Video Game Madness

Hola Readers.  Time for another ramble.  Today let's change our pace a bit and ramble on a short story collection shall we?  The book is Press Start to Play edited by Daniel H. Wilson and John Joseph Adams.  I picked it up because I was in the mood for something technological and nerdy AND I am pretty much trying to collect all of the collections that John Joseph Adams has a hand in 'cause he tends to have collections I love.  In this anthology every story is based on the concept of a video game.  How did this work out?  Some worked better then others, here are some of my favorites.  As always SPOILERS AHEAD!

Respawn by Hiroshi Sakurazaka, translated by Nathan Allan Collins - An average guy is working in a beef bowl joint when he is killed in a botched robbery.  How surprised is he when he wakes up in his killers body.  He, in the killers body is sent to jail for his own murder and while there is killed again...and respawns into another body.  This continues as he realizes that he is pretty much immortal and respawns into another body every time he dies.  His thought process on this new power is really what makes this story, I found my self enjoying it very very much.

1UP by Holly Black - A group of gamer friends who have never met in person gather at the funeral of one of their own.  Sorry's last request after a long illness was that they attend his funeral.  As the group examines Sorry's room after the funeral they discover a game.  Following the game reveals a story of horrific origins and reveals how and why Sorry died.  In true video game fashion, when the friends follow the game to the end it leads to Sorry's actual grave, where upon digging him up he "comes back to life" as he only faked his death in a last ditch desperate bid at freedom.  This was a great read on games, friendship and their connection.

Survival Horror by Seanan McGuire - One of my favorite authors writing a story featuring one of my favorite characters...of course it is gonna end up on my favorites list.  Antimony, the youngest Price girl from the InCryptid series is chilling with her super nerdy cousin Artie when they are both sucked into an evil video game that if they lose, results in the freedom of a potentially world ending monster.  We watch them play through, all while bantering with their signature snark of awesome.  This was a perfect blend of my favorite type of puzzle video games and one of my favorite series.  Pretty much all a girl could ask for.

Save Me Plz by David Barr Kirtley - Meg hasn't heard from Devon in four months.  They had dated for a while but his obsession with the computer game Realmso  Eldritch eventually ended their relationship.  So Meg grabs her sword and set's off to buy the game to try and reconnect with him.  As soon as she logs on Devon sends her a message "Save Me Plz"  Of she sets to find a gnome to help her on her quest which he does by giving her the Wand of Reification.  She goes through the quest and ends up at a castle where Devon is working on his computer.  He tells her he found a loophole that allows him to collect extra Wand's and he is using them to slowly morph the "real world" into a world resembling the game.  He tells Meg that she has voluntarily done the mission multiple times and she finally agrees to continue.  Really cool story.

The Relive Box by T.C. Boyle - A new game console has come out called the Relive Box.  The purpose of this is to allow the user to relive their own memories in real time.  In our story Katie and her father fight over the use of the box.  Katie who is a young 15 wants to go back and relive before her mother left.  Her father just want's to relive his younger day's, trying to find what went wrong with his life.  This reliving essentially takes over his life to the point of losing his daughter.  I think what really hits me about this story is all the thinking it made me do.  If people are constantly reliving the past, how do you make new memories?  What happens when younger users with limited memories spend their whole life fixated on a single memory?  So much to think about!  I love it!

Gamer's End by Yoon Ha Lee - In the distant future where things are done on a galactic level, realistic immersive games are used to train soldiers.  A soldier who is up for a promotion is sent up to a space station to be put through a simulation.  At this time the bulk of the government is at war with a group called the Taurag Republic who while willing to wage war, do everything in their power to not hurt civilians and non-combatants.  After a few minutes into the simulation he is pulled out when the station he is on is invaded by the Taurag Republic.  He is directed by voice to fight his way to the core and use the stabilizer as a weapon against them.  He is forced to kill a couple of the enemy on his way, which disturbs him more then he thought it would.  Once he gets their and get's directions he realizes that while using the station as a weapon would stall the enemy and buy them some time, it would also kill millions of people on the planet surface.  He refuses to do it.  He wakes up and is told that the whole thing was a real scenario designed to test his empathy and willingness to kill civilians.  He has "passed" and the promotion is his.  Great thinking story, loved it.

Killswitch by Catherynne M. Valente - I love this author, mostly because of the imagery she can evoke while still telling a fairly cohesive story and this story is no exception.  The game is called Killswitch and it can only be played once then the game deletes itself, it cannot be copied, it cannot be saved, it cannot be shared. This drives people crazy because there are two different playable characters to choose from the impossible, invisible Ghast that nobody has ever been able to play past the first level and Porto, a human female who the game is about.  The maker of the game has hinted at all kinds of secrets...but nobody can find them all because of it's unreplayability.  The story ends with the last of the limited game being bought by a player who has vowed to play it on a live stream, but the only footage is a minute of him starting the game and crying...

This collection as with all anthologies was a bit hit or miss.  Some of the stories felt a bit generic or flat, but over all I enjoyed the majority of the stories and will definitely be reading many of them again.  There were a lot of familiar authors that did not disappoint, and I got to read some great stories from writers I have never heard of, which to me is an awesome perk of short story collections. I give this book 7 out of 10 game controllers and recommend it to anybody who has enjoyed any sort of video or computer game.  Happy Reading Everybody!

Children And Farmers...In Space

I have just enough time to throw together a quick rambling today so lets get right to it shall we?  Today's ramble is brought to you by The Children of Hamlin by Carmen Carter and is one of the early Star Trek: TNG books.  After the not so enjoyable experience of my last Star Trek book, I turned to one my favorites when I was younger, and I still very much enjoy it.  I am going to assume everybody reading this knows enough about the show that I don't need to rehash and will jump into the synopsis.  As always SPOILERS AHEAD!

The USS Enterprise gets a distress signal and diverts from it's current mission of delivering a group known as the Farmers to their new home planet.  They get to the distressed ship just in time to rescue a small number of people from the ship.  Turns out that the ship was carrying Andrew Deelor, a Starfleet operative and his mysterious companion Ruthe.  Deelor was on the ship to work negotiations with a reclusive species known as the Choraii.  The aliens live in a loose society of traveling ships made of a bubble like structure and are willing to destroy whole civilizations for the smallest amounts of metal which is crucial to their survival.  It was this need for metal that brought the Choraii to the Federations attention in the first place.  They massacred every adult on an outpost known as Hamlin and all the children disappeared.  Now thirty five years later they have discovered that the children were taken by the Choraii and have had children of their own and Deelor's job is to negotiate for them back.  The Choraii are very difficult to negotiate with as their language is music based and they do not use visuals. Through out the negotiations the crew has to deal with the Farmers who not only eschew technology but are very vocal about being stuck on the ship.  A child and an older man are traded from the Choraii ship. The young one does pretty good once they figure out how to deal with him, but the older one eventually ends up dying.  When approached Ruthe says it is because he grew up in a world so different that being "rescued" was too much of a shock.  With the humans rescued, the ship heads to the Farmer's new world where they discover another massacre similar to what happened at Hamlin.  They also discover that the only child on the world is missing.  They track down the Choraii ship responsible and Ruthe negotiates for the child.  The trade turns out to be Ruthe for the child.  Ruthe was a child that had been "rescued" around 11 years of age and has been secretly searching for what she considers her home ship ever since.  There is much discussion about the ethics, morals and rules when it comes to this complicated situation, but in the end everybody has to move on.

I have always enjoyed this book, ever since I started reading them at the age of 10.  I think I liked this one so much because it featured children and Dr. Crusher, two of my favorite things at the time.  I still enjoy it for it's portrayal of such an alien species, culture and environment and  how one has to think a different way when dealing with them.  There is all the things that make Star Trek...well Star Trek in this book and as a huge fan I love it! The allusion to the story Pied Piper of Hamelin with the children being taken, the music being how the aliens communicate (Ruthe uses a pipe to "talk" with them) and the children's reluctance to leave the Choraii environment is very well done without being to extremely blatant.  The writing is pretty good, it flows nicely and switches between characters very smoothly.  There is not too much character introspection, and the author did not try and read too much into very established characters.  This book gave me the perfect combination of familiarity with my beloved Enterprise and loved characters and a bit of the exotic and alien with the absolutely strange and wonderful Choraii.  This is why I love SciFi, this is why I love rereading old favorites and this is why I love Star Trek.  Over all a solid entry into a wide and varied series.  I give it 7 out of 10 grapes and recommend it to anybody who loves this show/series as much as I do.

The Astronaut

Had a blast with my Bubby, his wife and my Hubbin this weekend, which included watching the phenomenal movie The Martian...based on the book The Martian by Andy Weir.  My Hubbin asked me try and hold off on reading the book before watching the movie 'cause I have a bad habit of being "that person" during the movie who compares it to the book the whole time...I tried...I really tried, but we had a long distance transfer at work which resulted in a long trip home...and the book was there...As always SPOILERS AHEAD!!!! (for the book and movie)

Mark Watney gets brutally ripped away from his crew during a massive storm.  Presumed dead by his crew mates (which makes sense 'cause his bio-readings show him dead) make an emergancy ascent to their ship the Hermes and head home.  Shockingly Watney survives his ordeal and is now stranded on Mars as the only living creature on the planet.  We follow Watney through his journal as he tries and plans on how to survive.  This is made a bit easier as he still has most of the equipment from the aborted mission at his disposal including potatoes which he plants using his own poo as fertilizer...I call them pootatos..get it...POOtatos hahahahahaha....ok...need to get back on track.  Watney realizes that everybody must think he is dead.  On a positive note, he also realizes that if he can survive long enough, the next Mars mission will be arriving in about 4 years.   Of course he not only needs to figure out how to survive that long, but how to navigate a ton of the planet to get to the new landing site.  Meanwhile back at NASA a series of satellite photos reveal that Watney is still alive.  This of course causes a huge stir and much discussing on the possibilities of his long term survival and the chances of rescuing him.  An unexpected boon happens when Watney gets a hold of Pathfinder and uses it to communicate with NASA.  They work together on several plans starting with a rushed probe to get him supplies.  This goes very wrong when certain variables are not accounted for.  Watney continues on his own with various plans, mishaps and revamping when things don't go his way...turns out he is a savvy botanist.  All hope seems lost when the Chinese reveal they have a probe that they are willing to donate to the cause in exchange for a spot on the next Mars expedition.  NASA plans on using this to send more food to Watney.  Meanwhile a kid named Rich Purnell figures that using the right calculations they can use the probe to resupply the Hermes the ship that the rest of Watney's crew is on and send them back to pick him up.  The problem is they only have one probe and must choose which plan to go with.  NASA director chooses the "safer" option of sending Watney food, only to be foiled when an anonymous person sends the plan to the crew of the Hermes who execute it without permission.  With no other option they go for the rescue plan and head back to Mars to pick up their missing crewman.  Back on Mars, Watney has overcome all kinds of stuff to finally get to the landing site where he is told how to strip pretty much everything off of the ascent vehicle.  After a couple of harrowing maneuvers the crew of the Hermes get their man back. And that is the  basic story.

For some reason, every time I refer to this book I call it the astronaut instead of The Martian...not sure why...but there you go. What the synopsis does not do is convey the sheer personality of almost every single character in this book, it is just amazing to me  how varied, detailed and authentic each person has, while still being a pretty scientific novel.  This combination of personality and science (well as much science as one can have in a slightly futuristic fiction novel) really makes this book readable for several types of readers.  I especially enjoyed the sense of humor in what could have been a very dreary and depressing story.  The voice of Mark (which is the dominant one in this book) is my favorite as you watch him cycle through emotions, then get on with keeping himself alive.  He is smart, but sometimes messes up, he is scared, but not helpless, he is funny, but no inappropriate. A lot of the strength in this book comes in part from the format.  About 2/3 of the total book is a first person verbal journal style of Mark Watney and his time on Mars.  This works well 'cause his stream of conscious style suits his predicament and gives him ample opportunity to just talk things out.  This also gives us a lot of the humor as he pretty much says whatever comes to his brain as he records.  We also get a kind of real time "technical" peek into exactly how he is surviving.  This first person narrative is peppered with random flashbacks and the normal prose at NASA.  In the end we get to see things from both ends, get to know things the other end doesn't and laugh when Mark refuses to cooperate in a PC manner when they finally establish communication.  Another strength (for me anyways) is the beliveability of this book.  It is set just far enough into the future that we can assume certain technology is in regular use, but not so far that we loose the sense of familiarity.  The author is pretty good at giving scientific, yet not overly smarty pants explanations on to why something should or shouldn't work.  This makes it very easy to stay in this world the author has created.  I am also very into Mars and follow news of it closely and even have the Curiosity Rover T-shirt so this book spoke to that very much.  I loved the tone of this book, I loved the world, I loved the characters, I just really enjoyed this book.  I also LOVED the movie...not quit as much as the book of course, but it was still awesome.  It followed the book fairly well, and with out a doubt, kept the flavor and spirit of the book.  I would recommend this book to just about anybody with any interest in well, pretty much anybody.  With the exception of some gloriously placed swear words, this book is even suitable for the slightly younger crowd.  I give this book 8 out of 10 Pootatos and wish I had the patience to put in all of the awesome little sayings and quotes that make me smile and laugh out loud.  GO READ THIS BOOK!  Happy Reading Everybody!

Fighting Fiction In Space

Hello all!  I think I have time for a quick rambling before I head back to the grind.  Today's book is Gulliver's Fugitives Star Trek: The Next Generation by Keith Sharee.  Summer by the pool always puts me in the mood for SciFi and I love Star Trek TNG so this sounded like a good idea.  Was it a good read?  First, as always SPOILERS AHEAD!

First of all, I'm gonna just say I'm gonna write this like anybody reading it is already a Trekkie and knows the characters I'm talking about.  The books are written with the assumption that the readers, if not already fans of the show, at least have a basic knowledge of the cast and setting.  If you are not part of this group...well...it's on Netflix so you have no excuse :-)
Councilor Troi finds herself in a trance that seems to transport her mind to a world filled with fantastic beings.  She manages to wake herself up, but is disturbed and goes to the Captain with her feelings of concern about a possible alien presence.  Meanwhile the crew has discovered a planet where a lost ship may have crashed ten years earlier. The crew contacts the planet and they are told that a boarding party will have to come aboard the Enterprise to make sure that no contraband or instances of the dreaded Allpox are present.  Two men and a couple of machines beam on board and fairly quickly start freaking out.  Apparently, the planet (called Rampart) is populated by a human colony that left year many many many years ago and established a world built around a lack of any fiction.  To maintain this strict adherence to facts, the government uses a combination of filtering helmet's that filter out any supposed "fiction" and deadly machine's called one-eyes that pretty much shoot lethal blasts of radiation at anybody's who's brain waves register in the fiction zone.  All kinds of hell breaks loose when the one-eyes detect the ever present fiction that thrives aboard the varied enterprise, and considering that the people of Rampart believe that even aliens are a work of fiction, you can see how a ship that employ's various races and species is in trouble.  The Rampart crew captures Captain Picard and the one-eye's wreak destruction upon the Enterprise.  A landing crew consisting of Riker, Data and Troi goes down to rescue Picard and are immediately captured themselves.  All except Councilor Troi who falls in with the Dissenters, a group of people who take on the names and persona's of various fictional characters and rebel against the fictionless government. Picard and Riker are to be "blanked" a process in which people who suffer from the Allpox (which is what they call fiction) have their mind completely erased and a new personality is inserted.  This is the only way the government can work around killing most of it's population.  More chaos and crazieness ensue.  The Dissenters stage a major demonstration and Picard and company are rescued.  Geordi and Worf with some help from the crew save the Enterprise and it is revealed that one of the Rampart guys is actually the brainwashed captain and sole survivor of the missing ship.
Troi discovers her trances are a result of a strange movie she watched based on the mythologies of Earth and the crew moves on to their next adventure.

Soooooo...this book was stupid.  I can't think of a nicer way to put it.  I usually enjoy the Star Trek books, they let me explore a vast universe that I love in greater detail, but this book was very very juvenile.  I think what really killed it for me was the writing.  For most of the book the writing felt cliched, trite and stock.  The author only attributed the simplist of emotions or thought process to very well established characters, dumbing down people who have been shown over and over to be smart, making characters with great depth one-dimensional, attributing all kinds of insta-relationship emotions to characters who were only around for a short while.  It actually took me a really long time to read because I kept having to put it down to unroll my eyes.  The concept was ok I guess, even though we all know that humans are creative by nature, and the standards of fiction on Rampart are especially strict, though I will give it to the author that he acknowledged if the government killed all the dissenters there would be no one left.  I'm not going to spend a lot more time on this 'cause there was just not a whole lot to it.  Essentially I felt like I was reading a very very basic fan fiction version of a Star Trek story.  I give this story a 3 out of 10 Zen bows and am looking forward to reading a GOOD Star Trek story.  Happy Reading Everybody!

What Nightmares Are Made Of

I just finished what is either one of the coolest books, or the most frustrating books ever.  What is this book that inspires such conflicting feelings? More Than This by Patrick Ness is a book that has been sitting in my e-reader tbr pile for a long time, along with a bunch of other books by this author.  I have heard lots of good things about this guy, and the yellow door on the cover of this book made it the one I picked up.  As always SPOILERS AHEAD, and by spoilers I mean ALL the SPOILERS so if you ever plan on reading this book, read it first and then read this post, because a huge part of this book is the not knowing so again, you are warned SPOILERS AHEAD!

The book is broken into four parts, each one changing the mood and direction of the story.
Prologue - We start the book with a boy drowning.  He is in a cold sea and though he struggles to stay alive, in the end the ocean wins and after slamming the boy against the rocks he dies.
Part 1 - The boy, who's name is Seth wakes up confused, scared and in pain.  He stumbles around trying to make sense of the fact that he is seemingly alive, even though he can remember drowning.  After finally getting his bearings, he realizes he is in his old childhood home in England, even though he and his family moved to America years before.  He discovers that his house and the whole town have been completely abandon for at least a couple of years.  There is no signs of life anywhere and everything is falling apart.  He falls asleep and has super vivid dreams of his past, both childhood and recent.  This happens through out this part of the book and we find out two major events in his life.  The first being when he was about 8 and living in this home, his mother left him and 4 year old brother home alone for a few minutes.  While she was gone, an escaped prisoner from the prison behind their home convinced Seth to let him in.  The prisoner kidnaps his little brother Owen and though he is finally recovered, he needs a lot of therapy.  This results in the family moving to Washington state and Seth feeling like they blame him for Owen's issues.  The other big event is after he and his friend Gudmund fall in love, a picture of the two of them is leaked and they are forced apart by Gudmund's parents.  Seth becomes a pariah at school and it is all too much for him.  In between these vivid dreams, Seth finds all the supplies he needs to survive.  He also discovers a weird dusty coffin in his old room with tubes and stuff inside.  At this point Seth decides that this is his own personal Hell and that it is his punishment.  He goes a bit crazy and starts running through the ruined town and sees a black van driving around.

Part 2 - Just as Seth starts to go to the van, he is pulled into a cave by a pair of kids Regine, a girl about his age and Tomasz a kid around 12.  They tell him that they are the only others here, and the person in the van, who they call The Driver and he kills anybody he comes across.  Seth is understandably reluctant to trust these two, but agrees to go with them.  They go to Seth's house where they are pursued by the Driver and narrowly escape.  Seth takes them to the grocery store he found and they collect food.  Seth insists that they tell him what they know, and after a whole ton of back and forth and interruptions, they finally tell him.  Their theory is that the world went bad and everybody connect themselves online to live.  They think the coffins are essentially lifepods that keep them alive while they are connected.  Seth immediately comes up with all kinds of problems with this theory.  He wonders why if they live in an artificial world, that all of their lives suck so bad in it.  He also wonders where all the other coffins are, and where the technology came from.  The other two do not have answers, but at the moment it is the best theory they have. Seth goes to the prison and discovers a very high tech area that contains the coffins.  He searches for his parents and finds them, but can't find his brother.  The Driver comes in and puts him in a coffin, trying to reattach him, but he is again miraculously saved by his new friends.  He tells them he now knows what happens but needs to process the info.  When he wakes up the next morning it is all clear.
Part 3 - Seth runs to a church where he finds a graveyard and his brothers grave.  Turns out his brother was not recovered, but instead he was murdered by the escaped convict.  After being told this, an official type person tells his parents about Lethe, a program that lets you forget your former life and restart in the online world.  Unfortunately their is only so much they can do to alter the brain so while they can get Owen "back" they cannot erase all the events, thus the story of his kidnapping and recovery.  The official tells them eventually everybody will be forced online because the state of the world is in such bad shape. They agree and are put online.  This seems to confirm the theory that Regine and Tomasz came up with, but something is still bugging Seth.  He feels like everything is unfolding like a story, that he keeps getting rescued, just in time, or he finds just the supplies he needs, he is having a hard time completely accepting the present reality. He theorizes that while the online reality may be true, this might also be a way for his mind to deal with death, or maybe an alien experiment, or, well who knows.
Part 4 - Seth decides that now that he has the truth, he is going to go back into the coffin before his death, not die, and tell all the onliners the truth.  Regine and Tomasz are against it at first, but end up supporting him.  On their way back to Seth's house to use his coffin, he has a feeling that even though they have defeated the Driver, if this was a story, he would appear one last time.  Sure enough, the melted, twisted body of the Driver appears and essentially all but kills Seth and then brings him back to life before being disintegrated by Tomasz in one more miraculous save.  Seth decides it doesn't matter if this is real or not, he has to do something and to try and live the best he can.  He gets into the coffin saying to his friends "I'm ready".

Whew talk about you long synopsis, and as always I did not even get more then the bare bones of it down.  Let's start with what really stuck with me about this book.  The first thing is the way the author wrote the first death scene and the part about Seth waking up.  I have to tell you folks, the way these were written really feels like nightmares I've actually had.  I had the same terrifying, queasy, trapped feeling I get when I have nightmares, it was really a work of authorial art.  It's really hard to describe why this whole first part made me so happy and yet so freaked out at the same time, but there you have it.  The flashback were cool because they felt so real and authentic.  The part with Seth and Gudmund could have come from almost any high school relationship, that angst, that falling so hard with no restraint, that feeling that this is the one good thing in your life.  The part with the high school turning into a nightmare after the pictures got out is unfortunately all to understandable to, and for a gay couple it would be all the worse (which is so unfair).  The parental reactions on both sides to the relationship came across true, with one set freaking out in a complete homophobic manner and the other set, more concerned about the problems it will cause.  The flashbacks about

Owen and the family falling apart around the events that happened are actually fairly accurate.  I have worked a lot in foster care and the medical field and unfortunately events such as this often come with a family never learning how to cope.  Seth working his way through both of these events in his life, figuring out what they really mean in the context of himself and other people was a great study in individual human thought process.  The open ended ending was superb.  I hate books that build up to a big reveal and then bam, a "what the heck was that" ending with a ton of questions that don't make sense.  Ending the book in this way, the author acknowledges that there is a bunch of stuff that doesn't make sense, and in all honesty there is probably no one ending that would satisfy all the questions and elements posed.  Really the only thing I did not like about this book was its length.  Many time, especially in the second part it felt like the author was dragging things out, that Regine could have filled Seth in anytime, but a bunch of bs reasons, or random events stopped her from talking, or something else to prevent Seth (and us) from knowing basic stuff.  Hmmm...now that I'm thinking about it, maybe that was part of Seth's brain trying to come up with an explanation...or the program hiding info...or...Ahhh this book is so frustrating and awesome!  Ok now that this post is going on a zillion pages I'm gonna wrap it up.  I give this book an 8 out of 10 cans of custard and recommend it to anybody who survived high school, likes a book that will make you think, or enjoy's a read that mixes genre's.  I will definitely be reading another one of these guy's books.
How do you feel about ambiguous endings?  What ending do you think is the real one?  Is this finally a way to give me an ending I don't have a huge problem with?

So Many Holmes

Baby Sis being the wonderful human being she is made sure that I had a new book for my birthday.  We not only share a love of reading, chocolate and The Gilmore Girls, but we also both love our boy Sherlock Holmes (and his buddy Watson).  In that spirit the book she so generously bewstowed upon me (I'm using my big girl words today) is the short story collection Two Hundred and Twenty-One Baker Streets edited by David Thomas Moore.  It was very different then I thought it was going to be, but once I got used to it I found several stories that I really enjoyed.

A Woman's Place by Emma Newman - Mrs. Hudson plays the pivotal role in this story.  We learn a fascinating secret about our ever present housekeeper that involves both Holmes and Moriarty.  This slight Sci-Fi twist on a typical Holmsian tale is the perfect vehical to show just how important Mrs. Hudson is.

A Study in Scarborough by Guy Adams - This story was my baby sis's favorite in the collection and I have to admit when I first started reading it, I wasn't impressed...but buy the end WOW!  I can't tell you any more, because as much as I love spoilers, you have to read this one for yourself.

The Final Conjuration by Adrian Tchaikovsky - This one seemed to really embody the spirit of this anthology.  In this story, Holmes is conjured to help out a magician in another world.  Despite the magical nature of this other world, Holmes logic still prevails.

The Innocent Icarus by James Lovegrove - I love stories like this one that keep our characters and settings familiar, but add just a bit of a twist.  In this case it is the evolution of various abilities in humans such as invincibility, flight, and speed.  The best part is that Holmes actually has no added abilities and accepts this by honing his wits.

All the Single Ladies by Gini Koch - Wooohoooo an awesome story where Holmes is a suave, competent, clever woman.  This story is told in modern times and gives us the meeting of Holmes and Watson in a throughly Homsian case.  Love this one!

The best and worst part of this collection is the mindset in which I had to be in to read it.  I am so used to Sherlock Holmes stories being a different version of his various cases.  I have read these set in various times and places, but always in the setting of a case.  This collection focused more on the personality of Holmes and Watson, many of these stories either did not involve a case, or the case took a back seat to the setting and story of the actual characters.  Overall, once I mentally switched gears I really enjoyed the majority of the collection and would recommend it to fans of Sherlock Holmes, Sci-Fi, Fantasy and genre mixing.  I give this collection 7 out of 10 blue beauties.
What is your favorite version of Holmes and Watson?  Why do you think the Holmesian genre is so adaptable?  Why does everybody want to make Holmes so depressed?

SciFi Awesomeness!

Hey guess what?  Two ramblings in a row!!!  How did you get so lucky you ask?  Mostly I have a ton of books to ramble about and I am low on ideas for other blog posts...so ramblings it is.  Today is a ramble about one of my favoritist short story collections.  My baby sis read it, called me and said get it, get it right now, and through the magic of ebooks The Starry Rift: Tales of New Tomorrows edited by Jonathan Strahan was purchased, read and loved.  Here are a couple of my favorites.

Ass-Hat Magic Spider by Scott Westerfeld - Besides being by one of my favorite authors, this story is also about the love of a hard copy book.  In the future colonists have a severely limited weight they are allowed to carry on the colony ship.  The main character goes through some extreme measures to make sure he can take at least one intact book with him.  This just goes to show you I am not the only one with a physical attachment to ones books.

Orange by Neil Gaiman - Another one of my favorite authors contributes this quirky, strange awesome story told entirely through answers.  This is the story that made my baby sis call me and I am glad she did.  The story...if you can call it that is some sort of transcript where all you get is the protagonists answers to unknown questions.  It is surprisingly readable and has a great sense of humor.  I love love love it.

Repair Kit by Stephen Baxter - This whole story is a bit of a deus ex machina in a tongue in cheek way.  The whole story hinges on a box that can repair things by pulling them from the past.  The best part is whenever the mechanic is asked to explain the way the box works, he is tells them that it is unexplainable alien technology.

Anda's Game by Cory Doctorow - Our plucky and pudgy heroine of this story shows us that anybody can choose to do the right thing.  Taking MMORPG's to a whole new level this story gives us a whole lot of social commentary (without to much preaching) in the package of an ordinary girl and her ordinary family. This story has heart and that makes this story awesome.

The Dust Assassin by Ian McDonald - The biggest appeal of this one is that it is set in India.  The author does a great job integrating the future with the culture, customs and religions of this fascinating country.  The combination of this perfect setting and a heart wrenching, yet brilliant story make this a unique and wonderful addition to this collection.

Infestation by Garth Nix - Vampires, aliens, supersoldiers, everything a fast paced story needs.  This story takes an old school baddie, vampires and turns them into supersoldiers from another planet.  In the future these supersoldiers have gotten to Earth and the government allows civilians the chance to take them out...or die trying.  A fun twist on the vampire hunter story.

Pinocchio by Walter Jon Williams - The last entry in this collection deals with a society where children are limited because of over crowding and the ability to switch bodies at will.  The story examines what happens when you are young and basically immortal.  It is also a social commentary on our celebrities, child stars, and the flash in the pan fame the Internet can bring.

This collection is varied and wonderful and re readable (which is a huge plus).  It is technically geared towards the YA crowd and I think it fits the bill perfectly.  Many of the stories are a great jumping off point for discussions of various issues that affect people now and potentially in the future.  I recommend this collection to just about everybody and give it 9 out of 10 real books!

What is your favorite short story genre?  Is social commentary in a story good or obnoxious?  What is your vision of the future? How does one write a story in only answers?

Elves, UFO's And Dimensional Travelers

I have read several short stories by Andre Norton, one of the first female Science Fiction writers, but for some reason have never actually picked up one of her full novels.  This has been remedied by reading Children of the Gates, which contains two of her novels.  The one I will ramble about today is the first one in the collection, Here Abide Monsters.  As always SPOILERS AHEAD!

Nick Shaw is headed to his lake house for the weekend to escape a bit of a difficult situation at home.  He meets up with a young woman named Linda and her Peke dog Lung.  She is headed to a friends house and has to drive a road known as the Cut-Off which seems to be responsible for various peoples dissaperances over the years including Nicks own cousin a few years ago.  Nick has a bad feeling and offers to escort Linda to her friends house.  The two encounter a wall of fog and end up in another world.  They meet up with a band of people from 1940's Britain and learn that they have ended up in a very strange world indeed.  The natives of the world seem to be creatures that come from Earth myth, the theory being that they may have slipped through the same portals that brought the humans to this world, thus creating the myths.  There also appears to be humans from every era and place on Earth roaming around, some more violent then

others.  To top it all off, an unknown alien race is running around in their spaceships beaming people up and capturing them in their ships.  As the group hides and runs and hides and runs they tell the new comers that at some point a man called the Herald will come from one of the big shining protected cities and offer them a choice.  If they accept his offer, they will be protected from the violent factions and the aliens, but they will become changed, something not quite human.  Nick gets captured by a medieval group, intent on violence and some arcane sorcery.  Eventually they leave Nick tied to a tree in the hands of some very vicious monsters.  The Herald appears and tells Nick that if he accepts his offer he will be forever protected and part of this fantastic world.  Nick asks for more time to decide and the Herald tells him he has his own power.  Nick discovers with great concentration he can create illusion and manipulate objects.  He is reunited with his group, who learn that they too can use this new found power to varying degrees of success.  Nick has another conversation with the Herald and also one of the group who had accepted the Heralds offer.  The two tell Nick that a great evil is coming and unless the humans accept the offer, they will probably not survive.  This is where it gets a little mushy and I'm not quit sure what happens, but in the end a lot of the group dies and the rest decide to accept the Heralds offer and the change that comes with it.

I have mixed feelings about this story.  It starts off really awesome, written in the style of the old school SciFi that I LOVE!  There was tension, excitement, monsters, UFO's, choices, action, everything that should make a great story...but it never really came together for me.  The characters seemed half formed, like they had a story to tell, but couldn't quit get it out.  The story also suffered from a lack of clarity.  The best I could figure is that this world has something bad in it and the bad is just compounded by aliens and roving bands of lost Earthlings and the only way to be able to survive is to choose to change into one of the native Elf type people.  That was it, except it wasn't told that simply, there were innuendos, hints, there was the tease of a greater story, of a bigger picture, of a vast universe, but the story never really delivered.  The imagery was beautiful, there were certain scenes and passages that really stuck in my head as truly stunning.  The beginning was especially good.  I like how she wrote the knowing dread of Nick as the wall of fog rolled towards him, I loved the descriptions of some of the native inhabitants of this alternate world, I have decided I really need to go find some of the fantastic creatures from this world and make them my pets. Also the cover was awesome!  Overall I appreciated the imagery, but wanted a story that I could follow.  I give this book 6 out of 10 portals to another universe.

There Is No Place Like Home

Yay, after much swearing, pounding of the keyboard, and a ton of coffee, I have finally gotten my technology to behave again!  In celebration of this, let's take a look at a short story collection I have recently finished.  The book is Oz Reimagined: New Tales from the Emerald City and Beyond, by  John Joseph Adams (Editor), Douglas Cohen (Editor).  I picked it up because I love all things Wizard of Oz, and it had some great authors contributing to it.  Here are some of my favorite stories.

The Great Zeppelin Heist of Oz by Rae Carson and C.C. Finlay - The first story in the collection was a witty little bit of fun.  It puts the witches in the role of smart ladies and the wizard in a more bumbling, conniving role, loved it.

The Lost Girls of Oz by Theodora Goss - This story is all about girl power in its best form, making Oz a haven for abused girls and giving them a way to fight back.  Nell, the reporter and main character in this story is a perfect voice to let us all know what is going on.

The Boy Detective of Oz: An Otherland Story by Tad Williams - This was a strange and cool little story that placed Oz in a virtual world, making it a sort of program.  This scifi take was cool in itself, and makes me want to go pick up the Otherland novels, which is always cool.

Off to See the Emperor by Orson Scott Card - This was a twisty little story about a little boy and a girl and how the story of Oz came to be.  The idea of a snarky 9 year old girl was written to perfection, adding just the right note to this story.

The Cobbler of Oz by Jonathan Maberry - This is probably my favorite story in this collection.  It is a sweet story about a little monkey girl with stunted wings who gets a great reward after a great risk.  It also gives a potential origin for the coveted Silver Slippers.

Over all the collection was a bit meh, but a lot of the stories were really dark and I was not in the mood for dark, so that may have had something to do with it.  In the beginning they say that you do not have to have read the original books to enjoy this collection, but I must say, it definitely helps if you have.  It did make me want to read the originals again and since they are free or cheap on the e-reader you may be seeing some original ramblings pop up. Be warned that this collection is not for children, more for the over 15 crowd.  As much as I liked a few of these stories the over all feeling was a 6 out of 10 silver slippers, but your mileage may vary, depending on your style preferences.
What do you think of short stories based on classics?  Does it feel like professional fanfic?  What type of story would you write about Oz?

First Flight

Hello All, how is everybody?  Did you all have a good weekend?  I was at the station for 60 hours hence the lack of post yesterday, I will try and do better having them ready to go in the future.  Today though lets talk about one of my favorite books that starts off one of my favorite series.  Dragonflight is the first book in the amazing Anne McCafferey's Dragon Riders of Pern series and is just awesome.  Considering it was written in 1968 you would think it would be old fashioned, but it is so perfect for any time period.  But enough gushing (for now) as always SPOILERS AHEAD!

Pern is a planet that has reverted back to a feudal type system of government consisting of the Lord Holders and their underlings, these are the people who live, farm, work, and do the things you would consider most feudal system people would do.  There are the Crafters who are responsible for the fine work, weaving, beastery, music, healing and so forth.  Then there are the Weyr folk.  These folk are either Dragonriders or people who help take care of the dragons and their riders.  These dragonriders are needed to help protect the planet of Pern from a menace called Thread.  Thread is essentially a crazy hungry spore that devours ANY organic matter at an extreme rate.  The only things that stop thread are metal and stone, and can only be killed by fire or by drowning in water. Thread falls on the planet for 50 years at a time and then stops for 200 giving everybody a break until the next pass of the Red Star (the rouge planet from which the Thread falls).  For more detailed info check here.  At the time the story is set, Thread has not fallen for close to 400 years (or Turns as they call them on Pern) and the Lord Holders are starting to resent the tithe they have to give the Weyr folk.  At this time the normal 6 Weyrs have been reduced to the one Benden Weyr with

nobody knowing where the other five went, the people, the dragons just dissappered, leaving the Weyr's empty. Also at this time Lord Fax has conquered several of his neighbors Holds going against the strict tradition of one Lord one Hold.  One of the holds Fax has captured is Ruatha, a hold famous for producing dragonriders of great renown, especially Queen riders.  Fax has done his best to wipe out all of the Ruathan blood line, but has missed one girl, Lessa who had the good sense to hide.  Lessa has now been living as a drudge, waiting for the day she can overthrow Fax and reclaim her home.  Meanwhile F'lar a bronze dragon rider is going on search to find suitable candidates for the Queen dragon egg, hoping to find somebody strong and able to lead the dragon riders back to their former glory.  See F'lar is one of the few people who not only believe that Thread is real and is returning, but is imminent.  F'lar draws out Lessa by challenging and killing Fax after he attacks the dragonman.  F'lar makes a deal with Lessa to let a newborn boy take over Ruatha, and Lessa can come to the Weyr to hopefully impress the soon to be hatched Queen Dragon and become the Weyrwoman (the leader of the Weyr).  Lessa agrees and all seems to go as planned.  After impressing Ramoth (the queen dragon) Lessa has a crash course in the ways of the Weyr, adding her own brand of fire and chaos to the mix.  F'lar's bronze fly's Ramoth, making him Lessa's Weyrmate and the Weyr leader of the entire Weyr.  After some much needed reminding, the Holds and Crafthalls start preparing for the arrival of Thread, even though most people still don't believe.  This denial is swiftly put to an end as the Thread comes pouring down and the people are saved only by the valiant efforts and sacrifice of the dragons and their riders.  The effort is aided by Lessa and her rare ability to hear and talk to all the dragons, not just her own.  It is painfully apparent that the one understaffed Weyr will not be able to protect the whole of Pern and solutions are sought.  Lessa finds the answer in an unlikely source a teaching ballad called The Question Song.  She discovers the dragons can go between times as well as space and goes back to the end of the last Pass to convince the dragon riders to come to her time to fight Thread.  The Oldtimers as they are called are amiable as the idea of sitting idle does now work for them.  They come forward in time, solving the mystery of the missing Weyr's and saving Pern.  This is the state we leave our beloved planet of Pern, safe for the moment, but ripe for change...which will come in the next book.

I love this book, I love this series, I love this author, I love this mix of fantasy and scifi, I love it all.  So many things work for me.  I love that even though this was written in 1968 (as I mentioned before) that you would not know it from reading it.  It will work for any time period it is read in, which is very hard to do.  I also love that Ms. Mcaffrey seems to have worked out the whole story and timeline out before she ever wrote this first book.  There are things and hints that tie in to later books so well, like the ballad of Moreta's ride or the fertilizer called angenothree, which turns out to be a chemical formula originally called by it's chemical

name HNO3 which the scientific part has been lost.  Eh it's hard to explain how well it is set up without going into later books.  I love the strong, sassy, cranky, touchy Lessa, I love her so much.  I love that she is a spitfire, but she is also kind of extremely touchy, a flaw to be sure, but one that makes her human.  One of my pet peeves is addressed beautifully in this book, I hate when miscommunication is used as a means to further the tension, or create discord if their is no real reason for it, and Lessa calls out the leaders on this type of stupid secrecy in a spectacular fashion.  I still think that the world building in this series is one of the most complete and incredible example I have ever read, this is a place I can fully inhabit long after I put the book down. On a rare downside, their is a bit of proprietary shaking of Lessa by F'lar that irritates me.  I am never ok with any sort of violence against another person, and when it is a big, strong man against a tiny scared woman...well it really makes me mad.  I can never be ok with even minimal violence toward another person, especially when it is done in anger.  Other then that their is not a whole lot for me to complain about.  I don't even mind the ending for once...because it is not a real ending because the story keeps going YAY! My Hubbin is always trying to get me to define why I love this book so much and I have a hard time pinpointing any one thing.  I think over all the feeling of freedom and triumph and working together to achieve a goal while maintaining your own person is just awesome!  I give this book 9 out of 10 Queen Dragon Eggs and recommend it to EVERYBODY!
What color dragon would you ride?  How do you feel about this odd mix of fantasy and scifi?  How obsessed with dragons am I?

Different

Hello All, sorry about the crazy timing of my posts, but work is happening at all hours...so I guess is this blog :-)  Just finished The Different Girl by Gordon Dahlquist.  I had heard a ton of good things about it from various sources and the cover was yellow...and we all know my weird obsession with yellow covers.  It is not a long book, I read it over the course of two days, but could have easily knocked it out in couple of hours, but it is packed pretty full.  As always SPOILERS AHEAD!

Veronika is one of four girls who live on a remote island.  The four girls are identical except for the color of their hair.  Veronika has red hair, Isobel has lemon yellow hair, Caroline has brown hair and Eleanor has black hair.  The story is told in Veronika's voice and lends an innocent air to the whole book.  We watch as the four girls have lessons, take naps and live a very simple basic life.  The girls are told that their parents died in a plane crash and that they were taken to the island to live.  Right off the bat you can tell that there is something different about these girls.  The girls are all told to take a walk and observe various things around the island for a specific amount of time and then report back.  They at first find it difficult to separate and make their own decisions on where to go, but it gets easier over time.  Veronika eventually even goes so far as to make a decision to stay past her allotted time to continue to study something.  The girls are constantly questioned and taught to think about things, but seem to be very well cared for by the only other people on the island.  Irene and Robbert.  The lives on the island are interrupted by the arrival of May, the different girl.  When she first see's Veronika and her sisters she screams, letting us know that they are even more different then originally thought.  May's arrival changes everything and the girls, especially Veronika and Caroline start to display curiosity and start making their own decisions about May.  Eventually we find out that May was on a boat with her Uncle and his friend, and that the boat they live in was attacked.  This caused the boat to blow up and May to wash up on the island.  Their is a constant curiosity on the girls part and a constant fear/frustration/curiosity on May's part as Robbert and Irene try and figure out what to do with her.  Irene and Robbert try and continue the girls lessons, adding in more questions and trying to get them to think.

 Eventually Robbert tells the girls that they were built by 8 mothers and 8 fathers who were on the plane that crashed, but the plane did not crash, it was blown up on purpose and the plane with the girls, Irene and Robbert escaped.  Apparently in the future (I'm assuming this is future Earth although it is never clearly stated) it seems that people are afraid of the AI/robot/cyborgs (again never fully explained) that the girls are.  It seems from the vague tidbits we get that there are schools that all children go to that tends to brain wash them into a certain style of thinking.  Eventually another boat comes to the island, scaring May into taking the four girls into hiding, while Irene and Robbert greet the boat.  Caroline decides she need to go get Robberts notebook and leaves the other girls.  While they are hiding the people on the boat apparently shoot Irene and Robbert, destroy the little compound they had been living in and leave.  Caroline shows up with the notebook, but is broken and falls to her "death" on the cliffs below.  The remaining three girls and May use the notebook to rebuild the little compound and are living there still.
This book is different, it is less of a story and more of an idea.  The point of this book is not to explain what is going on in the outside world, though we get a few hints of a possible dystopia, the point is more about the girls and how they think.  If I had to pick a point to this book...I'm not sure what it would be, and yet it is fascinating all the same.  The decision to use one of the four AI girls as the voice of this book was spot on.  It gave an uninformed, yet present voice to all the happenings.  Everything we know is from an almost emotionless, yet innocent perspective and it makes you think differently about things...which may be the point.  The patience and obvious care that Irene and Robbert have for the girls, obviously goes beyond just programming a machine, a certain parent child bond seems to be apparent in their actions.  The

disconnectedness, yet bond the four girls share is an odd one, but it makes a weird sort of sense.  I think my favorite part about May was her frustration in the four girls.  They knew they were constructs, yet they thought of themselves as alive and sentient.  May on the other hand at times had a hard time getting past their differentness, sometimes letting the idea that they were machines get in the way of getting to know them.  In the end though May bonded with them and called them friends.  This book is a really different (there is that word again) mix of man and machine, thinking and feeling, logic and intuition.  It is really hard to talk about, because it is really hard to explain.  Go read it and tell me what you think.  I give it 7 out of 10 AI's
At what point does a machine become human?  At what point does a human become a machine?  Is this a really heavy book for YA or am I just older then I thought?

The Biggest Library In The Universe

So if anybody missed it I am a super geek.  I am also a very behind the times super geek, there is all this fantastic geekiness in books, movies and television and I have to admit I am about 3 years behind the curve.  To start to remedy this situation I have been binging on various geektastic series, shows, and movies.  On Sunday I had a few free hours and instead of doing laundry, cleaning the house, paying bills or showering I decided to get a marathon Dr. Who session in.

To all of you who got to watch the 50th anniversary this week..pbltttt, I will get there when I get there.  I have a confession to make about this show, as much as I absolutely love it, I can never watch more then a couple episodes in a row because folks I am telling you it is brutal.  There is an emotional raking over the coals that happens in even the most light hearted of episodes.  I broke that rule yesterday and have been trying to keep my heart wrenching sobs to myself.  What does any of this have to do with a book blog you may ask.  Well for one thing all of my books are taking to long so I am running out of material to write about ;-) Two the episodes  called Silence in the Library and Forest of the Dead was all about the books (Spoilers ahead).  Seriously it was literally the biggest library in the universe.  A planet built around a computer core, filled with a print and digital version of every book in existence, and being added to all of the time!  The

visuals were stunning, the whole of the two episodes set in rooms full of books, buildings full of books, gardens full of books...made me want to start construction on my 33 story library tower of awesomeness.  The worst part of the whole thing is that eventually it has to be abandoned because of stupid flesh eating swarming alien dust thingies so nobody can ever visit this amazing wonder again (sob).  The computer at the core of this massive library houses the mind of a girl who was dying of an incurable disease and her father built here this library for her mind to live in for all eternity...how cool is that!  Anyways that is how my love of books and my love of the good Dr. dovetailed neatly into one beautiful, traumatic, amazing, brutal two episodes.
What do you think of using books in TV shows?  How great a dad is he that he gives his kid an eternity of books?!?  Am I stretching this whole books in other media thing to far?  Do you know that even though I am an EMT and have to write the word stretcher in every single one of my hundreds of reports that I cannot spell stretch without spell check?

Werewolves, Unicorns and Carnivorous Ink Blots OH MY!

Do you know what I love (I mean besides books, coffee, sparkly things, sleeping in, vodka, etc.)?  I love an unexpected happiness.  You know those times when you go to the mail and some relative you forgot even existed decided to send you a birthday check this year, or your favorite store has a random sale on just that item you were looking for, you know small things that seem to just happen, usually when you need it the most. 

That is how I feel about this short story collection I just finished reading, Unnatural Creatures with stories selected by Neil Gaiman.  This was one of those random buys, it was sitting on a shelf in the wrong section, just tossed there by somebody who had changed there mind, and for some reason, without even looking at the title I put in my to buy pile.  I cracked this book open and immediately fell into some of the best short stories ever, so so so many awesome, different, amazing, cool, funny, weird, scary, stories. The theme of this book is creatures who should only exist in ones imagination.  Lucky for us that is a pretty broad theme and the stories in this collection push this idea to the very edges (think living coat hangers).  There is talk of the Museum for Unnatural History and the creatures that may inhabit it sets the stage for our stories.  I could seriously go on and on and on about this book, but instead I'm going to try (and this is going to be pretty impossible) to give you a quick taste of my favorites (favorite being relative because every single story in here was awesome in its own way).

**__**  by Gahan Wilson-Ok so the story I start with has an impossible title as it is more of an inkblot then words, but that totally goes along with this story of a spot that grows and moves anytime one is not watching it.  This story is only 15 pages long and is both hilarious and creepy, perfect start to this book.

The Cartographer Wasps and the Anarchist Bees by E. Lily Yu-This story pretty much has everything one could want from a short story.  There is politics, power struggles, war, genetic breeding, cartography, anarchy, and oh yeah it all plays out between the bees and wasps.  After reading this I will never look at those black and yellow insects the same way again.

Gabriel-Ernest by Saki-This is a super short, super horrific, super awesome werewolf/untamed beast story that will give you more chills per page then anything I have read in a while

The Flight of the Horse by Larry Niven-This story cracked my up.  I loved the whole premise of it, I loved the scifi element of it, I LOVED the humor of it...just so much to love.  Pay close attention when you read this story and you may "learn" where some of our own myths and legends come from.

The Smile on the Face by Nalo Hopkinson-This story really got to me.  It is in the voice of a teenage girl trying to find a way to accept herself and it is a story any human can relate to.  Our girl finally finds her inner hamadryad and learns to accept it.  If I were a teacher, I might be tempted to make this one required reading.

I think there is a two fold strength to this collection.  The first being the selection of the authors from Diana Wynne Jones through Nalo Hopkinson to Larry Niven to so many more made this book truly one of many view points.  The other strength is that the stories were taken from so many time periods, the oldest story in this collection was published in 1885 and the newest being first published in this anthology in 2013 so you not only get a variety of authors, but a huge variety of style and glimpses into other times and places and people. Ok I lied there is a third strength and that is the illustrations by Briony Morrow-Cribbs at the beginning of each story add the perfect touch to each creation.  As an added bonus buying this book resulted in money being donated to 826DC which is a program works with the 6-18 crowd (and there teachers) to inspire the art of creative writing which is awesome and has the added benefit of making sure there are still decent authors around in my old age :-) I recommend this book to anybody and everybody, but especially you quirky people who love a good, twisty short story. This is without a doubt going on my favorites bookshelf, I give it 9 out of 10 Carnivorous Ink Blots.

What is your favorite unnatural creature?  What constitutes an unnatural creature?  Do reading stories like this make museums super scary (yet oddly thrilling)?

Games Old And New

Just finished Future Games, a short story collection edited by Paula Guran.  I picked this one up because it had a cool premise of games of the future, and I was hankering for some good SciF, also I recognized a lot of my favorite authors names on the front cover.  I'm not sure what I was expecting, but I wanted more...new games, or altered games, or space games. While I did get a few of these, the vast majority of the stories were about traditional games, played in a fairly traditional manner with a couple minor tweaks, mostly the fact that they were played against aliens as a first contact.

Baseball was the dominating sport in this story with three of the stories being directly about baseball and another one it playing a decent roll.  There was also football and hockey played pretty straight across the board as well.  As I am not a baseball fan, and except for in Distance by Maya Kaathryn Bohnhoff, the story was about the actual game, it got a little boring for me.  I guess with a title like Future Games I was expecting something a little more futuristic.  That is not to say there were not some great stories in here.

Will the Chill by John Shirley-The first story in this book was just like I expected.  A super athlete who hurls uninhabited planets against another competitor doing the same thing.  This definitely futuristic sport was cool enough to be a story in it's own right, but going inside this superstars head and learning about the results of his obsession with winning just put into the awesome category.

Man-Mountain Gentian by Howard Waldrop and Listen by Joel Richards-Both of these stories did a great job in taking something traditional (sumo and martial arts respectively)  and totally placing them in a different environment, one where the brain and mind were what won the matches for you vs the traditional brute strength.

Kip, Running by Genevieve Williams-This story was one of the few that really showed you a potential future Earth.  The story was fun, pacing was great and the fact that it was set in future Seattle didn't hurt at all.  I also liked the amount of character development the author managed to get into such a short amount of pages.

Name That Planet by Elizabeth Ann Scarborough-This one just cracked my up. An intergalactic game show complete with gooey aliens, a shiny toothed host and an intergalactic conspiracy.  I loved how familiar and alien this story felt all at the same time.  This is most definitely a future game :-)

Ladies and Gentleman This is Your Crisis by Kate Wilhelm and The Survivor by Walter F. Moudy-Both of these stories feature The Hunger Games like settings, long before that book existed.  In both of these stories the prominence of television, the callousness of the audience, and the government sanctioned murder/death all serve as chilling harbingers of a world not as far off as we would like.

Overall I found about every other story in this collection pretty great, which to me makes it totally worth it, but I have been known to buy collections for just one fantastic story.  I think that this book also shows that even if you are labeled (by yourself or others) as a SciFi Geek, Nerd, Dork or whatever that your interests can be wide and varied, that even that bespectacled Star Trek collector can be just as much of a beer swilling baseball fan as the next person. Overall I would recommend this book to SciFi fans, sports fans, or just people who like a glimpse of aliens playing baseball.

Space The Final Frontier

Ahhhhh OMGOMGOMG EEEEPPPPIICCCC!!!!!  Sorry fan girl moment.  Got to stay up past my bed time last night and go see the new Star Trek: Into Darkness movie and it was wonderful.  Just like the first movie it gave a nod to all the best pieces of the original while definitely becoming it's own movie.  Extra cool was the fact that all of my favorite geeky girl shows seemed to be represented by various actors, we had Sherlock Holmes, Dr. Who, Fringe I mean seriously a girl could go crazy happy with all the dorky goodness.
SPOILER ALERT!

The movie gave all kinds of direct and indirect homage to the original film everything from direct moments (think KHAN!!!!) to more subtle ones such as switching up the relationships between people (Carol now being the daughter instead of the mother).  Of course if you haven't seen the original than you probably have no idea what I am talking about and are rolling your eyes if you have even read this far :-)  Since this is a book blog I am going to leave you with some of my favorite SciFi short story collections so you too can see all of the wonderfully odd ways this amazing genre can make your summer great.

Federations

One of my favorite things about scifi is the new worlds and organizations that appear out of necessity when you go full scale universal.  All of the stories in this collection are part of some sort of federation.

The Starry Rift

My baby sis actually recommended this one to me and boy was it a perfect choice.  The stories in here are fresh and varied.  The one by Neil Gaiman, who I usually think of as a fantasy guy was seriously entertaining.

Get Off the Unicorn

While not strictly scifi in the sense we are used to, this collection has everything from high tech scifi, to the more subtle blurring of fantasy and scifi.  A great one to take a look at if you are not a hard core techie.

The Last Mimzy

This collection is just insane, with stories published as early as the 1940's it is far ahead of it's time.  This collection offers everything from humor to head scratcher's to true tragedies.  This is for a true die hard fan of Science Fiction

Star Trek: The Amazing Stories

Of course I can't write a post about Star Trek awesomeness without including a bit of biblio Star Trek love.  This is a collection of short stories based on all the various incarnations of the Star Trek franchise from some of the best authors out there.

Hopefully this will give you a little summer scifi reading to fill in all those long hours in a car, train, airplane, bus or space shuttle that always seems part of getting to where ever it is you are going for your summer fun.  Happy reading everybody!