Boing Boing put me onto this online short story. Its really very good, and it distracted me from the book I am meant to be reading by not only being clever, but also by using jargon in a manner that not only furthered the story, but (and here’s the rare bit) didn’t make me immediately…
Author: mikal
Isaac Asimov’s Robot City: Robots and Aliens: Maverick
Bruce did an ok job with this book, although I think overall he was suffering from not having a lot to work with. The book is quite readable, which isn’t true of some of the others, and has some nice details such as an attempt to sound technically feasible by the liberal sprinkling of unix…
Dragondrums
This is the third book in the Harper Hall trilogy (after Dragonsong and Dragonsinger). I didn’t enjoy it as much as the other two. This book focuses on Piemur instead of Mellony, and the first half is about his pubescent turmoil, which is probably why I didn’t enjoy this book as much. I had similar…
Dragonsinger
This book is interesting because its 200 or so pages only cover a seven day period. Its a coming of age story that continues directly on from Dragonsong, and overlaps somewhat with The White Dragon (if only peripherally). This book has parallels with Pawn of Prophecy in my mind, mostly because they’re both about young…
Books read in August 2009
The White Dragon Bio of a Space Tyrant: Politician Bolos 6: Cold Steel Dragonsong
Dragonsong
Dragonsong sits between Dragonquest and The White Dragon, although there is some overlap with The White Dragon and it doesn’t matter what order you read those two in. Some friends and I were joking the other day that all McCaffrey books seem to involve a pained teenager coming to age. That’s true with this book,…
Bolos 6: Cold Steel
This bolo book is different from the previous ones, in that it heavily focuses on the humans side of the story, instead of the bolo’s inner monologue. I’ve seen reviews online that say this makes it a bad bolo book, but I think that’s unfair. The bolos are critical to the telling of this story,…
Bio of a Space Tyrant: Politician
This is the third book in the Bio of a Space Tyrant series (following Refugee and Mercenary). I picked this series up on a whim when it was cheap in a bookstore sale, and liked the first two books, although the first was quite grim and the second a little odd. This book isn’t as…
Don’t use Jetbus Sydney if you want to catch your flight
I had to take a flight a few weeks ago, and I thought I’d do the financially (and environmentally) sensible thing and use an airport shuttle service. Especially because the airport train in Sydney is so expensive and slow. I found Jetbus online, and paid with PayPal. The first time I used them they were…
The White Dragon
This book took me ages to finish, and I’m not sure if that was because of distractions in real life (moving into a new house), or if it was because I just wasn’t all that into it. The first half of the book is the growing pains of Jaxom, the rider of white dragon Ruth….