Author Archives: James Pyles

Book Review of Transient: A Tech Noir Novel

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Cover art for “Transient”

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Transient: A Tech Noir Novel (2016) by Zachry Wheeler isn’t your ordinary vampire tale. In fact, when I first started reading it, I had no idea there were vampires involved.

It’s set in the future by quite a few years or decades.

Jonas is a transient, a human being who has infiltrated Eternal (vampire) society, in this case, Seattle. He was sent by the last remnant of humanity, hiding in places on Earth the Eternals can’t or won’t visit. He’s a spy who uses subterfuge and drugs to pass as in Eternal, suppressing his body heat and his aging.

Much of his story and the history of things are told in journal entries about the past.

Once the Eternals were the outcasts living on the fringes of humanity, but they were able to expand, to wage war, to take over, to cast out humanity when they were unable to turn them via the virus that creates the vampire state.

But as you might imagine, Jonas, having lived for five years among the enemy, has started to understand them, to admire their rather idyllic society, to make friends and the most forbidden act…to take a lover.

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Review of Star Trek: Strange New Worlds, Ep2, “Children of the Comet”

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Scene from Star Trek: Strange New Worlds “Children of the Comet”

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I just finished watching Star Trek Strange New Worlds Season 1, Episode 2, Children of the Comet.

The show starts on the surface of a desolate planet with a sparse and impoverished population of humanoids barely surviving. One of them looks up and sees what appears to be a comet in the sky.

Meanwhile, aboard the Enterprise, Uhura has been invited to join the senior staff in the Captain’s quarters for dinner. Ortega advised her to show up in dress uniform, but when she arrives, Uhura discovers that everyone is dressed very casually, including the Captain. In fact, dress is so casual, that Ortega looks like the 23rd century version of a “homie in the hood” complete with belly button reveal. On an actual Naval vessel, even if dress for an event were casual, it wouldn’t be that casual.

Ortega is shaping up to be a class A jerk which she continues to display as the episode progresses. In fact, both she and La’an seem grumpy most of the time, but the former because she’s arrogant and the latter because she’s depressed.

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Review of Star Trek: Strange New Worlds, Episode 1, “Strange New Worlds”

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Promotional image for Star Trek: Strange New Worlds

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I know I always approach these things on the late side, but I’ve just gotten around to seeing the first episode of Star Trek: Strange New Worlds, which happens to be titled Strange New Worlds. Oh, I’ve heard a lot about it, but that doesn’t translate into actual experience. Other people’s perceptions might be different than mine.

First of all, the intro scenes are fabulous. Top notch CGI. Incredible shots of the Enterprise. Worth the price of admission.

The show opens up in Christopher Pike’s (Anson Mount) home in a very snowy Montana. Captain Batel (Melanie Scrofano) who apparently is Pike’s girlfriend is shown asleep while Pike is making pancakes and watching The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951) on a large, flat screen TV. In fact, if I’d walked into that home, I wouldn’t have believed I was in the 23rd century at all. There was even a dial telephone next to his communicator. I surmised that Pike and Captain James Kirk (William Shatner) both have a “fondness for antiques”.

Pike looks like crap and is obviously carrying a heavy load but refuses to share it with Batel. She leaves for her ship while he says the Enterprise has another week in dry dock before he has to make a decision as to whether or not he’s going back.

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Book Review of Andy Weir’s “Project Hail Mary”

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Cover art for Project Hail Mary by Andy Weir

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Finally got to dig into Andy Weir’s 2021 novel Project Hail Mary. It’s a relatively new book in my local public library system, so I only get to keep it a max of fourteen days with no renewals. As of this writing, I have five days left.

My main reason for bumping it up on my reading list is also the reason I wrote my May 22nd blog post Does Every Single SciFi Story Absolutely Have to Have a Social Justice Theme?.

Some people I follow on twitter (and like) mutually complained that Weir’s book:

feels like the Hugo Award nod for Project Hail Mary fell out of a time travel portal from the year 1986 (Like many of the best-selling science fiction novels of that time, the book largely ignores pesky questions of race, class and gender).

My answer is that not every single story in the universe published after 2001 HAS to be about “pesky” race, class, and gender (my Oxford comma included).

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Video Introduction to My Novelette “Ice”

iceIf you like my work, buy me a virtual cup of coffee at Ko-Fi.

My first self-published novelette Ice was published December 2021, but like a lot of indie and self-published works, it needs all the help that it can get just to let people know it exists.

To that end, and to market my “brand” (as it were), I’ve taken to TikTok, creating little two and three minute videos. No I’m not some cute kid dancing around or making funny movies, but it beats the equipment I’d have to buy to record vids for YouTube.

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Review of Leo Flynn’s Revised “Mara’s Awakening”

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Promotional art for Leo Flynn’s “Mara’s Awakening

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Last year, indie author Leo Flynn asked me to review his SciFi story Mara’s Awakening, part 1 in the 3 part saga. I did review it and as much as I wanted to be nice about it, I didn’t think much of the story. It was too short and there was almost no story or character development.

Then last April, Leo contacted me again. Apparently, a number of people provided him with similar comments, so much so in fact, that he reworked the tale completely. He asked me to review the updated version.

I love it.

It’s not perfect, but it’s a lot better than it was. Mara, Ishali, Mallory, feel more like real people. Leo takes much more time to flesh out his protagonist and her circumstances. Prison feels a lot more substantial, and the reader experiences Mara’s anguish and frustration at being unjustly incarcerated for life.

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Book Review of “Skin Traders: A 224-Verse Book”

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Cover art for Gregg Cunningham’s novelette “Skin Traders”

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I just finished reading Gregg Cunningham’s short novelette Skin Traders: A 224-Verse Book.

Gregg and I share a table of contents in a number of anthologies including Raygun Retro and World War Four and we know each other somewhat online. He was one of the people who turned me on to the 224-Verse to begin with, so I was anxious to read this tale.

It is a short and violent story about a hostile planet Portia where cybernetically enhanced Lawmen are sought after for their implanted technology along with their skin, organs, muscles, and everything else. Life is brutal and Dark Orbit affiliated gangs of pirates plunder the seas and skies.

A Lawman sky ship is shot down by the pirate vessel Skin Trader and those Lawmen (men and woman) unlucky enough not to die immediately are captured and viciously brutalized. Sergeant Bayker is as helpless as the rest of the survivors but desperate to find a way for he and the crew to escape.

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Book Review of Denton Salle’s “Sworn to the Light”

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Cover art for “Sworn to the Light”

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Yes, I’ve been remiss in reviewing my (online) friend Denton Salle’s novelette Sworn to the Light: The Avatar Wizard – Book 1 (of four).

However, I did download it onto my Kindle Fire last month and last night I finished it.

Excellent work. A very compelling YA Fantasy work that I think my grandson would enjoy (although he prefers audio books).

A lot of Denton’s works are based on Slavonic wonder tales he learned from his grandfather, so you need to know that going in. The local is rather “Russian” in its architecture at least.

Eleven-year-old Jeremy visits his father’s homeland with his parents, in part because Jeremy has a problem. He spontaneously turns into a panda bear cub. He can’t control the change and he can’t control the bear once he’s transformed.

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More Social Media Dabbling: Video Reviews and Commentary

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Okay, fine. I’ve made another two TikTok videos. The first is a three-minute whimsical review of Adrian Tchaikovsky’s 2018 science fiction novel Children of Time. My written review of the book is more straightforward and detailed. TikTok videos are brief by design, so I had to compress everything into a max of three minutes. As I wrote my script, I realized there was no way I could deliver anything serious in such a short time period, so I punted and this is the result.

@james.pyles

I’m doing a series of three-minute SciFi book reviews. Today, it’s Adrian Tchaikovsky’s 2018 novel “Children of Time.” These are fast and whimsical reviews. To tead longer versions. Go to https://poweredbyrobots.com/book-and-film-teviews/ #bookreview #sciencefiction

♬ original sound – James

This morning…

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“Repent, Old Indie Writer,” Said The TikTok Man

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© James Pyles

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So I’m trying to expand into different areas of social media to see how they work for book promotion. To that end, I created a TikTok account (yes, I know, it’s for really young people to make short, humorous videos). But Richard Paolinelli has been using it, so I figured I’d give it a try.

I haven’t had the nerve to actually make a video showing my face yet, but I suppose I’ll get there. I really should watch some of Richard’s videos since he’s a geezer like I am.

Oh, I’ve revived my old Instagram account just for giggles.

If you are on either or both of these platforms, feel free to find and follow me.

Here’s my promotional TikTok video. It’s pretty short:

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