. It's still a solid premise.

The AI doesn't know what to do with Killian. It starts him off with a child's social credit score and makes him an offer if he will go back with a team to the planet. The AI has lost contact with the settlement and it has decided to send a military team to investigate.

This book has all of the prerequisites for an entertaining story. Exploration of a new world. Military action. Even a bit of a Star Trek/Kirk "putting it to" an alien logic system. IYKYK

But...the beta version has many little errors. Spelling. Changes in gender for no reason. Continuity errors (our hero was released from his handcuffs, but then was back in them).

And my pet peeve was the overuse of modern idioms. I don't believe most new/modern idioms will survive centuries from now. IMO, using modern idioms only works if the book is either humorous or just being a bit tongue-in-cheek. Modern idioms generally don't work well in serious sci-fi. Generally, less is more. One or two are excusable.

Hopefully, the author will clean up some of the more obvious issues before the formal release date. The book was generally very entertaining and engaging. I was stealing time from other priorities because I wanted to know what came next.

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Review: The 7½ Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle

The 7½ Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle by Stuart Turton
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

This is a 2-star review.

The elevator pitch for this book was good enough to get me to buy it. 5% into the book and I had zero connection to any of the characters or the setting.

Somehow, this mystery book ended up being mentioned in fantasy/sci-fi circles. For mystery fans, this might be a great book. For others...like me...not so much.

By a non-trivial margin.

The ghost of Dorothy Parker rose and the book took majestic flight.

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Review: Blood Meridian: Or the Evening Redness in the West

Blood Meridian: Or the Evening Redness in the West by Cormac McCarthy
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

This is a 2-star review which is a fair estimate of my engagement with the work.

I can't recall why I bought this book other than I was reading comments about Cormac McCarthy and this book was mentioned as something worth reading.

It didn't work for me.

It is set in the mid-1800s with the conflict between the US and Mexico. There are no heroes - including the first nations people. The characters seem to move from one desert location to another where they either end up killing a bunch of locals, or being stuck in the hoosegow for a while before being released to go kill a bunch of other locals in another desert location.

The book works hard to be "literary" to the point of boredom with extended descriptions of desert, mountains, and villages that end up being repetitious given that the region does not possess a wealth of diverse biological zones. The author also eschews the use of quotation marks to delineate when a character speaks. The lack of quotation marks isn't a deal killer, but it did make the book a more challenging read.

I made it 25% through the book before Dorothy Parker's putative ghost arrived. Go read something better.

This review made me laugh. He finished the book and nails the writing style in his review 100%.  If the writing style of the review doesn't work for you, then the book won't work for you either.

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SPFBO Champions League

Now that SPFBO has completed 10 competitions, Mark Lawrence has started a "Champions League" where each of those winners will be ranked against one another.  The competition has concluded with the winners announced on Facebook and on Mark's blog.

I've read most of the winners, but not all.  With that in mind, here is how I would rank these champions.

I've segmented this into tiers as there are some books that far outshine the others.  And other books that...welllllll.  You get the point.  Links to my reviews are included where available.  Included in the comments is where the book ended up in the competition.

First Tier - Must Read
Book	Author	Dann's Rating	Brief Comments
	J. Zachary Pike	5 Stars	Solid mix of humor, old-school, hack-and-slash AD&D, economics, and the financial crash of 2008. Our hero is an adventurer in the old school D&D sense.  He assembles a team to go acquire treasure.  Along the way, he learns how his expedition gets monetized and how the adventuring system creates victims unjustly. [Came in second in the competition.  Great book, great series.]
	Jonathan French	5 Stars	A bunch of half-orcs are charged with defending civilization (read humans) from predation by full orcs.  This is a surface level "guys" book that includes an important subtext about questioning the accepted narrative.  A "must read" for any fantasy fan. [Came in 8th in the competition.  I'm not sure why.  I may have to read the judges reviews.]
	Morgan Stang	4 Stars	I should not like this book.  It combines a Cthulu-esque mythos, with a Sherlock Holmesian protagonist, with a steam punk vibe. But I love this book.  Our hero and her sidekick are engaging and entertaining.  The mystery takes time to resolve and kept me guessing.  Lots of dry British humo(u)r. Well worth the time to read. [Came in 7th in the competition.  Again, I'm baffled, but to each their own dentifrice.]
	M.L. Wang	5 Stars	The book is a tour-de-force of Asian inspired fantasy storytelling.  Our protagonist isn't supposed to be good with a sword.  Turns out she is great with a sword. Lots of culture/norms busting subtext included with a main story and characters that are engaging and thought provoking. [Came in 1st in the competition.  This is a worthy victor and well worth your time.]
Second Tier - Good Books, Solidly Entertaining
	Olivia Atwater	4 Stars	[I haven't formally reviewed the book.]  This is one of those "cozy" novels that have become popular lately.  Great characters.  The storyline is mostly OK and would be great were it not for the unforeseen resolution that smacks mightily of Deus ex machina, literally. It turns out that angels and demons really do live among us.  And sometimes they do miracles.   [Came in 4th in the competition.  It's a good book.  If you like "cozy" coupled with "don't think too much about it", then this is a great read.]
	Justin Lee Anderson	4 Stars	I'd almost put this book above "Small Miracles".  It was a well told story with engaging characters.  At the end of the book, there is a big reveal that causes you to reconsider all of the other actions in the book.  A real mind-bender. [Came in 5th in the competition and 6th on my list, so pretty close!!]
	J.L. Odom	4 Stars	While I enjoyed this book and wish the author, a fellow Marine, great success, it just left something out.  Mostly this is the first book of a series and it largely sets up the later books without really resolving any issues in the first book. [Came in 3rd in the competition.  There was a lot of great writing and worldbuilding in the book.  But it isn't a complete story.  And the fantasy elements were minimal.]
Have Never Read - I'm working on it.
	Michael McClung	--	I haven't read this, but I've heard lots of good things about it. [Came in 6th in the competition.]
	Rob J. Hayes	--	I haven't read this one either.  But the author is well known in the self-publishing and Grimdark communities. I'm reading this book right now.  Not the best first few chapters.  I thought this was going to be a DNF for a while.  It's picking up.  Unless it sticks the landing, it will end up in the Second Tier, above. [Came in 9th in the competition.]
Last Tier
	J.D. Evans	2 Stars [2.5 Stars]	This is a romance novel smeared with a layer of fantasy-ium.  Our protagonists smash for no good reason.  The magic and political intrigue is stated but never really shown.  There are the bones of a good story here that are occluded by "romantasy". [Came in 10th.  I agree!!]

Review: In the Belly of the Whale

In the Belly of the Whale by Michael Flynn
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This is a 4-star review. This was closer to 4.5 stars, but not enough to push it to 5.

The book tells the story of a generation starship on its way to a far flung star with the purpose of expanding human habitation. The ship is home to roughly 40000 humans largely consisting of people taken from Asian and UK/European cultures. The ship has completed less than a millennia's worth of travel with more than a millennia to go. The crew are all great, great, great....great grandchildren of the first generation that launched from the Earth.

Roughly 80 years prior to the current story, the ship experienced a catastrophe where a section of the ship collapsed rendering that section theoretically uninhabitable. "Theoretically" as there are people who live there. They don't live well, but they are free of the strictures and structures imposed on the crew.

Those legal and social constraints form the core of the conflict within the novel. There are two leadership classes. One is in charge of navigation of the ship. These elites are viewed as being mostly benign as they are prevented from having children and thus cannot form any sort of dynasty. Instead, they "adopt" the next generation of navigators from the crew based on aptitude.

The other leadership class runs the various systems needed to keep people alive; i.e. food, air, water, maintenance, security, etc. Those leaders have evolved a self-limiting social structure whereby their children frequently inherit positions of great power. They use the power of those positions to accrue great wealth and still greater power.

The rest of the crew finds this situation intolerable. A mutiny/revolution eventually unfolds.

That is the general plot of the book. The subtext comments on what it means to be elite, what it means to lead, and what sort of organizational principles are needed to ensure that power is not turned toward the support of private/personal interests at everyone else's expense. The author does a great job of keeping the subtext from subsuming the plot/text of the book and becoming a thinly veiled polemic.

There are two features of the book that limited my enjoyment. The first is the number of characters. The book begins with a listing of the cast/crew including formal and informal names. Perhaps my age may be getting in the way, but the number of characters and the number of names (formal/informal/nicknames/positional) for each character got in my way a few times. There wasn't enough differentiation between the characters/names.

The second feature is the author's choice to include disparate scenes within a single chapter with no visual demarcation between those scenes. The book will spend several paragraphs and/or pages following one set of characters. The following paragraph then jumps to a different group of characters and different location without any additional visual indication that the location has shifted. This sort of jump occurs several times within a single chapter. This storytelling technique was unusual, quirky, and periodically disconcerting. Perhaps it is a byproduct of reading an e-book rather than a physical book.

One very positive feature of the book is the author's ability to show a culture that exists hundreds of years after our own. There are many cultural facets that are obviously derived from our time. But it is equally obvious that time has changed those cultural touchstones. The result is that the reader experiences a bit of anticipation for the next moment when an echo of our modern society is revealed through the lens of a culture that exists hundreds of years in our future.

Another positive feature is that the author has carefully considered the technical demands of maintaining a starship and crew for thousands of years. What limits must be put in place to prevent over population? How can problems associated with inbreeding be avoided? What sort of weapons are going to be acceptable? How much security/surveillance will be tolerated?

Overall, this is a highly enjoyable book. Well worth the effort.

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Review: Academy of Outcasts

Academy of Outcasts by Larry Correia
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

This is a 3-star review which is a reasonable estimate of my experience.

Larry's other fantasy works have been uniformly great. It took me until the afterwards of this book to figure out the problem. This is LitRPG. I rarely find LitRPG worth the effort of reading.

This book was no different. As is typical for LitRPG, there was a focus on "levels" for magic users. Not so much for fighters.

As is typical, the names used for other creatures involved minimal creativity. Sometimes no creativity.

There were enough spelling/grammar errors that I started making notes in my Kindle edition. People wear "striped" shirts and not "stripped" shirts. And once my editor's hat was on, other elements of the novel became noticeable.

One big incongruity is how the first mages set up the Nexus in the first place. All of the elemental components were on elemental plains. So how did those first mages get the elements that would allow them to cast spells to allow them to travel to elemental planes so they could mine more elemental components?

If you like LitRPG, then give this a try. It might be for you. Larry is a very good author...just not enough to make LitRPG interesting for someone that doesn't like LitRPG to begin with.

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Review: Orconomics

Orconomics by J. Zachary Pike
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

This is a 5-star review.

I rarely give out 5 star reviews. This book is something special.

[I failed to write a review when I read the book in 2019. So this will not be as detailed.]

The world of Orconomics is the world of old-school, hack-and-slash, raid dungeon for gold Advanced Dungeons and Dragons. The only good version of AD&D, in my opinion.

The sub-text of the book is the story of Wall Street trading in stocks, derivatives, and other financial tools. There is, to my layman's eyes, a pretty solid critique in this book to the activities that led to the financial collapse of 2008.

Back to the story, our hero assembles a team of adventurers to go get the McGuffin. In the process of hacking and slashing their way to the McGuffin, they learn that the whole system is a bit of a Ponzi scheme that gets adventurers to rob nominally peaceful non-humans (i.e. orcs, etc.) in order to fulfill investment contracts.

There is a ton of humor in the story. The characters are highly relatable. The economics sub-text informs rather the story rather than surpassing it. This is a solid book that is worthy of your time.

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Review: Never Let Me Go

Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

This is a 3-star review which is being a little generous. I don't recall who might have recommended this book. It tries a bit too hard to be "literary" at the expense of not telling a coherent story with believable character actions and motivations.

It's a little hard to review this book without giving away the major conceit. So... spoilers!

The premise of this book is that people have the ability to create clones of themselves for use when their body parts start to wear out. These clones are raised with the understanding that they will have to enter a period of "service" which will ultimate lead to their deaths.

We follow one group as they grow up in a sort of boarding school environment. They are given a sound education and a supportive environment. Eventually, they are allowed to leave/graduate and pursue other interests before entering their time of "service". Many of the clones actually work within the "service" industry by caring for other clones as their body parts are harvested. Not every surgery is life-ending although eventually, the doctors take something important.

It is implied that the clones are grown as a one-for-one source of parts for another person. Although I believe it is possible for clone to be genetically close enough of a match to others, this isn't a significant element of the story.

The relationship between the "person" and their "clone" is a bit unclear. It isn't clear how the growing of clones is funded or how that funding is justified. The entire arrangement smacks of a bit of the British NHS.

Another thing that isn't clear within the book is how one might know which is the clone and which is the original person. The clones appear to enjoy a large degree of autonomy and travel widely. They are able to pursue employment well beyond their function as clones.

Why can't a clone hop on a boat or a plane to simply leave the country? What is the medical/legal framework that keeps them from running for their literal lives? How might one differentiate a person from their clone? What is the mechanism (beyond propaganda/brain-washing during their formative years) that compels them to "serve". This is the one, huge plot-hole in the entire book. They end up serving as reserve body parts for no other explained reason than because "someone said so".

We eventually learn that this boarding school environment was not typical. It was a sort of experiment that was eventually discontinued due to a lack of funding. Most other clones just sort of plugged along being given a poverty level of existence.

While the book does inspire some level of reflection, the unjustifiable inevitability of the clones' "services" harms the overall reading experience.



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Review: Nemesis

Nemesis by Robert Kroese
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

This is a 3-star review, but 2.5 stars might be closer to my experience.

This series started out as highly inventive with a great mix of economics, politics, and technology.

This book really is a thinly veiled primer on economics mixed with a little bit of politics.

The world rapidly shifted into a "low trust" mode, but the outcome of the story relies on "high trust" behaviors. The odds of that outcome are low.

If you read and enjoyed the prior two entries, then reading this book is a good choice. You won't miss much by skipping it.

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Review: Cold Silver for Souls

Cold Silver for Souls by Tori Tecken
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

This is a 3-star review. Maybe a weak 3.5 star experience.

This book combines the "wild west" with a gold rush with magic with land barons with company towns. And it is a fun and easy read. If anything about the author's/publisher's synopsis makes this book sound even remotely attractive, then go read it. A good experience awaits you.

So...why only 3 stars?

This fictional world has rules. Some of them are explained. Most are at best half explained. If there are rules, then I'd like to understand them.

There is a ton of backstory that is implied but never really explored within the book. This appears to be the first in a series that is enticing readers to hang around to get the "rest of the story".

I'm a fan of the first book in any series being self-contained. The reader should be able to walk away from book 1 with a solid experience and no expectation that the rest of the answers will come later in the series. If the reader elects to continue the series, then have all the cliffhangers you want. But book 1 should stand alone.

Peter V. Brett did a masterful job of that in The Warded Man.

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