Ghost Story by Jim Butcher

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

The ending of this story saved it from being 2 stars in my estimation. I’d been telling lots of people that I viewed books 1-6 or 7 as the first arc of The Dresden Files. By the end of those books you’ve met all the main characters (both protagonist and antagonist). Book 7 or 8 until Changes was clearly the second arc. All the chickens were coming home to roost. Each story seemed to be building up on all the chaos that Harry had sewed throughout Chicago and the Never Never. This book can almost be read as an epilogue to the second arc.

Side Jobs by Jim Butcher

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

“Restoration of Faith” - for all Butcher’s disclaimer that this is amateur hour, it still reads rather well. Enjoyable story with a sort of proto-Harry.

“Vignette” - a fun bit of flash fiction. The only thing that felt weird was Bob seeming a bit meaner than usual.

“Something Borrowed” – from My Big Fat Supernatural Wedding - Fun to see the wedding and how things were able to go awry as a consequence of the fight with the Sindhe.

Changes by Jim Butcher

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Changes, the title promises us, and changes we do get. As I was reading the story, I told my wife, I think this is the close of another grand story arc. She’s at about book 6, which I considered the be the first arc where Butcher finally finishes introducing us to the key players in the story.

I half predicted the climactic plot twist, but I couldn’t have predicted where that would lead. I certainly did not predict the end of the book. That said, I wonder if Butcher did it because he’d painted himself into a corner with a previous book and wanted to rid Harry of a certain sword of Damocles hanging above his head.

Lightspeed Magazine, Issue 110, July 2019 by John Joseph Adams

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I was wondering what happened to the novellas in the newer issues - editorial in this issue answers the question - they were taking longer short stories and felt the novella section was redundant.

Science Fiction
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The Null Space conundrum (Violet Allen) - reminds me a lot of the type of story that Charlie Jane Anders would write. Somewhat nonsensical with an irreverent narrator.

Turn Coat by Jim Butcher

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This book combines the two types of Dresden novels into one. It’s both a story concerned with the overarching Dresden plot and a typical detective case. As the back of the book blurb says, this time it’s Morgan (Dresden’s nemesis on the White Council) who “hires” Harry to clear him of murder charges. Doing so brings together plot points from previous books (going as far back as Summer Knight) and gets us to resolve the first climactic part of the story Butcher has been telling over these past 11 novels.

Small Favor by Jim Butcher

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This entry in The Dresden Files was a real page-turner. I couldn’t stop myself from continually telling myself “just one more chapter”. Once the plot kicked off, it was kinetic the whole time. This one was once again departure from the case structure. Instead it’s like a lot of the previous books (except 9) where we’re just dealing with the consequences of all the prior books. We’ve got the fey, the knights of the cross, Marcone and his inner circle, and a couple others that would be a spoiler to mention.

White Night by Jim Butcher

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

This is my favorite Dresden in a while. While it’s still tied up in the overarching story, this one is more of a return to a typical detective story. Murders abound and Harry has to find the killer. Like a proper detective book there a red herrings and bad conclusions as Harry and friends work to try and figure things out. In typical Dresden fashion, there’s an explosive climax (I won’t say if it’s literal or metaphorical).

I can’t believe I’ve been using Linux for 20 years already! I started off with Fedora Core 1 (Yarrow) 20 years ago. It was in this book:

Red Hat Linux and Fedora Unleashed Cover

Boy has the technology come a long way in those 20 years!

One of my earliest desktop screenshots from back then:

Gnome - 20151002

Now one of my more recent desktops:

Threats: What Every Engineer Should Learn From Star Wars by Adam Shostack

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

A reminder that I use the tooltips on GR and 3 stars is “I liked it”

This book doesn’t have nearly as much Star Wars as I was hoping for, but the Star Wars aspect still helps a lot. Let me illustrate what I was expecting and what I got. What I was expecting is for a book that would follow one or more Star Wars movies and discuss the security issues in each scene (if the scene had any); basically like the Star Wars and Philosophy books that the author mentions in the acknowledgments section. What Shostack does instead is use specific moments in Star Wars to illustrate concepts in a a book that reads like a more entertaining version of the CISSP certification study book. That is to say, it’s not dry, but it’s also WAY more technical than you might expect from the title itself. (Or the trailer for the book)

SCIENCE: Ruining Everything Since 1543 by Zach Weinersmith

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I’m a huge fan of Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal, a nerdy web comic (like XKCD, but not stick figures). What elevates this book beyond a simple collection of science-themed SMBC strips is the ending where Weinersmith creates strips from personal anecdotes of various scientists (and a Mythbusters host).

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