Tag Archives: black hole

Book Review: “The Warship – Rise of the Jain, Book Two” (2019)

warship

© James Pyles

A few nights ago, I finished Neal Asher’s 2019 novel The Warship: Rise of the Jain, Book Two. I read and reviewed the first book in this trilogy a little over a year ago. That’s really too long a space between these volumes.

As with most of Asher’s novels (and there are plenty of them), the action takes place in the “Polity” universe (basically the Earth/human domain of space) and involves the primary protagonist the Prador, but they’re not the “big bads” in this story.

As with every one of Asher’s books I’ve read so far, one of the main challenges is keeping track of the numerous individual characters, their races and other things (the Spatterjay Virus for instance) that distinguishes one person/group from another.

This trilogy focuses on a species called the Jain or rather their technology and a number of mysteries that surround them.

Asher’s great at misdirection, so the Jain don’t necessarily occupy center stage through most of the scenes, even if the reader is led to believe they do.

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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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Review of Star Trek: Strange New Worlds, Ep 4, “Memento Mori”

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Scene from the Star Trek Strange New Worlds episode Memento Mori

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Just finished watching Star Trek: Strange New Worlds episode 4 Memento Mori. This one has elements of Balance of Terror which actually closely mapped to the 1957 submarine film The Enemy Below starring Robert Mitchum and Curd Jürgens. During World War Two, “an American destroyer discovers a German U-boat, and in the ensuing duel the American captain must draw upon all his experience to defeat the equally experienced German commander.”

Bonus points because David Hedison (as Al Hedison) had a role in the movie. He later played Captain Lee Crane of the nuclear submarine Seaview in the 1960s Irwin Allen TV show Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea.

As a child, I watched this film before Star Trek debuted, so when I saw Balance of Terror, I immediately recognized how writers Paul Schneider and Gene Roddenberry had “borrowed” from the movie’s plot.

At the beginning of the episode, we see scenes from prior shows revealing things about La’an, Uhura, and Hemmer.

Uhura is doing her engineering rotation and Hemmer is critical of her. Then again, he’s critical of everyone, so that’s not saying much. The Enterprise is taking a very powerful, very dangerous, and highly glorified air filter to the colony world Finibus 3 before their air becomes unbreathable. Heck of a place to settle down.

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