The Last Colony by John Scalzi
Old Man’s War series #3
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My Rating: 
4 out of 5 stars
First Published: April 17th, 2007
Read from: May 11 to May 13, 2015
Awards: 2008 Hugo Award Nominee for Best Novel, 2010 Seiun Award for Best Foreign Novel
The Name of the Wind by Patrick Rothfuss
The Kingkiller Chronicle series #1
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My Rating: 
5 out of 5 stars
First Published: March 27th, 2005
Read from: April 21 to May 10, 2015
Awards: 2008 ALA Alex Award, 2007 The Quill Award for Science Fiction/Fantasy/Horror
Startide Rising by David Brin
The Uplift Saga #2
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My Rating: 
2 out of 5 stars
First Published: 1983
Read from: January 26 to February 2, 2015
Awards: 1984 Hugo Award for Best Novel , 1983 Nebula Award for Best Novel, 1984 Locus Award for Best Science Fiction Novel
It’s not the first time I have discovered something similar, but this book (which won nearly every award a sci-fi novel could at the time,) pretty much sucked. Which is especially sad because I really liked the first in the series.
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Odd Apocalypse by Dean Koontz
Odd Thomas series #5
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My Rating: 
3 out of 5 stars
First Published: July 31, 2012
Read from: February 19 to February 28, 2015
“We love a series hero, but a series villain quickly becomes silly as he strives so obviously to shock us. Virtue is imaginative, evil repetitive.” – Odd Apocalypse, Page 23
This quote from Dean Koont’s “Odd Apocalypse” seems very apropos: the story of our virtuous hero Odd Thomas saving the world by stopping evil villains from destroying the world (as we know it) is getting a little repetitive. I think I liked this book of the series the least of all that came before. Which is odd, because the serial “novella” that was released before this book as kind of an appetizer, “Odd Interlude”, was one of my favorites because of both it’s short action-packed pace and a couple of fun, interesting new characters. But this book…
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Small Gods by Terry Pratchett
Discworld series #13
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My Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
First Published: 1992
Read from: March 1 to March 19, 2015
Yet another excellent book that deserves a full review, but I was either too lazy, busy or uninspired at the time.
As always with Pratchett’s work, this book while being funny and amusing, hit me in surprisingly “deep” places. I have literally PAGES of highlighted quotes from this book. Many because they were funny. But far more because they were so honest and True. True with a capital ‘T’.
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Starship Troopers by Robert Heinlein
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My Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
First Published: January 1963
Read from: February 19 to February 28, 2015
Awards: 1963 Hugo Award for Best Novel
Abaddon’s Gate by James S.A. Corey
The Expanse series #3
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My Rating: 
3.5 out of 5 stars
First Published: June 4, 2013
Read from: February 2 to February 12, 2015
“Corners and doorways… It’s always corners and doorways.” – Miller, Abaddon’s Gate
This is the third book of an excellent space opera science fiction series. While I did not enjoy it quite as much as those that came before, it was still a very well written and entertaining read, and sets up a future for the series, and the “franchise” that it has become, with a lot of promise.
I am a little unsure how to proceed with a review of this book without spoiling any of the cool premise of the previous books. Even what is printed on the book backs and the published book blurbs seem a little “spoilerly” to me. While I will strive not to deliver anything that will spoil the reading of this specific book, if you have NOT read the previous two novels in the series I strongly recommend you check out my review of Leviathan Wakes and Caliban’s War and then read those books first, before proceeding with this review.
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Caliban’s War by James S.A. Corey
The Expanse series #2
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My Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
First Published: June 26, 2012
Read from: January 26 to February 2, 2015
The Space Opera that is “The Expanse” just keeps getting better.
For someone who didn’t intend to wreck the solar system’s fragile balance of power, Jim Holden did a pretty good job of it. When a single super-soldier begins slaughtering soldiers of Earth and Mars, the race is on to discover whether this is the vanguard of an alien army, or if the danger lies closer to home.
Caliban’s War is the second book of the Expanse series that started with Leviathan Wakes. The series, written by James S.A. Corey – a pen name for the collaboration of Albuquerque, New Mexico authors Ty Franck & Daniel Abraham, has garnered a lot of attention. There is a SyFy television series coming out soon based on the books. Having enjoyed the first novel so much, it was long over due for me to read the sequels. Read My Full Review →
Downbelow Station by C. J. Cherryh
Company Wars series #1 – Alliance-Union universe
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My Rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars
First Published: February 1981
Read from: October 1, 2014 to January 26, 2015
Awards: 1982 Hugo Award for Best Novel
I have finally gotten around to starting to process tons of old digital photos. To top it off I have been learning some new software, having recently received Adobe Lightroom for Christmas (thanks Dad). While doing this I wanted to start uploading my work to Flickr, but instead of uploading in occasional batches of photos as I worked on them, I thought it would be nice to have some system of uploading them spread out over a schedule. I found a couple of different apps that do just that. One PC app called Flickr Shedulr, and one web-based app called PhotoQueue.com.
So far I have been using the freeware PC app, called Flickr Schedulr, and I really like it. The first thing you have to do is link it to your Flickr account. This gave me a little trouble at first, but once I got it linked everything has worked great. The app is organized into several different screens or tabs. Read My Full Review →
