Customer Comments

emmejo has commented on (298) products.

Seven Deadly Sins (Star Trek) by Margaret Clark

emmejo, May 8, 2013

This is an interesting short story collection, each story centering around a particular Star Trek race and a biblical sin. I enjoyed all the stories, Britta Burdett Dennison's "Freedom Angst" was the only one I really felt was weak, and it was still an interesting idea despite the awkward execution.

My favorite stories were:

"Revenant" by Marc D. Giller, which creates an almost gothic claustrophobic creepiness, well suited to the title and the Borg.

Keith R.A. DeCandido has written a number of very good Klingon tales, and although this one, "The Unhappy Ones", is set in a very different time than his post-DS9 stories, he makes solid use of source material and his own invention to make an entertaining, moving historical-feeling tale.

I've always found the Cardassians a fascinating race, and the political and moral morass of their military is explored in James Swallow's "The Slow Knife."

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Tarnished: The St. Croix Chronicles by Karina Cooper

emmejo, May 2, 2013

On the surface Cherry St. Croix looks like any other wealthy young lady, but the truth is that she is working as a bounty hunter to earn money for the drugs she has been addicted to for years. Keeping her two lives separated becomes even more difficult when she takes a job catching a murderer who has been killing girls and harvesting their organs. She ends up tangled with scientists, prostitutes, circus acts, and two attractive and dangerous men, one from her public, courtly world and the other from the criminal, supernatural places her job takes her.

This is a steampunky mystery crossed with a paranormal romance. That's a lot of ground to cover and it quickly becomes clear the author ended up with more than she could handle. The plot staggers and becomes obstructed by hoards of needless, distracting little sub-plots as the pacing leaps about, unable to keep steady enough to keep you engaged and collapsing towards the end into a sad hodgepodge.

The characters are all fairly stock, with few attributes that are unexpected enough to make you wonder what they will do. Cherry is an odd assortment of traits that don't always come off as convincing and she never seems as smart as she should be for her line of work. Both love interests are essentially pretty cardboard standups and about as useful and engaging.

So why did I rate this fairly high? The worldbuilding was nicely done, and I'm a sucker for a good fantasy world. Most steampunk is either all noble-hearted lords and ladies or glammed up streetwalkers and thieves. It's rare to find a story the features an actual contrast between classes and does a good job explaining how and why that gap is maintained. The tech and science were used sparingly, a personal disappointment as I like my sci-fi on the harder side, but when used they were used well. Cooper also has a gift for creating tone and the feel of the locations she sends the characters into.

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The Well of Loneliness: A 1920s Classic of Lesbian Fiction by Radclyffe Hall

emmejo, May 2, 2013

I've held off on writing a review for this book because I wasn't sure what I wanted to say. It is a fascinating, captivation portrait of a young woman out of step with her societies' picture of who she should be. It starts with her as the admittedly spoiled child of wealthy parents and continues on through the numerous trails she ends up facing due to her stubborn unwillingness to give up and pretend to conform. Stephen isn't always a likable character, she has too many sharp edges and too much pride and inflexibility which are as likely to hurt those she loves as it is to harm her, but she is compelling and interesting.

Hall's writing is as straight-shooting and passionate as her main character, ignoring the expectation that classic woman's book about a woman with romantic complications should be clever or light. This is the opposite of a Jane Austen-style book. It may be too harsh and desolate, with too few laughs or happy interludes for some readers, but if you like your classics with some grit to them, I would highly recommend this tale.

It might also appeal to Downton Abbey fans who are looking for a more somber rendition of the same time period.

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Star Trek: Dti: Forgotten History (Star Trek) by Christopher L Bennett

emmejo, April 30, 2013

The Department of Temporal Investigations is examining a strange space anomaly, with an even stranger ship trapped in inside. It looks to be made of parts of the Enterprise captained by Kirk, other ships from that time period and alien technology. The name on its hull is DTI Timeship Two. As far as anyone seems to know, DTI never had any thing called a timeship. This impossibility results in a investigation that will mean digging into the past of the Department and its founding members as well as looking for information on DTI's most infamous time-law breaker: Captain Kirk himself.

This book is definitely targeted to the hard-core fan and is jam-packed with references from every series and many of the less cannon novels, comics and games. If you look at the acknowledgments, you can see how painstakingly researched this book was. Bennett goes to far as to source his description and design of the timeship's service corridors. (Based on the ones seen in the ST:Enterprise episode "In a Mirror, Darkly" if you were wondering.) For the detail oriented fan, it makes it a treasure trove of trivia.

Bennett's writing is light and easy to read, although the techno-babble may bog down some reader. I enjoyed some of the quips that nearly broke the forth wall, such as the engineer discussing the design of the found ship and saying "The warp engines are a design from the sixties--sorry, twenty-two sixties."

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Tarnsman of Gor :Gor 1 Foster Cover by John Norman

emmejo, April 25, 2013

While on a camping trip, Tarn Cabot finds a metal envelope from his long-lost father. Soon he is whisked to another world, Gor, where he begins a new life as a warrior. When a campaign against a neighboring city goes drastically wrong, he struggles through a series of unlucky events, trying to recover his new life and the beautiful women he has fallen in love with.

This book is pretty standard-issue '60's "barbarian fantasy". It doesn't really do anything particularly noteworthy. The writing style is the popular overwritten and descriptive type that is seen often. Most of the characters are fairly stock and frequently lack much motivation for their actions. Yet it is still an entertaining and compelling read.

One thing some people may have issues with is the highly submissive ladies in this tale. Some of it is clearly interest in BDSM-type relationships (particularly in Talena's case, where she frequently initiates roleplay-like scenarios complete with costumes and bondage suggestions), some just seems to have been easy-to-write wish-fullfillment.

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