Tag Archives: Thoughts

Thought on “The Crystal Shard” by R.A. Salvatore

175 words or less, thoughts and feelings that I had after reading the book

When it comes to Forgotten Realms lore, there is a name that pops p up every so often, Drizzit. I only knew the character was a Drow. The Crystal Shard introduces us to Drizzit and his companionis. Playing fantasy games, it is easy to recognize the typical archetypes in our heroes, the head strong barbarian, the stouty stubborn yet heart of gold dwarf, the trouble making rouge, and the cool ranger in Drizzit. The book is layed out to show multiple and ever growing troubling situations our characters face in the tundra area of the world, Icewind Dale. Despite somewhat being a trope, R.A Salvatore takes us through a great story. I was immerested in the world, the plot, and came to love these characters. I can not say if this book is did anything new at the time of writing. I can’t tell if this is one of the catalyst of the discussion regarding race and alignment with DnD. All I can tell is that while the story was a fun ride.

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Thoughts on “Mall of Cthulhu” by Seamus Cooper

175 words or less, thoughts and feelings that I had after reading the book

An ok delve into a Lovecraftian modern day pulp story held back by it’s characters. It starts strong, though falters throughout, with dialogue that feels unnatural at times unassisted by one of the characters being borderline unlikeable. Not to the point where I wanted him to be remove, though I never found myself rooting for his success. When there’s high action, the writing brings the scenes to life, it’s the slow moments that need to be reworked. I did enjoy the adventure that was told, though despite the title, it felt as if the mall wasn’t as important as it could have been. I also loved the main character of Laura. there is some interesting relationship dynamic between Ted and Laura that I wish was better explored.

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Thoughts on “I Got Abducted by Aliens And Now I’m Trapped in a Rom-Com” by Kimberly Lemming

175 words or less on my thoughts of the book I just read.

Content warning on this one: it’s an NSFW  Sci-fi Romance Comedy book. it’s in the title.

This was not only my first read for a bookclub, it was also my first romance novel. This was a fun time, though It’s not for everyone.  I enjoyed the humor and the writing. as it’s similar to what friends and I have when it comes to our RPG games. . The sex scenes were so descriptive that I got blushed hard when I got to them. I’ve read adult fantasy novels where character have sex, though this was to another level. Loved the characters, the setting of strange planet of Waffles, the weakest thing about the whole book was the plot, it felt like there was quite a bit of deus ex machina moments. There were several times were I said “Oh we introducing that now?” with how far into the book we got. I wanted to see the story of Sol, Lox, and Dory and where it went. I’m not sure if I was rushing to finish to see how it was going to end, or what was going to be introduced next,

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Thoughts on “The Great Train Robbery” by Michael Crichton

175 words or less on my thoughts of the book I just read

My first foray into the writings of Michael Crichton leave me feeling mixed.  I’ve heard of the book as a good reference and thriller to read for my love of romanticizing the gas-light era of England and heists. It accomplishes its goal with some difficulty. The style of writing of his fictionalized retelling of the real-world event left me feeling as I was reading a slow documentarian approach to the story. There were times I felt my eyes glaze over.  The payoff of dealing with the pace, leads to an understanding and fleshing out of the Victorian time during the heist. It also helps building on the characters, to flesh them out while building on everything they go through in order to pull off a heist. After a while, it does pick up steam and becomes intriguing to find out how the heist is pulled off. I may want return to it for inspiration of heists and the Victorian setting. Though the slow beginning pace makes me unsure If I will ever fully re-read it.

 

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Thoughts On – “The Game Master’s Handbook of Proactive Roleplaying: Guidelines and Strategies for Running PC-Driven Narratives in 5E Adventures” by Jonah Fishel & Tristen Fishel

175 words or less, thoughts and feelings that I had after reading the book


After GMing for about 12 years, reading countless articles, and watching several videos to help me improve my craft; there’s always some advice that gets to me saying “I didn’t thought about it like that”. This book helped bring a new way to run TTRPGs that are character focus. While marketed to GMs, It also helps players in fleshing out a character. I was able to use for a character I’m currently playing for the better. There are a few pieces of advice near the end that I do not fully agree with, though my main issue is the last half of the book gets more complex. Building on the earlier ideas yet in a way that made it harder to parse. After multiple reads, I had realized these techniques where ones I’ve heard before in a more digestible way elsewhere. I enjoyed the book enough to order a physical copy to have as a good resource to revisit to time and time again.

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Thoughts On – “Alien: Inferno’s Fall” by Clara Carija, Philippa Ballantine

175 words or less, thoughts and feelings that I had after reading the book

To preface, I do not keep up with the Alien series, I watch the first two.1 I enjoyed Alien and Aliens for different reasons. The book feels like a blend between the two. There’s the horror of small underpowered family of miners trying to survive from the Xenomorphs, and the military horror of a band of Marines dealing with a new type of Xenomorph threat and AI subterfuge. The latter feels like the weaker of the two. It felt like it had a stronger story it wanted to tell though had to be delved into in the follow up book Alien: Seventh Circle. The story does take a while to get going. There is a slow burn as it introduces the memorable family that the book follows. Once the terror of Xenomorphs hit the ground, it caught me to the point where I could not put this book down. I dreamt about it and curious how it would go. I have Seventh Circle on my to read list, along with other books from the Authors.

  1. For those curious, despite the small entry into the Alien series. I do enjoy the sci-fi horror in the Alien movie that is mimicked in one of my favorite gaming experiences, Alien: Isolation. I also own the Alien RPG 1st edition from Free League Publishing to play these types of stories with friends. When I found out there were some books that had adventures at the end that tie-in with the story, I wanted to check them out. Alien Inferno’s Fall contains the adventure. “EVAC”. I may talk about the adventure itself once it’s played. I do not count these words as part of thought on the story itself, so i do not regard it breaking the weird rules i have for myself. ↩︎
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Thoughts On – “Careless People: A Cautionary Tale of Power, Greed, and Lost Idealism” by Sarah Wynn-Williams

175 or fewer thoughts on the book I just read

The previous book was a tense horror. When I finished this book, I was filled with a even greater dread than before. A stark reminder that despite marketing promotion and social post, that social media is a business. A real world tale that recants the classic saying that business only changing if something jeopardizes their bottom line. The satire characterizations that Media showcases the ones running 21st century technology, the ones I always assumed were over-done and “there’s no one they are like that”, are accurate. The writing of the memoirs’ stories was encaptivating like the tea about a messy relationship.  While this was all something I was aware of, Sarah Wynn-Williams has me asking for more. The memoirs were written in a way that is, by the medium of a memoir, bias that while puts her as well-meaning though she also takes efforts to mention how futile and aware she was wrong at points. I found the book encaptivating and while a bit demoralizing on society relationship with social media, hard to put down.

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Thoughts On – “The Ritual” by Adam Nevill

175 words or less, thoughts and feelings that I had after reading the book

This was my first horror novel in my adult life, at least as far as I can remember.  When I place down the book, I smiled thinking, “maybe I should be on the look out for more,”

While I do not favor the experience of watching horror on film, the tense and descriptive writing sold itself. It brings out an underlying human fear of being lost in an unventured woodland. While the characters do not possess an appealing personality there’s still times I root for their survival as they try to escape the forest and survive from the pursuit of the supernatural.At the mid-point there is the feeling of change between folk horror to a psychological horror in terms familiar to Stephen King’s Misery with Scandinavian Death metal. There was a moment of though where this could be two different books, however Adam does a great job tying them together with his character’s motivation and the descriptive built on the folk horror. It was an enjoyable novel for anyone looking into modern day horror

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Thoughts On – Sir Hereward and Mister Fitz: Stories of the Witch Knight and the Puppet Sorcerer by Garth Nix

175 words or less, thoughts and feelings regarding the book

This anthology of short stories telling the adventures of two heroes in a vein similar to Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser by Franz Lieber. As with such short stories, the primary appeal of the two heroes must be strong with little time to focus on character development, relying more on the world building, plot and the action to keep the readers intention. Garth Nix has accomplished that goal, however there were times I would have to double back to understand the description of the world. There was also the issue that plague older fantasy stories, the oddity with female characters. While they were portray as well-versed in sword play and strength, they tend to fall more into a traitorous role or a type of foe for our heroes to overcome. The stories I found to be akin to a streaming show that I while I enjoyed, I may not actively keeping up with it. However, If I saw a new season has been released, I would binge watch through the night.

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