Books Read, 2014

12/25 The Bloodline Feud, Charles Stross

8/1 The Rhesus Chart, Charles Stross

7/? The Reluctant Swordsman, Dave Duncan
7/? Zombies vs Unicorns, edited by Holly Black and Justine Larbalestier
7/? The Martian, Andy Weir

5/27 Monster Hunters International, Larry Correia
5/21 Cauldron of Ghosts, Weber/Flint
5/3 Hunted, Hearne
5/2 Trapped, Hearne

4/30 Tricked, Hearne
4/27 Hammered, Hearne
4/14 Raising Steam, Pratchett
4/7 Hexed, Kevin Hearne
4/4 Hounded, Kevin Hearne

3/8 The Deaths of Tao, Wesley Chu

2/24 With a Little Help, Doctorow
2/20 Animal Farm
2/14 1984


It was a weak year for my consumption of the printed word, mainly because of school: I don't include technical reading in this list, it's purely recreational. '15 reading will be likewise complicated by our trip to Europe, but that's OK. I'll have my laptop and iPad loaded up with ebooks for the hours spent traveling from A to B and back again.

SO, some recommendations:
The Kevin Hearne/Iron Druid series is very good urban fantasy. A friend turned me on to it as we're both from the Phoenix area and the story starts based in Tempe with recognizable landmarks. I ate these books like popcorn, I'd go through one typically in less than 48 hours. The story revolves around the Last Druid, he's over 2,000 years old and the rest were hunted down and killed by the Romans who were actually doing the work of vampires. The Druid has been hiding from a member of the Irish pantheon because The Druid stole a sword. Things come to a head when another member of the pantheon reveals that The Druid is living in Tempe. Chaos ensues. Fun stuff.

Andy Weir's The Martian is quite interesting. He published the book online, sort of crowd-sourcing the fact-checking and had many NASA and aerospace engineers providing information. It revolves around a man who is part of a Mars mission, who, after a freak wind storm, is presumed dead and the mission is aborted, the rest of the crew returning to Earth. But he's not dead, and he has to figure out how to survive and get himself off the planet. Very compelling and it will be made in to a Major Motion Picture, perhaps coming out in '15, but I'm not certain on that one.

You'll notice Charles Stross on the list twice. Rhesus Chart is continuing The Laundry series about a secret British government organization who is tasked with keeping Cthulhu at bay. Having worked in government IT off and on for 30 years, it's quite relatable for me and lots of fun.

The other Stross book, The Bloodline Feud, is an omnibus collecting the first two books of a series called, IIRC, The Merchant Princes. It's contemporary, might be called Urban Fantasy, about people who have a genetic trait that allows them to jump between World A and World B with the aid of a focus, sort of a Celtic knot pattern. World A is us, World B didn't have an American Revolution and the USA is multiple kingdoms. The merchant families who can do this world hopping have figured out that they can make a lot of money by taking drugs cross-country in B, popping them in to A, and delivering them to dealers. So they're in the transport business. Then along comes a woman, Miriam, in A's Boston who just lost her job and finds out she's not just an orphan, but she's actually about the level of a Duchess in B and long-lost. And she can hop. I've been meaning to read the series but just hadn't gotten around to tracking down the books when, before Thanksgiving, I found they were reissuing them collected in to larger trade paperback volumes. Very cool stuff, I'm early in to the second volume and things are going to get VERY complicated for Miriam.

Monster Hunters International was also recommended by the friend who turned me on to Hearne, but this one I was not too impressed with. It felt too Mary Sue-ish, and I'm kind of tired of books where the solution to any problem is more firepower. It was OK, it's hard for me to be more excited than that about it and it's not a series that I plan on continuing.

Dave Duncan's Reluctant Swordsman is the first in a series that is heroic fantasy but also combines world hopping, in that a guy from Our Earth gets plugged in to the body of a warrior in a fantasy milleu. Duncan writes very good HF, I quite enjoyed his King's Blades series. I should read more of his stuff.

Zombies vs Unicorns? Very fun stuff. A collection of short stories that alternate between a zombie story and a unicorn story, with some nice snark commentary between as links. Very entertaining read. I got it as part of an ebook collection.


And it looks like it finally started snowing again, we've been waiting for some nasty weather for a couple of days, I guess it's finally arrived.


Cheers!