The Blog Fantastic 039: Prince Caspian Review (Unread 015)

When I read the first book of C. S. Lewis’s The Chronicles of Narnia, I had a lot of problems with it. I enjoyed myself while reading, but once the book was done and I thought about it a little bit, it felt slight and weightless. There wasn’t much substance for me to hang on to and the experience I had with The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe soon drifted away. Just like the Pevensie children, I knew I would one day return to Narnia, mostly because I had already bought all seven volumes from Bay Used Books – a matching set, no less. I’ve decided to read the series in publication order so the second book I picked off the shelf was Prince Caspian.

I mentioned in my review of the first book that I enjoyed the writing style and that the plot had little tension or thrills to offer, my reaction to Prince Caspian is eerily similar. The plot isn’t thrilling, not much happens and what does happen is accomplished with far too much ease. Worst of all, I had a more difficult time reading the second volume because the writing style annoyed me for most of the book. I found it to be pandering and patronizing. Why I enjoyed it with The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe and not with Prince Caspian I can only blame on my mood while reading this book. This time around, I found that the writing style pulled me out of the story, provided too many interrupting commentary, and not enough plot momentum. If anything, it slowed down the story. It also surprised me just how little dialogue this book has. It’s a clear example of how breaking the storytelling rule of “show, don’t tell” will make for a shitty reading experience.

The Blog Fantastic 038: Dragondrums Review (Unread 014)

Dragondrums is the third volume of the Harper Hall trilogy. It’s noticeably different than the first two volumes because this volume focuses on Piemur, rather than Menolly. I read some reviews and comments online about how some people really didn’t like that change. It was said that it undermined Menolly’s character and that Piemur isn’t worthy enough to lead his own book. I personally like the change. Menolly rubbed me the wrong way because she was infallible and could do no wrong. She reeks of Mary Sue’ness and that got tiresome pretty quickly. She’s still a part of Dragondrums but it’s less focused that in the previous volumes. I did have my moments where I really liked her but overall, I liked her better in this book. She works better for me when she’s not in the spotlight. For me, she’s a character that works best when I’m not spending all my time inside her head. I can appreciate her talents and personality much more this way. I also happen to like Piemur, so having more of him in Dragondrums was a positive change, in my opinion. However, like Menolly, he did have his moments where he annoyed me.

This book is about growing up and dealing with changes that our out of control (kind of funny then that readers were upset about the change in main character – you can’t do anything about it so settle in and enjoy the story). Piemur, at the age of 14, loses his soprano voice leaving him unable to sing until his voice settles down and he finds his new vocal range. He’s at a loss as to what his future hold. He doesn’t know what to do. He’s never excelled at anything else at Harper Hall besides singing. He’d even become Master Shonagar’s favourite student because of his voice. Aside from that, he’s not really any good in other fields of music. He sucks at making instruments, his gitar playing is no more than average, he isn’t good at composition, or at copying sheet music. Crushed by the thoughts that he would have to return to his childhood Hold, he is given incredible news.

Star Trek: The Next Generation Omnibus review (Unread 013)

IDW Publishing, the current comic book publisher which holds the rights to Star Trek comics has put together a few archive collections of Star Trek comics previously published by other companies. They’ve also put together omnibus editions that collect multiple mini-series that were first published by IDW. It’s a good publishing strategy as mini-series are often overlooked by regular comic book readers and considering that most of IDW’s Star Trek output has been in this format it makes sense to give those minis a wider audience. Since the omnibus collections contain multiple mini-series at a more affordable price, it’s most likely the favoured choice of potential buyers. That’s why I bought this volume. The page per dollar ratio makes it worthwhile purchase. This volume focuses on stories set in The Next Generation series. Four miniseries are collected together. The first of which is The Space Between.

The Space Between

Written by David Tischman

Art by Casey Maloney

Additional Inks by Stacie Ponder and Aaron Leach

Colors by Leonard O’Grady

Letters by Robbie Robbins, Chris Mowry, and Neil Uyetake

Edited by Dan Taylor

The Blog Fantastic 037: Last Sword of Power Review (Unread 012)

Have you ever built up an author (or director, musician, etc.) in your head as being one of the greats? Maybe even a genius in their respective field? Now I don’t think David Gemmell is a genius, but I’ve always considered him a skilled writer who excels at certain types of stories. Those stories often focus on tough men put in situations where their survival is in question but the situation often leads to their redemption as heroes for having done the honourable thing in said difficult situation. I’ve pointed out his weaknesses as a writer before (female characters!) and his stories can be similar when looking at them side by side (yet they’re usually varied enough in the details to remain separate individual works). Sometimes he plays with big ideas and when he does, he rivals many of the other great fantasy authors. To be clear, I think David Gemmell is pretty great and up until a few weeks ago, at least, he was one of my favourite fantasy authors, comfortably sitting amongst the other greats in the literary pantheon of my mind.

Oh, how the mighty have fallen.

The Blog Fantastic 036: Elantris Review (Unread 011)

I don’t read as many books as I would like to, especially in certain genres. There’s too little time to get around to everything that interests me. Because of that, sometimes I try a book by an author who has caught my attention only to be disappointed by the sample of their work. It sucks when that happens, and it happens regularly. That’s why I’m thrilled when I discover a writer whose work I really enjoy, especially when that other has plenty more books to offer and all of their books are readily available. For me, Brandon Sanderson has become one of those writers in the last two years or so. I’ve known of him since he was handpicked to finish writing Robert Jordan’s The Wheel of Time, but I only got around to giving one of his books a try until a couple years ago. Since then, I’ve been enjoying him work. I still have plenty of his books to read (he writes at superhuman speeds) which means I’ll have several more Sanderson reviews to write in the future.

Elantris is the most recent book by Sanderson that I’ve read. I enjoyed it, but not as much as I enjoyed Warbreaker and The Emperor’s Soul. The novel is Sanderson’s first published work, though not the first book he’s written. As his first published book it’s certainly something to be proud of because there are loads of really good things about it. One of those things is the prologue which instantly grabs the reader and sucks them into the world of Elantris. The setup is pretty simple. There once was a city of gods. It was a city filled with magic and limitless possibilities. A few decades ago that city died and all its gods became decrepit wretches, now living a cursed life. This event was called the Reod, the fall of the gods. Still, the city lives on in a way because the magic that chose people among the populace of the surrounding cities to become gods in the famed city of Elantris continues to work. Though now, the Shaod (the Transformation) is no longer a blessing, it’s a sentence to a miserable new life. 

Gunpla Build Review: Master Grade RX-79 (G) Gundam Ground

It’s been nine months since my first Gunpla review. Since then, I’ve only had time to build one more model and it’s of the same Gundam suit. This time though, I built a Master Grade version of the RX-79 (G) Gundam. Regular readers will know that I’m a big fan of The 08th MS Team series and it just seemed natural to me to seek out the main Gundam from that series to build as my first Gunpla kit. Why then would I buy a kit for the same Gundam as my second build? The answer is simple enough. I’m extremely new to Gunpla building and I wanted to build a kid that would help me differentiate between High Grade and Master Grade kits. It seemed to me like the best way of doing that was to build the same Gundam in both grades.

Even though I had recently built an RX-79, I got quite a bit of enjoyment out of the Master Grade version. I simply like this mobile suit, so building it is a treat on its own, but the real delight came in comparing the High Grade kit to the Master Grade. Best of all, I found the Master Grade to be superior in all areas which led to this build being more enjoyable than my first one. Part of that definitively has to do with me being familiar with the building process and knowing the basics. That helped me a lot this time around. 

Star Trek: The Motion Picture: The Novel review (Unread 010)

I love Star Trek for a lot of difference reasons. One of the main reasons is that it can provide fans with a wide variety of stories within the franchise’s fictional universe. This is true of a lot of long lasting and ever evolving franchises but Star Trek is still one of my favourites because it does it well and even when it completely misses the mark, there is a lot left to enjoy. That’s true of Star Trek: The Motion Picture and it’s even truer of Star Trek: The Motion Picture: The Novel (that title!).

I didn’t really like Star Trek: The Motion Picture the first time I saw it. I’ve always thought it was interesting – how can it not be considering all the characters begin in a different situation than what we’re used to seeing, the uniforms are different, everything feels fresh and new – but I didn’t think it was good. It didn’t compare to the good Star Trek movies. The more I rewatched it, the more my opinion changed. I started to like it because the more I watched it the easier it was for me to notice the thematic elements at play (on full display but difficult to notice due to the slow pacing of the film), the surprisingly poignant character arcs (mostly Kirk, Spock, and McCoy, again, difficult to notice because they’re portrayed differently than we’re used to seeing and that’s the whole point), just how long those damn lingering shots of spaceships and the Intruder are (way, way too long). It also became apparent that the movie’s pacing actually supports the character development which also happens to be the heart of the movie. Having a slower pace allowed for more character reaction, anticipation, and boiling over of emotions, all of which fuel character interaction and allow for the thematic development of the relationships between humanoid to humanoid and human to unknown sentient beings.

Naruto 3-in-1 10 (volumes 28-29-30) review (Unread 009)

I was very, very excited to start reading volume 10 of the Naruto 3-in-1 editions. Back when I first started to read Naruto in Shonen Jump, I stopped reading somewhere along volume 29 or so. This means that I my Naruto reread would soon become, well, a read. “New” chapters! How can you not be excited for that?

This omnibus edition contains volumes 28 to 30 which are the first three volumes of Part Two of the entire series. With these volumes Masashi Kishimoto gives himself the task of reintroducing familiar characters after a two and a half years jump forward in time. I really enjoyed these first few chapters. Seeing all these familiar faces and finding new elements added to their character such as slightly different personalities and clothing. It seemed a little odd to feel as though I’m supposed to be pleased and surprised by meeting several characters again. In reality that’s the effect good storytelling has on readers. I care for these characters and it’s great to see them grow and change. I really like that Kishimoto wrote an interlude focusing on a young Kakashi in volume 27 because it contributes to the feeling that time has passed since we last saw Naruto and the rest of the cast.

The Blog Fantastic 035: Ghost King Review (Unread 008)

One of the best things about this
book is the cover.

David Gemmell is one of my favourite fantasy authors. I first discovered his writing when my brother lent me his copy of Lord of the Silver Bow, the first volume in Gemmell’s Troy trilogy which he was nearing completion before he passed away. His wife, Stella Gemmell, finished the trilogy and has since published a novel of her own titled The City. Since I’m a fan of Greek mythology and The Iliad I was excited to read it and Gemmell really impressed me. He mostly ignored a lot of the specifics of classical writing on the subject. It’s difficult to believe but Homer and Virgil didn’t have as much of an influence on Gemmell’s story as you would have expected. He definitively walked down his own path but that’s alright with me. At that point in his career he knew his strengths and by focusing on soldiers and other characters with strong personalities and by severely limiting the use of magic along with the presence and influence of the gods, he managed to write a trilling and action packed historical fantasy trilogy. This led me to reading several of his books and I’ve enjoyed every one.

After finding copies of most of the Stones of Power series at my local used book store (Bay Used Books) I read up a bit on the series before reading it. The cover of the first two books looked radically different than the other three. As it turns out, they’re two separate series that are tied together by the titular Stones of Power. From what I can tell there aren’t that many more connections between both stories. Sadly, I do not own a copy of the final book in the Jon Shannow trilogy which also happens to be the concluding volume of The Stones of Power. Hopefully I can find a copy by the time I get to that point in the series. I decided to start with Ghost King and its sequel Last Sword of Power because they were published first and they’re also first in chronological order. It’s always fun when that happens. I was really looking forward to Ghost King because it’s yet another book where Gemmell retells a well-known fantasy story. This time it’s the legend of King Arthur. Unfortunately, it’s kind of crap.

Star Wars: Heir to the Empire review (Unread 007)

Here it is; the big one. The grand-daddy of all Star Wars Expanded Universe novels: The Thrawn Trilogy by Timothy Zahn. It took me two years of exploring the EU to finally come around to reading Star Wars: Heir to the Empire. To be honest, this is probably where I should have started exploring the EU but for reasons that can be summarized by the simple fact that I had other EU books in my hands before I ever bought a copy of Heir to the Empire, I only got around to reading it two months ago. I’m glad I did because the book holds up as an entertaining follow-up to the original trilogy, despite the praise it’s usually given by fans of the franchise. I was honestly worried this book would be overhyped.

For those who have not heard of this book and its sequels, The Thrawn Trilogy is arguably the most important Star Wars novels as they’re regularly credited with first developing and popularizing the foundations of what became known as the Expanded Universe. All of the Star Wars novels of the 1990s owe a debt to Zahn and his trilogy. To try and put this accomplishment in perspective, Zahn gives the franchise an identity post Episode VI, creates some of the most popular and best developed characters of the EU, successfully writes about Luke, Leia, Han, and other characters from the film by being true to their onscreen counterparts but also providing them with a new identity. He does all of this while also telling an interesting story that mixes old and new tricks resulting in a thrilling first volume of a trilogy. What gives this book such a lasting impression is that it was used as the foundation on which all of the other Bantam Spectra era novels are built upon. It forms the backbone of this publication period of Star Wars novels. Some even credit this trilogy with renewing George Lucas’ interesting in creating the prequel trilogy. It’s uncontested truth that The Thrawn Trilogy has had a lasting impact on the franchise and is at the very least partially responsible for the continued success and popularity of Star Wars today.