Stuff I've been reading

Anyone who knows me knows that I love to read. In the early mornings at my job I get a little bit of down time in between telephone calls where I get to read, and I take full advantage of this time. I don't read a whole lot when I am at home (unless I am pooping, which I am sure you are all glad to know).  But I do love to read. My eyes are always open for the next interesting looking book I am going to read next.

I don't know a whole lot of other readers in my life, so I don't really have anyone to talk to about my hobby. So I figured hey I have this handy dandy blog. Why not use it? Maybe someone will read it. Maybe.

I'm not planning to review any books in depth. Just give you some thoughts on things I have been reading lately. I'll probably do this every month or so.

First, there is Under The Dome by Stephen King. I have been a huge King fan my whole life. I've read most of his books multiple times. I read the forewords and the afterwords. I have read his non fiction stuff. His interviews. Articles about him online. I almost feel like I know the man. I LOVE his writing and with the exception of a few books, I have enjoyed everything he has put out.

I have actually read Under the Dome before. It was about 4 or 5 years ago. I have been a reader my whole life, but sometimes I fall out of the habit and go for a few years without picking up a book. I was in the middle of one of these spells when I picked up Under the Dome. I can actually contribute this book to rekindling my interest in reading, as I have not been able to put down books since then.

The concept of the book is easy enough to grasp. An impenetrable, invisible dome descends over a small town, cutting it off from the outside world. No one can come in, no one can leave. While it sounds like a relatively simple concept, there is so much more to the book than that.

The town of Chester's Mill is just so well designed. There is a huge cast of characters, all with complex personalities. Since it is a small town, many of these characters know each other and have history with one another.

The main character is Dale Barbara, a former member of the military. He is not a "native" of the city, and is initially looked upon with suspicious eyes. However, through his strong work ethic and his natural abilities working the grill at the town restaurant, he is slowly accepted by the town.

However, he finds himself on the outs during an unfortunate bar brawl during which he really did nothing but defend himself from a group of punks. But one of the punks happened to be the son of a prominent selectman of the town, Big Jim Rennie. Dale "Barbie" Barbara decides to head out of town when he realizes that this brawl is going to be held against him, and that the people involved have decided to make his life a living hell.

Enter the dome. On his way out of town. Barbie witnesses a plane crash into the invisible barrier at full speed, as well as a car. There are a few other dome related mishaps too. This all happens very quickly at the beginning of the book. There isn't a lot of backstory or boring exposition. King gets right to the heart of the matter very quickly.

One of the things that people like to say about Stephen King is that he is overly detailed in his writing. Or that he is pretentious. That's a word my wife likes to use. But I don't see it. I think he is an amazing writer. He has a skill with his words to really put you into the shoes of his characters. He paints a picture of what is happening without getting too carried away or letting his details effect the pace of his narratives. I don't have a bad thing to say about Stephen King. He is my inspiration as a writer. If I ever decide to get up off my butt and seriously start working on some of these projects I have in my mind, I can only hope to be half the writer he is. I am a HUGE fan.

Now I am off course. OK. Without going into too much detail about the plot of the book, which is not what this blog entry is really about - suffice it to say that shit hits the fan in this small town. Barbie is trapped with the very people he was looking to get away from, and is soon scapegoated into being the town's villain as a ploy by power hungry Big Jim Rennie in his plot to take control of Chester's Mill.

Big Jim is an awesome villain, and I am hard pressed to name a character I have loathed more in a novel than him. Big Jim is a used car salesman, as well as the town's second selectman. He is also a criminal, running a meth lab in the town to line his own pockets. As mentioned, he is a power hungry control freak. The dome coming down is a dream come true for him as it allows him to go on the power trip that he has always dreamed about. He manipulates people. He commits murder. He deputizes all the "bad boys" of the town in an attempt to take over the police force and organize his own personal army to do his bidding and rule the town with an iron fist. All this he does in the name of Jesus as well, which makes you hate him even more.

The whole book is mainly a power stuggle between "Barbie's people" and Big Jim's. Big Jim is the one that takes power first, and paints Barbie's side as villains. They become like rebels, working behind the scenes and trying to figure out ways to take down the man in charge. All while this crap with the dome is going on. King did his research here and made the mechanics of the inside of the dome as realistic as possible. It gets dirty, it makes the town hot, it fills the air with pollution (since it can't get out). It basically makes the town one big pressure packed bomb waiting to blow up.

Which, it does. Figuratively or literally? You will have to read to find out.

I can't encourage you more to read this book if you haven't already. Don't let the so-so TV show influence your decision at all. This book is one of King's best, and puts the show to shame.

Let's move on.

I've seen movie trailers for a film called "The Maze Runner" and I thought the premise looked awesome. Little did I know that it was based on a book (actually a series of books) that I had never heard of before. I love the Hunger Games series. I like Divergent. This kind of looked like it was made of similar stuff. So I decided hey, why not check it out?

And it turns out to be just as good as I had thought. Even better. Like stuff like Lost or Persons Unknown? This will be right up your alley.

In this book, a boy named Thomas wakes up on an elevator with no memory of his past life. When the elevator reaches its destination, he emerges to find himself in a large, giant open area surrounded by towering walls on all 4 sides. There are other kids there - all boys. They have gone through the same ordeal. They just wake up and have no memory of the past. And they are abandonded in this place.

As you learn more about "the Glade" as it is called, you learn that the Glade is surrounded on all sides by a giant maze. The big walls that comprise the Glade's boundary have large doors built in to them that close at night. During the day, some of the kids - the Runners - run through the maze looking for a way out and also mapping its layout mentally.

At night, hideous monsters called Grievers come out. Anyone who has been caught out in the maze after the doors close has never returned.

You learn all of this stuff from the perspective of Thomas. There is so much going on in the Glade, and so much mystery with the maze and the Grievers. Why this is all happening and why these specific individuals. If there is a way out. There is much more to this too, but I will let you read it and discovery the mysteries of the Glade yourself. As I said before, if you are a Lost fan, you should like this. I thought it was pretty good and I am very excited to see if the movie is just as good. I haven't heard anything about it since I saw that trailer, so I am going to assume it sucks.

It's not a full book, but today I finished The Mystery Knight by George RR Martin. This is a prequel to the Song of Ice and Fire series, and the third in a series of "short novels" by the author. It takes place about a hundred years before A Game of Thrones.

These books follow a large hedge knight (meaning he has no allegaince to any particular house, nor a lot of money) named Sir Duncan the Tall, or just Dunk for short, as he travels around Westeros looking for work. He takes on an squire named "Egg" who is really Aegon Targaryen, a young member of the royal family. He shaves his head and pretends he is just a commoner, but really he just wants to get out and see the Seven Kingdoms. He and Dunk have adventures together, and we get to see a little bit of what the Seven Kingdoms were like when the Targaryens were in power.

These books are set in the aftermath of the Blackfyre Rebellion. If you are not too overly familiar with the series, this was a war where the dying king legitamized all his bastards before dying. And this threw the notion of who the rightful king would be into question. People who sided with his eldest bastard were the "black side" of the rebellion. Those who supported the king's trueborn son were red.

The red side won, but it left Westeros in upheaval. People still harbor ill feelings towards those on the other side of the rebellion and tension is everywhere.

In the Mystery Knight, Dunk and Egg head off to take part in a wedding tourney only to get caught up in a secret meeting of the rebellion that people are trying to rekindle. There is a lot more to this story, but I am not going to recap it all.

I thought it was quite good though. In fact - not only this book but the other Dunk and Egg books I have found to be better than expected. It's nice to be able to get a little insight into the history of Westeros. As well as see things unfolding from the persepective of truly "good" characters. Dunk is Ned Stark-like in the way he always does the right and honorable thing. Although he is not as bright as Ned, nor is he highborn. Egg is young and innocent, wanting to see the world from a different perspective. Unlike most highborn people or rulers in this universe, he wants to know and be familiar with the people his family is ruling over.

If you're slightly interested in the Song of Ice and Fire universe, check this series out. They are quick and easy to read. You can finish them in a day or so, depending on how long you sit down to read it. I believe there is a planned 7 entries into this series, although only 3 are out as of now. The first two books, the Hedge Knight and the Sworn Sword have been adapted into graphic novel form as well - so check those out too.

Another book I've recently finished is Star Wars: Honor Among Thieves. I've been reading Star Wars books since I was a kid. Damned if I am going to let anyone pass judgment on me for that though. Many of these books are really good. Really authentic and true to the source material. These aren't poorly written crapfests for people who aren't serious readers (well, some of them are clunkers). They are more like extensions of the movie. Who doesn't want to know what happens with Han and Leia and the like after the movies end? Some of these books also fill in the gaps in between movies.

Which is the case with Honor Among Thieves. In this book, the Rebel feet is still looking for a new home after the battle of Yavin. Han is dispatched to pick up a spy who has critical information regarding the Empire's next move and return her to the fleet. When he goes to pick her up, he finds he doesn't have time to bring her back. The spy, Scarlet Hark, draws him into a race against time to stop a game changing ancient weapon from falling into the Empire's hands. He does so while being chased down by bounty hunters still looking to deliver him to Jabba.

It's a short book, an easy read. Only about 250 pages. I finished it in 2 days. I prefer the books that take place after the movies, just because I like seeing what happens in the post Empire days. But this was good. It wasn't as good as the two books listed above, but I had fun with it. Scarlet Hark is a cool character, and it is nice to see some of the things that happened between movies. The book sets up the Rebel Alliance's discovery of Hoth nicely at the end. It is nothing especially deep or thought provoking, but if you like Star Wars and want to be entertained for a few days, you should read it.

I never read many graphic novels before working at my current job, but the Walking Dead series got me into them. I recently finished the Walking Dead Volume 21: A New Beginning. Most people I know have seen the show but have not read the graphic novels. There are huge differences with small similarities. Some of the characters and settings are the same, but they are basically two separate entities

In the graphic novels, the characters just won a major battle against a group of marauding hooligans (the Saviors) and are finally starting to rebuild civilization. Things are looking good. There are a couple of big towns in existence. Rick is in charge of Alexandria, and recently widowed Maggie is in charge of the Hilltop.

This story is mainly told through the perspective of a new group of survivors, hence the title A New Beginning. This group is taken in to Alexandria and given the tour. All the while they are thinking that it is too good to be true, and that Rick and company must be hiding something. There is a flutter of background activity in this book. Carl wants to leave Alexandria and go take up the weapon making trade at the Hilltop. Negan, the leader of the Saviors is a prisoner in Rick's house and appears to have mellowed out (although you know he is just looking for the perfect opportunity to escape). A member of a scouting party comes back, insisting he has heard zombies talk, which everyone dismisses as nonsense.

But at the end of the book, we discover that there is a new group of asshole survivors out there (this series never seems to run out of them) that disguise themselves as zombies so they can blend in. And then they attack and kill innocent people.

To be continued!

I was thoroughly entertained by this entry in the series. Things flow along seemlessly and the book is just incredibly engaging and easy to read. I didn't want it to end, which unfortunately it did very quickly. The Walking Dead is a great series. I think people underestimate it due to the whole "graphic novel / comic" stigma that people seem to have. This is not dumb. It's not for kids. In many ways it is even better than the show.

Another graphic novel I have recently finished is The Girl Who Played With Fire. I have read the actual novel before, and I thought it was okay. I preferred the first book in the series, and thought the subsequent two were pretty lackluster. However, the graphic novel helped change my opinion a lot.

This version removes everything that is boring about the book, and gets straight to the heart of the matter. And it really is a great story that has so many layers of depth to it. Lisbeth's past is explored and many of the questions that were brought up in the Girl With The Dragon Tattoo are answered here.

The artwork is really great. The story moves along at lightning pace. Anyone who was put off by the second novel in the series should just read the graphic novel. I was thoroughly impressed. Hopefully the Girl Who Kicked The Hornet's Nest will be made into a graphic novel, because I'm invested now and I have a hard time remembering how this series ended. And I would much rather read the graphic novel than go back and read the book again.

One more graphic novel and then we are done. I'm a fan of Doug TenNappel who is a great artist with some very off the wall story ideas. None of his graphic novels resemble anything you've seen before. His ideas are so simplistic and unique, that you get sucked in very quickly to his works.

Ghostopolis and Bad Island are two of his more well known graphic novels. On a whim, I decided to check out Cardboard. I had never heard of it before, but I had yet to be let down by anything he's put out there.

And Cardboard is awesome too. Again, a simple story. A single out of work father can't afford to buy his son a birthday present, so he scrapes together some change and gets him... a cardboard box. The neighborhood kids make fun of the boy for getting such a crappy present, but soon become jealous when they discover that anything made out of this cardboard comes to life.

Before running out of cardboard, the father and son use the remaining scraps to make a "cardboard maker" that comes to life and spits out more magic cardboard. So there is an unlimited supply at their hands. The main neighborhood meanie that we saw earlier in the story steals the carboard maker and makes an army of cardboard villains and monsters that soon get out of control.

So it is up to the boy and his dad to head on over and defeat this army once and for all. Again, a simple story that sounds kinda lame, but it just works. It's very easy to read. The artwork is great. And the characters really drive the story. For kind of a kiddish, cartoony graphic novel, there is a lot of heart here and it shines through as is the case with everything that Doug TenNappel puts out.

That's all for now. Usually I would have a lot more books in my recent memory, but its been busy at work, and Under the Dome took me a while to get through. So that's all I can remember at the moment to talk about. I just started The Hobbit for the second time (I first read it a few years ago). I've now seen all three of the movies, and there are many things from the movies that I don't remember being in the book. So I'm going back and reading the book to compare the two. I'll post about it when I am done reading it.

Okay bye.