The Tentacled Monkey

On Saturday I finished the vastly popular Pride Prejudice and Zombies from Quirk Press. The basic premise is that of a Victorian England story of misunderstood love that everyone is familiar with thanks to the forced reading of the novel in high school and from the excellent BBC productions that have been produced over the years. There is one major difference however, the addition of a strange plague that has afflicted England’s corpses reanimating them into the “unmentionables” (zombies) “denizens of Satan” with a penchant for brains.

At first, I wasn’t too sure about this book and therefore left it alone for the better part of a year, but my resolve and curiosity finally gave way and it was added to the Queue. This was a really fun book to read and honestly was hard to put down. It was fun and funny and really kept me interested even though I knew the main plotline almost as well as the back of my right hand.

It is campy with lots of innuendos about England’s “balls” and I was happy to see Mr. and Mrs. Bennett still are the primary humor for the story. I won’t go into the prime differences as they are far too numerous to list. But just know that if you LOVE the original you likely won’t enjoy this version. But, for those of us that are casual fans or totally unfamiliar with the story it will be a really funny read. I can say that reading this has actually made me want to read the original because you realize how very good it really is. So I give it 4 out of 5 stars.

Now for the next on the reading list is Poison Sleep by T.A. Pratt, book 2 of the Marla  Mason  series, I’m already about half-way through so another post on it should follow this week.

This means that I am still on tract for the 45 books this year. Yippee to me, prematurely at least.

MurfMan Books, SciFi 45 Books, Books, review, TA Pratt, zombies

So Sunday morning I finally finished Charles Stross’s Singularity Sky, a science fiction novel centered around the event and aftermath of a “type 3 singularity,” a technological singularity, occurring on a distant planet under a feudal government. The premise is that a backwater feudal government and pre-industrial society under heavy censorship and an informational chokehold is thrust into an open information galactic network hub, essentially becoming the equivalent of a giant PBX switch in space. The flood of information to and from the purported attackers, known as The Festival, exchanges local information for basically anything the person wants.

This book took me a long time to get through, from no fault of its own, and honestly the first half is somewhat slow. But the second half is excellent. and while this is not my favorite book as a whole, that still belongs to the excellent Culture series, this is still a brilliant piece on a subject with which Mr. Stross is always good at, a singularity. The premise is very interesting but the story doesn’t really grab you and hold you until the later half when things turn more exciting. All in all it is a good sci-fi novel and worth reading, and it’s evident sequel Iron Sunrise will definitely be on the list of to- read items very soon.

So next on my to-read list is the humorous Pride Prejudice and Zombies by Jane Austen and  Seth Grahame-Smith. So far I’m about a third of the way through its campy humor and zombie vanquishing Victorian ladies.

On a personal note my wife is ready to pop with my second child, her third, and therefore posting, and reading have been slow. I will post pics as soon as it happens.

MurfMan Books, Personal Charles Stross, Eschaton, review, SciFi, singularity

So I just finished First Lord’s Fury, the sixth and final book in the Codex Alera series by Jim Butcher. This book held a lot of meaning for me and others that are fans of Mr. Butcher’s other excellent series, The Dresden Files. The reason is this, Butcher has never wrote an ending until now. Sure he has written about seventeen books total, some very successful, but he has never ended a series. So this book held the expectations of all of his fans, and might I add that he delivered in spades.

Without spoiling too much, the entire book is a war against the Vord as introduced in the first novel and expanded upon in later ones. Character progression is great, the plot has enough twists and turns to keep you interested. To put it bluntly, it was an awesome read and a worthy finale to an excellent series.

Also finished last night was Use of Weapons by the man quickly becoming my favorite sci-fi author, Scotsman Iain M. Banks. This is another of The Culture series and follows a mercenary named Chernadine Zakalwe in a double story, one set in the past, one current. The theory here is that since The Culture is basically against violence, they find highly capable military professionals to work on their behalf. Zakalwe is one of these recruits, a veritable genius of military action used on countless worlds by The Culture. The story follows his exploits, but is truly about his hidden demons.

This is another shining example of Mr. Bank’s shear superiority of, not just the space opera, but of just damn good story-telling to boot. This is another must read for sci-fi fans out there.

So, next on the reading list is Singularity Sky by Charles Stross. This is a book that I have been meaning to read for a year now, and well no time like the present I suppose.

MurfMan Books, SciFi Charles Stross, Codex Alera, Culture, Iain Banks, Jim Butcher, review, SciFi

So yesterday I received my first phone upgrade in almost 2 years, Verizon’s new Motorola Droid. So far there really are only two things that I can say negative about it.

1. The antenna is noticeably weaker than it was in my Blackberry 8830. However, the 8830 has the best cellular antenna on any phone I have ever seen so it wasn’t a surpise to me.

2. The keyboard is just slightly smaller than I would have liked. But again, it is huge in comparrison to the minute keyboard on the 8830. In fact this post was placed using the Droid.

The email app also doesn’t seem to support rulesets, but again this isn’t a huge issue.

The good attributes are simply too long to list. The screen is amazing! And video plays with seemingly HD quality. The unit is very responsive and I am generally in love with it.

I cannot as of yet give an accurate account of battery life as today is the first day of a full charge, but I will let you know later.

Pics follow, sorry for their quality. I only had access to a camera phone.

MurfMan Geek, Tech cellphone, droid, Geek, review, Tech

My review

rating: 4 of 5 stars
This was an interesting twist on the common urban fantasy story. I will be looking forward to further books in this series! I really liked the Norse connection here, being a big fan of Norse mythology and Rune lore in general this was a very enjoyable romp through a modern re-visioning of of Norse gods and monsters.

View all my reviews.

This was made using the GoodReads Review widget that will export to HMTL. I like it since it has the image link and everything in it already.

MurfMan Books, SciFi Books, Norse, review, SciFi, Urban Fantasy

What follows is a list of articles and reviews to show why Twilight is a worthless piece of crap.

I was going to look for more but seriously, after that last review my job is done. She paints a picture of Twilight as some Mormon hypnosis book that will train young girls to “act as they’re supposed to.” Oh, and she completely trashes the novel. Did I mention it was a bad fucking book, full of shallow unrealistic characters, a Mary-Sue for fuck’s sake, and even introduces the villain 5 chapters from the end? It sucks too, not sure if anyone got that yet.

But now I am going to digress. The best part of doing a little bit of research is that all of these posts have some of the best comments known to the interweb. Seriously enjoy.

• http://www.thatguywiththeglasses.com/component/content/article/54/1703 – this GIRL calls it like is and labels Bella as a ‘Mary Sue’.
• http://fricknits.typepad.com/fricknits/2008/06/10-things-i-hate-about-twilight.html
• http://blogs.usaweekend.com/whos_news/2009/02/exclusive-steph.html – The interview with Stephen King where he admits that Meyer “can’t write worth a darn.”
• http://morgandempsey.wordpress.com/2008/02/25/book-review-twilight/ – This guy likes The Dresden Files but hates Twilight.
• http://duncanheights.com/blog/?p=1582 – “PS: Edward sparkles. Literally. He literally sparkles in the sun. As if he wasn’t perfect enough without looking like a walking diamond.”
• http://www.hereticalideas.com/2008/10/book-review-twilight/ — “Meyer’s writing style reminds me of what would happen if a Harlequin Romance was mashed with the Flowers in the Attic series.” This is a brutal review, I love it!

MurfMan Books, News, Personal, SciFi Books, funny, review, Twilight Sucks

In 1976 David Bowie was in the midst of his “Berlin-era” and had released Station, Station a dark pre-amble to the Berlin music scene and krautrock of the early 80’s. He was known as “The Thin White Duke” and Thomas Jerome Newton, the character he portrayed in The Man Who Fell To Earth was but an extension of that persona. In essence, a humanoid alien in disguise, rich and utterly alone. How far away is that from the image of “The Duke” himself just a few years after Ziggy Stardust flourished?

Bowie in this movie lets us into more of himself as an artist than he did in most of his music up to this point. It is not an especially poignant movie, and is somewhat slow and drawn out, but Bowie really does deliver on character. And seriously who hasn’t thought of David Bowie as an alien at some point anyway?

The story follows Thomas Jerome Newton, played by David Bowie, as a humanoid alien who is on Earth searching for water for his dying planet. Newton starts a multi-billion dollar technology company in an effort to raise enough money to build a ship to send him back home. Unfortunately he didn’t account for the back-stabbing cut-throat nature of American business.

All in all, this is an interesting movie to watch and should provide a change in the flavor of most sci-fi aficionados’ queue. Fair warning however, the book upon which this is based of the same name by Walter Tevis is notably different and really should not be compared to one another.

I enjoyed this movie and would recommend it to other sci-fi guys out there who are tired of the current trend of sci-fi action.

Some things to watch out for though:

1. Rip Torn’s penis
2. Bowie’s penis
3. lots of 70’s full frontal nudity

Bowie’s character’s true face:

The original trailer:

MurfMan Books, Movies, SciFi David Bowie, Movies, review, SciFi

Jonathon Frakes and Patrick Stewart at the Captains Summit

Paramount have put together a boxed set (available May 12, 2009) of the first six Star Trek movies that comes together with a special bonus disc, The Captains Summit.

The Captains Summit documents the first time in Star Trek history that four stars who at some point have played Captains in Star Trek (William Shatner, Patrick Stewart, Leonard Nimoy, Jonathon Frakes) have been brought together for a  70-minute rare and unprecedented round table event.

Whoopi Golderberg, star of Star Trek: The Next Generation, hosts the event as the four Captains share their Trek insights, talk about humorous moments and provide intimate details about their lives on and off set.

Watch the following excerpt:

You can check out the boxed set at Amazon by clicking the image below:

Star Trek 1-6 Plus Special ‘Captains Summit’ Disc.

<from SciFiScoop.com>

MurfMan Movies, SciFi Movies, review, Shatner, Star Trek

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I swear I am not trying to rain hell down on comic book movie adaptations. Really I’m not. And this new Punisher movie with Ray Stevenson as Frank Castle has been one of the most anticipated viewings on my list. I mean this had Titus Pullo in it for fuck’s sake! But alas, it was not to be. Stevenson does a fine job in which he barely speaks, likely trying to hide his British accent, but hey The Punisher isn’t known for his witty repartee. No, he’s known for kicking some serious ass, which Ray Stevenson does in spades.

No the problem is the villain. Dominic West was brought in to play the gangster Billy Russotti, ok fighting gangsters so long as they’re fighting i suppose. But then they actually attempted to turn Russotti into the Jigsaw. What the fuck? The result is a bad mix between Jack Nicholson as the Joker in Batman and a second rate demon from a Hellraiser movie.

Now think back like five years ago. Thomas Jane was Frank Castle in The Punisher and it was OK, you know? Ray Stevenson would have begun filing Rome at about this time as well. Can you believe that The Thomas Jane version would have been the better movie? The one with Travolta in it?!?

Yeah scary thought isn’t it.

MurfMan Comics, Movies Movies, Punisher, review

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Maybe it was just me, but I could hardly stand to watch this show, even with such starlets as Scarlet Johansson an Eva Mendes. I was a really disappointing ride through a pretty decent graphic novel from Frank Miller. I thin that due to the success of Sin City and 300 that Mr. Miller might have assumed an instant hit. The truth is that this is not a comic that should have been translated to film to begin with.

Mr. Miller has managed to run through his more popular pre-existing work as part his earlier films. And The Spirit marked his first screenplay adaptation from Will Eisner’s original comic. I honestly hope that Mr. Miller gets better at this than reflected in The Spirit, else he fall to the curb as another brilliant but burned out two-timer.

MurfMan Art, Comics, Movies, Personal Comics, Frank Miller, Movies, review, The Spirit