“Wolf in the Wind” Appears in “Shoot the Devil” Anthology October 1st

shoot the devil

Cover art for the anthology “Shoot the Devil.”

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My steampunk, occult, horror, western short story “Wolf in the Wind” will appear in the Crucifixion Press anthology “Shoot the Devil” on or about October 1, 2022.

Too often, the modern world wants us to avoid confrontation, to pretend that evil doesn’t exist, that the bad guy is always misunderstood, “the hero of his own story”. Even when people can be bothered to admit that evil exists, they just encourage us to be ‘nice’. To be ‘understanding’ and ‘compassionate’. Anything but actually facing the evil and driving it out with extreme prejudice.

-From the Foreword by Eric Postma

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Review of “Ghostbusters: Afterlife” (2021)

afterlife

© James Pyles

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I finally managed to see Ghostbusters: Afterlife (2021) when I found the Blu-ray at my local public library. Actually, like the blurb says on the Blu-ray cover, it is “perfect.”

Not absolutely, but it was an amazing experience, especially for a film that is so different from the original (I still haven’t seen the 2016 gender-flipped reboot and we will speak no more about it here).

First of all, McKenna Grace totally nailed it as Igon’s nerdy granddaughter Phoebe. I was a little dubious about a bunch of kids trying to be Ghostbusters, but I really loved how the film pulled it off.

It’s such an unlikely setting, a rural town and former mining community in the-middle-of-nowhere Oklahoma, but it worked.

Callie (Carrie Coon), Igon Spengler’s (the late Harold Ramis) daughter and her two kids Phoebe and Trevor (Finn Wolfhard) are evicted from the apartment somewhere (the location is never disclosed), and go to the only place left to them. A year ago, Igon died and Callie hopes to sell his farm to recoup her losses. No such luck.

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Book Review of “Infinity Engine: Transformation Book Three”

infinity engine

Cover art for Neal Asher’s novel “Infinity Engine”

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It’s been three-and-a-half years since I first started this trilogy with Dark Intelligence and almost three years since I read and reviewed part two, War Factory. Now I wrap up Neal Asher’s Transformation trilogy with Infinity Engine.

The hardest part of reading these books is keeping track of all of the characters. In Book One, Thorvald Spear seemed to be the central character and he still receives a lot of the focus, but the Black AI Penny Royal (I love the name) is the intelligence that is manipulating all of the other characters and circumstances to their own ends.

A main component was introduced in the last book, “Room 101,” a former weapons factory orbiting a supergiant star that, according to Penny Royal’s design, is being remade into something radically different.

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Coming in October in a New Anthology: “Wolf in the Wind”

wolf teaser

Promotional image from Crucifixion Press

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My short story “Wolf in the Wind” was accepted some months ago for a new anthology, but it won’t see the light of day (so to speak) until October. Until then, here’s a small taste.

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What Are People Saying About “Ice?”

ice

Cover art for my fantasy novelette “Ice”

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Now that my week long promotion of “Ice” is over, what’s the final tally of reviews and ratings?

On Amazon, there are a total of four “ratings” which in this case is three reviews and one rating. The latest review was a four star, which is totally terrific. On Amazon, “Ice” has 100% 4 and 5 star reviews. Pretty cool.

On goodreads, it’s a tad confusing. The page says three ratings and two reviews, but I only find one review and two ratings. They’re all four star, so again, no complaints.

I have gotten a few messages from others saying they’ve downloaded “Ice” and will get to reading it soon. I know the feeling. I do the same thing since my reading list is long. Hopefully, in the future, this will spawn more attention for my wee indie novelette.

Now I know free stuff is cool. However “Ice” is currently available for a mere $2.99, so the price is still very reasonable. Here are a few of the descriptions:

Anita said:

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New Four-Star Review of “Ice” on goodreads!

ice

Cover art for my fantasy novelette “Ice”

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People are downloading and hopefully reading my fantasy novelette Ice from Amazon on their kindles. No new Amazon reviews yet, but there was a terrific one on goodreads I want to share. There are also a number of folks who have marked that they are reading “Ice” or it’s on their to-read list.

But first, the review:

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Starting Today and through August 9th, download and read “Ice” for FREE!

ice

Cover art for my fantasy novelette “Ice”

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This is it!!!

Read my fantasy novelette Ice for absolutely FREE starting today, August 5th. From today through the 9th, it’s a free ebook download from Amazon to your kindle device.

Here’s a “blurb”

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My Fantasy Novelette “Ice” is FREE for Five Days Starting Tomorrow!

ice

Cover art for my fantasy novelette “Ice”

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Longing to escape the heat of the waning dog days of summer? My fantasy novelette Ice (click that link) will be a free download to your Kindle device from Amazon from Friday, August 5th through Tuesday the 9th.

Here’s the summary:

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Review of Star Trek: Strange New Worlds, The First Season

snw

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If you follow this blog, you know I’ve been reviewing, episode by episode, Star Trek: Strange New Worlds. Basically, it’s Kurtzman NuTrek designed to appeal to the old school “Star Trek” fan like me. Did it work?

Sort of.

First of all, let’s be clear that you can’t make a television show (or any art form) in 2022 and have it seem like it was created in 1966. All art is a reflection of its time. If you remade films like Casablanca (1942) or Gone With The Wind (1939) today, they wouldn’t be anything like the original classics because approximately eighty years have passed.

So expecting SNW to be like the original Star Trek starring William Shatner and Leonard Nimoy is completely unrealistic.

That said, I totally miss that era in science fiction and in television in general.

There’s almost no way to compare the two shows and yet, it begs the question was SNW “Star Trek?”

What makes Star Trek “Star Trek?”

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Review of Star Trek: Strange New Worlds, Ep10, “A Quality of Mercy”

old pike

Scene from the Star Trek Strange New Worlds episode “A Quality of Mercy”

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This is it. The final episode of season one “Star Trek: Strange New Worlds” A Quality of Mercy. Yes, it was good. Yes, it had problems, big fat furry ones.

We start off being reunited with Captain Batel (Melanie Scrofano) who we saw in bed with Pike in the series pilot. They’re near the Romulan Neutral Zone. Batel has a mission some distance away while Pike, Spock, and Number One meet with one of the Commanders of a Neutral Zone outpost Cmdr Hasen Al-Salah (Ali Sassan). Things seem to be going well until the Commander’s young teenage son bursts in to meet Pike. Pike recognizes him as one of the two cadets he doesn’t save during his fated accident just seven years in the future. He internally freaks out and leaves.

Una follows him and yes, it’s another “my fate is haunting me” scenes.

Back in Pike’s quarters, he meets his older Admiral self, complete in the Rear Admiral’s uniform (maroon monster) we saw Kirk (William Shatner) wearing in Star Trek II: The Wrath of Kahn. He still has the Johnny Bravo hair, as big as ever for both of them.

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