You’re Not Fooling Anyone When You Take Your Laptop to a Coffee Shop: Scalzi on Writing by John Scalzi My rating: 3 of 5 stars If you are an aspiring writer, Scalzi tells it like it is and gives you a good feeling for what it might be like to be a modern writer. No…

White Sand, Volume 1 by Brandon Sanderson My rating: 3 of 5 stars It’s very odd reading a Sanderson comic rather than a prose book. So much of what’s great in his books involves the background information and the inner monologues of the characters. That said, it is neat to see a visual representation of…

Neon Noir: A Delilah Street Paranormal Investigator Anthology by Carole Nelson Douglas My rating: 1 of 5 stars This book might be for you. It was most assuredly not for me. The world was OK, but three things kept me from enjoying it: – The reveals or answers to the cases seemed to come out…

The Way of Kings by Brandon Sanderson My rating: 4 of 5 stars I want to start off by thanking Tor.com for being DRM-free. It’s great to see a major publisher doing this. With that out of the way, this was a massive story. It’s quite a different pace from everything I’ve read so far…

The Complete Cook’s Country Magazine 2017 by America’s Test Kitchen My rating: 4 of 5 stars Halfway through 2017 the magazine underwent a visual revamp to modernize the look. I think it works fairly well. What I continue to enjoy about Cook’s Country is the back half which is both educational and contains tailored sections…

Mega Man 3 by Salvatore Pane My rating: 4 of 5 stars As usual for this series, it’s a combination of a history of the game covered and an autobiography of author. Although I never played Megaman 3 (or played very little of it) I did own Megaman 2 and so it was great that…

Ready Player One by Ernest Cline My rating: 2 of 5 stars When it comes to my experience of this book, there are a few things that marred my enjoyment. When I first heard of it and didn’t know all the info about it I did by the time I actually read it, it sounded…

The Complete Cook’s Country Magazine 2016 by America’s Test Kitchen My rating: 4 of 5 stars I’ve already made some recipes from this collection of all the 2016 issues. As usual, the test kitchen rocks. The few I didn’t like were recipes where I was challenging my tastes. The learning, 5 ways, dinner for two,…

Mistborn Adventure Game by Brandon Sanderson My rating: 3 of 5 stars I’m not a dice RPG gamer, but I did want to read the short story in here – “The 11th Metal”. It’s a prequel for the first book of the first Mistborn trilogy. That said, it’s definitely best not to read before having…

The Hero of Ages by Brandon Sanderson My rating: 4 of 5 stars I cannot believe how well Sanderson made this entire trilogy fit together. Each book was amazingly plotted and, as a whole, the trilogy is so well put together. No part of the trilogy was wasted and each detail Sanderson provided was vital…

The Plot to Hack America: How Putin’s Cyberspies and WikiLeaks Tried to Steal the 2016 Election by Malcolm Nance My rating: 3 of 5 stars The biggest weakness this book has is that the author was in a hurry to get it out before the elections were over because he assumed Americans make decisions based…

The Witch of Portobello by Paulo Coelho My rating: 4 of 5 stars I like to avoid spoilers wherever possible, I even stay away from reviews and trailers for most movies and books. But in the last few years I’ve come to the conclusion that (with the exception of detective stories and murder mysteries) if…

Best Mexican Recipes by America’s Test Kitchen My rating: 4 of 5 stars Once again, a great cooking tome by America’s Test Kitchen. Opens by explaining the Mexican pantry. Then recipes that are well-structured with great explanations. So far I’ve made one recipe and the family loved it. I can’t wait for it to warm…

Caliban’s War by James S.A. Corey My rating: 4 of 5 stars I read this book in 10 min – 1 hour chunks so maybe I missed something. But who the (expletive) is Caliban and why was this his war? (If it’s a spoiler don’t tell me. If it was (view spoiler)[ Nguyen’s (hide spoiler)]…

Beyond Lies the Wub by Philip K. Dick My rating: 3 of 5 stars As expected from a Philip K Dick book, that was trippy. Talky in the style of golden and silver age science fiction, but I have a fondness for the style as some of my first science fiction exposure was in that…