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Bookmark: Steven Gould

by Xaviar XerexesApril 20, 2013

Steven Gould is one of my favorite authors because of the way he takes one impossible idea and then logically delves into a world with this one new impossible idea in it. He has a scientific method feel to how he writes science fiction that I really enjoy and he generally has a nice touch with action and characters as well. He’s probably best known for his Jumper trilogy from which the movie Jumper was made. The movie loses a lot of what makes the novels special, with the movie instead crafting a gigantic mythology of war between jumpers and …

Bookmark: Game of Thrones

by Xaviar XerexesApril 14, 2013

Game of Thrones is the first novel in the A Song of Fire and Ice saga and the teevee series adapting that string of novels. But you know that, everyone knows that. The popularity of this story is surprising to me; clearly the HBO teevee adaptation had a lot to do with it but it seems like the novels had gathered a lot of steam on their own. I only read the novels last year and only just now, thanks to the free “preview” of HBO on the local cable system for a few months, have I caught the first …

To Read Stack of Comix

by Xaviar XerexesMarch 7, 2013

Here’s a shot of my current list of graphic novels I’m reading. Working my way from the top down probably: Faith Erin Hick, Hope Larson, Kazu Kibushi, Vera Brosgol, Lewis Trondheim, Mark Siegel, Arne Bellstorf, Dean Haspiel, and Joe Sacco. That’s a pretty impressive list of creators’ work on my shelf right now.

Bookmark: Neal Stephenson

by Xaviar XerexesMarch 4, 2013

These “Bookmark” posts are useful for me; hopefully a few other people get something out of them along the way. I really enjoy Neal Stephenson‘s books. Unlike Stephen King, another novelist where the length of the book increases with each new effort, I never read a Stephenson book and wonder how badly he beat the editors. Stephenson books revel in their research, the density of information jammed into the pages is part of what makes his novels work. You can divide up the novels of Neal Stephenson into maybe three categories. Scholars and critics can tell me why I’m wrong …

Bookmark: Cory Doctorow

by Xaviar XerexesFebruary 16, 2013

I met Cory Doctorow once at a conference called Supernova in Washington DC back in the very early part of the ‘naughts. It was actually about technology policy which is the fascinating thing about Cory Doctorow, talented and successful writer; he’s also quite an effective public advocate for a number of progressive 21st Century causes, including privacy and copyright reform. He’s had an impressive public life. It’s the books though where he has been able to wrap his ideas around and through interesting narrative; probably still the best way to get through to majority of the world. I’ve read everything …

Taking the Piss Out of the Hardy Boys

by Xaviar XerexesJune 24, 2012

Another “I’m only bringing this up because I’m re-reading comic archives” post — this one about Kate Beaton’s Mystery Solving Teens characters. Taking a somewhat staid cultural item, whether it’s history or a fictional character or book and applying a veneer of knowing sarcasm over it is the bedrock of Beaton’s sense of humor. She can also deftly point out the absurdities of the original situation or character. For the Hardy Boys, turning the rather adult-like teenage stars of those books into rather modern, slacker teens flips the premise sideways. Why would these teens solve mysteries? Why in the heck …

Kickstart My Art: Clang

by Xaviar XerexesJune 10, 2012

Neal Stephenson is a geek legend at this point. I don’t think his first novel Snow Crash would have existed without William Gibson’s early novels coming first, but it’s just speculation on my part unless I get a chance to talk to either author. Don’t get me wrong, I love Neal’s books and unlike some, I’ve liked each new one better then the last. What some see as a weakness — stuffing a tremendous amount of knowledge on the subjects of his books — well, I tend to love that part of his books. His most recent project, The Mongoliad, came …

Fiction Reading This Summer

by Xaviar XerexesSeptember 15, 2009March 8, 2020

I read a bunch of Terry Pratchett’s Discworld novels this summer, not really in order though. It’s just a wonderful series, funny, but a coherent enough fantasy world that you care about the stories and the characters. I wish I’d had these to read when I was a kid. I’ve also been reading John Scalzi’s novels lately. He’s a fairly “lite-science” science fiction writer and pretty efficient at telling a tale (things happen! characters move!). They’re good reads and the 3 part “Old Man’s War” series is good fun. I’m in the middle of reading Zoe’s Tale, which is a re-telling (so far) of parts of the …