I was itching to explore the Dark Tower series again, and while I was listening to the KingCast, a fantastic podcast about Stephen King and films, and their guest was Bev Vincent, and they talked about his book, The Road to the Dark Tower. I hunted it down with a vengeance, and was delighted to…
Category: The Book Shelf
Drug of Choice (1970) – Micheal Crichton
Micheal Crichton writing as his alter-ego John Lange delivers a fast-paced, odd, and occasionally uneven tale with Drug of Choice. I think the biggest problem with the story is that its too short. A number of the sequences could have been expanded on to unnerve the reader and immerse them into the mystery of what…
The Secret of Secrets (2025) – Dan Brown
Dan Brown sends his hero Robert Langdon off on another adventure with his latest novel, The Secret of Secrets. And I’m divided. I like the research and the information Brown is putting forth, it opens up a number of avenues for questions and research, but, the story doesn’t have the same punch and push as…
Artificial Condition (2018) – Martha Wells
Martha Wells delivers another entertaining entry in the Murderbot Diaries with Artificial Condition. Much like the first story, this is only a novella as well and it rips along at warp speed, filled with action beats, laughs, and a small exploration of the worlds that Wells is building. The story picks up shortly after the…
Magpie Murders (2016) – Anthony Horowitz
I’ve always enjoyed Anthony Horowitz’s writing. I dug his young spy novels, the Alex Rider series, and his foray into James Bond territory. But he is not a writer to be confined by genre, and when I came across Magpie Murders in one of the little libraries in a neighbor’s yard, I had to at…
The Trees (2021) – Percival Everett
With two books, Percival Everett has become one of my favorite authors. I loved his take on Jim from The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn in James. And when I read the blurb on The Trees I knew I had to take a look. I didn’t know that I would be blown away by it. Everett…
The Hunt for Red October (1984) – Tom Clancy
I haven’t read this book since the mid-80s when my schoolmate and friend, Michael Hay suggested I might like it. I dug into it, and for awhile there, birthdays or Christmases would bring me the latest Tom Clancy hardcover. I’ve been itching to kind of go back and see I still enjoy the stories, and…
The Maid’s Secret (2025) – Nita Prose
I love checking in with Molly the Maid. After two novels and one novella, I’m quite willing to see where Nita Prose takes the character. So I dug into this one without having read a thing about it. I just wanted to see how Molly, Juan, Mr. Preston, Mr. Snow, Stark, and Angela were doing….
Star Trek: Vulcan’s Heart (1999) – Susan Shwartz, and Josepha Sherman
Vulcan’s Heart is a pretty expansive story, and a good one, even if it felt a little overlong at times. Set in the 2340s, the novel ties in a number of classic episodes into one tale. There is The Enterprise Incident from The Original Series, and The Next Generation episodes Yesterday’s Enterprise and the Unification…
Battlestar Galactica: Warhawk (1998) – Richard Hatch, and Christopher Golden
Richard Hatch’s second installment in the continuation of the original Battlestar Galactica moves a little better than the first one. The characters have been introduced now, but even so, there are few things that happen that makes it feel like the stories are falling back on what has already happened as opposed to taking things…
The Mind Reels 