Author: Scott

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DnD Ludmerea Shop stuff

Session 1 [01/31]

Session 1 [01/31] PCs: Jenna, Bastra, Lucas, Thorum

  • Jenna sells handcrafted wreaths and necklaces, and has become friends with the widow Dona Amerlias.

  • Bastra paints and works on developing a patron; the town is neutral toward him.

  • Lucas arrives to teach wizardry, but finds the village is small and education level is not what he’s used to. No students are ready to pay him to study yet.

  • Thorum has been working as a wilderness escort and developing a reputation as a hard worker. Many of his clients were once Nerik’s – while Nerik is currently under deep suspicion after his charges died in a goblin ambush.

03.12: Sten Sture, associate bishop of Cathedral Nemijen arrives in the early afternoon, with two dozen donkeys and two animal handlers, Rooiakker and Mieke.

Sten discusses disaster with quartermaster, posts up notifications for assistance at a rate of 10 guider per day as escorts for the caravan in the wildlands. Rooiakker and Mieke handle sign ups for PCs + Dory’s group of Muhner (Dory, Luiz, Abilo, and Juliana). Meanwhile, Sten buys up every supply in town, paying above market, and has them loaded on his donkey train.

03.13 Caravan sets off for Fort Augustaberg. Escorts divided in two; PCs scout ahead for the best path guided by Jenna’s map of the region. Dory’s group is close guard for the caravan; tomorrow they’ll switch.
After a full day, filled with fording icy streams and tamping down the last snow clinging from the 03.07 storm, Thorum and Jenna lead the laden caravan to an excellent campsite about 15 miles west and 18 north of Redewall.

Dory’s group takes first watch; near watch turnover lean wolves rush the campsite making for the hobbled donkeys. Basta and Thorum shake off their meditation and rouse the PCs; several arrows, psychic morningstar, and flame bolts scorch the wolves; one dies to a dagger thrust at the base of the tree guarded by Lucas, with Jenna poised above.

(Session end.)

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Books

Recent Reads

December and January

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Books

Alien Echoes and Neuromancer

Alien Echoes by Mira Grant was an interesting take on the alien universe. The first half of the book was an excellent and gritty story about the struggles of colonies, with fascinating extrapolated biological issues.

When the aliens come crashing down, it’s clear that they’re trouble of a wildly different scope — too perfect to be accidental. Olivia offers fascinating viewpoints — she explains what’s expected and what’s really unusual (from an amateur Xenobiologist’s POV), which proves to be a fascinating breakdown of plausibility for the various alien traits.

Neuromancer by William Gibson is a classic; I think I’ve read other Gibson novels, but this was unfamiliar enough that I think it’s a first encounter. Case is our sole POV, but his interactions with Armitage and Molly, and the interestingly textured characters that they run into at each stop, really lend the gritty feel of a complex world that’s ground on with interlocked histories, at national and personal levels.

It gets very ambitious, with a lot of travel to different interesting places, including orbit by the end.

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Books

Recent Books 11/19

Some Desperate Glory by Emily Tesh was excellent, and very subtle in a few ways. Our POV character, Kyr, is a young woman from a defeated humanity, raised to gain glory for her fallen people. The society that’s she’s raised in has added some blinders – as has Kyr’s self image. As the book continues, and the way the universe expands, Kyr finds herself reevaluating what she has always known… it’s a rough road.

The book features quite alien societies – definitely more than humans in funny suits – and weird universe changing technologies that are hard to understand for everyone. There’s interesting simulations and temporal variations… Kyr doesn’t get a smooth path, but it’s a fascinating read, and the Kyr who emerges is so different but still grounded in the girl we first encountered.

Spear by Nicola Griffith is a powerfully Welsh retelling around the edges of the round table. Celtic myth and gods patrol the edges, but it’s a very human scale. Some of it was familiar, or familiar at a slant from Hawk of May, but Peretur comes from a very different, not nobly raised background that renders the political largely invisible to her.

The world isn’t particularly rough or cruel, though it’s a lot closer to the bone, and the nobility’s share is a sizable bite. The story as a whole feels very concise – it doesn’t mess about with multiple viewpoints, or try to handle multiple big events. It’s not the end of Caer Leon – it still feels like summer, and Medraut isn’t in the picture yet. This tale comes to a firm ending about Pereteur’s storyline – if not that of the companions that Peretur is joining.

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Books

Recent Reads

(As of 9/21/2023)

Light from Uncommon Stars by Ryka Aoki. Set in the world of today, it’s mostly an excellent story; the primary POV was Katrina Nguyen, a young violin prodigy on the run. She’s very much a modern youth, who interacts oddly with Shizuka Satomi, a violin teacher with a dark past. In parallel, Lan Tran, a starship captain in disguise runs a donut shop. I had to push past the “you’re putting peanut butter in my chocolate” for the melding of modern, fantasy, and space opera; fortunately, the strong characters keep you riveted and moving through.

The River Road by Karen Osborn. Another book set in the world of today, without any fantasy to relieve it. It’s mostly about how two families deal (and fail to deal) with tragedy. There’s a lot of confused memory, glorious flashbacks and unbridled youth. It’s a very nicely textured deep look at a rural near town friendship, and the slices we each see of each other.

Crip Up the Kitchen is a book filled with excellent advice about how to work around disabilities and conserve spoons, with careful and detailed explanations for the various tools and their uses. The recipes are similarly carefully detailed and thoroughly explained — even new cooks, and cooks exploring new tools are setup for success. The stories of adaptation and perseverance are excellent and inspiring; the gatekeeping lectures preceding each recipe that the author has a personal cultural connection to were wearying and repetitious.

Best American Science Fiction and Fantasy 2018, N. K. Jemsin Editor. A very broad mix of short stories, most relatively short and well crafted. I’d come across a few stories in other collections, and they run the gamut from quite familiar to entirely unique. Not every story was a great match for my taste – but the majority were, and craft was evident in them all.

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Books

Recent Reads

(August 25, 2023)

It’s been a while since it visited the library, so I’ve been rereading several novels. (I have added many more books to my library queue and requested several, so I’ll soon be back to new books.)

World War Z by Max Brooks was a fast reread; the various little tales are all quick, and when you start to encounter characters again in the second half of the book, there’s a warm burst of familiarity. A minor flaw is that the lack of continuous storyline meant that it didn’t embed in my mind, preventing it from being as useful when trying to sleep.

Halfway Human by Carolyn Ives Gilman was a fascinating flash back to the world of 25 years ago, where a story centered on an asexual aromantic lead character was played up as genuinely alien to standard galactic society. Tedla, blands, and the whole society of Gammadis are a fascinating look at where desires for service and gender interact – and don’t.

The Dispatcher by John Scalzi is a fun thought experiment, looking at a world where most murder victims pop back to life immediately after dying. It’s fleshed out to tackle some quick exploits – like integrating Dispatchers, basically licensed assassins, into high risk surgeries, or the adaptation of society to mercy killings basically as a “do over” for nasty accidents, etc. It feels like a long short story – one big concept well explored, rather than the complex storylines of most novels.

Vatta’s War is a five book series by Elizabeth Moon. We follow a few POV characters, but the anchor is Ky Vatta. The series kicks off with Trading in Danger, where Ky begins the story by getting kicked out of the academy for “helping” in a way that backfires with terrible publicity. She’s a great character, who is put through a lot of misery but comes through it surprisingly well. There are a number of parallels to Moon’s Deed of Paksenarrion books, but Ky manages to stand apart – in part because the universe is facing a different threat than Pak’s tale.

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Books

The Lies of the Ajungo

Moses Ose Utomi’s debut novella, The Lies of the Ajungo, was a fascinating read. It feels much like a good Leguin novel, with a carefully selected words and a very deliberate pace and feel.

The reversals and subtle revelations are well paced and great to experience.

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Books

Rule 34 and Imago

Rule 34 is an interesting Charles Stross book set in a downward sliding Scotland, and a whole host of disinvestment and rot in public institutions after the great recession.

We’re guided though the worlds (physical and internet) with a few viewpoint characters. Liz is a cop, who mostly reviews the net side of crimes… with a slowly revealed backstory explaining how she got derailed from promotions and into her current role. The other half is anchored by Anwar, a scammer out on parole, trying to make some money and support his family in a very challenging world.

There are some interesting detours into pseudo-states and international crime, some characters from the main characters’ pasts come back to complicate their lives, and AI runs amuck. Solid, but not my favorite of his.

Imago was a good conclusion to the Xenogenesis trilogy. It doesn’t include the rough toddler POV that made the middle book harder to love. Jodhas is a very interesting adaptation to Earth; very human looking and male to begin, but with a fascinating development path.

We get to see the threads begun by Akin in the previous book flourish, though it’s not directly addressed or a main focus. The huge slide of the human settlements that we saw last book has slowed, but there are new settlements to find.

All in all, a satisfying conclusion to the trilogy… though Dawn is enough stronger than the other two that I’d recommend it as a stand alone to most… and just let them know that the other books exist if they want to see the whole sequence together.

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Books

Adulthood Rites and Picnic on Paradise

Octavia Butler’s Adulthood Rites is a sequel to Dawn. It’s a rough start, following a super baby – it definitely sets Akin apart from the children of our world, though it’s all weirdly plausible and consistent.

After the time jump forward, into adolescence, Akin feels less weird (though still intentionally very weird). There are interesting meditations and debates about what is inherent, genetically preloaded, and what things can and should be changed and cherished. The slow slide of Phoenix is fascinating and sad.

Adulthood Rites was a reread – probably my second read, and a couple of decades apart.

Picnic on Paradise was new to me. It’s a weird, stylish future, quickly reduced to a lengthy trek and squabbling through hardship. A few quirky and interesting characters, several that never really develop depth.

It’s well written, but not one I’m likely to read again.

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Books

Softwire and Dawn

The Softwire: Virus on Orbis 1 by P. J. Haarsma was hanging out in our library; I don’t think I’ve ever read it, so it likely came from Jax’s library. It’s compellingly written, and moves at a quick pace. It’s a well written exploration of a truly alien environment – without the separation and control that adults visiting in a ship would have.

It feels like good YA, but is willing to include a lot of subtler elements in the world building that don’t make it feel so straightforward that it’s just for kids. By the end, there was a foe and a straightforward conflict – but it took an intriguing path to get there. I started looking for the next book, but since it was published in 2006, it’s not actively stocked. I’ll have to keep it in mind when combing bookshops.

Dawn by Octavia Butler was a reread. It’s a fascinating study – the Oankali feel intriguingly different and alien, and the initial setup of Lilith as a rat in a maze, being examined and tested, is hard to take… it’s a rough setup, which primes her for the role that she’s reviled for.

The Oankali concept of trade being off kilter, and the anxieties of humans at being pieced together from isolation and forged into small bands feel all too authentic. We’re all mutts that would bite the hand that feeds us, if that hand was so alien.