When Sir Terry passed away in 2015, I was devastated. I
met him once at a book signing in Denver. The only person I’ve ever seen live
that got more laughs per minute while on stage was George Carlin. Sir Terry was
this beautiful, mischievous presence.
There were a few of his books that I
hadn’t read that I held off on reading because I wanted to save them. I’ve read
all of the Discworld novels several times, or so I thought. I thought this book was a stand-alone that wasn’t based in the Discworld. When I
realized it was a Discworld novel, I couldn’t put it down. I read it all in one
sitting. It was like receiving a letter from a beloved, long-past uncle.
Every town on Discworld knows the stories about rats and pipers, and Maurice - a streetwise tomcat - leads a band of educated ratty friends (and a stupid kid) on a nice little earner. Piper plus rats equals lots and lots of money.
Until they run across someone playing a different tune.
Now he and his rats must learn a new concept: evil . . .
I happened to see this short story
collection with the foreword by Ernest Cline at my local bookstore. All of the
stories are somehow video game-related. Some of the stories I cannot get out of
my head.
Desert Walk by S.R. Mastrantone is a creepy meditation on being
a completionist.
All of the People in Your Party Have Died by Robin
Wasserman is a chilling homage to the Oregon Trail.
1Up by Holly Black is about the bond you can
create with gamers you’ve never met in person.
Oh, sure, there are stories by
Andy Weir and Hugh Howey as well, but those three stories live in my head rent-free.
You are standing in a room filled with books, faced with a difficult decision. Suddenly, one with a distinctive cover catches your eye. It is a groundbreaking anthology of short stories from award-winning writers and game-industry titans who have embarked on a quest to explore what happens when video games and science fiction collide.
From text-based adventures to first-person shooters, dungeon crawlers to horror games, these twenty-six stories play with our notion of what video games can be—and what they can become—in smart and singular ways. With a foreword from Ernest Cline, bestselling…
As a veteran of the Marine Corps, I tend to shy away from
military science fiction. But so many people had recommended this book that I
couldn’t ignore them forever.
Apparently, Haldeman was a Vietnam veteran and
wrote this book as a scathing satire of the military. I don’t remember who said
it, but “military intelligence is an oxymoron.” The book perfectly captures the
bureaucracy, the nonsense, and the hurry-up-and-wait aspect of military life. Not to
mention the difficulty of getting out of the military and trying to reacclimate
to civilian life.
On the positive side, he does an excellent job of capturing
the bond you build with the people you share a fighting position with. And the
strange sensation when they get transferred, and you may never see them again.
The monumental Hugo and Nebula award winning SF classic-- Featuring a new introduction by John Scalzi
The Earth's leaders have drawn a line in the interstellar sand--despite the fact that the fierce alien enemy they would oppose is inscrutable, unconquerable, and very far away. A reluctant conscript drafted into an elite Military unit, Private William Mandella has been propelled through space and time to fight in the distant thousand-year conflict; to perform his duties and do whatever it takes to survive the ordeal and return home. But "home" may be even more terrifying than battle, because, thanks to the time…
