Books read in February 2009
The Restaurant at the End of the Universe The Complete Hammer's Slammers Volume 3 Life, the Universe and Everything Without Warning So Long, and Thanks For all the Fish On Basilisk Station Mostly Harmless
Mostly Harmless
It turns out I was confused when I said that So Long and Thanks For All the Fish was the last Hitchhikers Guide book. There is one more, Mostly Harmless. This book wasn't as good as the others to be honest, it felt disjointed and I ended up disappointed by the ending. Then again, it was still quite funny and I didn't hate the book. It just wasn't as brilliant as the others.
Free Baen ebooks
Bradley noted in the comments for my On Balisik Station post that Baen has been making free ebooks of a bunch of their stuff available. Specifically, http://baencd.thefifthimperium.com/ seems to be the place to go. It seems legitimate to me too. Awesome. I still like dead tree, but this seems like a good excuse to give ebooks a try, especially for those books which are now quite hard to find, but that I want to read before I read the ones you can still get.
On Basilisk Station
I bought this book because it was cheap a while ago, and only just got around to reading it. Its a pretty standard science fiction story of one naval officer's plight -- incompetent seniors; inadequate equipment; and evil neighbors. The story revolves around a young naval officer named Honor Harrington, who the Internet tells me has her career based around that of Admiral Nelson. This book was an interesting enough story, and doesn't collapse under the weight of cliche like some others do. It was entertaining and I will probably read the rest of the series. [isbn: 1416509372]
So Long, and Thanks For All the Fish
This is the final book in the Hitchhiker's Guide trilogy, and to be honest I think this one is better than the third book. I enjoyed it, and I think the real strength of the book is that it doesn't try to hard to be a sequel.
Without Warning
LibraryThing, of which I am a member runs a program where members are shipped early copies of books for free, with the preference for them writing a review when they're done reading the book. The books are shipped by the publisher directly to the reviewers. This isn't that uncommon in the publishing industry -- both of my books have experienced a similar process, although less formal. A pre-release version of this book was provided by this mechanism. The pre-release had some quite annoying typographical and grammar errors. I assume they are corrected in the final published version. I am a little conflicted about this story. On the one hand, the author comes from my home town, as do about 0% of popular authors. You can see he's Australian in the text -- several of the main characters are Australian, Greg Norman gets a cameo, and Tasmania is a hiding place of preference for refugees. On the other hand, I found this book a slow read. The story is good, and the ideas very interesting. The story is good too, with most chapters ending with a hook to keep you going. On the other hand, I just couldn't get into the…
Life, the Universe and Everything
Another classic from the trilogy of four. I'd always known that Cricket was somehow evil.
The Complete Hammer’s Slammers Volume 3
This book consists of three paperbacks combined into one volume, and follows in from Volume 1 and Volume 2. I'll cover each story separately: The sharp end: this story is a little different from the other Hammer's Slammers stuff. To be honest, its a bit less grim. Normally the stories are about how war is in the end just a bunch of guys trying to not die (for the grunts at least), whereas this story is a little bit more hopeful than that. Then again, there is still plenty of the negative side of war in this story. Paying the piper: I've seen other people complain that this book is disjointed, which is a fair comment. Concepts are reintroduced several times, even though they've already been covered. I wonder if this was originally a set of short stories in a series? Its a good read however. The darkness: a much shorter story, which is a lot more like the ones in Volume 1 and Volume 2. [isbn: 9781892389800]
The Restaurant at the End of the Universe
Another classic. This book is probably a little better than The Hichhiker's Guide because it doesn't have to spend so much time explaining the background to the story. It is a very fast read, just like the other book, and I enjoyed it.
Books read in January 2009
Bio of a Space Tyrant: Refugee Battlefields Beyond Tomorrow The Compleat Bolo Prince of the Blood Dawnspell The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy Isaac Asimov's Robot City: Refuge