Thursday, January 12, 2006

Vampires in NYC, Wizards in Chicago, & Lost

Gabe, SF’s agent provocateur and Internet-transient moves yet again.

I finished up Charlie Huston’s Already Dead yesterday. The short of it – it was a fun book that once the plot really picked up, was tough to put down. The long of it comes when I finish up the review in the next couple of days, but I would recommend it.

Earlier in the week I finished up Jim Butcher’s first Dresden Files novel – Storm Front. I was finally pushed over the edge to get my hands on a copy of the book and read it after Hobbit published a positive review of the UK edition for SFFWorld a couple of months ago. On the whole, I liked it and I think Jim’s got his hooks in me for at least the next couple of books. The books are in the Laurell K. Hamilton vein of fantastic creatures and magic in our world. I stopped reading the Anita Blake novels after the fourth or fifth installment, something about the incessant details of Anita’s wardrobe and the sliding of the novels into softcore porn didn’t agree with me. Granted, I like softcore porn as much as the next guy, maybe more, and probably too much. But when I want that, I’ll watch Skinimax at midnight.

Anyway, Butcher seems to have a better sense of humor about his writing and the first person narrative he uses with Harry feels very natural. I like the supporting cast, and the details of the supernatural society of which Harry Dresden is a part. If the next few Dresden Files agree with me, and I’ve heard from book 3 on the series just gets better, I might make my way over to Butcher’s BFF saga Codex Alera. If any of my faithful readers can opine on those books, drop a few words down in the comments.

Oh, and the first book of The Dresden Files is being turned into a SciFi Channel pilot/movie/miniseries. Jim Butcher seems pretty happy with what they are doing.

And what would a Thursday post be without some comments on the previous night’s episode of Lost? Well, I liked it and was glad to see some focus on the mysterious Mr. Eko. However it was pretty easy to be a couple of steps ahead of where they were going with his back-story. Still, I thought it was an effective and enjoyable episode that leaves me wanting for more.

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