Monday Book Pick: The Given Sacrifice
The Given Sacrifice by S.M. Stirling
Once again, S.M. Stirling proves himself to be the current master of the epic trilogy. Set in his Emberverse, he wraps up another historic period of his alternate universe where Powers have denied technology beyond gunpowder. Don’t worry, there will be more epic trilogies set in the Change series. It’s just time for the next generation.
Monday Book Pick: Big Boys Don’t Cry
Big Boys Don’t Cry by Tom Kratman
Tom Kratman writes a Bolo Novella. OK, they aren’t called “Bolos”, but Parthas. They are just huge, tank like, war machines with an AI core, that are pretty damn smart by the time they reach revs in the late thirties. Let’s just say that in this morality play, the Partha’s human masters do things to them that no Bolo (or Partha) should have to live through. I know a few things about the military, military history, and training. Subjects that Kratman is an expert on, and all three play a part in this story. An interesting read, with a happier ending than you would expect.
Monday Book Pick: Nick Fury, Agent of SHIELD: Empyre
Nick Fury, Agent of SHIELD: Empyre by Will Murray
Will Murry is well known to pulp fans for his new Doc Savage novels. This book is about Marvel’s Nick Fury, Director of Shield. It was published back in 2000, and features the “old school” Nick Fury. The one who lead the “Howling Commandos” back in WWII. This is before someone decided that Sam Jackson would make a Bad Ass Nick Fury (which he did/does). In this adventure, Nick Fury has brought back the psychic division (called “Special Powers” in this iteration), and just in time too. The Special Powers group plays a major role in solving the latest evil plot from Hydra to cause death and destruction around the world. The afterword to the book says that Will Murry is a practicing psychic and has used all the of the techniques the SHIELD Special Powers group uses, including remote viewing. For you skeptics, consider this. This book was published in 2000. Spoiler alert here: It has a Middle Eastern base group (a fragment of Hydra and a thinly disguised Saddam Hussein) using commercial airliners to attack major cities by crashing the airliner into the target city. OK, Tom Clancy also used that one his books back before 9/11/2011. Still, the point had to be made. Either way, this is old school Marvel adventure with a flying SHIELD Humvee taking out Iraqi (of course they use another name, but it’s not hard to figure out) MIGs and Nick Fury at his cigar chomping best.
Monday Book Pick: Sword of Exodus
The Sword of Exodus by Larry Correia and Mike Kupari
The sequel to Dead Six. Valentine and Lorenso are in even deeper shit than they were before. Plenty of action and raw meat for the firearm enthusists.
Monday Book Pick Archive
Monday Book Pick: The Forever Engine
Filed under: Baen Books, Monday Book Pick, Science Fiction
The Forever Engine by Frank Chadwick
Crunchy Steampunk goodness from one of the founders of the genre. Yes, it’s that Frank Chadwick, creater of the Space:1889 RPG. Those of you, like me, will find a good deal familiar with tale of adventure and Mad Science. Including Liftwood, stout hearted British Marines, and a five barrel Nordenfelt!
Monday Book Pick: Hard-Boiled
Hard-Boiled by Doug Ross
Doug Ross takes a break from political blogging and knocks out a formula pulp Noir detective story. In doing so, he reminds us that there was a formula for these books because the formula worked! It was a fun, fast paced read. Where the good guys have flaws and the bad guys are ruthless killers. It isn’t high art, but it is an example of a classic art form. The Pulp Noir Detective Thriller.
Monday Book Pick: Dead Six
Dead Six by Larry Correia and Mike Kupari
This is an upfront adventure story. Two groups of very skilled killers, one a group of mercenaries, the other a group of ruthless thieves. Both end up in a small Middle Eastern country and their missions often put them into conflict. Lots of action, very accurate weapons description and handling, shadow agencies, and grand conspiracies. I really enjoyed this book, a fun read with plenty of action and twists.
Monday Book Pick: The Evil in Pemberley House
The Evil in Pemberley House by Philip Jose Farmer and Win Scott Eckert
Win Scott Eckert finishes an unpublished Farmer novel set deep in Farmer’s Wold Newton settings. Half the fun of this book is spotting all the references. Some are obvious, others require a Farmerphile, such as myself, to spot. Overall, a nice bit of pulp set in the early 70s. Patricia Clarke Wildman, the daughter of the Pulp Hero known as “Doc Savage”, is in a rough emotional spot, after the death of her parents, and her recent husband. Then she discovers that she is inheriting an English estate, made famous in the Jane Austin novel, “Pride and Prejudice.” Of course there is a ghost involved, and some shady characters among the living up to no good. With only minor spoilers, let me say that good mystery and spot of adventure is just what Patricia needed to get her out of her funk. She is her father’s daughter after all. Mild warning about the sex scenes. Very risque by 1970’s standards, but not so much today. Milder than what you would find in John Ringo’s Ghost series. A good read for the Farmer fan, but perhaps a bit too much ‘inside baseball’ references for someone not familiar with Farmer’s body of work.
Monday Book Pick: Blood of Heroes
Filed under: Baen Books, Monday Book Pick, Science Fiction
Blood of Heros by Steve White
A well researched time travel tale. The author lays out the rules for time travel in his future universe up front, which is a plus in time travel stories. Our heroes travel back to bronze age Greece to observe a historical event and then the fun starts. They run into humanoid aliens. Very long lived, technologically advanced aliens. These aliens didn’t reproduce very often, but they had been there long enough produce a second generation. The older ones had names that included Chronos and Theia. The younger ones included Zeus, Hera, and Apollo. You can see were this is going. There is much action and adventure (adventure: bad things happening to other people far away). A fun read with two sequels already.
Monday Book Pick: Amateur Night
Amateur Night: A World War II Historical Adventure by C.P. McKechney
An interesting, but long, story about a Nazi attempt to knock out the Panama Canal just before the US becomes involved in WWII. The plot is foiled by a collection of ‘expendable amateurs.’ This book was interesting to me personally in several ways. First, I’m a more than average history buff, I enjoy military fiction, and most of the action occurs in the Canal Zone, where I lived for a couple of years as a kid. There are some interesting characters in the book, some of which are slightly more filled out than your typical cardboard cutout character. The action scenes are well written and are clearly carefully story boarded. There is also a very good, and shorter, book trapped inside this novel waiting to get out. I was reminded of an interview with an author who pays his mortgage with sales from e-books, in which he points out that he budgets for an editor for all of his books. Those carefully story boarded actions scenes I mentioned, you read almost all of them multiple times as the author provides multiple viewpoints for each fight. These are not blended together to provide a fast narrative that conveys the chaos of combat. You get the full action sequence played out, in full, from two or more perspectives, one right after the other. If you enjoy this type of book, and have the time to kill, give it a go. If you don’t have the patience to slog through a book that really is much too long, then don’t start this one.