Agent to the Stars by John Scalzi

Agent to the Stars by John Scalzi

I bought this book on Audible and listened to it using the Audible app on my iPhone. John Scalzi and Wil Wheaton knock another one out of the park. I am not listening to their books in any particular order so I am not sure if they are getting better or if I am learning to enjoy the writing and performance more and more. ...

January 8, 2013 · 2 min · 257 words · Dave Nelson
Soon I Will Be Invincible by Austin Grossman

Soon I Will Be Invincible by Austin Grossman

I bought this book on Audible and listened to it on my iPhone using the Audible app. This is the first book I have gotten lately from Audible that left me very disappointed. It is a highly rated book, but it didn’t work for me. Paul Boehmer does a good job with Doctor Impossible’s portion of the story but Coleen Marlo comes across as flat and lifeless, just dull and a little bored. ...

January 1, 2013 · 2 min · 355 words · Dave Nelson
A Dirty Job by Christopher Moore

A Dirty Job by Christopher Moore

I bought this book from Audible and listened to it using the Audible app on my iPhone. This book was a big surprise for me, the story is fantastic and the performance is top notch. Fisher Stevens does an amazing job bringing every character to life and delivering the dry humor in a way that makes it crack me up. I have always loved stories about Death, Terry Pratchett’s Mort and Neil Gaiman’s various incarnations of Death are some favorites. And now Christopher Moore has added the Death Merchants Minty Fresh and Charlie Asher to my list. ...

December 25, 2012 · 3 min · 496 words · Dave Nelson
Altered Carbon by Richard K. Morgan

Altered Carbon by Richard K. Morgan

I bought this book from Audible and listened to it using the Audible app on my iPhone. Todd McLaren does a fine job in narrating the audiobook. This is a solid science fiction who-done-it story. I enjoyed the lead character Takeshi Kovacs and his loose morals and ethics. I look forward to reading the other books soon. The publisher appears to not have read the story, in the summary it says “assuming one can afford the expensive procedure” while in the story everyone has their mind stored as part of basic healthcare that everyone receives, but the wealthy are able to update what is stored more often so that if they die they will loose a lot fewer memories. Also the wealthy are able to have clones of themselves available so they may transfer themselves to a younger body on a whim and be perpetually young. ...

December 18, 2012 · 2 min · 399 words · Dave Nelson
Portal 2 Video Game

Portal 2 Video Game

I really enjoyed the first Portal video game, it was a much needed break from the first person shooters I had been playing that were focused on violence. Portal did not disappoint, the levels grew progressively harder as the game went on and the payoff at the end was spectacular. The GLaDOS song at the end of the game is fantastic. Now we have Portal 2, I played it using Steam from Valve on a MacBook Pro. There were no slowdowns, frame-drops, or stutters during the game, and the audio was great. ...

December 11, 2012 · 2 min · 350 words · Dave Nelson
Ready Player One by Ernest Cline

Ready Player One by Ernest Cline

I bought this book on Audible and filled every free minute with it until it was over. A tour-de-force for Wil Wheaton, easily the best performance I have every heard or seen from him. If Cory Doctorow and William Gibson wrote a book together, I imagine that it would be a lot like this one. It has the fun and pacing of a Doctorow book with the environment and physical elements of a Gibson novel. But I am not saying that this story is derivative in any way, it is its own story in its own world with fantastic characters that I am going to remember for a long time. ...

December 4, 2012 · 3 min · 580 words · Dave Nelson
Dodger by Terry Pratchett

Dodger by Terry Pratchett

And now for something completely different by Terry Pratchett… I bought this book from Audible and used the Audible iPhone app to listen to it. This is a great story from the creator of Discworld, Tiffany Aching, The Bromeliad Trilogy, Nation, and The Amazing Maurice. It is very different from those other stories, but it is full of his humor and voice. Stephen Briggs does a fantastic job bringing the characters to life. His acting gives each character great depth. ...

November 27, 2012 · 2 min · 322 words · Dave Nelson
Monster Hunter Alpha by Larry Correia

Monster Hunter Alpha by Larry Correia

I read this book out of sequence, I read Monster Hunter Legion before reading this one, but it wasn’t that big a deal. In Legion they mention what happens in Alpha but most of it is kept a secret from the rest of the team, there are a few things that did not make sense, but not enough to make it awkward. This story shows just how smart Larry Correia is, the first 2 books (and the 4th one) focused on the trials and tribulations of Owen Pitt, but the 3rd one focuses on Earl Harbinger for a change of pace and a chance to delve deeply into a different character. If he wants to, Larry Correia will be able to write Monster Hunter books forever changing the focus of each book at will. ...

November 20, 2012 · 2 min · 322 words · Dave Nelson
Monster Hunter Legion by Larry Correia

Monster Hunter Legion by Larry Correia

OK, I screwed up and listened to this one out of order, it is the fourth book in the series when I should have been reading the third, Monster Hunter Alpha. Luckily the third book focuses on Earl so much that reading them out of order didn’t mess up the story line for me too much. But when you read them, I highly recommend reading them in the correct order. ...

November 13, 2012 · 2 min · 315 words · Dave Nelson
Monster Hunter Vendetta by Larry Correia

Monster Hunter Vendetta by Larry Correia

Oliver Wyman returns to narrate the second book in Larry Correia’s Monster Hunter Vendetta, book 2 in the Monster Hunter series of books. He continues doing a great job with all of the accents and odd speech patterns. The bad guys in this book take a huge jump up the scary scale. Owen and the other Monster Hunters of MHI are up for the challenge. ...

November 6, 2012 · 2 min · 265 words · Dave Nelson