Forgotten Realms

I couldn't list all my Star Trek novels without listing all my D&D: Forgotten Realms novels (don't worry D&D fans, Dragonlance is next).

Forgotten Realms was one of the best additions to the D&D universe and after decades still is the genesis for tons of games, novels, and memorabilia. One of my most prized possessions is the Waterdeep City System campaign set that comes with a detailed map of the entire city of Waterdeep that takes up a whole table to lay outSo without further ado, here is a list of Forgotten Realm novels I've read over the years:

• The Crystal Shard - R.A. Salvatore
• Streams of Silver - R. A. Salvatore
• Legend of Drizzt: Exile - R. A. Salvatore
• Legend of Drizzt: Homeland - R.A. Salvatore
• Legend of Drizzt: Sojourn - R. A. Salvatore
• Canticle: The Cleric Quintet -  R.A. Salvatore
• Realms of Magic (short story collection) - various authors
• Realms of Mystery (short story collection) - various authors
• Swordmage - Blades of the Moonsea Book I    Richard Baker
• Pool of Radiance    Carrie Bebris

I read "Swordmage" as an Advanced Reader Copier and wrote a review about it for a magazine years ago, but I'll be damned if I can remember what magazine. I did give it a good review though.

"Pool of Radiance" I found in a gym-sized book fair buried under a ton of other fantasy novels. It was in perfect condition, and even though I had never played the game, or read the previous books in the series, couldn't help but to pick up and give it a read.

I have a handful of other Forgotten Realms novels that are on my ToBeRead pile, and I even have one on my e-reader, and I feel an obligation to all the folks who devoted so much to the universe to read at least as many of these as I have the Dragonlance books (see the upcoming post). Looking on the list now, I especially feel this way, because quite frankly that list looks puny.

Until Next Time....
Forgetfully Yours,
Michael

Star Trek Novels

I'm an obsessive list maker - not of what I need To Do, but of trivial things that no one other than myself really care about.

For instance, I've been keeping track of all the books I've read since Jan. 1, 1999. I thought I was a freak for doing this, until I found out there are literally thousands of people who keep reading lists and proudly share them with their other reading friends.

So... I've read a lot of Star Trek books since the day I discovered science fiction in both print and movie form, and I thought this would be a good place to start. It's not that impressive of a list to Trekkies (or Trekkers or whatever they are these days), but I'm pretty proud of it so far.

Generations - J. M. Dillard
First Contact - J. M. Dillard
The Next Generation: Ship of the Line - Diane Carey
Best Destiny - Diane Carey
Deep Space Nine: Valhalla - Nathan Archer
Deep Space Nine: Warped - K. W. Jeter
The Three-Minute Universe - Barbara Paul
Probe - Margaret Wander Bonanno
Voyager: Incident at Arbuk - John Greggory Betancourt
The Next Generation: Nightshade - Laurell K. Hamilton
Renegade (#55) - Gene DeWeese
Dreadnaught (#29) - Diane Carey

I feel like there might be one or two missing from here. Maybe I haven't read as many as I would like to believe. If I think of them, or if I read more (I have one in the queue), I'll update this post.

Until Next Time,
Michael

I'm back

Yes, I'm back.

Taken away by my workload, school projects, life, etc. etc.

Can't believe it's been two years.

And I need to update my currently reading list.

For those who are curious, I'm reading "Big Little Lies" by Liane Moriarty.

More updates coming, eventually.


Literally Yours,
Michael

Numbers

So I mentioned in a previous post or two that due to a class I'm currently taking, my reading time would be reduced, but at the same time, that I would be looking for ways to apply what I learn to the world of books and/or publishing.

Obviously, it's no surprise that I love words and reading, etc.

What does surprise people is my fascination with Math. Don't be mislead by that sentence, I'm not saying I'm good at Math, just that I'm fascinated by it. There are even particular hard science fiction books that I've enjoyed because they involve characters interaction with Math (tangent: I did not like Arthur C. Clarke's final novel "The Last Theorem". I thought despite the co-authorship with Frederick Pohl, the novel was poorly written, poorly plotted, and poorly executed. It may have started out as a good idea, but it quickly turned south.) And eventually some of my future posts will involve science fiction novels with math-based themes or plot lines.

But Math, like English, is a language, and it's characters represent abstracts and ideas, just like English, and through the language we can better understand the world around us.

The one lesson we've covered a lot in my Statistical Analysis (Nanodegree) class is standard deviations, how to calculate it, and what it ultimately means.

Basically, if you have data, you can pick a piece of particular datum and calculate where it lies in relation to all the other data in the population you took it from. In other words, you can calculate how many standard deviations this one particular piece of data is from the mean/average. 

I could go much more into the details and how that is discussed, but I suspect many of my regular Cheesy Readers aren't ready for me to suddenly change the regular topics of this blog so quickly.

Maybe as I go, more and more will become fascinated by my path, but maybe others only want to see my final conclusions. Time will tell.

Until Next Time...
Deviantly Yours,
Michael

The Ox Bow Incident quotes

I recently finished "The Ox Bow Incident" by Walter Van Tilburg Clark and thought I'd post some of the more interesting quotes from the book. Keep in mind, I'm not saying I agree or disagree with the quotes I've posted below, but I find them worthy of thought and discussion.

"Law is more than the words that put it on the books; law is more than any decisions that may be made from it; law is more than the particular code of it stated at any one time or in any one place or nation; more than any man, lawyer or judge, sheriff or jailer, who may represent it. True law, the code of justice, the essence of our sensations of right and wrong, is the conscience of society. It has taken thousands of years to develop, and it is the greatest, the most distinguishing quality which has evolved with mankind. None of man's temples, none of his religions, none of his weapons, his tools, his arts, his sciences, nothing else he has grown to, is so great a thing as his justice, his sense of justice. The true law is something in itself, it is the spirit of the moral nature of man; it is an existence apart, like God, and as worthy of worship as God. If we can touch God at all, where do we touch him save in the conscience? And what is the conscience of any man save his little fragment of the conscience of all men in all time?"
"...night is like a room; it makes the little things in your head too important. A man's not clearheaded at night."

"All any of us really want any more is power. We'd buck the pack if we dared. We don't, so we use it; we trick it to help us in our own little killings. We've mastered the horses and cattle. Now we want to master each other, make cattle of men. Kill them to feed ourselves. The smaller the pack the more we get."

"We're doing it because we're in the pack, and because we're afraid not to be in the pack. We don't dare show our pack weakness; we don't dare resist the pack."

So if you'd like to comment or discuss anything you've read above, or would just like to talk about the book in general, please feel free to comment below.

Until Next Time...
Incidentally Yours,
Michael

Game of Thrones and Philosophy: Logic Cuts Deeper than Swords

Game of Thrones and Philosophy: Logic Cuts Deeper Than Swords by Henry Jacoby

My rating: 2 of 5 stars


If you love "A Song of Fire and Ice" and/or the HBO series "Game of Thrones" don't feel as though this is a necessary read to gain any deeper understanding than you probably already have. If you are compelled to suck down every word written about this series, then yes, go ahead and read it. Personally, I love philosophy, but I wasn't able to read more than just a few essays at a time without taking a long break between because of many of the repetitive essays and examples. All in all, I could have spent time reading more worthwhile books.



View all my reviews

Ghost In The Shell - The Quest

I suppose it's time I weigh in on the remake of the anime classic "Ghost In The Shell".

My knee-jerk reaction to remakes is always negative, but this time was a little different - let's just say I'm... apprehensive.

I didn't learn about this remake until only a few weeks shy of its release, and at first became a bit excited because our CGI technology has advanced since this animation was first released over 25 years ago. Even when I heard Scarlett Johansson would play the lead, I still held out hope. But as the story line played out in the trailer, my heart sank a little.

From what I can tell, this live-action movie is going to focus more on "solving the mystery of her origin" and only touch upon the philosophical question of whether self-consciousness equals life. And while there are scenes that mirror the original, it looks like there are plenty of new ones due to this plot change and addition of a few characters. This at least has the basis to be a really good reboot, we'll just have to wait and see.

What I found really sad was that a young movie reviewer on the Fox News channel made the moronic statement that this film reminded him of "The Matrix" and believes this was inspired by the Wachowski Brothers film. If that guy had taken two seconds on Google he would have realized it's the other way around. The original 1995 anime inspired "The Matrix." Just goes to show that the "experts" aren't always experts.

Without actually having watched the film, I'm not going to say much more - this post isn't meant as a movie review, but I do want to view this remake/reboot with an open mind.

Do I believe I'll like it? There is a decent chance I will.

Will I own it? If I like it half as much as the original 1995 movie, yes.

Will I like it more than the original? Highly unlikely. The original will always have that nostalgia for me - that certain mystique I felt at that age of an exciting, action-packed technological future where artificial intelligence and humans team together. 

Until Next Time...
Here's the IMDB page of the new Ghost in the Shell for more info.

Futuristically Yours,
Michael     

Never Meet Your Heroes...

... or in this case, follow them on Twitter.

You may have heard the adage before - "Never meet your heroes." The reason for that is because you learn how human they are and you witness their strengths as well as foibles  first hand, and sometimes that can be quite disheartening.

Such is the case with Stephen King. 

I wouldn't call him my hero, but I've enjoyed his fiction since I was a teenager, and have always thought it'd be nice to meet him someday. So when I signed up for Twitter, I began following his account.

I've now decided I have to stop. I can't stand to listen to him whine anymore.

I understand that he didn't support Trump. He's even said more than a few times that because of the Watergate scandal he refuses to vote Republican ever again. Hey, I'm cool with that. The man has his personal political beliefs, and whether I agree with his beliefs or not, those beliefs don't keep me from enjoying his work.

But in the lead up to the November 2016 election and in these months following, his Twitter posts have been predominately political, wholly anti-Trump, and have lacked any sort of intelligent thought.

Don't get me wrong. I follow plenty of anti-Trump people, and probably the same number of pro-Trump people. Unlike many of my "open-minded" friends who immediately block anyone who doesn't believe exactly like they do, I read both sides of any issue/debate.

Unfortunately, though, King constantly posts whiny little quips that completely lack any sort of depth, wit, or thought. I honestly expected him to...well, be a better writer. His tweets are simplistic rehashes of items we've all seen on the news multiple times. If he only posted them once in a while, that'd be fine. But he posts multiple times per day - I sometimes wonder if he's even writing fiction any more, seems like all his time is spent on Twitter now like a teenage girl who can't stop giving updates while at the shopping mall.

My plan is simple. I'll mute his feed for a while, give him a few months to emotionally recover, and then check back in. If he's still going on and on, then I'll stop following him. I'll continue to read his fiction, and I'm sure that King being King, like in the past, he'll get in a political jab or two. But that's okay, I have faith he'll temper his comments for the sake of his fiction.

I still like the guy, just can't follow him on Twitter.

I'm just one guy among his thousands of followers and loyal re-tweeters, I doubt he'll even notice I'm gone.

Until Next Time....
Tweetly Yours,
Michael 
 

Okay, So It Was't Exactly a Banner Year...

Well, usually these types of posts are written during the last week of a year. But me... Hey, I got busy, so I'm a little late on this topic. Plus, my Year In Reading isn't much to brag about this year.

I fell way short of my short story goal, even let my subscription to the Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction expire for a while in an effort to get out from under the rising stack of issues I haven't read yet. The number of novels I finished this year is nothing to boast about, although I did manage to read more classic novels than modern novels, including a reread of Mary Shelley's "Frankenstein," one of my favorites of all time, and squeezed in my annual reread of Dicken's "A Christmas Carol."

I did read a number of Information Technology books, articles, and essays in an effort to keep up with the industry that pays my bills. Then on a personal level, I kept my head buried in a lot of cookbooks and woodworking books. I lived through a total top-to-bottom bathroom remodel, and adopted an Olde English Bulldog (named Zeus by the previous owner, which sort of brought to my attention that the past three out of four animals I've owned have been named after mythological figures, and five out of the last five pets have been named from fictional characters -- I'm sensing a theme here).

The blogs continue on, not regularly, but enough to let folks know I'm still alive. I tweet at least once per day from at least one of my accounts, but for all purposes have practically sworn off Facebook completely - the last time I logged on to that bit social media was pre-November election, I just couldn't stand the bitterness and hatred BOTH sides were throwing at each other. All I learned from that was how hypocritical both sides can be - each thinking of themselves as "open minded" when in fact, neither of them are.

Other than those little tidbits of news, life for me has remained pretty normal - the novel continues, the poetry continues, and I've brought my book hoarding pretty much under control.

So that's it -- the Year 2016 in Review.

Until Next Time...
If you have a bit of scrap wood around you're wanting to find a project for, I've linked in two videos on how to build your own Tardis. (If you have to ask what the Tardis is, you're reading the wrong blog). The first one is more instructional by a by a man in Oakland, and the second one is by a nerdy English woman who enjoys poking fun at herself.

Annually Yours,
Michael

Just How Many Humbugs Are There

I'm finishing up my yearly reread of Dickens's "A Christmas Carol." I could post a little something about it and its staying power in our culture, but thousands of people before me have done it and said it better than I can.

Instead, I thought I'd do what I do best - Make an Irrelevant List.

Since I love the book so much and many of the adaptations, I thought I'd give a stab at listing all the movie and television movie versions with the actor or actress who played the part of Scrooge. I won't list the many television cartoon or sitcom recreations because that'd make this list too long.

So here, in chronological order, is a list of "A Christmas Carol" adaptations:

Scrooge (1901) -cast list unknown
A Christmas Carol (1908) - Thomas Ricketts
A Christmas Carol (1910) - Marc McDermott
Scrooge (1913) - Sir Seymour Hicks and retitled Old Scrooge for its U.S. release in 1926.
A Christmas Carol (1914) - Charles Rock
The Right to Be Happy (1916) - Rupert Julian
A Christmas Carol (1923) Russell Thorndike
Old Scrooge (1926) - Sir Seymour Hicks
Scrooge (1928) - Bransby Williams
Scrooge (1935) - Sir Seymour Hicks
A Christmas Carol (1938) - Reginald Owen
Scrooge: A Christmas Carol (1951) - Alastair Sim
Scrooge (1970) - Albert Finney
Mickey's Christmas Carol (1983) - Scrooge McDuck
The Muppet Christmas Carol (1992) - Michael Caine
A Christmas Carol (1997) - Tim Curry
A Christmas Carol (1999) - Patrick Stewart
Christmas Carol: The Movie (2001) -voice: Simon Callow
A Christmas Carol (2009) - computer animated with Jim Carrey

Again, this list doesn't encompass the dozens of random cartoon versions that exist, and doesn't include the hundreds of foreign language versions of the book.

Whenever discussing movie version of this classic tale, the question always comes up: Who is the best Scrooge?

The Boss and I only slightly disagree. To her, Alister Sim is the best, closely followed by Michael Caine, and nearly all movie critics agree with her. Personally, I switch the two, Caine followed by Sim. If you haven't watched Caine in the Muppet version, you should give it a try. Honestly, Caine does a wonderful job as Scrooge, but doesn't get the full credit he deserves because it's a Muppet version. The good movie critics, thankfully, give him his due.

So since this is the end of this entry, log off your computer, snuggle in, and either read the book or watch the movie. Slow down, enjoy the Season, and keep Christmas in your heart the whole year long.

Until Next Time...
If I need to convince you, then maybe this movie trailer will help. 
Spiritly Yours,
Michael