TSR, the (in)famous creators of the AD&D role playing game (then WOTC, Hasbro, and perhaps even more (in)famous regarding their poor OGL handling) also publish books loosely based on their games. One of those is Elfshadow by Elaine Cunningham. It's set in the Forgotten Realms, but no prior knowledge is required.
The Verdict: It's not bad. Expect regular 'sword and sorcery'.
Dapper / TellTales! #6
TSR, WOTC, and now HASBRO all seem to struggle a bit when it comes to marketing, and sometimes they release books that simply make no sense.
Take, for example, How Not to get Eaten by Owlbears.
This is part of my 'recovery effort' from the old NightLive website.
Years ago I did review a number of TSR / WOTC products, so I've dusted off the old review scheme. You'll run into some TSR / WOTC / Hasbro reviews from now on...
Unfortunately, dslreports.com is no more. Are there any alternatives?
I did find https://www.waveform.com/tools/bufferbloat which is a little less clear, but seems to work.
(And yes, I know that QOS is not the right way to address bufferbloat, but it may be the only option available to many of us.)
First you see a dragon. Then you're watching some royal intrigues for 35 minutes, and only then the action starts.
Which doesn't make Damsel a complete disaster, but it helps to know what to expect.
Summer Glau has a pendant for Sci-Fi 'nerdish' shows. Unfortunately, they're not all successful, but apparently her choice in roles matches my taste in television...
And yet another space opera / military sci-fi series. Shades of Honor Harrington, and that's fine. Captain Grim leads the crew of his older but still powerful boat through a conflict between multiple sides, Consortium, Caliphate, Guild, Alliance...
Another space opera / military sci-fi series. Main protagonist might be a little too much of an anti hero in the 6th book, but it’s quite readable.
Series starts with greedy corporations that unload endless debts on wannabe students, then moves on to an interstellar conflict between several races.
Entertaining set of 3 (now 4) novels, in which a post-apocalyptic junkyard owner becomes a kind of queen bee, driven by biotech, and assisted (hampered?) by gen-engineered cats, after aliens overcame earth’s finest.
The Verdict: great read. Looking forward to book 4!
Supposed to be somewhat ‘lesbian scifi’ but - except for one scene that wasn’t even that explicit - these read as a fast paced nerd-becomes-heroine set of short stories. Does suffer a little from the Mary Sue effect.
Synopsis: dirtside engineer knows how to create sentient robots, and falls in love with a copper-without-impulse-control from the floating cities above.
The Verdict: perfectly readable, light SciFi.
Short story that got expanded into three short novels, about a girl who lost her memory and starts living on a cemetery.
It's an easy read - nothing too exceptional - with perhaps a somewhat unexpected plot twist near the end, where the whole story adopts a supernatural element.
The verdict: a decent, entertaining read.
Are you ready yet to become a millionaire?
If you are 20 years old, and you have 300 dollars to spare every month, then you are one hell of a lucky person.
If you're 59 and going on 60, it ain't that easy...
I had high hopes for season 2 of Arcane... Season 1 was brilliant, an emotional roller coaster, great animation, and a good story to carry it all. How could season 2 be any less?
Well... it turned out it could be. Worse, that is.
Voor Engelstalige boeken ben je waarschijnlijk beter uit met Amazon + Audible, maar voor Nederlandstalige boeken is Kobo misschien de betere optie.
Koop je online, zorg dan dat je koopt van een betrouwbare (toe)leverancier. Er zijn heel veel spelers welke rotzooi verkopen, of onbetrouwbaar zijn.
Ik beperk me dan ook vooral tot de grotere / betrouwbare namen, maar dat betekent niet dat alle (kleine) shops slecht zijn!
Elke keer wanneer Amazon (Amazon.nl, om precies te zijn) met een trotse melding komt dat je 'al je digitale producten nu op Amazon.nl' kunt kopen krijg ik hoofdpijn. Omdat ik weet dat daarmee gelijk de prijzen omhoog gaan, en het toch niet werkt...
It's the end of the year, so here we go again... Good intentions.
I have a few... Pretty much the same as last year and I just might fail yet again. But I'm going to try again! I'll tell you next year how things ended up...
You may have noticed that a large part of this blog consists of nothing but SciFi and Fantasy book reviews. I'm 58 now, and I've done nothing but reading SF and Fantasy over the last 40 odd years. There has been the occaisional side trip into other genres, but in the end I always return to my roots 😇 So, what are the best books I've ever read?
Countdown + Movie Review + Series Review
In Marvel MCU terms there is little difference between alternate timelines and alternate universes, so I'll group them together.
And - even if you dislike Jonathan Majors - there are some multiverse installments worth watching.
The preceding show Ms Marvel isn’t that bad, except for an overly short season. This one though… yeah, this one didn’t work. It’s a pity because it had some promising elements, but the end result is a hasty mess.
The verdict? Skip it.
Perhaps not as good as the original Orphan Black (ignoring the nose-dive and recovery near the end of that show) but still quite interesting. I wasn’t expecting the killing of such an essential character near the end though… Was it to attract new viewers, or the original plan of the creators? Who can tell?
Okay, first of all: don't support piracy! If you like something, then simply buy it!
Now, I can understand you want to preview something before actually buying it, and in that case I'll close one eye and consider a download for preview to be acceptable. Obviously, I expect you to actually buy the product if you like it, and otherwise delete what you downloaded.
