Book Recommendations

I'm a voracious reader. But a terrible book reviewer. For an example of a great book reviewer, I would point you to Jeffro at the Castalia House Blog. On to the recommendations:

JACK CLOUDIE, by Stephen Hunt.

I've  been a fan of Hunt's Jackalian universe series from the beginning. I wish these books got more attention. And I wish he'd return to them! They're gonzo Steampunk. Hunt has the ability to throw everything but the kitchen sink into a story and somehow make it work.

HOLLYWOOD PHARAOHS, by Andrew Mayne.

I finally got around to reading this book after a friend's recommendation a few years back. As I turn away, more and more, from the traditional publishing powerhouses and their "Literary/Social Justice" agenda driven works, I am finally coming around to reading the independent stuff being kicked out by the biggest print revolution since Gutenberg happening at Amazon. This was a surprisingly entertaining book. My first forays into the self-published world were...blah. I could see why many of them were self-published. But that is changing! A very good thing, I think. HOLLYWOOD PHARAOHS is a modern day thriller written by a stage magician. And it's a lot of fun.

RIDING THE RED HORSE, Edited by Tom Kratman and Vox Day.

I purchased this one a few months back and finally got a chance to read it last month. And it was well worth it. First of all, the presence of Jerry Pournelle's story His Truth Goes Marching On is nearly worth the price alone. And there wasn't a bad story in the book. Besides Pournelle's, my other favorite was Shakedown Cruise by Rolf Nelson. I loved the way the A.I. was portrayed and can't wait to read more about Armadillo.

Another thing that makes this book special is the Non-fiction. From combat lasers to Fourth Generation war, which was a fascinating essay by William S. Lind, there was a lot of good stuff in this book.

THE MARTIAN by Andy Weir

Combine APOLLO 13 with the MACGYVER T.V. Series. Add liberal doses of humor to help the dry, cold martian terrain go down. Mix well.

THE MARTIAN is one of the best Science Fiction books I've had the pleasure of reading in a good long time. Hard science fiction, at that, which usually doesn't hold my interest for very long.

It's refreshing. The only agendas this book has is to A) Entertain you and B) Demonstrate that daring the impossible, odds be damned, is itself a worthy thing. If I took away any theme from the book, its that nothing worthwhile happens without risk. And we've become far too risk averse for our own good.

Highly Recommeded.

My how time flies...

It seems like just yesterday that I was posting on my love of the Guardians of the Galaxy movie. Then family crises and real world drama struck. I don't know how the big bloggers do it.

Anyway, I'm still here and still plugging away on my fiction. I hope to have some book and movie reviews up soon.

Guardians of the Galaxy

Guardians of the Galaxy is a lot of things. It's funny and action packed. It's even heartwarming. It's strikingly beautiful and even awe inspiring. I loved it.

Talking with my friends as we walked out of the theater, it occurred to me that this movie is everything that The Fifth Element aspired to be but wasn't: fun, gonzo, epic but mostly, coherent. 

I remember how hopeful I was back in the day. Standing in line with my then girlfriend (a dumb ass) and her little brothers, I kept thinking that here comes the sci fi movie I've been waiting for: the next Star Wars. Oh, how my hopes and dreams were dashed by that atrocity of a movie. It was certainly a beautiful movie and visually striking. But that was it. It was empty and hollow. There was action but no passion. But mostly, it just devolved into an incoherent mess of a narrative. Maybe it made more sense on repeated viewings. I wouldn't know. I never watched it again.

I'm not saying that Guardians of the Galaxy is the next Star Wars. But if it had been made by Luc Besson, rather than a former Troma director, I would consider it one hell of an apology. 

Endings

So, I have been on a Richard Laymon kick the past few weeks. He passed away in 2001 and I try not to read too many of his books so as to not run out of them. I reread Night in the Lonesome October and One Rainy Night. If gore and stomach twisting horror aren't for you, then run away!. But if you want horror, real scary horror, give a Laymon a try. 

I just finished Funhouse by Laymon, which I hadn't read before. It was pretty good. His usual stuff, which means compellingly readable and dread inducing. But the ending, well... it was crap. Not just over the top. Way, way over the top. It still wasn't as bad as most of Stephen King's endings (at least the ones that  I have actually made it to), which are horrible.

I headed back to Amazon, in search of the next book to read and noticed something in the reviews of various books that has bothered me in the past: There are people who absolutely hate "Happy Endings" no matter the genre or story.

Shouldn't the end of a story be appropriate to the story itself? I have always thought so but I get the feeling I am outnumbered.

I like Happy Endings. I like Unhappy Endings less, but if they seem appropriate, it won't ruin the story for me. The only endings I actively dislike, in movies or books, are the Sudden Fade to Black/Faux Daringly Ambiguous Endings (I'm looking at you Inception). But that's neither here nor there.

But the hatred of Happy Endings, for the sake of hating  happy Endings, reminds me of an ex-girlfriend of mine who liked to wallow in the misery of her horrible upbringing and consequently, avoided Happy things (Endings, Christmas, rainbows and smiling children) like the plague (There's a reason she is an ex-girlfriend).

However, Amazon tells me she wasn't alone. Far from it. I have always known this but have never been able to puzzle out the lure of dark, depressing things, like Unhappy Endings. I don't think  I will ever undertand it.

Been away a while...

Life, while being great and all, happens and laughs at our plans.  Life happened for me these past few months. While I was able to write a bit more in my Atoms & Arcana epic, I wasn't able to get much else done, outside of my real world obligations. But I hope that has changed and we have turned a corner.

I have discovered a few new daily reads:

Vox Day's (in)famous site, Vox Popoli.

John C. Wright's website. I discovered his books through the Vox Day site and I am glad that I did.

I have now finished Count to a Trillion and Awake in the Night Land. Where has this guy been all of my life? Wright has a way with the English language that is nothing short of masterful.


As for Vox, I have found him to be sometimes borderline offensive but always thought provoking. If political correctness is the neurotoxin slowly bringing Western Civilization to its knees, then the conversations that happen at Vox Day, and those like it, are the antidote.

I am reminded of a Carl Sagan quote regarding James Randi and feel you could apply the same to Vox:

• "We may disagree with Randi on certain points, but we ignore him at our peril."

Pandemonia: The Art of Audacity

"Complacency, not failure, is the opposite of success."

                                                               -Ignezio

While many military leaders in the Stormsea Republic like to point to the Lord Zachias' magnum opus, The Manual of Maneuvers, as the most influential treatise on strategy in the Republic (if not most of the civilized world) some consider him a bit too irreverent, and more than a little cynical. Those that would say such things would hold up their own champion of strategy, the ancient mercenary, and least cynical of men, Ignezio, author of "The Art of Audacity".

Not much is known about the man. It is held that he most likely made the Crossing, from the Old World to Pandemonia, with the original men and women and was most likely a Centurion in their Legion. Historians believe he was integral in the training and organization of the Proto-Republic's first armies as well one of the more influential forebearers of what would later be called Stormsea. Ignezio's book is devoid of personal details and focuses solely on the man's philosophy, one that he believed applied as much to life as to war.

As the title would suggest, Ignezio held that of all virtues (namely the seven Cardinal Virtues of the Proto-Republic: Volition, Reason, Integrity, Love, Duty, Kindness and Audacity) in high regard but Audacity, being boldness, was the most important.

Ignezio said:

       "Audacity, that which some call Courage and others Boldness, is the greatest of all of the virtues. For without Audacity, where would the others be? How would a man maintain his Integrity in the face of temptation and pressure without Audacity. Is not every man a man of integrity until pressure or temptation are applied against the fulcrums of our fear or greed?

        And what of Love? Would love be both liberating and daunting without Audacity? No, it would simply be daunting, rendering the would-be lover a prisoner to his or her desires, trapped, with all of the drawbacks of love and none of the beauty, living in fear of a life consumed by loneliness.

       What of Reason? How is a man to maintain his intellectual poise, his equanimity in the face of superstitious fearmongering, weathering the emotional blows and tantrums of the terminally anti-intellectual. The anti-intellectuals being those mediocre men who wear their emotions on the sleeve, indeed, who claim with appalling pride that they are correct because they feel that they are, and that those feelings are as valid as any man's reason. Such mediocre men, with vaste mindless numbers being their only advantage, will always be the enemy. They are the tools and legionaries of Tyrants and Demogogues. Their boldness, a false and hollow boldness, comes from their like minded fellows, swept up in emotion with their mobs and hordes, not from within their own minds.

         Where mediocrity, fear and temptation are fought, Audacity leads the charge, outnumbered as always. Because Audacity wouldn't be Audacity if it weren't outnumbered."

Creative Writing Playlists

I'm sure I am not the only person who listens to music when writing my stories or working on my Fictional Milieu. I have two basic playlists that I listen to when writing or mapping. 

The first is entirely Orchestral Scores/Symphony type stuff. I use it primarily when writing action or battles. As one can imagine, given my last post, John Williams figures big on this list. But so does John Powell. I love his work. He is the natural successor to Lord Williams in my humble opinion.

The Lone Wolves Playlist #1:

Our Last Hope- Two Steps From Hell*

El Dorado- Two Steps From Hell

All is Hell that Ends Well- Two Steps From Hell

Lacrimosa Dominae- Trailerhead*

The Slave Children's Crusade (from Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom)- John Williams

Coming Back Around (from How to Train Your Dragon)- John Powell

Goa (from The Bourne Supremacy)- John Powell

Raider's March (from Raiders of the Lost Arc)- John Williams

The Asteroid Field (from The Empire Strikes Back)- John Williams

Willow (from Willow)- James Horner

Battle in the Mutara Nebula (from Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan)- James Horner

Imagine the Fire (from The Dark Knight Rises)- Hans Zimmer

Playlist número dos is a completely different animal. It's kind of a little bit over everything. I mean, it's really all over the damn place. As much as I love the first playlist, well, sometimes you just need to take a break.

The Lone Wolves Playlist #2:

Making Love Out of Nothing At All- Air Supply

The Heat of the Moment- Asia

Dr. Feelgood- Motley Crüe

Just Like Paradise- David Lee Roth

Love Will Turn You Around- Kenny Rogers

Islands in the Stream- Kenny Rogers & Dolly Parton

Bawitaba- Kid Rock

Sing- My Chemical Romance

Careless Whisper- George Michael

Blaze of Glory- Bon Jovi

I Don't Care- Fallout Boy

The Heat is On- Glenn Frey

Right Round- Flo Rida

Country Girl (Shake it for me)- Luke Bryan

Glory of Love- Peter Cetera

Sweater Weather- The Neighborhood

I'd Really Love to See You Tonight- England Dan & John Ford Coley

Hysteria- Muse

Sleeping With a Friend- Neon Trees

Witch Hunt- MDMFK

Save a Horse (Ride a Cowboy)- Big & Rich

After the Rain- Nelson

Emotion- Samantha Sang

Lay All Your Love On Me- ABBA

Ready to Take a Chance Again- Barry Manilow

Living After Midnight- Judas Priest

Burning Love- Elvis Presley

The Humpty Dance- Digital Underground

Girlfriend- Matthew Sweet

I usually set Playlist #1 on Repeat for a few hours while only taking one turn around #2 every time I listen.

*Two Steps From Hell & Trailerhead are two groups that produce music for Hollywood to use in movie trailers and have began to get followings for their stuff amongst some pretty loyal fans. You may not recognize their names but if you watch movie trailers or commercials, it's almost certain you've heard them.

Pandora!!!!

So, at one time, roughly two years ago, I was listening to Pandora Radio quite a bit. I stopped after a while because, for some reason, Pandora can't get it through its stupid algorithm the fact that I can't stand The Lord of the Rings soundtrack. Can't stand it. I hate the damn movies and I hate the damn score.

I typically listened to my John Williams station and would up vote anything by him, Hans Zimmer (especially The Dark Knight and The Dark Knight Rises),Basil Polidouris, James Horner (Khan!!!!) Of course this means I would get a lot of Star Wars, Indiana Jones and The Wrath of Khan (which is great writing music, by the way). And I am more than OK with all of that. They're like the symphonic score to my childhood. 

But I would down vote Howard Shore's music at every turn. 

It got to the point where I would put Pandora on so that I could listen to music while doing the dishes every night and I was continuously taking a break to dry my hands and then scramble for the little 'Thumbs Down' icon whenever it tried to float the score form that turd of a movie trilogy past me. So, I took a break from Pandora and eventually just made a couple of great playlists of my own on iTunes.

Fast forward to about three weeks ago, I finally joined the 21st century and got a Smart Phone that had Pandora already installed. I thought, "What the heck? I'll give it another try."

 And you know what?

 Effing Pandora still insists on trying to make me like this craptastic music by pushing it on my every other effing song!!!!

Ugh. Back to iTunes. Which is too bad, because Pandora has introduced me to a few gems, most notably Lindsey Stirling's Legend of Zelda Medley. It's awesome. But I spent too much on this phone to chuck it through a window when it really isn't the phones fault at all. 

Pandemonia: The Filthsea

Far below the city of Darkstar, below even the labrynthine sewers of the known world's largest city is the Filthsea.

The Filthsea fills the bottom of a cavern so wide you can't see the far side from the shore near the falls that pour into the water from the sewers above it. The Filthsea was once crystal clear, pure and filled with subterranean marine life; collossal jelly fish glowing blue and purple, blind albino cave whales, and other more alien creatures. 

And then the sewers above eroded a hole through the ceiling of the Filthsea's cavern. The waterfall of sewage that cascades into the Filthsea dwarfs even the Drammenstorm Falls of the Redwood Reach. All manner of garbage and waste falls into the Filthsea and it has long since been a nauseous green and brown water of mutated marine giants and other more terrifying entities.

The Sewer Infantry rarely goes there as the Salmoraxii have made the shores of the Filthsea into one of their bigger settlements and footholds on this side of the Gate from their home world. One day, the more forward thinking, competent commanders of the Sewer Infantry hope to mount an offensive and take the fight straight to the Salmoraxii. 

Okay. All right. Important safety tip. Thanks, Egon.

Harold Allen Ramis
November 21, 1944- February 24, 2014

I'm not usually affected by the deaths of celebrities. I just don't get it when people identify with someone so geographically distant, someone they have probably never met, someone most likely nothing like their on-screen persona.

That being said, I was not only shocked to hear that Harold Ramis passed but I was shocked at how sad it made me.

I'm not going to do the math, but just spitballing it, I'd guess that Harold Ramis accounted for about 80% of my adolescent laughter.

Rest in peace, Dr. Spengler.
Don't cross the streams.

I stand corrected...

So, for the past few months, I have been telling my friends that Marvel bringing The Guardians of the Galaxy to the big screen sounded like a lame idea.

But then I saw the trailer...

I hate to say it, but I am intrigued. Though, I still think its a bad idea to continue making separate Avengers movies (Thor 2, Iron Man 3, etc.) rather than focusing on more team movies.

GFWG Meeting

This past Thursday was yet another meeting of the Glens Falls Writer's Group. Last meeting, I turned in Chapter 2 of my Atoms & Arcana epic. The first chapter was well received, all things considered. The second not so much. Well, I should say that the group picked up on many of the issues that I had worried about myself. And I also received two great ideas that might help me solve it. (Thanks Sandy and Chris)

One problem though, is that many of the others in the group just don't read Sci-Fi/Fantasy. With the genre comes a couple of conceits; made-up names and places (a lot of names). My story has a definite military fantasy feel to it, like say The Black Company. Not that I would dare to compare myself to a Giant. But by nestling comfortably into that genre, or sub-genre, a list of names comes with it.

This was the biggest criticism I received and the bulk of the notes I took away from the meeting.

If there happen to be any pros out there that were to read this, I would appreciate some advice on how to handle this issue, aside from giving them unique personality traits in broad strokes, which I am reluctant to do. (I don't want The Squad Joker, The Squad Cynic, etc.) I want them to grow and have multi-faceted personalities. And unfortunately, my fellow writers only get to read a chapter every two weeks, which I can understand makes it difficult to keep them straight.

Any advice would be appreciated.

Sewer Infantry Slang: Brown Breaches

Brown Breaches (n),(adj.): A horrifying, often soul crushing spectacle or encounter or used to describe said encounter. Can happen anywhere but usually involves a Greater Rift Aberration, a denizen of The Weirdwood or close call with one the Bleak Powers, like Xerqix or his depraved followers. Related: Slantways

(1)"That time we cleared out that Xerqix temple, we were surrounded by the Clown God's favored assassins and lost a quarter of our men. Even the Sarge agreed it was a Brown Breaches encounter."

(2) "Shit, Sarge! The cryptopi are droppin' from the ceiling! Brown breaches, Sarge! It's brown breaches!

Pandemonia: The Black Hand

Not long after the founding of the Stormsea Republic, when some of the ancient Leviathans still stalked the world, refusing to give up the fight, one of the greatest soldiers of the age and holder of one of the last vorpal swords, Centurion Arblaster was attached to the Third Provincial Legion. The Third took part in the defense of Sunturi after a failed experiment opened a rift to some infernal plane of existence. To this day, the exact plane is unknown. But the entities that crossed over were well observed.

An army of small fiends wrought a path of destruction through the city of Sunturi, doing damage out of proportion to their small physical size. They were led by a giant, hellish Lord, protected by armor sculpted from black volcanic rock and holding a sickening black sword. His cloven feet burned the ground where he walked and the prints can still be seen in Sunturi to this day.

No soldier could stand against him. Where he touched soldiers, he burned them. When he held them in his fist, they ignited.

Arblaster called out a challenge to the fiend and stood in his way, though the Fiend Lord was twice as tall as a man. The Fiend Lord laughed and a whole city heard his mirth and quivered in fear. All except Arblaster. The Fiend Lord and the Centurion fought. Arblaster's vorpal sword cut the Fiend Lord's sword in two. The Fiend Lord slapped Arblaster with his palm and sent the man flying into a building.

The Fiend thought his victory was complete but Arblaster stood up. There was a giant, burning black hand print on his chest. Arblaster stumbled, hurt and nearly broken, toward the Fiend Lord. The Centurion still held the vorpal sword and cut the Fiend Lord in half, through its stone armor, and it died laughing.

Arblaster sank into unconsciousness and slept for a week. When he woke, his hair had turned white and the same black hand was burned through his armor to his skin. He died many years later, a farmer and a very old man. A statue of him stands in Sunturi at the site of the battle and another statue stands in his home city of Centralia.

The armies of the Republic honor bravery against impossible odds by allowing the painting of a large black hand on the armored chest of any soldier judged worthy after the witnessing of a Black Hand victory.

The Snow Mangler 5000

I didn't think it was possible to love a machine this much but after the past few days of relentless snow, I can safely say that I love my snowblower.

The other night, I went to bed at 1am. It had been snowing earlier in the day and we received 5 inches or so. I got home from work to the pleasant surprise that my neighbor had already done most of the work for both of our houses with his little snowblower. So, at 1am, everything was cleared of snow( cars, driveway, sidewalks, etc).  I went to bed thinking, maybe the worst of it has passed. WRONG!!!

By 5:30 that morning when I woke up, there was 10 more inches on the ground. It was as if God tired of sprinkling his little flakes and grabbed a cosmic ice cream scoop and dumped it all at once.

When, we finally dug out, and after fixing the loose belts on my Toro Snow Mangler 5000, I realized that I was never more in love with that thing than I was right then.

Sewer Infantry Slang: Monkeychuck

Monkeychuck (n):catastrophe, fiasco or misadventure of potentially epic and tragic scope that is foreseeable by nearly everyone involved except the Cobnocker(s) who dreamt it up, usually The Powers That Be.

Etymology: Believed to derive from the Stormsea Republic's Second Expedition to The Monsoon Kingdoms, specifically Lord General Arcturus' foray into the interior of the Big Island near the mouth of the Con Dao river.  Arcturus took an entire Expedtionary Legion, woefully under equipped and unprepared, into the rainforest to "see what's back there". After losing forty percent of his force to disease, malnutrition and constant raids by the baboon worshipping natives, Arcturus was forced to turn back. But not until after he had named a small mountain range after himself. On his return to Darkstar, then the capital, he was of course decorated with medals and other honors and later, elected to the Senate.

Survivors of the ill fated campaign told stories of the various species of monkeys and apes that infested the rainforest and continuously deficated in tents and bit soldiers while they ate. At some point, the soldiers invented a game that consisted of chucking two male monkeys into a pit and betting on the outcome of their combat.

The Second Wave

Not getting much writing done the past few days. The Ball and Chain, as well as one of my beloved spawn, are in the throes of yet another wave of the Stomach Bug From Hades. Three weeks ago, a (most likely different virus altogether) ripped through our humble homestead with an average duration of 4 days and leaving a net weight loss for our family in a double digit number that raises the old eyebrows. We did have a brief respite, filled with the warmth of sinusitis and high fevers, but we are hunkering down for the second wave of effluvia, Gatorade and Clorox Wipes.

I am beginning to loathe Stomach Bugs as much as I do those of the Socialist/Communist persuasion.

Best Commercial EVAH!

Best Commercial Ever!

"Stop LOLing everything!"

Sewer Infantry Slang: Cobnocker

Cobnocker (n): the crossbreed of an idiot and an asshole who somehow manages to avoid being saddled with both parents' good qualities.