Feed Your Interest

this is late going up.
which should not be a surprise to anybody:

20/12 - Sunday - 11am - 4pm for your shopping pleasure
21/12 - Monday - 10am - 6pm
22/12 - Tuesday - 10am - 6pm
23/12 - Wednesday - 10am - 6pm
24/12 - Thursday - 10am - 4pm for your last minute shopping
25/12 - Christmas Day! - Closed for present hunting
26/12 - Boxing Day - 11am - 4pm
27/12 - Sunday - Closed as per normal
28/12 - Monday - 11am - 5pm
29/12 - Tuesday - 11am - 5pm
30/12 - Wednesday - 11am - 5pm
31/12 - New Year’s Eve - Closed for our drinking pleasures
1/1 - New Year Day - Closed for hang-over issues
2/1 - 10/1 - Beginning of the New Year - Gone Nessie Fishing
11/1 - Monday - Back to Normal Hours

Also, I came up with a little ditty for Twilight. It was done purely to annoy a friend, but now I’m very proud of it.

Jingle Bells, Edward Smells
Jacob’s more like prey.
Bella must have zero pride
Their crap we just can’t abide!

We’ve gotten a fair few deliveries recently…

Here’s some of them!

Shadow Queen
This is the latest book set in the Black Jewels world. It doesn’t have the pure brilliance of the original trilogy, but fans of the Black Jewels will find this to be book to be devoured!

From Dead to Worse - Sookie Stackhouse!
The next book in this well-deserving-of-multiple-reads series!
If you did ever want the full box set of most (it doesn’t have the most recent one or two) of the series, make sure you let us know because we can get that for you too!

The Hidden City
Yes, I’ve already mentioned this. But it is well worth mentioning again because it is a really really really good fantasy novel that I will happily recommend to all.
It is *not* a fast paced book. But let’s face it, a lot of the time, the more recent “fast-paced” books have been pretty shitty because “fast paced” is all that they have going for it.
*THIS* book, regardless of what you might think about the pacing, is good.

Outcast: Fate of the Jedi #1
This is the first book in the new Star Wars novel series: Fate of the Jedi.
It chronicles the events after Jacen had died (whoops spoiler alert), and the mis-trust that the Republic begins to feel for the Jedi…
(Yes, I can see some of you thinking: again!?)

Undead on Arrival This is L.A. Banks’ latest book in her Crimson Moon series.

Ruby Dice by Catherine Asaro

When the Tide Rises by David Drake

Storm from the Shadows by David Weber
The latest book by Weber (and one of 3 to be released this year if the rumours are to be believed), this is the next book in the Saganami Isles series!

Have you guys met Kitty?

She’s a radio DJ who has accidentally, “kinda”, revealed to all of the listeners of her midnight program that there is an entire community of werewolves (and other creatures that go bump in the night) living amongst them.

Kitty & the Midnight Hour is the first of this great series. For any fans of Kim Harrison or Charlaine Harris, this series by Carrie Vaughn is well worth picking up!

In case you’ve already been reading this series, then you’d be pleased to know that we’ve got the latest two books on hand at the moment!
Kitty & the Dead Man’s Hand, which takes place in sunny Las Vegas (not that much of the action take place in the day time at all…), and Kitty Raises Hell which attempts to prove (successfully, I might add) that what happens in Vegas doesn’t always stay in Vegas!

Well worth reading!

We’ve also got other books (delivery of 6 boxes!), but it’s Michelle Sagara’s Hidden City that I’m very excited about!

I read it in hardcover and it was absolutely freaking awesomely fantastic!
And now its in paperback and everybody else can get it and enjoy it too!!!

Come on in and pick up a copy when you can

This is what I’ve been distracted by recently. (Amongst other things.)
The Accord by Keith Brooke had a cover recommendation by Peter Hamilton (of Dreaming Void fame). Since I can’t remember ever having seen a cover recommendation by Hamilton before (I’m sure others can prove me to have a bad memory), it immediately caught my eye.

And the book is good.
It is an interesting idea. Well, it’s an old idea, with a different sort of a twist to it. The concept of immortality through digitization has been around for a while. Morgan’s Altered Carbon (yes, I know it is still lacking an image and a description. yes, I intend to get on to it. eventually…) was the most recent that I really loved.
Anyway, here, the Accord is Brooke’s style of immortality. It is a warehoused copy of a person. Upon the person’s death, his most recent warehoused copy is uploaded into the Accord. In effect, the Accord is where people go after they die… It is a man-made heaven, but accessible to all who can pay for a warehousing service, as opposed to those who have (or don’t have) a religious bent.

The Accord is interesting. It is named such as the scenery that the people in it see, the rules, the occupations, are all the result of the majority subconscious vote. So to a large degree, because people have pre-conceived perceptions of what their life is like, it will continue in a similar fashion in the Accord.
But at the same time, for those who have longed to be something different in live, the Accord will allow them to do so as long as the majority of the subconscious-es don’t mind…
And of course, since everybody has the perception that the afterlife is a place where people can’t die… There is immortality for all…

All that having been said, there is the actual story that I’ve yet to cover.
Basically, the creator of the Accord (if it can ever be traced to one person) is a gentleman by the name of Noah… He has indulged in an affair with the wife of an extremely possessive politician. The possessiveness leads to a murder, and Noah and Priscilla find themselves dead (alive?) in the Accord. And still being chased by the man who killed them, as his jealousy and anger knows no bounds.

The tale is told in a measured pace from multiple PoVs. Don’t expect Hamilton style action and speed. It’s not stupidly slow like Dune either. The pacing is really just right for Brooke’s style of story-writing.

The political wrangling, the techy discussions and explorations are well done, blend in with the rest of the tale and add to the overall atmosphere.

It is a book well worth reading!

Yes!

We did get our deliveries!
Gotten several gazillion over a fairly short period of time, to be honest. But our shelves are full again, and now with NEW books!

Click here to view our Feb catalogue (yes the March one is slightly over due).

Some of the more interesting stuff that have come in though…
Bone Crossed
The new Mercy Thompson book by the ever awesome Patricia Briggs.

Undone
It’s a new series by Rachel Caine that is set in her world of the Weather Wardens. If its anything like those, its going to be chock full of magic, adventure, sarcasm and pure unadulterated fun.

Accord
I’m reading this at the moment, and I am really REALLY enjoying how Keith Brook writes… I’ll say a bit more about it once I’ve actually finished.

Shadow Queen
This is another book set in the world of the Black Jewels and part of the reason why I’ve yet to finish reading Accord… Switching between two books is distracting…

There are some new stuff arriving in March, and we’ll get the new March books up Soon™.
In the mean time… Check out these Feb stuff!

If you can live forever…
If you HAVE lived forever…
You’ve done everything that is possible under the sun…
You have gained the skills and the abilities to be able to learn and do anything new that might eventually appear under the sun…
If you have the power such that you can magically do everything you ever wish you could do…

Then what will you do next…?

In Cayal the Immortal Prince’s case… He chose to die.
But as you can imagine. It isn’t that easy for an Immortal to die…

Jennifer Fallon is a top rate Australian author. She’s always had a different style of fantasy writing, and now her skill and her story telling are truly blooming and are showcased here in her latest series: The Tide Lords.

Comprising of four books, The Immortal Prince; The Gods of Amyrantha; The Palace of Impossible Dreams; and The Chaos Crystal, the Tide Lords have long been in hiding as the magical Tide that grants them their powers has been out. So long they have been in hiding, that the humans treat them as myths, and the only people that still remember and believe in them are the half-human slaves that were created for the sole purpose of serving the Tide Lords all those ages ago…

But now as the Tide returns, deeper and more powerful than it ever has in the past, the Tide Lords start to stir from their shadows, beginning to scheme and to plot to place themselves at the head of humanity again, and in position to rule the world of Amyrantha all over again.

And in their glee and desire to conquer all, they will turn their collective sights against Cayal… For he seeks a way to die. And if his mortality is rendered true, then the rest of the Tide Lords too, can die, and they have no desire to ever be able to do so…

If you haven’t realise yet… THIS IS WELL WORTH READING!!!

So, for some strange reason, the website is lacking covers and descriptions for both Altered Carbon and Broken Angels. Clearly I should fix that relatively soon.

I’ve just finished re-reading Broken Angels. I’m kinda starting in the middle of the story here (Altered Carbon is the first), but given that each book is fairly well self-contained, there’s nothing significant that I’m giving away. Well, apart from the fact that Takeshi Kovacs survived the events of the first book. Which tends to be something you’d expect when the first book is subtitled “Takeshi Kovacs Book 1″.

One thing I’ve really come to enjoy about Richard Morgan’s sci-fi books is his social commentary. It’s a different take that a lot of sci-fi authors don’t necessarily go into. There are a few others that might, but they don’t do a good job of it. it comes across as a lecture. Or a disjointed, jarring hitch in an otherwise acceptable read.
With Morgan, it is a smooth relevant insertion into a paced novel that enhances the tale and sets you to thinking after the book is done.

In Broken Angels, Kovacs is a mercenary soldier fighting to overthrow a rebellion on a little planet miles away from anywhere. Somewhere along the line, he is offered a chance to grapple with a bit of Martian technology. If he takes the chance, if it pays off, he’d be able to buy his war out of the way, and to get himself hypercasted to a different planet that isn’t at war and sleeved into a much more comfortable body that hasn’t been plastered by little bits of shrapnel over and over, repaired by not-so-comforting doctors, and then sent back out into the dirty little battle field…

(For those of you who are going “what the hell are hypercasting and sleeving!?” Morgan’s universe is set in a time when human consciousness can be digitized and downloaded into a little container known as the cortical stack. Thus a person can have ever lasting life as long as they have the funds to transfer their consciousness from one body to another - now known as sleeves - and also to have their consciousness transferred - aka hypercast - across space to a new body in a new place…)

Along the way to get this little possible bit of Martian technology (yes, there were Martians in Morgan’s universe. no, they don’t seem to be around anymore. yes, people will pay big bucks for Martian technology), he will encounter a multitude of problems, including corporations that have a conflict investment portfolio, smart evolving nanobots that have an extremely short life of 4 days, a man of voodoo, radioactive fall out, and of course… Martian technology.

If you’re wondering about the psychological conditioning… Well, Kovacs was an Envoy… An Envoy is the UN Protectorate’s bug bear. They are the elite soldiers that are sent out to troublesome worlds to put down problems and to maintain the status quo. They aren’t elite due to powerful weapons or tactical genius… Those are easily accomplished by having enough money or AI. They are elite due to their psychological conditioning. They think faster, they intuit faster, they control their emotions better, they understand better… The Envoys were what convinced humanity that mind trumped all matter. And it scared the crap out of them.

My description has been a little bit more focused (ok, a lot more) on the events of Broken Angels…
If I were to focus a bit more on Morgan’s books as a whole…
I’d say that the Takeshi Kovacs books are noir-style cyberpunk at its peak of brilliance. That his story telling is superb, his action is visceral, his points are well made, and that Quellcrist Falconer seems like an awesome person I would have liked to meet…
You’ll just have to read the three books if you’d like to find out a bit more about Quellcrist…

His three Takeshi Kovacs books are highly recommended. Highly highly recommended.

The difference between virtuality and life is very simple. In a construct you know everything is being run by an all-powerful machine. Reality doesn’t offer this assurance, so it’s very easy to develop the mistaken impression that you’re in control.
– Quellcrist Falconer

So. Who plays World of Warcraft? Or at least heard of it?

Might be faster to ask who hasn’t heard of it.

Regardless, where we come in, is the fact that there is tons and tons and tons of lore that stretches from when the orcs first met the humans, all the way to know when the Alliance and the Horde have travelled in an uneasy truce to Northrend to meet the Lich King…

STILL sounds like gobblydekook to you?

Let’s put it this way…
If you play the game, you should *absolutely* read these background stories. It’d tell you about how the Dark Portal came to be. About the Dragon Aspects and the reasons for their existence. All in a much much richer and more imaginative manner than the game could ever do…

The basic story here is… “We’ve got Warcraft!”.

Tides of Darkness
This recounts the story that was told in the game “Warcraft II” (aka WC2).
While Beyond the Dark Portal tells the story of the expansion to WC2.
There is a fair amount of stuff here, including how the Outland became the shattered piece of living rock that it is at the moment, and it also puts into perspectives the reasons for why the Alliance are “mildly” upset with the Horde…
bear in mind that the Horde as it currently stands, has been around for a lot shorter of time than the Alliance, and you know what they say about people with long memories…

War of the Ancients
This is an omnibus containing the complete trilogy of the War of the Ancients. I’d say that it takes place after the events of WC3 and the battle for mt hyjal… But that’s a lie because it doesn’t really take place then. It starts off *after* that at least, but it doesn’t really take place then.
This is an awesome look at the Dragon Aspects as they were millennia ago. More importantly, this talks about the first invasion of the Burning Legion, the sundering that shook the high elves such that they were never recover again, and the events leading up to Queen Azshara’s change in “policies”…
Ever wondered how the naga came about and why they do what they do? Read this.

Warcraft Archive
I think this was the first omnibus of warcraft books.
Contained within are

• Day of the Dragon - in which Rhonin (yes of Kirin Tor fame) enters Khaz Modan to seek the truth behind the Red Dragonflight’s change in loyalties…
• Lord of the Clans - After the events of Thrall’s escape from Durnhold Keep, and before the prolog of WC3, what exactly had Thrall been doing…? This shows how he came into his shamanistic powers, and more importantly, the events that drove him and shape him so that he is now the leader of the Horde!
• The Last Guardian - Everybody who has played BC knows about Karazhan… For those of you who haven’t, it was the home place of Medivh, the Last Guardian of Azeroth. Charged with great magical powers to protect Azeroth from the Burning Legiong, Medivh’s life was played out as a tragedy, culminating in a betrayal of all he and his line stood for. if you’ve ever wondered about the original tenant of Karazhan, and why his name is spoken in such hushed whispers of fear and awe, this is the way to go
• Of Blood & Honor - (Yes, I know it’s spelled with a “u”.) Tirion Fordring, who has made such a large reappearance in Wrath of the Lich King, wasn’t always a paladin that understood that life doesn’t lie in absolute black and white. Once every bit as ardent and fanatical as the rest of his brethren, his perceptions of good and evil were irreversibly altered when he came face to face with the “vile and corrupt” orcs… Yet another book of a major WoW character that is well worth reading

Rise of the Horde
The orcs used to be fairly nice people. Green, maybe even pebbly, and definitely mildly toothy… but as Kermit says “it’s not easy being green!”
Point is, they were the sort of people you might invite over for tea with your grandma as long as your grandma didn’t mind company that comes from a different generation as she is from (believe me, that’s how she felt about your school friends ‘oh my, they are such *nice* boys, but they wear such strange alien and AWFUL clothing!!!’).
Then the Burning Legion and Kil’jaeden came along and corrupted them with fel magic…

Cycle of Hatred
I’ve got this theory (to be fair, it’s not just me, and I definitely wasn’t the first to voice it either) that Jaina & Thrall have something going on. yes, yes, I know, inter-species and all… but hey! if it’s all in the name of better diplomatic relations, why not?
*eh-hem*
Jaina Proudmoore wants peace between the Alliance and the Horde, and the fact is, it is only through her sheer magical power, political deftness and knowledge that the first truce between the two factions was forged, and part of the reason why it continues to this day.
See how it all begins…

Warcraft: The art of the Trading Card Game
Don’t look at me…
I think it’s weird as well to have an art book for the trading card game. it’s a bit like having a brush to brush your toothbrush that brushes your teeth…
but there you go… Blizzard’s making a gazillion million dollars and i’m not.
I imagine collectors will like this…

That said, if you DID want this for your collection, or as a present, let us know ASAP, because we’ll need to order it in for you. No, we don’t charge extra.

Lo’Gosh #1
Some of you have been to Stormwind and met the new King (I hope you have at any rate…). If you’ve ever wondered about why he suddenly went and displaced the gorgeous Katrana Prestor, here’s the beginning of that tale.

So there you go. lots of Warcraft books. As I said before, if you play the games, the books are well worth reading. If you don’t… I’d say War of the Ancients is worth reading simply as an epic fantasy.

happy levelling!

After finishing Temporal Void, I just had to go back and re-read some of Hamilton’s other stuff. Have I mentioned how stunningly-crafted his stories are?
They are filled with epic ensembles of characters that strangely do not blur into one… They maintain very distinct, very unique characters that continue to develop through out the books. And eventually events will bring them all together, leaving you (well, me at least) with this sense of having travelled through the galaxy’s most amazing social revolutions…
After which I realize I’ve just finished another one of Hamilton’s books and now need to wait for him to stop slacking around and to deliver the next…

Fallen Dragon is unique amongst his books thus far as it is a stand-alone. There are no prequels, there are no sequels (yet and not likely ever). While some lament this as being indicative of a lack of his customary depth, I say “hey, at least you don’t have to wait for the next book!”

And the idea that it is lacking in depth and scope is one that is flawed anyway. The events of the book span from Earth to Thallspring. A colonized planet many light-years away, and one that has been the target of the most recent asset realization of the ZB Corporation…

Asset Realization is interesting.
The basic idea is that colonies cost a *lot* of money to get started and to get going. And that doesn’t include the cost of space travel, which in itself is also a very significant amount. It is for this reason that the majority of corporations have actually stopped investing in colonization entirely. It costs a lot, and due to the distances involved, there is no way for the corporations to profitably invest more time and finances to realize a profit. Ultimately, that investment (and the colony’s debt to the corporation) are written off as a loss on the corporation’s books…

Long term, what the corporations do instead, is 10-20 years down the road, when the colony has itself up and running, is self-sustaining and using its own resources to manufacture finished products, it sends its fleet and military forces to the colony, and claim a large portion of those finished products as a portion of its assets.
Since there was no cost to the corporation in creating those products, their spacefleet and military already existed, every single one of those products has a zero manufacturing cost, and all sales of the products are immediately profitable.

The side effect of course, is that in the midst of that realization, they tend to piss off the populance, they tend to wreck economic havoc with the colony planet, and they tend to get innocent people hurt.

The main character is a fairly nice guy by the name of Lawrence Newton who happens to be the squad leader in the military force that is sent into Thallspring to maintain law and order during the realization.

The narration takes a slightly round-about view of events. Showing the events as they are occurring “now” on Earth and on Thallspring, as well as showing the events that led Lawrence to his current occupation and state of mind.
And yes, there *are* other equally interesting characters through the book, not the least being a girl whose DNA has been rewritten to make her more than human, and a guy who is a product of a long line of on-going genetic experiments back on Earth…

It’s one of my favourite books by Hamilton, and I’d whole-heartedly recommend it to any reader of the sci-fi genre.