Podcast Episode 27
Just a quick podcast about another podcast while I sit here in a parking lot waiting for my cat at the vets office.
Currently reading: Sentenced to Prism by Alan Dean Foster 📚
Finished reading 2023: Howling Stones by Alan Dean Foster 📚
Well, a week after returning from vacation I finally had the energy to get back to my SF reading last night, continuing to read Alan Dean Foster’s “the Howling Stones”, one of the standalone novels set in his Humanx Commonwealth. Very enjoyable novel, and like all his work great inspiration for running my Traveller RPG campaign.
I’ll finish this novel today, most likely, which should give me time to read one or two more SF novels during November. Not sure what I’ll read, but I have only got a few more standalone Commonwealth novels to go, so I’ll probably work on finishing them all by the end of the year. There are a few short stories I need to find after I finish the novels.
Podcast Episode 25
A quick check in. I’ve been on vacation. Didn’t get any reading done but I did watch a movie or two.
Currently reading: Howling Stones by Alan Dean Foster 📚
Finished reading 2023: Quofum by Alan Dean Foster 📚
This is the first time, EVER, that I’ve made my Goodreads Reading Challenge goal, and I still have over two months left in the year.
Finished reading 2023: Drowning World by Alan Dean Foster 📚
Yet another solid Alan Dean Foster novel.
As it turns out, in this Alan Dean Foster novel I’m reading now, Drowning World, two aliens races are living side by side on a planet. One race is native to it. They are trying to drive the other race off the planet, and are getting weapons and tech support from a more advanced alien race wishing to keep the Commonwealth from gaining benefits from that planet. The native species attacks their neighbors by surprise.
That’s as far as I got last night, as I read this while watching news of the Israel-Hamas war.
Weird.
I made an attempt to read And Chaos Died the other night, by the late Joanna Russ.
I say “attempt” because about 5 pages in I realized it is not a casual read. This isn’t one to read while you watch America’s Funniest Home Videos. It will require some dedicated attention, solitude, and a non-weary mind. None of which I had the other night.
So I began Alan Dean Foster’s Drowning World, the fourth (chronological in-universe) of his standalone Humanx Commonwealth novels.
Here’s the thing about ADF. He’s not going to blow your mind with state of the art science fiction ideas, speculative science, hallucinogenic mind-fucks, or experimental narrative styles and structures. ADF tells a good, solid, entertaining science fiction story within his fictional universe. Within those stories you will find some humor, some surprises, and in this era of depressing “the universe hates us” science fiction ADF offers adventure and optimism (not unlike Star Trek).
ADF will drop you on to an alien planet, introduce you to weird aliens with weird names, and a hour later the names don’t seem weird and the aliens are beings you might even relate to. He’ll tell you one small story – one of thousands of possible stories – based in his setting.
There is something to be said for a novel you can just read and don’t have to decipher.
Currently reading: Drowning World by Alan Dean Foster 📚
Finished reading 2023: Blood Music by Greg Bear 📚
It is Wednesday night. I’ve had a four day break from reading, and I’m about to get back into Blood Music, by Greg Bear, for a couple of hours tonight. My eyes feel rested.
It felt weird and kinda wrong not to read for four days (other than work related reading), but my eyes, body, and mind were very tired. Sometimes you gotta take a break.
Podcast Episode 22
In this quick episode, I just talk about taking a three day break from reading and also playing our science-fiction role-playing game on Sunday.
A session report from Sunday’s session of my Classic Traveller RPG campaign.
Podcast Episode 21
A quick check in. I am reading the novel Blood Music right now. I managed to read for complete novels this month. I doubt I’ll finish this fifth one. But I’m getting a good start for October.