Book Review: Brief Cases, by Jim Butcher

This is the second collection of short stories in the universe of The Dresden Files.  I remember enjoying the previous collection, Side Jobs, just as much as the books themselves, so I read these as well.  I enjoyed most of the stories very much, but found this collection to be slightly different.  In the collection Side Jobs, the stories all revolve around Harry Dresden.  In Brief Cases, a few of the stories are about other characters in the series.  This made the collection a bit uneven, but still enjoyable.  Some of the stories I definitely liked better than others, and some of them I questioned the reason for their existence.

Here's my rating of each story.

A Fistful of Warlocks

This one was tough for me.  This isn't a Dresden story - the focus is on Anastasia Luccio and takes place back in the Old West, and includes appearances by Wyatt Earp and Doc Holliday.  It has been so long since Skin Game came out (waaaay back in May of 2014), I didn't even remember who Luccio was.  This is kind of a "Gunfight at the OK Corral" story, but with wizards and their enemies.  I didn't see the reason behind this story, and it didn't do much for me.  The pace and writing were not like typical Dresden fare.

The Bigfoot Trilogy:  B is for Bigfoot, I Was a Teenage Bigfoot, and Bigfoot on Campus

These stories were great!  It introduces a race that has never made an appearance in the Dresden books - the Bigfeet (or is it Bigfoots).  Each story builds on the one prior to it, and they introduce a great new character, Strength of a River in his Shoulders, who comes to Harry for help at the beginning of each of the stories.  These are well worth reading, and I hope this Bigfoot makes more appearances in the mainstream Dresden Files stories.  It is definitely an interesting take on the Bigfoot mythology.

AAAA Wizardry

This story covers some of Harry's time as a teacher, when he is working with young Wardens.  A suitable story for giving some background information, but no big action - this story couldn't have been very impressive, as I barely remember anything about it.

Curses

This one was a strange tale, involving the investigation of a curse on the Chicago Cubs.  We learn that the Cubs have been losing for so long due to a curse related to a goat.  Harry investigates to find the truth.  The story succeeded in drawing me in, but I have to say I found the ending a little confusing - I believe I had to read it twice.

Even Hand

While Harry does not appear in this story, it is an excellent addition.  One of the central characters is Johnny Marcone.  For a story that doesn't include Harry himself, this one is outstanding story.  We get to see inside Marcone's world, how is organization works, and we learn some very concerning things about him.  This story is an important piece of the Dresden series.

Bombshells

This story focuses entirely on one of Molly Carpenter's missions for the Leanansidhe.  She is still keeping a low radar, and is being taught by the Leanansidhe.  She ends up getting sent on a mission to rescue Thomas Raith, Harry's half brother.  During her mission, she learns that things are not always as they seem - which parallels many of Harry's own investigations.

Cold Case

This story covers Molly Carpenter's first task as the Winter Lady.  Similar to the event of some of the earlier Dresden novels, we get more background on Mab's plans, and more of a glimpse into what the forces of Winter are all about, and it isn't pretty.  Once again, Mab and her organization are involved in things that don't always what they seem to be, and I wouldn't be surprised we are getting some more background that will lead up to some explosive things in future novels.  Mab and her forces are sitting on a powder keg.

Jury Duty

This story follows Harry on a tour in jury duty, which he would like very much to avoid.  Naturally, Harry has to do a little investigating on his own.  This story was passable, but not among the best in this collection.

Day One

This story follows Waldo Butters meeting his first challenge as a Knight of the Cross.  He has been in training and seriously questions his worthiness to be a Knight.  With a little help, he learns he is more worthy than he thinks.  I'm hoping this leads to more overlap with Harry's investigations in future Dresden Files volumes.

Zoo Day

This story has an interesting format.  Harry spends the day at the zoo with his daughter Maggie and his Foo Dog, Mouse.  This story is unique in that it gets told from the perspective of all three characters.  We get some interesting background on what it is like to be a child, and what grown-ups don't remember about it.  This is a bit dark for the first Maggie story, but the style of the story makes up for that.

Overall, this was a very enjoyable collection.  Highly recommended.

Book Review: Monster Hunter Alpha, by Larry Correia

I first came across Monster Hunter International back in 2014.  It was a kind of story I had never seen before, and while it intrigued me, I wasn't sure I would like it - but it was extremely enjoyable.  In 2015, I read the sequel, Monster Hunter Vendetta, and enjoyed it just as much.  After that, I've been involved in reading many other things, and it took me a while to get back to this series.  Monster Hunter Alpha, the third installment, is just as good as the first two.

This time around, the organization Monster Hunter International (MHI) isn't in the picture.  This is a solo story for Earl Harbinger, the leader of MHI.  Earl gets a visit from an old friend who reveals that a werewolf from Earl's past is back in the United States.  It is clear that Earl has a desire to stop this werewolf at all costs for personal reasons.

As Earl tracks down this werewolf, he starts to learn that things are not as they seem, and it takes quite a while for things to become clear.  The danger he encounters is very unexpected, and there are some major surprises as the story unfolds:  Mr. Correia does not disappoint.  The Monster Control Bureau (MCB) also puts in an appearance and they manage to complicate the situation immensely.  Eventually, Earl and the MCB learn that they have stumbled into a plot that could bring about the end of the world, and find themselves trapped in the small town where it is happening.  Unable to reach out to MHI, he must trust in the representatives from the MCB and the local townspeople to help him combat this great evil.  Of course, the members of this small town are not well armed, but they come up with some creative ideas.  And, eventually, we learn that the title means.

The story moves at a great pace, and Earl finds both friends and enemies in unexpected places.  We get a good peek into Earl's past (he has been around for close to 100 years), and what his life has been like as a werewolf, and his struggles to control it.  Each chapter starts with an entry from Earl's journal, detailing his struggle with being a werewolf, and his desire to be rid of the curse and be a normal man again.  We learn many of Earl's abilities as a werewolf, what elements he has learned to control, and which elements he still struggles with - you get a real sense of what it would be like to have all the senses of a dog with you at all times, and you just can't turn them off.  Yeah, you might be able to heal quickly, and it might take a silver bullet to kill you, but you also have such a heightened senses of smell and hearing that it makes it hard to focus.

We also find that the events of the previous two books have a bearing on the story in this one.  One thing I would have really liked when reading Alpha was a refresher on the plot of the first two books - after all, it has been 3 or 4 years since I started reading the series.  I recognized a few names, but I was kind of vague on most of it, and I think it would have been nice to be able to connect the dots in a few places.

Overall, this is a great continuation of the series, and it was fantastic getting a glimpse into the past life of the leader of MHI.  Earl is tough as nails and has no fear.  If you like guns, monsters, guns, action, and more guns, you should enjoy Monster Hunter Alpha.

As always, I'd love to hear from you if you have read any of the books in this series and have enjoyed them as much as I have.  Please feel free to leave a comment.

Book Review: Not Alone, by Craig A. Falconer

I came across this book in the Kindle store back when I first bought a Kindle - probably summer of 2016.  I was immediately interested in it, and purchased it.  It then got buried under a bunch of purchases of books my some of my favorite authors and I forgot about it.  I recently saw that a sequel has been published, which jogged my memory that I had this book on my reading list.  I also recently had a very busy period where I wasn't reading any novels at all, so I started it during a free moment.

Let me say that this book is not what I was expecting.  The back cover blurb indicates that Dan McCarthy discovers evidence of a government cover-up and his quest to force disclosure.  Given the books length, about 736 pages, I expected that this would be the smallest portion of the story - I expected the majority of it to deal with first contact.

This isn't the case - and that is not a bad thing.  This is a very different kind of first contact story - and it *is* a first contact story, sort of.  What do I mean by that?  Well, you'll just need to read the book - as I said, it is a very different treatment of the first contact theme.

The story is fast-paced.  Dan's accidental discovery of the evidence, his leak of of the information, and his path to forcing disclosure, unfolds over two weeks, and about 50% of the book.  The remainder of the book deals with the events that take place after disclosure, and this is where the plot becomes much more interesting (and it was already super engaging).

The chapters count down to disclosure, and then begin counting up once disclosure occurs (a mechanism you've probably seen in some other novels).  I'm not sure I understand the countdown measurement - it is not in days or hours, and there is no hint that I could find as to what the numbering stands for.

I don't want to reveal too much of the plot, but Not Alone is interesting and engaging from beginning to end, and it doesn't disappoint - quite the achievement when the story ended up being much different than I was expecting.  There are also some very unexpected surprises later in the story.  Remember the surprise in The Mote in God's Eye by Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle?   (What, you haven't read it?  Remedy that immediately - you are missing out!)  There is an equivalent element of surprise to be found in Not Alone.

Overall this is a very pleasing story of a young man with his head in the stars who stumbles onto the opportunity to prove that his belief in UFO's and aliens is real, and chooses to act on it.  Very highly recommended!  I can't wait to check out the sequel and see how things ultimately get resolved.

As always, I'm interested in hearing from others.  If you have read this book and enjoyed it I'd be interested in hearing from you.

Book review: Codex Born, by Jim C. Hines

This is the second book in the Magic Ex Libris series, and I felt it was just as good as the first one.  This review makes references to some things that happened in the first book, Libriomancer, so if you haven't read that book yet I wouldn't read this post any further.

This story begins a few months after the events of Libriomancer.  Isaac Vainio is no longer a field agent.  Now he is a researcher for the Porters, and he's been working on the task assigned to him by Johannes Gutenberg, the man who created the Porters centuries earlier.  He has been researching the mysterious force which made an appearance at the end of the previous story.  While the Porters protect the world from magic, including the knowledge of it, this mysterious force is something which Gutenberg himself has been keeping from the Porters.  A force which he has been aware of and feared for 500 years.

In Codex Born, Isaac is called in to investigate the death of a wendigo in werewolf territory.  He quickly learns that forces which want revenge on Johannes Gutenberg (in response to events from centuries ago) are beginning to move against him.  In the months between books 1 and 2, both Isaac and Nidhi have had some difficulty adjusting to their new relationship with Lena Greenwood, the dryad.  This relationship appears to be a split-object triangle (definition).

Isaac has also taken on a mentoring role for a 14-year-old girl named Jeneta Aboderin.  Like many of those who exhibit magical abilities, Jeneta discovered her ability quite by accident, and her talent could forever change how the Porters understand magic.  I won't reveal her talent - you'll need to read the book to learn about it for yourself.

In the previous book, we learned that Lena is a dryad who was effectively pulled from a book - the title of Codex Born refers to Lena.  In this story, we learn more about her origins - it is interleaved through the entire story as a blurb at the start of each chapter.  As it turns out, her origins can have some nasty ramifications in this story.

One of the things I like about this series is that magic has consequences. In Dungeons & Dragons magic users and clerics and Druids all require physical components to their spells and you can only use the spells that you currently have in memory.  In this series, the more magic you use the more drained you become.  This can be very dangerous, as explored at the end of Libriomancer.

An especially interesting element of this story is how Lena is shaped by the desired of her companions.  The person she is depends greatly on the company she keeps - and the relationship she has with her two lovers makes her a formidable ally.

As with the first book, the story comes to a satisfying end, building on the previous story, and revealing that the situation is rapidly becoming more dire as time passes.  All has not yet been revealed - Isaac still doesn't quite know what they are dealing with.

This is a great follow up to Libriomancer, and the looming danger continues to grow throughout the story.  I highly recommend this to anyone who has read the first book.

As always, if you have read this series, I'm interested in hearing from you.  Feel free to leave a comment.

Book Review: Old Man's War, by John Scalzi

This is the first novel I've read by John Scalzi.  When it was nominated for the Hugo award for best novel in 2006, I checked it out, and read the first few pages.   For some reason, I wasn't interested.  Perhaps I felt this had too much in common with Robert A. Heinlein's Starship Troopers.  Perhaps the book started with too much of the first person prose and very little dialogue that I typically have difficulty with.  I can't really remember.  But, as has happened all too frequently since I purchased a Kindle, I managed to get a good price on this book so I decided to check it out.

On the surface, the theme of this story is very similar to Starship Troopers, but there are many differences, both in the story and in the protagonist.  In Starship Troopers, Juan "Johnny" Rico graduates from high school and follows a classmate into the military.  He then goes through a brutal boot camp, and then heads off to fight the "bugs" which have been attacking Earth.  I'll leave other differences for the reader to discover.

In Old Man's War, John Perry is a 75-year-old man with a lifetime of experience, who then joins the military to extend his life.  He must serve for a mandatory 2 years, and a potential maximum (and,  highly likely to be imposed) of 10 years of service protecting human colonists from all the other lifeforms in the universe (and there are several of them - some of which list human beings as a delicacy on their menu).  There is also an interesting twist on who can qualify as a colonist, which I won't reveal.

This story qualifies as "military" science fiction.  I don't reach much of that, and frankly I don't care for most of it.  I did finally get around to reading The Forever War, by Joe Haldeman, a few years ago, and I found it painful to get through.  It had some interesting concepts, which is why I continued reading it, but it really wasn't for me.  I also tried reading a few other series, but for the most part they weren't for me.  One exception was The Lazarus War:  Artefact, by Jamie Sawyer.  I enjoyed this, but did find it a bit hard to get through.  Some of it was the pacing of the book.  You can find my review here.

So, why did I take a chance on this book, other than the price?  Well, I'm 11 years older, so my perspectives are changing as I get older.  I should have taken a chance on this book earlier.  While the first few pages are kind of slow, with John Perry giving some of his background, but it turns out he's kind of a funny guy.  The story is told from Perry's point of view, and immediately the character reminded me of the character Colonel Miles Quaritch, played by Stephen Lang, in James Cameron's 2009 film Avatar.  Perry seems very focused on the things he speaks about.  The initial discussions he has with fellow recruits about the Colonial Union(CU) and the Colonial Defense Force(CDF) is interesting (early on, it is the discussion of the elevator ride into orbit).

The blurb on the cover reminds me of the remake of The Day the Earth Stood Still.  Essentially, the number of planets which are habitable are few and far between.  In the film, Keanue Reeves' character states that humanity is destroying our own planet, and due to the limited number of livable worlds in the universe, this can't be allowed.  In Old Man's War, it means that aliens are willing to fight over habitable worlds - regardless of whether the world is already inhabited,  Humanity must play the same game and expand their territory at all costs or risk extinction.

The technology in this story is fascinating.  Soldiers get a weapon that is somewhat reminiscent of the Lawgiver II from the Sylvester Stallone film Judge Dread - but much cooler.  And the rejuvenation process is equally cool (and was somewhat unexpected for me).  The CDF battle cruisers move around the universe using "skip" drives, and we learn a few details around how these drives work.  The way skip drives work was a surprise to me, and I'll leave it to the reader to learn about it for themselves when they read the book.

There are some very interesting alien races in this story as well.  In particular, the Consu stand out from the others.  They behave strangely and speak cryptically.  For me, this was very reminiscent of the Vorlon race in the TV series Babylon 5 (the Vorlon's rarely said anything which could be immediately understood; sometimes, but not always, whatever was said became clear later on - sometimes several episodes away, or in a few cases almost a season later).

The story is told in three parts.

Part 1 is about John's recruitment, which is an interesting process.  Those on Earth know very little about the CDF, aside from the fact that they keep the best technology for themselves and don't share it with Earth.  People are not allowed to enlist until they reach the age of 75.  Everyone expects that once they join, they will be made young again - after all, geriatric troops won't be able to put up much of a fight.  Of course, nobody on Earth knows much about what this really means, but John finds out soon enough.

Part 2 focuses on John's training at boot camp, and the details of several short missions.

Part 3 details a very important mission which is a followup to a previous mission which is completed at the end of part 2.  The focus is around some very dangerous information about one of the alien races which is in conflict with humanity, and resolving this crisis.

Overall, this was a fantastic read, and a wonderful first effort from an author, and I would highly recommend it to anyone who enjoys science fiction.  I should be kicking myself for not reading this book when I first saw it back in 2006!  I'm sure I'll be checking out other books in the series at some point.

As always, I'm interested in hearing from my readers.  If you have read this book, I'm interested in what you thought of it.  If my review impacted your decision to read this book, I'd be interested in hearing about that as well.