The Story

After two tours of Afghanistan and an incident where he lost his whole team, ex-Star-Trek-fan Jim Pike has decided that he doesn’t want to be in a position of responsibility ever again. Which is exactly why he took a position as a bellboy at Botany Bay Hotel and Conference Centre, the hotel that hosts an annual Star Trek convention (GulfCon).

Only this year, he’s not only dealing with Trekkies. This year, he has to lead a team of Trekkies who all want to survive the zombie invasion that has broken out at GulfCon.

Dun dun dun!

The Response

Oh! I had wanted to read this since I saw the book trailer. I don’t normally enjoy book trailers – think a lot of them are way too cheesy, in the not-so-good-kind-of-cheese in all honesty – but this one suited the book so perfectly and it fed my love of scifi, zombies and scifi spoofs. So yay!

There are a few things you should know going into this book. The first is that the more you know about the Star Trek universe (especially the original series), the more you are going to appreciate this book. Like how the main character’s last name is Pike. And how at one point he runs into a “zombie” dressed up like Khan and so yells “Khaaaaaaaaaaaaaaan!” Or how there is a group of red shirts who get killed, not by the “zombie” hoard, but by random freak accidents (if one can call dying due to anaphylactic shock during the “zombie” apocalypse a freak accident).

The second is that these aren’t really zombies. I mean, they kind of are… but really, these “zombies” are infected by an alien parasite that makes them become like zombies. But I’ve never seen a zombie with a third eye before. So I refuse to believe that they are actually zombies. Plus the parasite came from outer space. (Hence the use of quotation marks whenever I mention the term in regards to this book.)

Okay, disclaimers aside!

I went into this except an awesome scifi spoof cheese fest and that’s exactly what I got. (If you read this, you have to expect it to be fun and cheesy and not serious, because otherwise you’re going to be disappointed.) The writing is good, but it’s camp, and I thoroughly appreciated it for what it is!

There were a bunch of things that I absolutely loved about this, and so I am going to use bullet points to go over these points in the least possible fangirlish squealing way that I can possibly do so:

• Shout outs to other scifi fandoms – go BSG! Star Wars! Yay!
• An RV that has been transformed into the Enterprise!
• The fact that real scientists doing super-secret research have used this convention as a FRONT all this time to meet in secret and discuss super-top-secret discoveries in the world of science!
• They used real Klingon ceremonial weapons! Who wouldn’t want to use one of those to kill a zombie?!
• The “zombies” told someone to “lower your shields” when they wanted into the convention hotel!

Now that fangirling is out of the way, I am also going to mention that this wasn’t just a squee-fest. I mean, there’s actual real character development behind the story. You can see how Jim Pike goes from not wanting to be a leader anymore, to really accepting and dealing with what happened in his past, allowing it to help him get his group out safely. And the two main females – Leia and Rayna – with how they dealt with their first foray into war-like situations, going through shock and ending up kicking arse in order to survive.

The descent of Matt into utter madness was also extremely exciting to read. In fact, he may have been my favourite character to read. Him with his tentacled arm. He wasn’t a nice guy before his infection, but at the same time, watching him develop his new alien abilities was so intriguing.

I can see how a lot of people may not like this, especially if you don’t like silly spoofs, or scifi, or (gods forbid!) Star Trek. It IS a silly book. But it’s highly enjoyable when taken for what it is.

The Bottom Line

Highly recommended for fans of the original Star Trek series. It’s good fun, mixed with a dash of awesome space aliens. (And yes, I still refuse to believe they are zombies.)

Other Reviews

Becky’s Book Reviews, Graeme’s Fantasy Book Reviews, Speculative Book Review, SciFiGuy.ca. Have you reviewed this book on your blog? Let me know and I’ll add your link.

The Story

In January of the year 2012, our world is face with a zombie apocalypse. Dr. Robert Twombly kept a journal of his experience in the zombie apocalypse, starting from when the outbreak first appeared for the next following months. We get to read his thoughts while he sees his friends turn, while he tries to learn about what caused the outbreak, and his trek to a safe haven in Churchill, Manitoba.

The Response

Okay, Team Zombie – this is definitely one that you should pick up. The premise isn’t that original, but the illustrations are horrifyingly, disgustingly beautiful. Look at the one below that shows how the disease affects the arm, for example, where in the last stage the skin is practically falling off the bone:

One of the cool things about the fact that Twombly is a scientist, or researcher, or whatever, is that part of the illustrations kind of look as if they are diagrams that a scientist would have done to show the progression of the disease or to document certain events. Other illustrations, however, are more along the lines of portraits of the people Twombly came across in his journey. And they are all beautiful in their own ways.

And after reading Zombies, I’ve realized that there is one more good thing about living in Canada – this isn’t the first book about the zombie apocalypse where the survivors escape to Canada because the zombies cannot survive our cold winters. I guess this means that, in the chance that the zombie apocalypse happens anytime soon, I will be able to survive because I get to deal with snow and winter and icky stuff. Heh.

I’m not entirely sure how I feel about the ending… there’s not closure. (Potential spoilery stuff ahead.) It sorts of implies that Twombly gets attacked by zombies, but we don’t even really learn what caused the zombie apocalypse or how it ended or anything like that… it just ends… I suppose it leaves it up to imagination, and makes you think about the book once you are done, but I enjoy my closure.

The Bottom Line

A good addition to the zombie-lover’s library. The illustrations are definitely the highlight of this book. Definitely keeping to thumb through again.

Other Reviews

Graeme’s Fantasy Book Review, My Favourite Books. Have you reviewed this book on your blog? Let me know and I’ll add your link.

The Story

Okay. You know Firefly and Serenity? You know Shepherd Book? You know how his past is all mysterious-like and while everyone had crazy theories, no one really know what he was before he became a Shepherd, and how he knew so much about the Alliance, and all sorts of stuff like that?

Well.

This graphic novel is all about Book. ALL about Book. And you know what? It totally tells us who he is and how he became who he is and what happened and everything!

The Response

Okay, fellow Browncoats. I am trying to keep this as spoiler free as possible, because I don’t want to tell you what happens because I want you to have the same reaction that I had when reading it. And that reaction was all “…… OMG ….. OMG …….. OMG OMG OMG.”

But if you haven’t gotten your grubby little hands on this yet, I have to ask you – WHAT EXACTLY are you waiting for? It gives us the answer for some of the most speculated stuff of all the Firefly fandom! (ie – Who was Shepherd Book before he became a Shepherd? Why did the Alliance give him medical attention after scanning his Ident card? What kind of secrets is he not telling us?!)

GAH.

I’m still not happy with Joss for killing off Book in Serenity – he was one of my favourite characters on the show – but this graphic novel kind of makes up for it. Almost makes up for it.

Starting off with the last few moments before the crew of Serenity discover Book dying, we then move backwards through Book’s life – stopping to see, first when he left the order to become a passenger on Serenity, how he joined the order, etc etc (can’t tell you more!) until he’s a little kid just starting out on his journey.

What I really liked about the way Zack told this story was how he blended each episode of Book’s life together – the last line of one of Book’s memories is also the first line in the next memory we see. So even though there are huge gaps, they feel a lot more like they flow coherently. And the way it told the stories in a backwards way was cool because you would see something and then see what directly influenced the previous bit of Book’s life – I don’t think it would’ve worked as well if it started from Book’s childhood. Mind you, it means that once I was done, I wanted to read it backwards to get a different perspective of how each event directly influenced the next, to see if there was anything I missed.

One thing I’ve noticed, though… well, we’ve had Those Left Behind, Better Days, The Other Half, Float Out and now The Shepherd’s Tale, and with each one, the illustrations seem to be less and less like the actors… which is understandable but I totally loved how real and lifelike the ones looked in Those Better Days, so it’s a little disappointing.

Oh well! The story totally made up for it. Totally.

The Bottom Line

A must-have for Firefly and Serenity fans. Love love love!

Other Reviews

Have you reviewed this book on your blog? Let me know and I’ll add your link.

The Story

One of the most iconic comic series to date, a series that helped set the standards of graphic novels as a medium to be taken seriously by the general public, The Watchmen tells the story of a group of masked heroes in the mid-eighties in an alternate universe USA.

And I don’t even know how to start talking about what Watchmen is about, so if you have no idea, rent the movie. Or read this article on Wikipedia.

The Response

Okay. So, this is supposed to be great. Fabulous. All that stuff. It’s got critical acclaim, and any number of comic book fans would tell me that it’s the greatest thing ever…

But this was a little smidgeon boring. Actually, it was all kinds of extremely boring.

I couldn’t get into it at all.

I loved the movie based on this graphic novel so much. So so SO much. Loved the story, loved the cinematography, loved it all. And so many people say that it was such an awesome adaptation of the book – but if I had read the book first, I would not have wanted to see the movie. Yes, I saw how they kept most of it so true to the novel, to the point where you could have a screencap and compare it to a panel in the graphic novel, and it would be almost exactly the same, and that was cool. But it wasn’t enough to get me really really super excited about actually reading the book.

The characters? Yes, it’s realistic in that they all have major issues, and none of them are the perfect hero, blah blah blah, but oh gosh, NONE of them are likable. Or even empathizable. You’ve got the psycho, the super-smart genius who only relates to Alexander the Great (even though I have an historical crush on Alexander the Great, this did not endear him to me), the guy who underwent so much radiation that he turned blue and waltzes around naked all the time, a really boring dude, and some chick that a bunch of people are in love with. And they’re all main characters and they’re all not likable. And I’m sure if the Comedian, Hollis and what’s-her-name’s mother had more page-time, they would’ve been just as bad.

And so now I’m wondering why I liked the movie so much. I think it was the effects and the cinematography and some other stuff that distracted me from the characters.

The Bottom Line

Meh. Not really caring too much about this book on a whole. Perhaps too hyped up. Need to move on to other more exciting reading materials.

Other Reviews

Things Mean A Lot, Dear Author, Look at that Book, Fyrefly’s Book Blog. Have you reviewed this book on your blog? Let me know and I’ll add your link.

The Story

So. Billy Pilgrim is an untrained soldier in WWII, present at the Dresden Bombings. He’s also a time traveler. And an attraction at a Tralfamadorian zoo. And the sole survivor of a plane crash. All at the same time. Because time doesn’t flow in a linear fashion, yo. In fact, everything that has ever happened and will ever happen, they all happen at the same moment. So when someone dies, they’re not really dead, because they’re still alive somewhere in time. So it goes.

The Review

Um. I just… don’t know what to say… I simple did not GET this book. I don’t know whether Billy Pilgrim is completely utterly mad and insane and unhinged, or whether the stuff in the book is really actually happening to him. I do not get it. And the whole thing about the book jumping around to different periods of Billy Pilgrim’s life constantly was confusing as all hell. And the characters? It’s so hard to know or to like any of them because you only see them for a short snippet in a certain period of their lives, and then the next time you see them is 30 years before or after that last time you saw then. And coming from a scifi fan, who likes time travel stories, well!

Actually, this book reminded me of why I hated classics in high school and refused to read them for so many years afterwards. Because, quite frankly, this book is a whole lot of “WTF kind of crack is this?” mixed with a dash of “OMG I need three stiff drinks in order to understand what is going on here.” (Why are the weird books the ones that are always chosen to be the classics that are studied in high schools?)

And I know a lot of people liked this book! Love this book, even! Otherwise it wouldn’t be a classic, right? RIGHT?

But! There are just so many things about it that don’t make sense to me! First of all, if Billy Pilgrim is in the middle of some event in his life, but then gets transported (or whatever) to sixty years later, and if that’s the first time he’s ever been that far ahead in the future, how does he know who his daughter or wife or son or even good friends are if he hadn’t met them from the time period he had been in before? And how come he didn’t completely freak out the first time he got unstuck in time and travelled to another period in his life? (Seriously, who WOULDN’T freak out about that?!) And how come the plots of those scifi books he liked paralleled his own life so closely? (Too closely to seem coincidental, in fact!)

Plus, there just seemed like there were too many things going on. I mean, I love me some time travel, and I love me some war fiction… but mixing the two of them together, well, it didn’t mesh for me. It felt like it was trying to create a statement on the horrors of war, but then didn’t really seem to actually show the effects of the horror of war for more than a paragraph every dozen of pages. And it felt like it was trying to be smart and make a statement about how there’s no such thing as freewill and how we can’t change what has been predestined for us, but it was never explored!

Oh bother.

The Bottom Line

I’m going to read one or two other books by Kurt Vonnegut Jr just to see if I don’t like all of his books, or if it was just the one… but I will fully admit that I am nervous of what I will find. And I don’t know if I would recommend this one. On one hand, A LOT of people LOVE it… but on the other hand, I really did NOT.

Other Reviews

Things Mean A Lot, Mostly Harmless, Booklit, Jenny’s Books. Have you reviewed this book on your blog? Let me know and I’ll add your link.

The Story

The Five Laws of Librarians:

1. Books are to be read.
2. Every person his or her book.
3. Every book its reader.
4. Save the time of the reader.
5. The library is a growing organism.

So starts the collection of the first five comics in the Rex Libris comic book series, a series that tells the story of one kick-butt librarian. Now, this is not any ordinary librarian, but one who worked in Rome over 2000 years ago before the Romans burt their library down. The Egyptian god Thoth took Rex under his wing for the library organization, and since then has been hunting down books – both the populate the library, and to bring overdue books BACK to the library. The Rex Libris books are his autobiography, in graphic novel format.

The Review

It’s so disappointing when a book doesn’t live up to it’s potential by like half. I mean, a series of books about a space and time traveling librarian sounds like it could only be made of win, right? Right?? That’s certainly what I had been hoping for.

But there were so many things going on here that it didn’t have time to really develop the potential awesomeness for any of the parts. There’s the space traveling to retrieve overdue books. Battling aliens or historical characters to get these overdue books back to the library safely. Librarians turning rowdy patrons into pigs. Mythological characters working in the library – Circe! Thoth! The Sphinx! That could DEFINITELY have been awesome. Fictional characters randomly popping out of the books in the library. So many things that could’ve be focused on and expanded.

Then there is the fact that this adventure is really what Rex Libris is writing for his autobiography, and so you get random asides of conversation between him and his editor in the middle of the story. And of them arguing what would make a better story – the truth, or some random ploy to draw readers. Could’ve worked if the fact that this is a story inside a story was emphasized more… or if it was gotten rid of altogether.

It wasn’t all bad though, it did have some fun stuff. Like the fact that a very sassy (and very old) Circe was there using her magical powers to keep order in the library. Wish that had been played with a little bit more.

The Bottom Line

It was okay. I won’t be reading the rest of this series, but I won’t get rid of this collection either.

Other Reviews

The Novel World, So Many Books, Experiments in Reading. Have you reviewed this book on your blog? Let me know and I’ll add your link.

After “The Zombie War” occurred, the author of this book was asked to work on the United Nation’s Postwar Commission Report. When he discovered that the report was being cut down to bare boned facts, the author was less than impressed, as shown in part of the introduction to this book:

The official report was a collection of cold, hard data, an objective “after-action report” that would allow future generations to study the events of that apocalyptic decade without being influenced by “the human factor.” But isn’t the human factor what connects us so deeply to our past? Will future generations care as much for chronologies and casualty statistics as they would for the personal accounts of individuals not so different from themselves? By excluding the human factor, aren’t we risking the kind of personal detachment from a history that may, heaven forbid, lead us one day to repeat it? And in the end, isn’t the human factor the only true difference between us and the enemy we now refer to as “the living dead”? I presented this argument, perhaps less professionally than was appropraite, to my “boss,” who after my final exclamation of “we can’t let those stories die” responded immediately with, “Then don’t. Write a book. You’ve still got all your notoes, and the legal freedom to use them. Who’s stopping you from keeping these stories alive in the pages of your own (expletive deleted) book?”

So that’s what this book is – a collection of interviews with survivors of The Zombie War. It starts with interviewing people who were there to see some of the first outbreaks in small villages, continues on through people trying to escape the zombies once the outbreak went global, to those who helped fight back and reclaim their countries. And it shows how much it affected people in different areas of the world, how it affected families, how class distinctions were decimated, how it affected people mentally, and how people finally worked together to retaliate and take their survival into their own hands.

I loved this. Loved it! So freaking much. There was the potential for it being a bit dull at times – an oral history? fiction acting like a non-fictional set of interviews about war? – but it never was.

Brooks did a really good job with the interviews – giving each of the interviewees their own distinct voice, allowing all of their cultural background come through in their conversation subconsciously. It really gave the feeling that this really was a global war.

One of the best things about this book was how realistic it all was. Not the zombie apocalypse, per se, but human reaction to it. Everything that happened that was spoken about in the book – yes, it was disturbing, but there is no doubt that these were things that would really actually happen. Parents killing their children because they believe it’s the only way to protect them, cannibalism in order to survive, people not being able to deal with the stress so having complete mental breakdowns and believing that they are actually zombies themselves. Yes, it was scary, but I could totally see a lot of those events happening if something like the zombie apocalypse were to really occur. (It kind of reminded me of the most recent season of Torchwood in that aspect.)

Another thing I really liked about this was that it didn’t speculate about how zombies appear in the first place. It doesn’t go into that because it is treated like actual fact. You don’t really have time to sit there and think, “Yeah, that would totally never, ever happen.” You do have to suspend belief a little bit, but not to an extreme amount.

Not sure how the movie adaptation of this book will work, not sure if I’d really be interested in seeing it after the awesome experience of the book. I think I would only end up disappointed with it, especially as half of what I liked about the book was HOW it was told – through interviews with people who survived.

The Bottom Line: Again, loved this book. It wasn’t dry and it was completely realistic. I’ve borrowed this copy from my brother, and now I’m not entirely sure that I want to give it back. ;)

The Time Traveller is a scientist in London who has developed a time machine. This story is told as a narrative he is regaling his group of friends with after his first journey through time.

In that journey to the future, he comes across what he at first believes to be a utopia, but he soon realizes it is a horrific future for our world. There he encounters the two races that will inhabit the world – the Eloi and the Morlocks. The Eloi are supposed to be the elite class of their world; they do no work (as a result are weak and small) and spend all their time having fun. The Morlocks are more like the working class. They live underground and keep the technology that keeps the Eloi safe working; because of their underground life, they have adjusted by becoming spider-like and can see in the dark (and thus are super-sensitive to light).

There are, of course, a few twists thrown in there which make the story somewhat horrifying.

Back in high school, I read a lot of sci-fi. I haven’t lately, and I’ve really been missing it. Yes, I’ve been watching a lot of it, but that is definitely not the same. I think what it had come down to is that I wasn’t really enjoying any of the more recent sci-fi books published. This, however, and The Invisible Man (the other most recent sci-fi book I’ve read, also coincidentally by Wells) were definitely wonderful. I think perhaps I’m going to have to start again with reading more of the classic ones. More Wells, then perhaps I’ll start back on Asimov and revisit C.S. Lewis’s Space Trilogy.

I’ve always found stories of time travel have really exciting – which perhaps is part of the draw for Doctor Who. While there’s always the possibility that a story about time travel won’t come off believable at all, when it’s done well it’s absolutely fascinating. The possibilities of what could happen – oh! Who you could meet, what you could see! Or what your actions could cause! If you go to the past and alter anything, that could alter your present. Or maybe your present already takes into account that thing you had altered when you travel to the past… Fascinating! (Speaking of fascinating time travel, I really like how Terminator TSSC dealt with it in the season finale on Friday.)

Wells seemed to have played it safe with The Time Machine as his Time Traveller only travels to the future in this book. It’s probably easier this way as Wells doesn’t have to touch on how our actions can have an effect on our present. It also gave him the opportunity to go into how he thought things could evolve – and it was a scary possibility. It’s hard to relate to either of the races as they don’t feel human, but not in the way I would have expected. If we talk about evolution, I would expect things to progress further than they have, creating some sort of super-being, whereas the beings that the Time Traveller encounters seem so much more primitive.

Bottom Line: Definitely enjoyable and thought provoking. I can see why this is a classic. This is a really short book, and I highly recommend that everyone take a few hours to sit down with it.

(Side note: I may totally have been inspired to read this because the Seventh Doctor is reading it at the beginning of the Eighth Doctor’s movie. butimsonotobsessed.)

The second book in The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy series, The Restaurant at the End of the Universe starts off with Arthur, Ford Prefect, Trillian and Zaphod Beeblebrox aboard the Heart of Gold while the Vogans are attempting to finish their job of distroying human life – because Vogans hate to leave any job unfinished. Plus, there is a group of psychiatrists who want an end to the whole discovering of the Question to the Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe and Everything.

In order to prevent the Vogans from distroying the Heart of Gold, Beeblebrox decides to hold a seance in hopes that his dead ancestors will not want to spend the rest of eternity with him and will help their group out of the trouble they’ve found themselves in. Which is when Beeblebrox discovers that he became President of the Galaxy in order to meet the man who runs the universe. Only he doesn’t remember this plan – at all. Nevertheless, his dead great grandfather sends him off to meet other people who were in on this plan.

Of course, Beeblebrox decides he doesn’t want to be involved in this plan, no longer wants the Heart of Gold, and lots of hijinks ensue – including hijacking a ship that is destined to fly directly into a star, going to the restaurant at the end of the universe, and leaving Ford and Arthur abandoned on earth in a time where Arthur and Ford join the group of people who will become the human race.

It’s about time I got around to reading this book. I read the first one three years ago now… wow, I didn’t realize it’s been that long, and I’m rather embarrassed about that fact. Hopefully I can read Life, the Universe and Everything before another three years has passed.

Anyway! This was a lovely good romp in the scifi genre. I haven’t read much scifi lately – some dystopian which could be considered, but no real space books. And it reflects most of the scifi that I’ve been watching on television as of late – the funny scifi stuff that doesn’t take itself too seriously. The best kind there is, I would have to say.

So I did enjoy it, but I really don’t have anything particular to say about it. I don’t remember too much about the first book other than what is in the movie (and we all know how movies differ from the books they’re based on) so I can’t really say how much more I liked one book than the other. I know this is a classic, and so many people LOVE it, so I’m rather ashamed to say this, but while I did like it, I didn’t enjoy it enough to consider it a favourite, or to say that I know I will for sure reread it one day.

After an end-of-term party, five college housemates wake up not only with hangovers, but also superpowers. None of them are sure where these superpowers came from, and none of them really care. All that matters now is that one of them can fly, one can turn herself invisible, one is super strong, one is telepathic and one is really, really fast. And as any group of friends might do if they all discovered they had superpowers, these five friends decide to become superheroes – with costumes, code names and all. Only, things don’t go as smoothly as they’d like. First, they have to keep their identities secret, but people keep noticing that something is up. Secondly, what happens when a superhero can’t always save everyone, or is the one to hurt other people?

There was potential for this book. Sadly, it wasn’t as good as I had been hoping. There were so many things about it that bothered me.

For one thing, there were way too many characters to keep straight. Five main characters, and about five times that in secondary characters that only show up once every ten chapters (and good luck remembering exactly who they all are). Because there are so many characters, there wasn’t any time to really develop the main ones. In fact, they all were very two-dimensional with no personality – a few of them even felt rather Mary Sue or Gary Stu-ish, imo.

The narration was confusing and jarring. The first chapter of the book is written by one of the minor characters, Marcus Hatch, who is a conspiracy theorist and runs his own newspaper. He says that he’s telling the story of these five college kids because no one else believes that it was real, or knows that it actually happened. He’s telling it to prove that he’s not crazy. But then it gets into the story, and we see it from the perspectives of the five main characters. My questions is, how would he know what they were thinking when they were the main characters? How would he know when a character falls asleep in class, or when they stopped being invisible after forgetting how to turn visible again? Yes, the telepath was supposed to have told Hatch everything that was going on, but there were periods when he (the telepath) was completely overwhelmed by his power he couldn’t even figure out what he was thinking, let alone what his friends were thinking. I wouldn’t have been this picky about it, though, if Hatch just did the first and last chapters. But when every few chapters there was something by Hatch, it kept reminding me that it was supposed to be written by some guy outside of the story, and it was jarring. If he was going to interrupt every once in a while and spew how this is a true story and real journalism, etc. then it would’ve flowed a lot better had Schwartz written it less like a novel and more like an expose or something along those lines. It could’ve been really cool like that. Instead, it just felt disjointed.

Not that it was all bad. It got in depth about some issues that were really interesting to explore – like the effect that superpowers would have on your mental and physical health. It dealt with morality and laws – if you were to have superpowers and could use them to help people, but it would be against the law to do so, what would be the right thing to do? So, yes, it was interesting at points.

What it comes down to, however, is that I wouldn’t recommend reading this book unless all you had experienced of superheroes was on tv or in the movies. If you’ve read comic books or graphic novels, stick with them.