Lucas Blogs About Books

Remember Cowboys and Aliens ? No? Me neither.   So, what's this book's deal? I thought you'd never ask, Hypothetical Reader. The deal with Lake of Fire  is that it's a comic book written, colored, and lettered by Nathan Fairbairn and drawn by Matt Smith. The pithy synopsis is that it's crusaders vs. aliens. Perhaps a less pithy synopsis is in order. Yeah, okay, have you heard of the Albigensian Crusade ? You mean the twenty year campaign of extermination against the Cathars in the Languedoc region of France in the early 13th Century? Yes, that Albigensian Crusade. Lake of Fire  takes place in 1220, about halfway through. After a couple of pages showing a spaceship crashing, we cut to Theo and Hugh, two teenage boys who have set off to join the crusade before the campaigning season is over. However, when they arrive they discover that a family friend, Count Henry, has been dispatched to bring them home and has overtaken them on the road. Sensing an opportunity to get...

Yep, more Le Guin ! So, what's this book's deal? As you can see, it's another of Ursula K. Le Guin's Hainish novels. This time it's Planet of Exile  which, like Rocanon's World ,  includes both fantasy and science fiction tropes. Though it certainly does lean more into the science fiction side of the premise. The premise being? So, remember how the League of All Worlds is at war with some other unnamed faction? Vaguely. Well, that's still going on. However, it hasn't directly affected the planet of Werel, where this story takes place. Only indirectly? Yeah. See, the League has established a colony there, which is currently at relative peace with the local population. And by local population you mean who exactly. Well, the human settlers call them HILFs. Humanoids I'd Like to Fu— No! It stands for Highly Intelligent Life Forms. But yes, they are humanoid (again due to the spread of the ancient Hainish civilization) and yes, some of the settlers and so...

Oh yeah, one of the pages came loose while reading. Might want to get on that Saga Press. Hey! Once again I'm setting aside the framework of the Hypothetical Reader to discuss a book that I enjoyed, and yet feel hasn't quite lived up to its potential. This time it's Temi Oh's debut science fiction novel, Do You Dream of Terra-Two? On an unrelated note, I'm a sucker for books whose titles are questions. I mean, I don't always buy them, but I think it's an effective marketing gimmick because it automatically engages the potential reader. Although it is sort of a double-edged sword because the response could just be, "Well, that's a stupid question." Anyway, in the case of this book, I initially misread the title as Oh Do You Dream of Terra-Two? because only the author's surname was given on the spine. Back on topic. Do You Dream of Terra-Two? is about the United Kingdom Space Agency's attempt to launch the first manned mission to th...

I'm slightly embarrassed to admit that it took me three books to catch on to the whole "number of feathres on the cover indicates which book in the series this is" thing. So, what's this book's deal? All right, so the deal with Malice of Crows is that it's the third book in Lila Bowen's The Shadow series. Like Lamont "Who knows what evil lurks in the hearts of men?" Cranston the Shadow? Like the Orson Welles radio show or the Alec Baldwin movie? No. The Shadow is a series of fantasy/horror western novels about a Durango Ranger named Rhett Walker (who's gone through a number of previous names, but we'll get to that later). Rhett himself is a shapeshifting monster, that is to say that he looks human but is functionally immortal (unless someone manages to stab him in the heart) and can turn into a bearded vulture (aka a lammergeier) at will. However, to other monsters, Rhett just looks like a normal human (monsters can spot eacho...

Hey, some doofus has his hand covering part of the author's name. So, are you going to make any kind of New Year's resolution? Nope. Besides, wasn't Thursday the time to ask about that? I don't usually show up in  Simplified Series . No, I suppose you don't. So, what's this book's deal? Well, had you appeared in last Thursday's post , you'd know that A Breach in the Heavens is the conclusion of N.S. Dolkart's Godserfs trilogy. Godserfs? Oh, that's what the elves call humans. You see, the elves were like humanity's rebellious older siblings who were banished to another dimension because they wouldn't worship the gods. So, humanity is like the goody-two-shoes younger sibling? Yeah. Anyway, this is the first time I've reviewed a non-first entry in a series on this blog so, I'm not sure how to handle the dreaded SPOILERS . Well, why not just say that you pretty much have to spoil the first two books to dis...

I'm still trying to work out the exact mechanics of this collision. Fun cover though. Okay, time to put Hypothetical Reader back in its box for a moment. That's right, plain old essay format review time. Now, I know that pervious instances of this format were both books that I thought were quite good, but I'll be honest: while I enjoyed reading Stupid Love Comedy , it is, in fact, only okay. Let's talk about why. So, Stupid Love Comedy is a Shōjo manga by Syusyusyu Sakurai (disclaimer, I haven't read all that much in the Shōjo genre, so it's possible that people who are fans of that genre may enjoy this more than I did) concerning the relationship between Osamu Hasegawa, a manga editor, and Suzu Sakura, a mangaka. See, Hasegawa used to be an editor at San Cruz,  a Shōnen magazine, who has been reassigned to Shōjo magazine  Daisy  to work with one of their promising new talents. Well, her debut was promising. As it turns out, Sakura-sensei (in addito...

Depicted: a scene which does not appear in the book. So, what's this book's deal? Well, Hope Never Dies  by Andrew Shaffer is a detective novel pastiche in which former Vice President Joe Biden investigates the death of his friend, an Amtrak conductor on the Acela Express, with a little help from another old friend, that's right, former President Barack Obama. We begin with ol' Uncle Joe in what he calls "a black Irish mood," stewing over a video of Obama parasailing in South Africa, believing that the 44th president would rather hobnob with celebs than play a round of golf with his dorky former VP. Who should turn up in his backyard but Barack himself, and he's got some bad news: Amtrak conductor Finn Donnelly was hit by a train with a baggie of heroin in his pocket and a map to Joe Biden's house at his desk. From there Biden and Obama undertake an ill-advised investigation into Donnelly's death,  while rekindling the bromance which has bee...

Book (mostly) delivers exactly what this cover promises! (see review) So, what's this book's deal? Like, zoinks, Hypothetical Reader! This is a pulpy, post-modern, Scooby-Doo-meets-H.P. Lovecraft pastiche! Back in 1977, a quartet of preteens and their Weimaraner found out that a squatter was using legends of a lake creature to get control of an abandoned gold mine. Or so they thought. Anyway by 1990, jock Peter's committed suicide after a brief career in Hollywood, tomboy Andy's been kicked out of the Air Force and has an unrequited crush on science nerd Kerri, who's tending bar instead of going to grad school, and fantasy nerd Nate's been in and out of mental institutions because of his hallucinations(?) of Peter's g-g-g-ghost (Sean the Weimaraner is dead, don't worry, he's got a great-grandson, Tim). As for the squatter, well, Wickley's finally out of prison, but tracking him down only confirms Andy's suspicions that there's more...

Oh, so that's what Link was saying. That's it, I'm at my limit! What is it this time, Hypothetical Reader? A kids' book was one thing, but the manga adaptation of a v ideo game ? Have you no shame? You know, even for a rhetorical device intended to give voice to my own anxieties about how others perceive me, you sure can be judgmental. Okay, okay, I have my guilty pleasures, too. Guilty pleasures? Who has time for that, enjoy what you enjoy, HR. Fine. So, what's this book's deal? You ever play Ocarina of Time on the N64? Of course. It's like that. You're the wors- JK LOL!!!! So, it has the same basic plot as the game, Link has to leave his home in the Kokiri Forest to meet Princess Zelda and fulfill his destiny as the Hero of Time. There are a few tweaks here and there, but no real surprises. The main difference is that instead of being the strong, silent type he is in the game, Link is quite talkative. This makes him more of a...

F/NAL G/RLS by R/LEY SAGER? Before we go any further, I assume that you know what the "final girl" trope is in horror film. If not, Google is your friend. So, what's this book's deal? I'm glad you asked, Hypothetical Reader. It's the story of Quincy Carpenter, a baking blogger (yes, this is her real job, and yes, the book does explain how she manages to financially support herself (hint: it doesn't involve the blog)) in Manhattan who, ten years earlier, was the lone survivor of the Pine Cottage Murders (think any slasher movie with an escaped mental patient). Luckily (kinda) for Quincy, she has no memory of what happened between midnight and one am on the night in question. Afterwards, the media dub her a "Final Girl." Sharing this dubious honor are Lisa Milner, who years earlier survived a similar slaughter at her sorority house, and Samantha Boyd, who was working at the Nightlight Inn when it was attacked by the Sack Man. None of...