John (Nevets)'s bookshelf: all en-US Sat, 14 Jun 2025 20:14:51 -0700 60 John (Nevets)'s bookshelf: all 144 41 /images/layout/goodreads_logo_144.jpg <![CDATA[Richard Stark’s Parker: The Outfit]]> 7961296 152 Darwyn Cooke 1600107621 John (Nevets) 4 4.26 1963 Richard Stark’s Parker: The Outfit
author: Darwyn Cooke
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 4.26
book published: 1963
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2025/06/14
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?]]> 36402034 258 Philip K. Dick John (Nevets) 0 currently-reading 4.16 1968 Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?
author: Philip K. Dick
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 4.16
book published: 1968
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/04/19
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> Blindsight (Firefall, #1) 48484 Two months since the stars fell...

Two months since sixty-five thousand alien objects clenched around the Earth like a luminous fist, screaming to the heavens as the atmosphere burned them to ash. Two months since that moment of brief, bright surveillance by agents unknown.

Two months of silence while a world holds its breath.

Now some half-derelict space probe, sparking fitfully past Neptune’s orbit, hears a whisper from the edge of the solar system: a faint signal sweeping the cosmos like a lighthouse beam. Whatever’s out there isn’t talking to us. It’s talking to some distant star, perhaps. Or perhaps to something closer, something en route.

So who do you send to force introductions on an intelligence with motives unknown, maybe unknowable? Who do you send to meet the alien when the alien doesn’t want to meet?

You send a linguist with multiple personalities, her brain surgically partitioned into separate, sentient processing cores. You send a biologist so radically interfaced with machinery that he sees X-rays and tastes ultrasound, so compromised by grafts and splices he no longer feels his own flesh. You send a pacifist warrior in the faint hope she won’t be needed, and a fainter hope she’ll do any good if she is needed. You send a monster to command them all, an extinct hominid predator once called “vampire,” recalled from the grave with the voodoo of recombinant genetics and the blood of sociopaths. And you send a synthesist – an informational topologist with half his mind gone – as an interface between here and there, a conduit through which the Dead Center might hope to understand the Bleeding Edge.

You send them all to the edge of interstellar space, praying you can trust such freaks and retrofits with the fate of a world. You fear they may be more alien than the thing they’ve been sent to find.

But you’d give anything for that to be true, if you only knew what was waiting for them…]]> 384 Peter Watts 0765312182 John (Nevets) 2 4.01 2006 Blindsight (Firefall, #1)
author: Peter Watts
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 4.01
book published: 2006
rating: 2
read at:
date added: 2024/08/07
shelves:
review:

]]> The Deep Sky 61884842 Yume Kitasei's The Deep Sky is an enthralling sci fi thriller debut about a mission into deep space that begins with a lethal explosion that leaves the survivors questioning the loyalty of the crew.

They left Earth to save humanity. They’ll have to save themselves first.

It is the eve of Earth’s environmental collapse. A single ship carries humanity’s last hope: eighty elite graduates of a competitive program, who will give birth to a generation of children in deep space. But halfway to a distant but livable planet, a lethal bomb kills three of the crew and knocks The Phoenix off course. Asuka, the only surviving witness, is an immediate suspect.

Asuka already felt like an impostor before the explosion. She was the last picked for the mission, she struggled during training back on Earth, and she was chosen to represent Japan, a country she only partly knows as a half-Japanese girl raised in America. But estranged from her mother back home, The Phoenix is all she has left.

With the crew turning on each other, Asuka is determined to find the culprit before they all lose faith in the mission—or worse, the bomber strikes again.

---

Content warnings are available at the author's website (see author bio).]]> 399 Yume Kitasei 1250875331 John (Nevets) 0 to-read 3.66 2023 The Deep Sky
author: Yume Kitasei
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 3.66
book published: 2023
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/06/17
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[A Master of Djinn (Dead Djinn Universe, #1)]]> 52504334 Nebula, Locus, and Alex Award-winner P. Djèlí Clark returns to his popular alternate Cairo universe for his fantasy novel debut, A Master of Djinn

Cairo, 1912: Though Fatma el-Sha’arawi is the youngest woman working for the Ministry of Alchemy, Enchantments and Supernatural Entities, she’s certainly not a rookie, especially after preventing the destruction of the universe last summer.

So when someone murders a secret brotherhood dedicated to one of the most famous men in history, al-Jahiz, Agent Fatma is called onto the case. Al-Jahiz transformed the world 50 years ago when he opened up the veil between the magical and mundane realms, before vanishing into the unknown. This murderer claims to be al-Jahiz, returned to condemn the modern age for its social oppressions. His dangerous magical abilities instigate unrest in the streets of Cairo that threaten to spill over onto the global stage.

Alongside her Ministry colleagues and her clever girlfriend Siti, Agent Fatma must unravel the mystery behind this imposter to restore peace to the city -or face the possibility he could be exactly who he seems…]]> 438 P. Djèlí Clark 1250267676 John (Nevets) 4
I'm trying to review more books, and post them on here this year. This was influanced by the recent loss of a very active reader and reviewer Jenny "Reading Envy" Colvin.]]> 4.01 2021 A Master of Djinn (Dead Djinn Universe, #1)
author: P. Djèlí Clark
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 4.01
book published: 2021
rating: 4
read at: 2022/07/27
date added: 2022/07/28
shelves:
review:
I recently finished listening to the audio book of this. I enjoyed it. I really like the universe, and the world building that went into the story. The characters are enjoyable, but maybe not as deep as other works, but that works in this story as well. The story can be a bit obvious at times, but is still fun and entertaining. The end may be a bit weaker than the journey there, but it still resolved everything. Maybe tied it up a bit too neatly, but hey it's a story not life. I will very much keep an eye on this author, and probably read more in this universe, it is just too much fun not too.

I'm trying to review more books, and post them on here this year. This was influanced by the recent loss of a very active reader and reviewer Jenny "Reading Envy" Colvin.
]]> <![CDATA[Fugitive Telemetry (The Murderbot Diaries, #6)]]> 53205854 No, I didn’t kill the dead human. If I had, I wouldn’t dump the body in the station mall.

When Murderbot discovers a dead body on Preservation Station, it knows it is going to have to assist station security to determine who the body is (was), how they were killed (that should be relatively straightforward, at least), and why (because apparently that matters to a lot of people—who knew?)

Yes, the unthinkable is about to happen: Murderbot must voluntarily speak to humans!

Again!]]> 168 Martha Wells 1250765374 John (Nevets) 4
I will keep reading this series as long is it is being made. But there is not much more to say, Martha Wells just continues to make this great comfort food.

I'm not typically a big review writer, but I was inspired to create this one in memory of an avid reader and reviewer Jenny Colvin.]]> 4.25 2021 Fugitive Telemetry (The Murderbot Diaries, #6)
author: Martha Wells
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 4.25
book published: 2021
rating: 4
read at: 2022/06/16
date added: 2022/06/17
shelves:
review:
I'm not sure this is exactly where I expected the story to continue. Don't get me wrong, I liked it, the story was good, and unlike some of the early novellas in this series, it is fairly episodic. I won't quite say self contained, since it is really helpful to have some background first, but the actual plot is mostly self contained. It also showed some character development for our lead. And shows it both developing new skills, and refining how it works in this environment.

I will keep reading this series as long is it is being made. But there is not much more to say, Martha Wells just continues to make this great comfort food.

I'm not typically a big review writer, but I was inspired to create this one in memory of an avid reader and reviewer Jenny Colvin.
]]> <![CDATA[A Boy and His Dog at the End of the World]]> 40698027
My parents told me how crowded the world used to be, but we were never lonely on our remote island. We had each other, and our dogs.

Then the thief came.

There may be no law left except what you make of it. But if you steal my dog, you can at least expect me to come after you.

Because if we aren't loyal to the things we love, what's the point?]]> 365 C.A. Fletcher 0316449458 John (Nevets) 4
The story itself is much more a traditional young adult natural adventure novel, just set in a world that his been very depopulated. But what I really enjoyed about this story is how it ended up being a story it keeps telling you it is not. The lead character, Griz, narrates the novel, and Griz is a reader. And this is how the author ends up mentioning other P-A stories that obviously influenced this one. I'm a bit surprised that more of the adventuring stories don't also get name checked since like I said they are obviously a big influence as well.

I'm usually a bit vague regarding plots in my reviews, since I don't like to spoil the experience for the future reader. And I'm going to be so in this one is well. Especially since I very much enjoyed going into this fairly cold and just enjoying the ride as Griz went adventuring.

I was inspired to read this book while it was one I had for a while, was also on Jenny (Reading Envy) Colvin's to read pile as well. And since she had just passed, I thought it was appropriate to not only read a few books on that list, but also to write up some reviews, since that was something she was always doing. After finishing this, it also made me a bit sad that she had not gotten around to this one, since what little I know about her, I think she would have very much enjoyed it as well. ]]> 4.11 2019 A Boy and His Dog at the End of the World
author: C.A. Fletcher
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 4.11
book published: 2019
rating: 4
read at: 2022/06/12
date added: 2022/06/14
shelves:
review:
I ended up really enjoying listing to this book. While I'm not a huge fan of the post apocalyptic sub genre, especially in literature, as with most art quality will overcome much. It seems the author, is more of a fan of this type of story then me, and does allude to this in the story. And that is a good thing, I think it helps in both them crafting a good story, and knowing both what tropes work, and what ones are ripe for being manipulated.

The story itself is much more a traditional young adult natural adventure novel, just set in a world that his been very depopulated. But what I really enjoyed about this story is how it ended up being a story it keeps telling you it is not. The lead character, Griz, narrates the novel, and Griz is a reader. And this is how the author ends up mentioning other P-A stories that obviously influenced this one. I'm a bit surprised that more of the adventuring stories don't also get name checked since like I said they are obviously a big influence as well.

I'm usually a bit vague regarding plots in my reviews, since I don't like to spoil the experience for the future reader. And I'm going to be so in this one is well. Especially since I very much enjoyed going into this fairly cold and just enjoying the ride as Griz went adventuring.

I was inspired to read this book while it was one I had for a while, was also on Jenny (Reading Envy) Colvin's to read pile as well. And since she had just passed, I thought it was appropriate to not only read a few books on that list, but also to write up some reviews, since that was something she was always doing. After finishing this, it also made me a bit sad that she had not gotten around to this one, since what little I know about her, I think she would have very much enjoyed it as well.
]]> Invader (Foreigner, #2) 57014
With the situation fast becoming critical, Bren Cameron, the brilliant, young paidhi  to the court of the atevi  is recalled from Mospheira where he has just undergone surgery. But his sudden and premature return to the mainland is cause for more than mere physical discomfort. For during his brief absence, his government has sent his paidhi -successor, Deana Hanks—representative of a dangerous archconservative faction on Mospheira who hate the atevi . And though she should depart when Bren is once again able to fill his post, no recall order comes.

Cut off from his government and haunted by the continuing threat of assassination, Bren realizes his only hope may be to communicate directly with the Phoenix  as the spokesman of the atevi— an action which may cut him off for good from his own species. Yet if he doesn't take this desperate and illegal action, he may be forced to helplessly bear witness to the final destruction of the already precarious balance of world power. ]]> 456 C.J. Cherryh 0886776872 John (Nevets) 3
I've very much enjoyed that the lead character is a "good guy" in almost every sense of the phrase. While he is not perfect, he is striving to do his best for the world and the inhabitants of it. He is the type of character you would see on the "West Wing" tv show, and I very much liked that.

This is also the middle book of what is described as a sub-trillogy of the series. And it feels like it, while it doesn't end on a cliff hanger, there is much more unresolved at the end of this book than there was at the end of the first book. I will read book 3 soon, but for now I think I'm going to take a bit of a break from the series.

I was inspired to write this review in memory of Jenny (Reading Envy) Colvin. ]]> 4.18 1996 Invader (Foreigner, #2)
author: C.J. Cherryh
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 4.18
book published: 1996
rating: 3
read at: 2022/06/06
date added: 2022/06/09
shelves:
review:
After finishing Foreigner I really wanted to continue the story, and I had gotten both this and book 3 at the same time as book 1. So I jumped right in. This does pick up almost immediately after the first book ended. It continues the court and political intrigue that was very much part of the first book. It also stayed within the POV of the one lead character. While not quite having a midlife crisis, we do go deep into his insecurities, many of them brought on by the stressful situations he finds himself in. While I think this aspect is well told, it does get a bit old over time, as I waited for the story to progress. C.J. Cherryh describes his emotional landscape the way other genre writers describe the physical landscapes of the worlds they are building. This is done with great skill in language, but I felt I wanted the story to move on more then be stuck in just one characters mind.

I've very much enjoyed that the lead character is a "good guy" in almost every sense of the phrase. While he is not perfect, he is striving to do his best for the world and the inhabitants of it. He is the type of character you would see on the "West Wing" tv show, and I very much liked that.

This is also the middle book of what is described as a sub-trillogy of the series. And it feels like it, while it doesn't end on a cliff hanger, there is much more unresolved at the end of this book than there was at the end of the first book. I will read book 3 soon, but for now I think I'm going to take a bit of a break from the series.

I was inspired to write this review in memory of Jenny (Reading Envy) Colvin.
]]> Foreigner (Foreigner, #1) 57043 Foreigner begins an epic tale of the survivors of a lost spacecraft who crash-land on a planet inhabited by a hostile, sentient alien race.

From its beginnings as a human-alien story of first contact, the Foreigner series has become a true science fiction odyssey, following a civilization from the age of steam through early space flight to confrontations with other alien species in distant sectors of space. It is the masterwork of a truly remarkable author.]]> 428 C.J. Cherryh 0756402514 John (Nevets) 4
This is a science fiction book. But I wouldn't call it a science fiction story. By that I mean that after the first chapter the rest of the story takes place on just one planet, with tech not much different then ours. Yes this is an alien world, with aliens, but it is much more of a court/ political drama then it is anything else. To be honest it feels more like a lot of fantasy that includes this sort of drama in it. And for what it is, it is very good. But I wouldn't go in looking for galaxy spanning space opera, it is a much smaller story then that. With the exception of the beginning, it stays with just one POV character, this works, but also aids in the story feeling smaller.

I always find it interesting when you see themes in books written decades ago, that feel that they could be making social commentary today. And this one has a few. I know it is nothing new, but that in and of it self, can be eye opening. Thinking of the fact that we as a society have been dealing with some of the same issues for decades, and in some cases centuries, is both enlightening, and discouraging at the same time.

In the past I haven't done many reviews, but I’ve decided to do a few more recently to memorialize the passing of Jenny Colvin (Reading Envy). A very active reader and reviewer, and someone who I will miss doing more of these. ]]> 3.92 1994 Foreigner (Foreigner, #1)
author: C.J. Cherryh
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 3.92
book published: 1994
rating: 4
read at: 2022/05/26
date added: 2022/05/26
shelves:
review:
This was actually a reread for me, but the last time i read this was roughly 30 years ago, when I was a teenager. I hadn't remembered much of the story, and I'm sure I got more out of it this time. I will probably follow this up soon with a few more books in the series, something I didn't do the first time I read this.

This is a science fiction book. But I wouldn't call it a science fiction story. By that I mean that after the first chapter the rest of the story takes place on just one planet, with tech not much different then ours. Yes this is an alien world, with aliens, but it is much more of a court/ political drama then it is anything else. To be honest it feels more like a lot of fantasy that includes this sort of drama in it. And for what it is, it is very good. But I wouldn't go in looking for galaxy spanning space opera, it is a much smaller story then that. With the exception of the beginning, it stays with just one POV character, this works, but also aids in the story feeling smaller.

I always find it interesting when you see themes in books written decades ago, that feel that they could be making social commentary today. And this one has a few. I know it is nothing new, but that in and of it self, can be eye opening. Thinking of the fact that we as a society have been dealing with some of the same issues for decades, and in some cases centuries, is both enlightening, and discouraging at the same time.

In the past I haven't done many reviews, but I’ve decided to do a few more recently to memorialize the passing of Jenny Colvin (Reading Envy). A very active reader and reviewer, and someone who I will miss doing more of these.
]]> <![CDATA[Sixteen Ways to Defend a Walled City (The Siege, #1)]]> 37946419
A siege is approaching, and the city has little time to prepare. The people have no food and no weapons, and the enemy has sworn to slaughter them all.

To save the city will take a miracle, but what it has is Orhan. A colonel of engineers, Orhan has far more experience with bridge-building than battles, is a cheat and a liar, and has a serious problem with authority. He is, in other words, perfect for the job.

]]> 350 K.J. Parker 0316270792 John (Nevets) 4 Castle by David Macaulay. In that it is more just about the goings on of this walled city. Even if is seen through the eyes of a gruff, engineer who knows hoe to get things done, even if it is not the most honest way. Now I’m an engineer by trade, and so the minutiae of how they accomplished things was interesting to me, but I could see how it would not be everyone’s thing, so take that for what it is worth.

I don’t do many reviews, but I’ve decided to do a few more recently to memorialize the passing of Jenny Colvin (Reading Envy). A very active reader and reviewer.]]> 4.01 2019 Sixteen Ways to Defend a Walled City (The Siege, #1)
author: K.J. Parker
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 4.01
book published: 2019
rating: 4
read at: 2022/05/14
date added: 2022/05/25
shelves:
review:
I really enjoyed this book. But I also could see why it is not for everyone. The POV character is not the most likable person, although I’ve known a few like him. The character development is minimal at best. And even the plot isn’t as satisfying as it could have been. But I still liked it. It is a fantasy book with out any real supernatural elements, it’s almost more like an alternative history story. It reminds me of a grown up version of one of my favorite books growing up Castle by David Macaulay. In that it is more just about the goings on of this walled city. Even if is seen through the eyes of a gruff, engineer who knows hoe to get things done, even if it is not the most honest way. Now I’m an engineer by trade, and so the minutiae of how they accomplished things was interesting to me, but I could see how it would not be everyone’s thing, so take that for what it is worth.

I don’t do many reviews, but I’ve decided to do a few more recently to memorialize the passing of Jenny Colvin (Reading Envy). A very active reader and reviewer.
]]> <![CDATA[The Collected Stories of Philip K. Dick 5: The Eye of The Sibyl]]> 22585
Volume 5/5. Contents:
- The Little Black Box (1964)
- The War With the Fnools (1964)
- A Game of Unchance (1964)
- Precious Artifact (1964)
- Retreat Syndrome (1965)
- A Terran Odyssey (1987)
- Your Appointment Will Be Yesterday (1966)
- Holy Quarrel (1966)
- Not by Its Cover (1968)
- Return Match (1967)
- Faith of Our Fathers (1967)
- The Story to End All Stories (1968)
- The Electric Ant (1969)
- Cadbury, the Beaver Who Lacked (1987)
- A Little Something for Us Tempunauts (1974)
- The Pre-Persons (1974)
- The Eye of the Sibyl (1987)
- The Day Mr. Computer Fell Out of Its Tree (1987)
- The Exit Door Leads In (1979)
- Chains of Air, Web of Aether (1980)
- Strange Memories of Death (1984)
- I Hope I Shall Arrive Soon (1980, also titled Frozen Journey)
- Rautavaara's Case (1980)
- The Alien Mind (1981)

Other editions of this volume are titled:
- The Little Black Box
- We can remember it for you wholesale
- The Eye of the Sibyl

Editions published by Citadel don't include the story "We can remember it for you wholesale" into Vol. 5, it was placed in their Vol. 2 instead. Apart from that, contents are the same across editions.]]> 396 Philip K. Dick 0806513284 John (Nevets) 3 4.27 1987 The Collected Stories of Philip K. Dick 5: The Eye of The Sibyl
author: Philip K. Dick
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 4.27
book published: 1987
rating: 3
read at:
date added: 2022/04/02
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Consider Phlebas (Culture, #1)]]> 8935689
Within the cosmic conflict, an individual crusade. Deep within a fabled labyrinth on a barren world, a Planet of the Dead proscribed to mortals, lay a fugitive Mind. Both the Culture and the Idirans sought it. It was the fate of Horza, the Changer, and his motley crew of unpredictable mercenaries, human and machine, actually to find it, and with it their own destruction.]]> 467 Iain M. Banks 1857231384 John (Nevets) 2 3.86 1987 Consider Phlebas (Culture, #1)
author: Iain M. Banks
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 3.86
book published: 1987
rating: 2
read at:
date added: 2022/03/24
shelves:
review:

]]> Rendezvous With Rama 774928 Rendezvous with Rama is also one of Clarke's best novels--it won the Campbell, Hugo, Jupiter, and Nebula Awards. A huge, mysterious, cylindrical object appears in space, swooping in toward the sun. The citizens of the solar system send a ship to investigate before the enigmatic craft, called Rama, disappears. The astronauts given the task of exploring the hollow cylindrical ship are able to decipher some, but definitely not all, of the extraterrestrial vehicle's puzzles. From the ubiquitous trilateral symmetry of its structures to its cylindrical sea and machine-island, Rama's secrets are strange evidence of an advanced civilization. But who, and where, are the Ramans, and what do they want with humans? Perhaps the answer lies with the busily working biots, or the sealed-off buildings, or the inaccessible "southern" half of the enormous cylinder. Rama's unsolved mysteries are tantalizing indeed. Rendezvous with Rama is fast moving, fascinating, and a must-read for science fiction fans. Clarke collaborated with Gentry Lee in writing several Rama sequels, beginning with Rama II.]]> 245 Arthur C. Clarke 0553287893 John (Nevets) 0 4.03 1973 Rendezvous With Rama
author: Arthur C. Clarke
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 4.03
book published: 1973
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2020/12/15
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Kill the Dead (Sandman Slim, #2)]]> 7778609
Stark has enough trouble juggling a diva devil and a scorching French bombshell without a zombie plague to complicate matters. And just what happens when a human-angel half-breed is bitten by the living dead? His human side begins to die, transforming him into an unstoppable angel of death—a killing machine devoid of emotion or thought, with no regrets or future to worry about. Not a bad way to be when your choices are limited. Now, Stark has to decide . . . if he does finds a cure for the zombie infection, will he take it?]]> 434 Richard Kadrey 0061714313 John (Nevets) 3 4.08 2010 Kill the Dead (Sandman Slim, #2)
author: Richard Kadrey
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 4.08
book published: 2010
rating: 3
read at:
date added: 2020/08/25
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Sandman Slim (Sandman Slim, #1)]]> 5776788
Life sucks and then you die. Or, if you’re James Stark, you spend eleven years in Hell as a hitman before finally escaping, only to land back in the hell-on-earth that is Los Angeles.

Now Stark’s back, and ready for revenge. And absolution, and maybe even love. But when his first stop saddles him with an abusive talking head, Stark discovers that the road to absolution and revenge is much longer than you’d expect, and both Heaven and Hell have their own ideas for his future.

Resurrection sucks. Saving the world is worse.

Darkly twisted, irreverent, and completely hilarious, Sandman Slim is the breakthrough novel by an acclaimed author.]]> 388 Richard Kadrey 0061714305 John (Nevets) 3 3.95 2009 Sandman Slim (Sandman Slim, #1)
author: Richard Kadrey
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 3.95
book published: 2009
rating: 3
read at:
date added: 2020/08/25
shelves:
review:

]]> Elysium 23374690 199 Jennifer Marie Brissett 1619760533 John (Nevets) 4 3.46 2014 Elysium
author: Jennifer Marie Brissett
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 3.46
book published: 2014
rating: 4
read at: 2020/08/13
date added: 2020/08/18
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The End of All Things (Old Man's War, #6)]]> 23168809 Hugo-award winning author, John Scalzi returns to his best-selling Old Man's War universe with the direct sequel to 2013’s The Human Division

Humans expanded into space…only to find a universe populated with multiple alien species bent on their destruction. Thus was the Colonial Union formed, to help protect us from a hostile universe. The Colonial Union used the Earth and its excess population for colonists and soldiers. It was a good arrangement...for the Colonial Union. Then the Earth said: no more.
〿
Now the Colonial Union is living on borrowed time—a couple of decades at most, before the ranks of the Colonial Defense Forces are depleted and the struggling human colonies are vulnerable to the alien species who have been waiting for the first sign of weakness, to drive humanity to ruin. And there’s another problem: A group, lurking in the darkness of space, playing human and alien against each other—and against their own kind —for their own unknown reasons.
〿
In this collapsing universe, CDF Lieutenant Harry Wilson and the Colonial Union diplomats he works with race against the clock to discover who is behind attacks on the Union and on alien races, to seek peace with a suspicious, angry Earth, and keep humanity’s union intact...or else risk oblivion, and extinction—and the end of all things.]]> 380 John Scalzi 0765376075 John (Nevets) 4 3.97 2015 The End of All Things (Old Man's War, #6)
author: John Scalzi
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 3.97
book published: 2015
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2020/08/11
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Fuzzy Nation (Fuzzy Sapiens, #7)]]> 9647532
Then, in the wake of an accidental cliff collapse, Jack discovers a seam of unimaginably valuable jewels, to which he manages to lay legal claim just as ZaraCorp is cancelling their contract with him for his part in causing the collapse. Briefly in the catbird seat, legally speaking, Jack pressures ZaraCorp into recognizing his claim, and cuts them in as partners to help extract the wealth.

But there's another wrinkle to ZaraCorp's relationship with the planet Zarathustra. Their entire legal right to exploit the verdant Earth-like planet, the basis of the wealth they derive from extracting its resources, is based on being able to certify to the authorities on Earth that Zarathustra is home to no sentient species.

Then a small furry biped—trusting, appealing, and ridiculously cute—shows up at Jack's outback home. Followed by its family. As it dawns on Jack that despite their stature, these are people, he begins to suspect that ZaraCorp's claim to a planet's worth of wealth is very flimsy indeed…and that ZaraCorp may stop at nothing to eliminate the "fuzzys" before their existence becomes more widely known.]]> 303 John Scalzi 0765328542 John (Nevets) 3 4.12 2011 Fuzzy Nation (Fuzzy Sapiens, #7)
author: John Scalzi
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 4.12
book published: 2011
rating: 3
read at:
date added: 2020/08/11
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Collapsing Empire (The Interdependency, #1)]]> 30078567
Our universe is ruled by physics and faster than light travel is not possible -- until the discovery of The Flow, an extra-dimensional field we can access at certain points in space-time that transport us to other worlds, around other stars.

Humanity flows away from Earth, into space, and in time forgets our home world and creates a new empire, the Interdependency, whose ethos requires that no one human outpost can survive without the others. It’s a hedge against interstellar war -- and a system of control for the rulers of the empire.

The Flow is eternal -- but it is not static. Just as a river changes course, The Flow changes as well, cutting off worlds from the rest of humanity. When it’s discovered that The Flow is moving, possibly cutting off all human worlds from faster than light travel forever, three individuals -- a scientist, a starship captain and the Empress of the Interdependency -- are in a race against time to discover what, if anything, can be salvaged from an interstellar empire on the brink of collapse.]]> 336 John Scalzi 0765388898 John (Nevets) 3 4.09 2017 The Collapsing Empire (The Interdependency, #1)
author: John Scalzi
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 4.09
book published: 2017
rating: 3
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date added: 2020/08/11
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]]> Redshirts 13055592 Intrepid, flagship of the Universal Union since the year 2456. It’s a prestige posting, and Andrew is thrilled all the more to be assigned to the ship’s Xenobiology laboratory.

Life couldn’t be better…until Andrew begins to pick up on the fact that:
(1) every Away Mission involves some kind of lethal confrontation with alien forces
(2) the ship’s captain, its chief science officer, and the handsome Lieutenant Kerensky always survive these confrontations
(3) at least one low-ranked crew member is, sadly, always killed.

Not surprisingly, a great deal of energy below decks is expended on avoiding, at all costs, being assigned to an Away Mission. Then Andrew stumbles on information that completely transforms his and his colleagues’ understanding of what the starship Intrepid really is…and offers them a crazy, high-risk chance to save their own lives.]]> 320 John Scalzi 0765316994 John (Nevets) 3 3.85 2012 Redshirts
author: John Scalzi
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 3.85
book published: 2012
rating: 3
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]]> Lock In (Lock In, #1) 21418013
A quarter of a century later, in a world shaped by what's now known as "Haden's syndrome," rookie FBI agent Chris Shane is paired with veteran agent Leslie Vann. The two of them are assigned what appears to be a Haden-related murder at the Watergate Hotel, with a suspect who is an "integrator" - someone who can let the locked in borrow their bodies for a time. If the Integrator was carrying a Haden client, then naming the suspect for the murder becomes that much more complicated.

But "complicated" doesn't begin to describe it. As Shane and Vann began to unravel the threads of the murder, it becomes clear that the real mystery - and the real crime - is bigger than anyone could have imagined. The world of the locked in is changing, and with the change comes opportunities that the ambitious will seize at any cost. The investigation that began as a murder case takes Shane and Vann from the halls of corporate power to the virtual spaces of the locked in, and to the very heart of an emerging, surprising new human culture. It's nothing you could have expected.]]> 336 John Scalzi 0765375869 John (Nevets) 4 3.89 2014 Lock In (Lock In, #1)
author: John Scalzi
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 3.89
book published: 2014
rating: 4
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date added: 2020/08/11
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]]> <![CDATA[Mortal Engines (Mortal Engines, #1)]]> 287861
The great traction city London has been skulking in the hills to avoid the bigger, faster, hungrier cities loose in the Great Hunting Ground. But now, the sinister plans of Lord Mayor Mangus Crome can finally unfold.

Thaddeus Valentine, London's Head Historian and adored famous archaeologist, and his lovely daughter, Katherine, are down in The Gut when the young assassin with the black scarf strikes toward his heart, saved by the quick intervention of Tom, a lowly third-class apprentice. Racing after the fleeing girl, Tom suddenly glimpses her hideous face: scarred from forehead to jaw, nose a smashed stump, a single eye glaring back at him. "Look at what your Valentine did to me!" she screams. "Ask him! Ask him what he did to Hester Shaw!" And with that she jumps down the waste chute to her death. Minutes later Tom finds himself tumbling down the same chute and stranded in the Out-Country, a sea of mud scored by the huge caterpillar tracks of cities like the one now steaming off over the horizon.

In a stunning literary debut, Philip Reeve has created a painful dangerous unforgettable adventure story of surprises, set in a dark and utterly original world fueled by Municipal Darwinism -- and betrayal.]]> 326 Philip Reeve 0060082097 John (Nevets) 3 laser-18 3.78 2001 Mortal Engines (Mortal Engines, #1)
author: Philip Reeve
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 3.78
book published: 2001
rating: 3
read at: 2018/07/30
date added: 2018/08/01
shelves: laser-18
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]]> The Adventures of Tom Sawyer 24583 244 Mark Twain John (Nevets) 4 3.92 1876 The Adventures of Tom Sawyer
author: Mark Twain
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 3.92
book published: 1876
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2018/05/27
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]]> Frankenstein: The 1818 Text 35031085 This is a previously-published edition of ISBN 9780143131847.

Mary Shelley's seminal novel of the scientist whose creation becomes a monster.

This edition is the original 1818 text, which preserves the hard-hitting and politically charged aspects of Shelley's original writing, as well as her unflinching wit and strong female voice. This edition also includes a new introduction and suggestions for further reading by author and Shelley expert Charlotte Gordon, literary excerpts and reviews selected by Gordon and a chronology and essay by preeminent Shelley scholar Charles E. Robinson.]]> 260 Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley 0143131842 John (Nevets) 4 4.02 1818 Frankenstein: The 1818 Text
author: Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 4.02
book published: 1818
rating: 4
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]]> <![CDATA[The Hunger Games (The Hunger Games, #1)]]> 2767052
In the ruins of a place once known as North America lies the nation of Panem, a shining Capitol surrounded by twelve outlying districts. The Capitol is harsh and cruel and keeps the districts in line by forcing them all to send one boy and one girl between the ages of twelve and eighteen to participate in the annual Hunger Games, a fight to the death on live TV.

Sixteen-year-old Katniss Everdeen regards it as a death sentence when she steps forward to take her sister's place in the Games. But Katniss has been close to dead before-and survival, for her, is second nature. Without really meaning to, she becomes a contender. But if she is to win, she will have to start making choices that weigh survival against humanity and life against love.]]> 374 Suzanne Collins 0439023483 John (Nevets) 4 4.34 2008 The Hunger Games (The Hunger Games, #1)
author: Suzanne Collins
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 4.34
book published: 2008
rating: 4
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]]> Charlotte’s Web 24178 Stuart Little and The Trumpet of the Swan, is a classic of children's literature that is "just about perfect." This high-quality paperback features vibrant illustrations colorized by Rosemary Wells!

Some Pig. Humble. Radiant. These are the words in Charlotte's Web, high up in Zuckerman's barn. Charlotte's spiderweb tells of her feelings for a little pig named Wilbur, who simply wants a friend. They also express the love of a girl named Fern, who saved Wilbur's life when he was born the runt of his litter.

E. B. White's Newbery Honor Book is a tender novel of friendship, love, life, and death that will continue to be enjoyed by generations to come. This edition contains newly color illustrations by Garth Williams, the acclaimed illustrator of E. B. White's Stuart Little and Laura Ingalls Wilder's Little House series, among many other books.]]> 184 E.B. White 0064410935 John (Nevets) 4 4.20 1952 Charlotte’s Web
author: E.B. White
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 4.20
book published: 1952
rating: 4
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]]> <![CDATA[The Chronicles of Narnia (The Chronicles of Narnia, #1-7)]]> 11127 Librarian note: An alternate cover for this edition can be found here: 2005.

Journeys to the end of the world, fantastic creatures, and epic battles between good and evil—what more could any reader ask for in one book? The book that has it all is The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, written in 1949 by Clive Staples Lewis. But Lewis did not stop there. Six more books followed, and together they became known as The Chronicles of Narnia.

For the past fifty years, The Chronicles of Narnia have transcended the fantasy genre to become part of the canon of classic literature. Each of the seven books is a masterpiece, drawing the reader into a land where magic meets reality, and the result is a fictional world whose scope has fascinated generations.

This edition presents all seven books—unabridged—in one impressive volume. The books are presented here in chronlogical order, each chapter graced with an illustration by the original artist, Pauline Baynes. Deceptively simple and direct, The Chronicles of Narnia continue to captivate fans with adventures, characters, and truths that speak to readers of all ages, even fifty years after they were first published.]]> 767 C.S. Lewis 0066238501 John (Nevets) 3 4.27 1956 The Chronicles of Narnia (The Chronicles of Narnia, #1-7)
author: C.S. Lewis
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 4.27
book published: 1956
rating: 3
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]]> The Lord of the Rings 33 One Ring to rule them all, One Ring to find them, One Ring to bring them all and in the darkness bind them

In ancient times the Rings of Power were crafted by the Elven-smiths, and Sauron, the Dark Lord, forged the One Ring, filling it with his own power so that he could rule all others. But the One Ring was taken from him, and though he sought it throughout Middle-earth, it remained lost to him. After many ages it fell by chance into the hands of the hobbit Bilbo Baggins.

From Sauron's fastness in the Dark Tower of Mordor, his power spread far and wide. Sauron gathered all the Great Rings to him, but always he searched for the One Ring that would complete his dominion.

When Bilbo reached his eleventy-first birthday he disappeared, bequeathing to his young cousin Frodo the Ruling Ring and a perilous quest: to journey across Middle-earth, deep into the shadow of the Dark Lord, and destroy the Ring by casting it into the Cracks of Doom.

The Lord of the Rings tells of the great quest undertaken by Frodo and the Fellowship of the Ring: Gandalf the Wizard; the hobbits Merry, Pippin, and Sam; Gimli the Dwarf; Legolas the Elf; Boromir of Gondor; and a tall, mysterious stranger called Strider.]]> 1216 J.R.R. Tolkien 0618640150 John (Nevets) 5 4.52 1954 The Lord of the Rings
author: J.R.R. Tolkien
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 4.52
book published: 1954
rating: 5
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]]> <![CDATA[Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone (Harry Potter, #1)]]> 3 309 J.K. Rowling 0439554934 John (Nevets) 4 4.47 1997 Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone (Harry Potter, #1)
author: J.K. Rowling
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 4.47
book published: 1997
rating: 4
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]]> <![CDATA[We Are Legion (We Are Bob) (Bobiverse, #1)]]> 32109569 Alternate Cover Edition can be found here.

Bob Johansson has just sold his software company and is looking forward to a life of leisure. There are places to go, books to read, and movies to watch. So it's a little unfair when he gets himself killed crossing the street.

Bob wakes up a century later to find that corpsicles have been declared to be without rights, and he is now the property of the state. He has been uploaded into computer hardware and is slated to be the controlling AI in an interstellar probe looking for habitable planets. The stakes are high: no less than the first claim to entire worlds. If he declines the honor, he'll be switched off, and they'll try again with someone else. If he accepts, he becomes a prime target. There are at least three other countries trying to get their own probes launched first, and they play dirty.

The safest place for Bob is in space, heading away from Earth at top speed. Or so he thinks. Because the universe is full of nasties, and trespassers make them mad - very mad.]]> 383 Dennis E. Taylor John (Nevets) 4 laser-18 4.29 2016 We Are Legion (We Are Bob) (Bobiverse, #1)
author: Dennis E. Taylor
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 4.29
book published: 2016
rating: 4
read at: 2018/04/04
date added: 2018/04/04
shelves: laser-18
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]]> <![CDATA[Persepolis Rising (The Expanse, #7)]]> 28335696 In the vast space between Earth and Jupiter, the inner planets and the Belt have formed a tentative and uncertain alliance, still haunted by a history of wars and prejudices. On the lost colony world of Laconia, a hidden enemy has a new vision for all of humanity – and the power to enforce it.
New technologies clash with old, as the history of human conflict returns to its ancient pattern of war and subjugation. But human nature is not the only enemy, and the forces being unleashed have their own price. A price that will change the shape of humanity – and of the Rocinante – unexpectedly and for ever …

The seventh novel in James S. A. Corey's New York Times bestselling Expanse series--now a major television series.
The Expanse Leviathan Wakes, Caliban's War, Abaddon's Gate, Cibola Burn, Nemesis Games, Babylon's Ashes, Persepolis Rising,
The Expanse Short Fiction The Butcher of Anderson Station, Gods of Risk, The Churn, The Vital Abyss, Strange Dogs.]]> 608 James S.A. Corey 0316332828 John (Nevets) 4 laser-18 4.34 2017 Persepolis Rising (The Expanse, #7)
author: James S.A. Corey
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 4.34
book published: 2017
rating: 4
read at: 2018/03/04
date added: 2018/04/04
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]]> <![CDATA[Gods of Risk (The Expanse, #2.5)]]> 15837317 A novella set in the hard-scrabble world of James S. A. Corey's NYT-bestselling Expanse series, Gods of Risk tells the story of Bobbie Draper following the events of Caliban's War. This story will be available in the complete Expanse story collection, Memory’s Legion.HUGO AWARD WINNER FOR BEST SERIESAs tension between Mars and Earth mounts, and terrorism plagues the Martian city of Londres Nova, sixteen-year-old David Draper is fighting his own lonely war. A gifted chemist vying for a place at the university, David leads a secret life as a manufacturer for a ruthless drug dealer. When his friend Leelee goes missing, leaving signs of the dealer's involvement, David takes it upon himself to save her. But first he must shake his aunt Bobbie Draper, an ex-marine who has been set adrift in her own life after a mysterious series of events nobody is talking about.The ExpanseLeviathan WakesCaliban's WarAbaddon's GateCibola BurnNemesis GamesBabylon's AshesPersepolis RisingTiamat's Wrath​Leviathan FallsMemory's LegionThe Expanse Short FictionDriveThe Butcher of Anderson StationGods of RiskThe ChurnThe Vital AbyssStrange DogsAuberonThe Sins of Our Fathers]]> 72 James S.A. Corey 0316217654 John (Nevets) 3 3.73 2012 Gods of Risk (The Expanse, #2.5)
author: James S.A. Corey
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 3.73
book published: 2012
rating: 3
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]]> <![CDATA[The Butcher of Anderson Station (The Expanse, #1.5)]]> 11570653
This is his story.

Word ~9,000 words
]]> 40 James S.A. Corey John (Nevets) 3 3.99 2011 The Butcher of Anderson Station (The Expanse, #1.5)
author: James S.A. Corey
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 3.99
book published: 2011
rating: 3
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]]> <![CDATA[Babylon’s Ashes (The Expanse, #6)]]> 25877663 The sixth book in the New York Times bestselling Expanse series.

NOW A MAJOR TV SERIES

A revolution brewing for generations has begun in fire. It will end in blood.

The Free Navy - a violent group of Belters in black-market military ships - has crippled the Earth and begun a campaign of piracy and violence among the outer planets. The colony ships heading for the thousand new worlds on the far side of the alien ring gates are easy prey, and no single navy remains strong enough to protect them.

James Holden and his crew know the strengths and weaknesses of this new force better than anyone. Outnumbered and outgunned, the embattled remnants of the old political powers call on the Rocinante for a desperate mission to reach Medina Station at the heart of the gate network.

But the new alliances are as flawed as the old, and the struggle for power has only just begun. As the chaos grows, an alien mystery deepens. Pirate fleets, mutiny and betrayal may be the least of the Rocinante's problems. And in the uncanny spaces past the ring gates, the choices of a few damaged and desperate people may determine the fate of more than just humanity.

]]> 532 James S.A. Corey 0356504263 John (Nevets) 4 4.22 2016 Babylon’s Ashes (The Expanse, #6)
author: James S.A. Corey
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 4.22
book published: 2016
rating: 4
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]]> <![CDATA[Nemesis Games (The Expanse, #5)]]> 22886612
A thousand worlds have opened, and the greatest land rush in human history has begun. As wave after wave of colonists leave, the power structures of the old solar system begin to buckle.

Ships are disappearing without a trace. Private armies are being secretly formed. The sole remaining protomolecule sample is stolen. Terrorist attacks previously considered impossible bring the inner planets to their knees. The sins of the past are returning to exact a terrible price.

And as a new human order is struggling to be born in blood and fire, James Holden and the crew of the Rocinante must struggle to survive and get back to the only home they have left.]]> 536 James S.A. Corey 031621759X John (Nevets) 4 4.44 2015 Nemesis Games (The Expanse, #5)
author: James S.A. Corey
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 4.44
book published: 2015
rating: 4
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]]> Cibola Burn (The Expanse, #4) 18656030 The fourth novel in James S.A. Corey’s New York Times bestselling Expanse series

The gates have opened the way to thousands of habitable planets, and the land rush has begun. Settlers stream out from humanity's home planets in a vast, poorly controlled flood, landing on a new world. Among them, the Rocinante, haunted by the vast, posthuman network of the protomolecule as they investigate what destroyed the great intergalactic society that built the gates and the protomolecule.

But Holden and his crew must also contend with the growing tensions between the settlers and the company which owns the official claim to the planet. Both sides will stop at nothing to defend what's theirs, but soon a terrible disease strikes and only Holden - with help from the ghostly Detective Miller - can find the cure.]]> 581 James S.A. Corey John (Nevets) 3 4.19 2014 Cibola Burn (The Expanse, #4)
author: James S.A. Corey
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 4.19
book published: 2014
rating: 3
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]]> <![CDATA[Abaddon’s Gate (The Expanse, #3)]]> 16131032
For generations, the solar system - Mars, the Moon, the Asteroid Belt - was humanity's great frontier. Until now. The alien artefact working through its program under the clouds of Venus has emerged to build a massive structure outside the orbit of Uranus: a gate that leads into a starless dark.

Jim Holden and the crew of the Rocinante are part of a vast flotilla of scientific and military ships going out to examine the artefact. But behind the scenes, a complex plot is unfolding, with the destruction of Holden at its core. As the emissaries of the human race try to find whether the gate is an opportunity or a threat, the greatest danger is the one they brought with them.]]> 539 James S.A. Corey John (Nevets) 4 4.26 2013 Abaddon’s Gate (The Expanse, #3)
author: James S.A. Corey
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 4.26
book published: 2013
rating: 4
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date added: 2018/03/04
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]]> <![CDATA[Caliban’s War (The Expanse, #2)]]> 12591698
On Ganymede, the station that represents the main food source for exoplanets, a Martian marine sergeant watches her entire platoon being slaughtered before her eyes by a supernatural monster. On Earth, a high-ranking politician struggles to defuse an interplanetary war. Meanwhile, an alien protomolecule sweeps across Venus, causing profound and mysterious changes and threatening to spread and sweep across the solar system.

In the vastness of space, James Holden and the crew of the Rocinante maintain the stability of the exoplanetary alliance. When he and his crew agree to help a scientist search for his missing daughter on war-torn Ganymede, the fate of humanity hinges on whether one craft can prevent an alien invasion that may already be underway.

"Corey spins his novel with elegant, old-fashioned threads while maintaining a fast-paced pace." -- Charles Stross, one of Britain's most acclaimed science fiction authors.

"It's like watching a Hollywood blockbuster come to life in a paperback." -- io9]]> 624 James S.A. Corey 1841499900 John (Nevets) 4 4.36 2012 Caliban’s War (The Expanse, #2)
author: James S.A. Corey
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 4.36
book published: 2012
rating: 4
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]]> <![CDATA[Leviathan Wakes (The Expanse, #1)]]> 8855321
Jim Holden is XO of an ice miner making runs from the rings of Saturn to the mining stations of the Belt. When he and his crew stumble upon a derelict ship, the Scopuli, they find themselves in possession of a secret they never wanted. A secret that someone is willing to kill for—and kill on a scale unfathomable to Jim and his crew. War is brewing in the system unless he can find out who left the ship and why.

Detective Miller is looking for a girl. One girl in a system of billions, but her parents have money and money talks. When the trail leads him to the Scopuli and rebel sympathizer Holden, he realizes that this girl may be the key to everything.

Holden and Miller must thread the needle between the Earth government, the Outer Planet revolutionaries, and secretive corporations—and the odds are against them. But out in the Belt, the rules are different, and one small ship can change the fate of the universe.]]> 592 James S.A. Corey 1841499889 John (Nevets) 4 4.30 2011 Leviathan Wakes (The Expanse, #1)
author: James S.A. Corey
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 4.30
book published: 2011
rating: 4
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]]> Reamde 10552338
For Richard, the game was the perfect opportunity to launder his aging hundred dollar bills and begin his own high-tech start up—a venture that has morphed into a Fortune 500 computer gaming group, Corporation 9592, with its own super successful online role-playing game, T’Rain. But the line between fantasy and reality becomes dangerously blurred when a young gold farmer accidently triggers a virtual war for dominance—and Richard is caught at the center.

In this edgy, 21st century tale, Neal Stephenson, one of the most ambitious and prophetic writers of our time, returns to the terrain of his cyberpunk masterpieces Snow Crash and Cryptonomicon, leading readers through the looking glass and into the dark heart of imagination.]]> 1044 Neal Stephenson 0061977969 John (Nevets) 4 3.97 2011 Reamde
author: Neal Stephenson
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 3.97
book published: 2011
rating: 4
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date added: 2018/01/11
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]]> Seveneves 22816087
A catastrophic event renders the earth a ticking time bomb. In a feverish race against the inevitable, nations around the globe band together to devise an ambitious plan to ensure the survival of humanity far beyond our atmosphere, in outer space.

But the complexities and unpredictability of human nature coupled with unforeseen challenges and dangers threaten the intrepid pioneers, until only a handful of survivors remain . . .

Five thousand years later, their progeny—seven distinct races now three billion strong—embark on yet another audacious journey into the unknown . . . to an alien world utterly transformed by cataclysm and time: Earth.

A writer of dazzling genius and imaginative vision, Neal Stephenson combines science, philosophy, technology, psychology, and literature in a magnificent work of speculative fiction that offers a portrait of a future that is both extraordinary and eerily recognizable. As he did in Anathem, Cryptonomicon, the Baroque Cycle, and Reamde, Stephenson explores some of our biggest ideas and perplexing challenges in a breathtaking saga that is daring, engrossing, and altogether brilliant.]]> 872 Neal Stephenson John (Nevets) 4 4.01 2015 Seveneves
author: Neal Stephenson
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 4.01
book published: 2015
rating: 4
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date added: 2018/01/11
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]]> The Martian 18007564
Now, he’s sure he’ll be the first person to die there.

After a dust storm nearly kills him and forces his crew to evacuate while thinking him dead, Mark finds himself stranded and completely alone with no way to even signal Earth that he’s alive—and even if he could get word out, his supplies would be gone long before a rescue could arrive.

Chances are, though, he won’t have time to starve to death. The damaged machinery, unforgiving environment, or plain-old “human error” are much more likely to kill him first.

But Mark isn’t ready to give up yet. Drawing on his ingenuity, his engineering skills — and a relentless, dogged refusal to quit — he steadfastly confronts one seemingly insurmountable obstacle after the next. Will his resourcefulness be enough to overcome the impossible odds against him?

]]> 384 Andy Weir 0804139024 John (Nevets) 4 4.41 2011 The Martian
author: Andy Weir
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 4.41
book published: 2011
rating: 4
read at: 2015/03/01
date added: 2017/12/26
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]]> <![CDATA[The Name of the Wind (The Kingkiller Chronicle, #1)]]> 186074
The intimate narrative of his childhood in a troupe of traveling players, his years spent as a near-feral orphan in a crime-ridden city, his daringly brazen yet successful bid to enter a legendary school of magic, and his life as a fugitive after the murder of a king form a gripping coming-of-age story unrivaled in recent literature.

A high-action story written with a poet's hand, The Name of the Wind is a masterpiece that will transport readers into the body and mind of a wizard.]]> 662 Patrick Rothfuss 075640407X John (Nevets) 5 4.52 2007 The Name of the Wind (The Kingkiller Chronicle, #1)
author: Patrick Rothfuss
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 4.52
book published: 2007
rating: 5
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date added: 2017/08/28
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]]> <![CDATA[The Confusion (The Baroque Cycle, #2)]]> 822 815 Neal Stephenson 0060733357 John (Nevets) 4 4.26 2004 The Confusion (The Baroque Cycle, #2)
author: Neal Stephenson
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 4.26
book published: 2004
rating: 4
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]]> <![CDATA[Quicksilver (The Baroque Cycle, #1)]]> 823 Quicksilver is the story of Daniel Waterhouse, fearless thinker and conflicted Puritan, pursuing knowledge in the company of the greatest minds of Baroque-era Europe, in a chaotic world where reason wars with the bloody ambitions of the mighty, and where catastrophe, natural or otherwise, can alter the political landscape overnight.

It is a chronicle of the breathtaking exploits of "Half-Cocked Jack" Shaftoe--London street urchin turned swashbuckling adventurer and legendary King of the Vagabonds--risking life and limb for fortune and love while slowly maddening from the pox.

And it is the tale of Eliza, rescued by Jack from a Turkish harem to become spy, confidante, and pawn of royals in order to reinvent Europe through the newborn power of finance.

A gloriously rich, entertaining, and endlessly inventive novel that brings a remarkable age and its momentous events to vivid life, Quicksilver is an extraordinary achievement from one of the most original and important literary talents of our time.

And it's just the beginning...

(back cover)

This P.S. edition includes 16 pages of supplementary materials.

Cover design by Richard L. Aquan
Cover illustration from the Mary Evans Picture Library; painting of Great Fire of London on stepback]]> 927 Neal Stephenson John (Nevets) 4 3.91 2003 Quicksilver (The Baroque Cycle, #1)
author: Neal Stephenson
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 3.91
book published: 2003
rating: 4
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date added: 2017/08/28
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]]> Brave New World 5129 Brave New World is a searching vision of an unequal, technologically-advanced future where humans are genetically bred, socially indoctrinated, and pharmaceutically anesthetized to passively uphold an authoritarian ruling order–all at the cost of our freedom, full humanity, and perhaps also our souls. “A genius [who] who spent his life decrying the onward march of the Machine” (The New Yorker), Huxley was a man of incomparable talents: equally an artist, a spiritual seeker, and one of history’s keenest observers of human nature and civilization. Brave New World, his masterpiece, has enthralled and terrified millions of readers, and retains its urgent relevance to this day as both a warning to be heeded as we head into tomorrow and as thought-provoking, satisfying work of literature. Written in the shadow of the rise of fascism during the 1930s, Brave New Worldd likewise speaks to a 21st-century world dominated by mass-entertainment, technology, medicine and pharmaceuticals, the arts of persuasion, and the hidden influence of elites.

"Aldous Huxley is the greatest 20th century writer in English." —Chicago Tribune]]> 268 Aldous Huxley 0060929871 John (Nevets) 4 3.99 1932 Brave New World
author: Aldous Huxley
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 3.99
book published: 1932
rating: 4
read at: 2013/03/12
date added: 2014/10/15
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]]> 2312 11830394
The first event takes place on Mercury, on the city of Terminator, itself a miracle of engineering on an unprecedented scale. It is an unexpected death, but one that might have been foreseen. For Swan Er Hong, it is an event that will change her life. Swan was once a woman who designed worlds. Now she will be led into a plot to destroy them.]]> 561 Kim Stanley Robinson 0316098124 John (Nevets) 3 3.50 2012 2312
author: Kim Stanley Robinson
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 3.50
book published: 2012
rating: 3
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date added: 2014/10/15
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]]> <![CDATA[2001: A Space Odyssey (Space Odyssey, #1)]]> 70535
So great are the implications of this discovery that for the first time men are sent out deep into our solar system.

But long before their destination is reached, things begin to go horribly, inexplicably wrong...

One of the greatest-selling science fiction novels of our time, this classic book will grip you to the very end.]]> 297 Arthur C. Clarke John (Nevets) 5 4.17 1968 2001: A Space Odyssey (Space Odyssey, #1)
author: Arthur C. Clarke
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 4.17
book published: 1968
rating: 5
read at: 2013/09/16
date added: 2014/10/15
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]]> Flowers for Algernon 18373 Winner of both the Hugo and Nebula Awards, the powerful, classic story about a man who receives an operation that turns him into a genius...and introduces him to heartache.
 
Charlie Gordon is about to embark upon an unprecedented journey. Born with an unusually low IQ, he has been chosen as the perfect subject for an experimental surgery that researchers hope will increase his intelligence – a procedure that has already been highly successful when tested on a lab mouse named Algernon.

As the treatment takes effect, Charlie's intelligence expands until it surpasses that of the doctors who engineered his metamorphosis. The experiment appears to be a scientific breakthrough of paramount importance, until Algernon suddenly deteriorates. Will the same happen to Charlie?]]> 311 Daniel Keyes 015603008X John (Nevets) 2 4.19 1966 Flowers for Algernon
author: Daniel Keyes
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 4.19
book published: 1966
rating: 2
read at: 1993/10/13
date added: 2014/10/15
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]]> <![CDATA[The Warrior's Apprentice (Vorkosigan Saga, #2)]]> 61906
Shortly after his arrival on Beta Colony, Miles unexpectedly finds himself the owner of an obsolete freighter and in more debt than he ever thought possible. Propelled by his manic "forward momentum," the ever-inventive Miles creates a new identity for himself as the commander of his own mercenary fleet to obtain a lucrative cargo; a shipment of weapons destined for a dangerous warzone.]]> 372 Lois McMaster Bujold 0743468406 John (Nevets) 4 4.27 1986 The Warrior's Apprentice (Vorkosigan Saga, #2)
author: Lois McMaster Bujold
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 4.27
book published: 1986
rating: 4
read at: 2013/02/02
date added: 2014/10/15
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]]> <![CDATA[Dauntless (The Lost Fleet, #1)]]> 112292
Captain John "Black Jack" Geary's legendary exploits are known to every schoolchild. Revered for his heroic "last stand" in the early days of the war, he was presumed dead. But a century later, Geary miraculously returns from survival hibernation and reluctantly takes command of the Alliance fleet as it faces annihilation by the Syndics.

Appalled by the hero-worship around him, Geary is nevertheless a man who will do his duty. And he knows that bringing the stolen Syndic hypernet key safely home is the Alliance's one chance to win the war. But to do that, Geary will have to live up to the impossibly heroic "Black Jack" legend...]]> 293 Jack Campbell 0441014186 John (Nevets) 4 3.97 2006 Dauntless (The Lost Fleet, #1)
author: Jack Campbell
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 3.97
book published: 2006
rating: 4
read at: 2011/08/17
date added: 2014/10/15
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]]> Starship Troopers 17214
In one of Robert A. Heinlein’s most controversial bestsellers, a recruit of the future goes through the toughest boot camp in the Universe—and into battle with the Terran Mobile Infantry against mankind’s most alarming enemy.
]]> 264 Robert A. Heinlein John (Nevets) 4 4.01 1959 Starship Troopers
author: Robert A. Heinlein
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 4.01
book published: 1959
rating: 4
read at: 2013/04/05
date added: 2014/10/15
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]]> <![CDATA[On Basilisk Station (Honor Harrington, #1)]]> 35921
But the people out to get her have made one mistake.

They've made her mad!]]> 464 David Weber 1416509372 John (Nevets) 3 4.13 1993 On Basilisk Station (Honor Harrington, #1)
author: David Weber
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 4.13
book published: 1993
rating: 3
read at: 2014/06/13
date added: 2014/10/15
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]]> Year Zero 12953520 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER

An alien advance party was suddenly nosing around my planet.
Worse, they were lawyering up. . . .

In the hilarious tradition of The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, Rob Reid takes you on a headlong journey through the outer reaches of the universe—and the inner workings of our absurdly dysfunctional music industry.

Low-level entertainment lawyer Nick Carter thinks it’s a prank, not an alien encounter, when a redheaded mullah and a curvaceous nun show up at his office. But Frampton and Carly are highly advanced (if bumbling) extraterrestrials. And boy, do they have news.

The entire cosmos, they tell him, has been hopelessly hooked on humanity’s music ever since “Year Zero” (1977 to us), when American pop songs first reached alien ears. This addiction has driven a vast intergalactic society to commit the biggest copyright violation since the Big Bang. The resulting fines and penalties have bankrupted the whole universe. We humans suddenly own everything—and the aliens are not amused.

Nick Carter has just been tapped to clean up this mess before things get ugly, and he’s an unlikely galaxy-hopping hero: He’s scared of heights. He’s also about to be fired. And he happens to have the same name as a Backstreet Boy. But he does know a thing or two about copyright law. And he’s packing a couple of other pencil-pushing superpowers that could come in handy.

Soon he’s on the run from a sinister parrot and a highly combustible vacuum cleaner. With Carly and Frampton as his guides, Nick now has forty-eight hours to save humanity, while hopefully wowing the hot girl who lives down the hall from him.

“Hilarious, provocative, and supersmart, Year Zero is a brilliant novel to be enjoyed in perpetuity in the known universe and in all unknown universes yet to be discovered.”—John Hodgman, resident expert, The Daily Show with Jon Stewart]]> 364 Rob Reid 0345534417 John (Nevets) 4 3.60 2012 Year Zero
author: Rob Reid
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 3.60
book published: 2012
rating: 4
read at: 2014/05/10
date added: 2014/10/15
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]]> Fahrenheit 451 17470674
Guy Montag is a fireman. His job is to burn books, which are forbidden, being the source of all discord and unhappiness. Even so, Montag is unhappy; there is discord in his marriage. Are books hidden in his house? The Mechanical Hound of the Fire Department, armed with a lethal hypodermic, escorted by helicopters, is ready to track down those dissidents who defy society to preserve and read books.

The classic dystopian novel of a post-literate future, Fahrenheit 451 stands alongside Orwell’s 1984 and Huxley’s Brave New World as a prophetic account of Western civilization’s enslavement by the media, drugs and conformity.

Bradbury’s powerful and poetic prose combines with uncanny insight into the potential of technology to create a novel which, decades on from first publication, still has the power to dazzle and shock.

--back cover]]> 227 Ray Bradbury 0007491565 John (Nevets) 4 4.01 1953 Fahrenheit 451
author: Ray Bradbury
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 4.01
book published: 1953
rating: 4
read at: 1991/10/15
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]]> The Martian Chronicles 76778
The Martian Chronicles tells the story of humanity’s repeated attempts to colonize the red planet. The first men were few. Most succumbed to a disease they called the Great Loneliness when they saw their home planet dwindle to the size of a fist. They felt they had never been born. Those few that survived found no welcome on Mars. The shape-changing Martians thought they were native lunatics and duly locked them up.

But more rockets arrived from Earth, and more, piercing the hallucinations projected by the Martians. People brought their old prejudices with them – and their desires and fantasies, tainted dreams. These were soon inhabited by the strange native beings, with their caged flowers and birds of flame.

Contents:
Rocket Summer
Ylla
The Summer Night
The Earth Men
The Taxpayer
The Third Expedition
-And the Moon Be Still As Bright
The Settlers
The Green Morning
The Locusts
Night Meeting
The Shore
Interim
The Musicians
Way in the Middle of the Air
The Naming of Names
Usher II
The Old Ones
The Martian
The Luggage Store
The Off Season
The Watchers
The Silent Towns
The Long Years
There Will Come Soft Rains
The Million Year Picnic]]> 182 Ray Bradbury 0553278223 John (Nevets) 4 4.16 1950 The Martian Chronicles
author: Ray Bradbury
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 4.16
book published: 1950
rating: 4
read at: 1993/06/10
date added: 2014/10/15
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]]> Walk When the Moon Is Full 1204234 64 Frances Hamerstrom 0912278846 John (Nevets) 5 4.57 1975 Walk When the Moon Is Full
author: Frances Hamerstrom
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 4.57
book published: 1975
rating: 5
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]]> <![CDATA[The Sandman, Vol. 7: Brief Lives]]> 25105 256 Neil Gaiman 1563891379 John (Nevets) 4 4.55 1993 The Sandman, Vol. 7: Brief Lives
author: Neil Gaiman
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 4.55
book published: 1993
rating: 4
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]]> Antarctica 41126
What he finds is an interesting blend of inhabitants who don't always mesh well but who all share a common love of Antarctica and a fierce devotion to their life there. He also begins to uncover layers of Antarctic culture that have been kept hidden from the rest of the world, and some of them are dangerous indeed. Things are brought to a head when the saboteurs—or “ecoteurs” as they call themselves—launch an attack designed to drive humans off the face of Antarctica.
]]> 672 Kim Stanley Robinson 0553574027 John (Nevets) 4 3.79 1997 Antarctica
author: Kim Stanley Robinson
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 3.79
book published: 1997
rating: 4
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date added: 2012/07/16
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]]> <![CDATA[Zoe's Tale (Old Man's War, #4)]]> 2102600
I ask because it's what I have to do. I'm Zoe Boutin Perry: A colonist stranded on a deadly pioneer world. Holy icon to a race of aliens. A player (and a pawn) in a interstellar chess match to save humanity, or to see it fall. Witness to history. Friend. Daughter. Human. Seventeen years old.

Everyone on Earth knows the tale I am part of. But you don't know my tale: How I did what I did — how I did what I had to do — not just to stay alive but to keep you alive, too. All of you. I'm going to tell it to you now, the only way I know how: not straight but true, the whole thing, to try make you feel what I felt: the joy and terror and uncertainty, panic and wonder, despair and hope. Everything that happened, bringing us to Earth, and Earth out of its captivity. All through my eyes.

It's a story you know. But you don't know it all.]]> 335 John Scalzi 0765316986 John (Nevets) 5 3.73 2008 Zoe's Tale (Old Man's War, #4)
author: John Scalzi
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 3.73
book published: 2008
rating: 5
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]]> <![CDATA[The Last Colony (Old Man's War, #3)]]> 88071
That is, until his and Jane's past reaches out to bring them back into the game--as leaders of a new human colony, to be peopled by settlers from all the major human worlds, for a deep political purpose that will put Perry and Sagan back in the thick of interstellar politics, betrayal, and war.]]> 320 John Scalzi 0765316978 John (Nevets) 5 4.06 2007 The Last Colony (Old Man's War, #3)
author: John Scalzi
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 4.06
book published: 2007
rating: 5
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]]> <![CDATA[The Ghost Brigades (Old Man's War, #2)]]> 239399
The universe is a dangerous place for humanity—and it's about to become far more dangerous. Three races that humans have clashed with before have allied to halt our expansion into space. Their linchpin: the turncoat military scientist Charles Boutin, who knows the CDF’s biggest military secrets. To prevail, the CDF must find out why Boutin did what he did.

Jared Dirac is the only human who can provide answers -- a superhuman hybrid, created from Boutin's DNA, Jared’s brain should be able to access Boutin's electronic memories. But when the memory transplant appears to fail, Jared is given to the Ghost Brigades.

At first, Jared is a perfect soldier, but as Boutin’s memories slowly surface, Jared begins to intuit the reason’s for Boutin’s betrayal. As Jared desperately hunts for his "father," he must also come to grips with his own choices. Time is running out: The alliance is preparing its offensive, and some of them plan worse things than humanity’s mere military defeat…]]> 343 John Scalzi 0765354063 John (Nevets) 4 4.10 2006 The Ghost Brigades (Old Man's War, #2)
author: John Scalzi
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 4.10
book published: 2006
rating: 4
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]]> <![CDATA[A Forest of Stars (The Saga of Seven Suns, #2)]]> 265287 - Hidden Empire (Aspect, 7/02) has won acclaim from many popular 카지노싸이트 Fiction writers, including Margaret Weis, R.A. Salvatore, and Kate Elliot. Its 7/03 Aspect mass market publication will tie in with the hardcover publication of A FOREST OF STARS.
- Kevin J. Anderson has sold millions of copies of his Star Wars, Dune, and X-Files novels, making him one of the best known writers in the genre today. He has been nominated for the Nebula Award, the Bram Stoker Award, and the SFX Reader's Choice Award.
- Foreign rights to A FOREST OF STARS have already been sold in the U.K.]]> 496 Kevin J. Anderson 0446528714 John (Nevets) 2 3.92 2003 A Forest of Stars (The Saga of Seven Suns, #2)
author: Kevin J. Anderson
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 3.92
book published: 2003
rating: 2
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]]> <![CDATA[Hidden Empire (The Saga of Seven Suns, #1)]]> 898232 654 Kevin J. Anderson 0446610577 John (Nevets) 3 3.82 2002 Hidden Empire (The Saga of Seven Suns, #1)
author: Kevin J. Anderson
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 3.82
book published: 2002
rating: 3
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]]> <![CDATA[Star Wars: Tales from Jabba's Palace]]> 353476
Featuring original stories by: Kevin J. Anderson, M. Shayne Bell, John Gregory Betancourt, Mark Budz and Marina Fitch, A.C. Crispin, Dan'l Danehy-Oakes, George Alec Effinger, Kenneth C. Flint, Esther Friesner, Barbara Hambly, Daryl F. Mallett, J.D. Montgomery, Judy and Gar Reeves-Stevens, Jennifer Roberson, Kathy Tyers, Deborah Wheeler, Dave Wolverton, William F. Wu, Timothy Zahn.]]> 448 Kevin J. Anderson 0553568159 John (Nevets) 4 3.67 1996 Star Wars: Tales from Jabba's Palace
author: Kevin J. Anderson
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 3.67
book published: 1996
rating: 4
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]]> <![CDATA[The Subtle Knife (His Dark Materials, #2)]]> 119324
Each is searching—Lyra for the meaning of Dark Matter, Will for his missing father—but what they find instead is a deadly secret, a knife of untold power. And neither Lyra nor Will suspects how tightly their lives, their loves, and their destinies are bound together... until they are split apart.]]> 326 Philip Pullman 0679879250 John (Nevets) 3 4.12 1997 The Subtle Knife (His Dark Materials, #2)
author: Philip Pullman
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 4.12
book published: 1997
rating: 3
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]]> <![CDATA[The Golden Compass (His Dark Materials, #1)]]> 119322
Can one small girl make a difference in such great and terrible endeavors? This is Lyra: a savage, a schemer, a liar, and as fierce and true a champion as Roger or Asriel could want--but what Lyra doesn't know is that to help one of them will be to betray the other.]]> 399 Philip Pullman 0679879242 John (Nevets) 4 4.02 1995 The Golden Compass (His Dark Materials, #1)
author: Philip Pullman
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 4.02
book published: 1995
rating: 4
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]]> <![CDATA[The Amber Spyglass (His Dark Materials, #3)]]> 18122
But how can he go looking for Lord Asriel when Lyra is gone? Only with her help can he fathom the myriad plots and intrigues that beset him.

The two great powers of the many worlds are lining up for war, and Will must find Lyra, for together they are on their way to battle, an inevitable journey that will even take them to the world of the dead...]]> 465 Philip Pullman 0440238153 John (Nevets) 3 4.11 2000 The Amber Spyglass (His Dark Materials, #3)
author: Philip Pullman
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 4.11
book published: 2000
rating: 3
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]]> <![CDATA[The Caves of Steel (Robot, #1)]]> 41811 206 Isaac Asimov John (Nevets) 4 4.19 1953 The Caves of Steel (Robot, #1)
author: Isaac Asimov
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 4.19
book published: 1953
rating: 4
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date added: 2011/11/06
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]]> Axis (Spin, #2) 116410 Spin won science fiction's highest honor, the Hugo Award for Best Novel.
 
Now, in Spin's direct sequel, Wilson takes us to the "world next door"--the planet engineered by the mysterious Hypotheticals to support human life, and connected to Earth by way of the Arch that towers hundreds of miles over the Indian Ocean. Humans are colonizing this new world--and, predictably, fiercely exploiting its resources, chiefly large deposits of oil in the western deserts of the continent of Equatoria.
 
Lise Adams is a young woman attempting to uncover the mystery of her father's disappearance ten years earlier. Turk Findley is an ex-sailor and sometimes-drifter. They come together when an infall of cometary dust seeds the planet with tiny remnant Hypothetical machines. Soon, this seemingly hospitable world will become very alien indeed--as the nature of time is once again twisted, by entities unknown.]]> 303 Robert Charles Wilson 0765309394 John (Nevets) 4 3.50 2007 Axis (Spin, #2)
author: Robert Charles Wilson
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 3.50
book published: 2007
rating: 4
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]]> <![CDATA[Redemption Ark (Revelation Space, #2)]]> 89190 694 Alastair Reynolds 044101173X John (Nevets) 3 4.15 2002 Redemption Ark (Revelation Space, #2)
author: Alastair Reynolds
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 4.15
book published: 2002
rating: 3
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]]> <![CDATA[The Mote in God's Eye (Moties, #1)]]> 100365 596 Larry Niven 156865054X John (Nevets) 4 4.08 1974 The Mote in God's Eye (Moties, #1)
author: Larry Niven
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 4.08
book published: 1974
rating: 4
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]]> <![CDATA[Mistborn: The Final Empire (Mistborn, #1)]]> 68428 What if the whole world were a dead, blasted wasteland?

Mistborn
For a thousand years the ash fell and no flowers bloomed. For a thousand years the Skaa slaved in misery and lived in fear. For a thousand years the Lord Ruler, the "Sliver of Infinity," reigned with absolute power and ultimate terror, divinely invincible. Then, when hope was so long lost that not even its memory remained, a terribly scarred, heart-broken half-Skaa rediscovered it in the depths of the Lord Ruler's most hellish prison. Kelsier "snapped" and found in himself the powers of a Mistborn. A brilliant thief and natural leader, he turned his talents to the ultimate caper, with the Lord Ruler himself as the mark.

Kelsier recruited the underworld's elite, the smartest and most trustworthy allomancers, each of whom shares one of his many powers, and all of whom relish a high-stakes challenge. Then Kelsier reveals his ultimate dream, not just the greatest heist in history, but the downfall of the divine despot.

But even with the best criminal crew ever assembled, Kel's plan looks more like the ultimate long shot, until luck brings a ragged girl named Vin into his life. Like him, she's a half-Skaa orphan, but she's lived a much harsher life. Vin has learned to expect betrayal from everyone she meets. She will have to learn trust if Kel is to help her master powers of which she never dreamed.

Brandon Sanderson, fantasy's newest master tale-spinner and author of the acclaimed debut Elantris, dares to turn a genre on its head by asking a simple question: What if the prophesied hero failed to defeat the Dark Lord? The answer will be found in the Mistborn Trilogy, a saga of surprises that begins with the book in your hands. Fantasy will never be the same again.]]> 541 Brandon Sanderson John (Nevets) 4 4.48 2006 Mistborn: The Final Empire (Mistborn, #1)
author: Brandon Sanderson
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 4.48
book published: 2006
rating: 4
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]]> <![CDATA[Ready Player One (Ready Player One, #1)]]> 9969571 Librarian's note: An alternate cover edition can be found here

IN THE YEAR 2044, reality is an ugly place. The only time teenage Wade Watts really feels alive is when he's jacked into the virtual utopia known as the OASIS. Wade's devoted his life to studying the puzzles hidden within this world's digital confines, puzzles that are based on their creator's obsession with the pop culture of decades past and that promise massive power and fortune to whoever can unlock them.

But when Wade stumbles upon the first clue, he finds himself beset by players willing to kill to take this ultimate prize. The race is on, and if Wade's going to survive, he'll have to win—and confront the real world he's always been so desperate to escape.]]> 480 Ernest Cline 030788743X John (Nevets) 4 4.21 2011 Ready Player One (Ready Player One, #1)
author: Ernest Cline
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 4.21
book published: 2011
rating: 4
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]]> Cat’s Cradle 135479 Told with deadpan humour and bitter irony, Kurt Vonnegut's cult tale of global destruction preys on our deepest fears of witnessing Armageddon and, worse still, surviving it ...

Dr Felix Hoenikker, one of the founding 'fathers' of the atomic bomb, has left a deadly legacy to the world. For he's the inventor of 'ice-nine', a lethal chemical capable of freezing the entire planet. The search for its whereabouts leads to Hoenikker's three ecentric children, to a crazed dictator in the Caribbean, to madness. Felix Hoenikker's Death Wish comes true when his last, fatal gift to humankind brings about the end, that for all of us, is nigh...]]> 306 Kurt Vonnegut Jr. John (Nevets) 4 4.17 1963 Cat’s Cradle
author: Kurt Vonnegut Jr.
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 4.17
book published: 1963
rating: 4
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]]> Slaughterhouse-Five 4981 Slaughterhouse-Five, an American classic, is one of the world’s great antiwar books. Centering on the infamous World War II firebombing of Dresden, the novel is the result of what Kurt Vonnegut described as a twenty-three-year struggle to write a book about what he had witnessed as an American prisoner of war. It combines historical fiction, science fiction, autobiography, and satire in an account of the life of Billy Pilgrim, a barber’s son turned draftee turned optometrist turned alien abductee. As Vonnegut had, Billy experiences the destruction of Dresden as a POW. Unlike Vonnegut, he experiences time travel, or coming “unstuck in time.”

An instant bestseller, Slaughterhouse-Five made Kurt Vonnegut a cult hero in American literature, a reputation that only strengthened over time, despite his being banned and censored by some libraries and schools for content and language. But it was precisely those elements of Vonnegut’s writing—the political edginess, the genre-bending inventiveness, the frank violence, the transgressive wit—that have inspired generations of readers not just to look differently at the world around them but to find the confidence to say something about it.

Fifty years after its initial publication at the height of the Vietnam War, Vonnegut's portrayal of political disillusionment, PTSD, and postwar anxiety feels as relevant, darkly humorous, and profoundly affecting as ever, an enduring beacon through our own era’s uncertainties.]]> 275 Kurt Vonnegut Jr. John (Nevets) 4 4.10 1969 Slaughterhouse-Five
author: Kurt Vonnegut Jr.
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 4.10
book published: 1969
rating: 4
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]]> <![CDATA[The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo (Millennium, #1)]]> 2429135
An international publishing sensation, Stieg Larsson’s The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo combines murder mystery, family saga, love story, and financial intrigue into one satisfyingly complex and entertainingly atmospheric novel.]]> 480 Stieg Larsson 0670069019 John (Nevets) 5 4.17 2005 The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo (Millennium, #1)
author: Stieg Larsson
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 4.17
book published: 2005
rating: 5
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]]> <![CDATA[The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest (Millennium, #3)]]> 6892870
Lisbeth Salander - the heart of Larsson's two previous novels - lies in critical condition, a bullet wound to her head, in the intensive care unit of a Swedish city hospital. She's fighting for her life in more ways than one: if and when she recovers, she'll be taken back to Stockholm to stand trial for three murders. With the help of her friend, journalist Mikael Blomkvist, she will not only have to prove her innocence, but also identify and denounce those in authority who have allowed the vulnerable, like herself, to suffer abuse and violence. And, on her own, she will plot revenge - against the man who tried to kill her, and the corrupt government institutions that very nearly destroyed her life.

Once upon a time, she was a victim. Now Salander is fighting back.

~from the jacket]]> 566 Stieg Larsson 030726999X John (Nevets) 4 4.23 2007 The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest (Millennium, #3)
author: Stieg Larsson
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 4.23
book published: 2007
rating: 4
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]]> <![CDATA[The Girl Who Played with Fire (Millennium #2)]]> 5060378 Millenium publisher Mikael Blomkvist has made his reputation exposing corrupt establishment figures. So when a young journalist approaches him with an investigation into sex trafficking, Blomkvist cannot resist waging war on the powerful figures who control this lucrative industry.

The Murder
When a young couple is found dead in their Stockholm apartment, it's a straightforward job for Inspector Bublanski and his team. The killer left the weapon at the scene - and the fingerprints on the gun point in only one direction.

The Girl Who Played with Fire
Ex-security analyst Lisbeth Salander is wanted for murder. Her history of unpredictable and vengeful behaviour makes her an official danger to society - but no-one can find her. The only way Salander can be reached is by computer. But she can break into almost any network she chooses...]]> 503 Stieg Larsson 0307269981 John (Nevets) 4 4.25 2006 The Girl Who Played with Fire (Millennium #2)
author: Stieg Larsson
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 4.25
book published: 2006
rating: 4
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date added: 2011/11/06
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]]> <![CDATA[Logicomix: An Epic Search for Truth]]> 6493321 This graphic novel recounts the spiritual odyssey of philosopher Bertrand Russell. In his agonized search for absolute truth, he crosses paths with thinkers like Gottlob Frege, David Hilbert & Kurt Gödel, & finds a passionate student in Ludwig Wittgenstein. But his most ambitious goal—to establish unshakable logical foundations of mathematics—continues to loom before him. Thru love & hate, peace & war, he persists in the mission threatening to claim both his career & happiness, finally driving him to the brink of insanity.
This story is at the same time a historical novel & an accessible explication of some of the biggest ideas of mathematics & modern philosophy. With rich characterizations & atmospheric artwork, it spins the pursuit of such ideas into a satisfying tale.
 Probing, layered, the book throws light on Russell’s inner struggles while setting them in the context of the timeless questions he tried to answer. At its heart, Logicomix is a story about the conflict between ideal rationality & the flawed fabric of reality.]]> 347 Apostolos Doxiadis 1596914521 John (Nevets) 3 4.05 2009 Logicomix: An Epic Search for Truth
author: Apostolos Doxiadis
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 4.05
book published: 2009
rating: 3
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date added: 2011/11/06
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]]> <![CDATA[The Bloom County Library, Vol. 3: 1984-1986]]> 7967742 272 Berkeley Breathed 1600107559 John (Nevets) 4 4.63 2010 The Bloom County Library, Vol. 3: 1984-1986
author: Berkeley Breathed
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 4.63
book published: 2010
rating: 4
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date added: 2011/11/06
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]]> <![CDATA[The Bloom County Library, Vol. 2: 1982-1984]]> 6937127
Volume Two of the Bloom County Library continues right where volume one left off, with Berkeley Breathed's endearing, enchanting, and occasionally infuriating inhabitants of Bloom County treating us to their madcap adventures, cynical observations, and optimistic innocence - sometimes all at once!]]> 297 Berkeley Breathed 1600105831 John (Nevets) 4 4.59 2010 The Bloom County Library, Vol. 2: 1982-1984
author: Berkeley Breathed
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 4.59
book published: 2010
rating: 4
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date added: 2011/11/06
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]]> <![CDATA[The Bloom County Library, Vol. 1: 1980-1982]]> 6440814 284 Berkeley Breathed 1600105319 John (Nevets) 5 4.35 2009 The Bloom County Library, Vol. 1: 1980-1982
author: Berkeley Breathed
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 4.35
book published: 2009
rating: 5
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date added: 2011/11/06
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]]> <![CDATA[The Wise Man's Fear (The Kingkiller Chronicle, #2)]]> 1215032 There are three things all wise men fear: the sea in storm, a night with no moon, and the anger of a gentle man.”

My name is Kvothe.
I have stolen princesses back from sleeping barrow kings. I burned down the town of Trebon. I have spent the night with Felurian and left with both my sanity and my life. I was expelled from the University at a younger age than most people are allowed in. I tread paths by moonlight that others fear to speak of during day. I have talked to Gods, loved women, and written songs that make the minstrels weep.
You may have heard of me.

So begins the tale of a hero told from his own point of view — a story unequaled in fantasy literature. Now in The Wise Man's Fear, an escalating rivalry with a powerful member of the nobility forces Kvothe to leave the University and seek his fortune abroad. Adrift, penniless, and alone, he travels to Vintas, where he quickly becomes entangled in the politics of courtly society. While attempting to curry favor with a powerful noble, Kvothe uncovers an assassination attempt, comes into conflict with a rival arcanist, and leads a group of mercenaries into the wild, in an attempt to solve the mystery of who (or what) is waylaying travelers on the King's Road.

All the while, Kvothe searches for answers, attempting to uncover the truth about the mysterious Amyr, the Chandrian, and the death of his parents. Along the way, Kvothe is put on trial by the legendary Adem mercenaries, is forced to reclaim the honor of the Edema Ruh, and travels into the Fae realm. There he meets Felurian, the faerie woman no man can resist, and who no man has ever survived ... until Kvothe.

In The Wise Man's Fear, Kvothe takes his first steps on the path of the hero and learns how difficult life can be when a man becomes a legend in his own time.

]]> 994 Patrick Rothfuss 0756404738 John (Nevets) 4 4.55 2011 The Wise Man's Fear (The Kingkiller Chronicle, #2)
author: Patrick Rothfuss
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 4.55
book published: 2011
rating: 4
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date added: 2011/11/06
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]]> <![CDATA[The Thing Beneath the Bed (The Adventures of the Princess and Mr. Whiffle #1)]]> 7286699
It looks like a children's book. It has pictures. It has a saccharine-sweet title. The main characters are a little girl and her teddy bear. But all of that is just protective coloration. The truth is, this is a book for adults with a dark sense of humor and an appreciation of old-school faerie tales.

There are three separate endings to the book. Depending on where you stop, you are left with an entirely different story. One ending is sweet, another is horrible. The last one is the true ending, the one with teeth in it.

The Adventures of the Princess and Mr. Whiffle is a dark twist on the classic children's picture-book. I think of it as Calvin and Hobbes meets Coraline, with some Edward Gorey mixed in.

Simply This is not a book for children.]]> 68 Patrick Rothfuss 1596063130 John (Nevets) 3 4.29 2010 The Thing Beneath the Bed (The Adventures of the Princess and Mr. Whiffle #1)
author: Patrick Rothfuss
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 4.29
book published: 2010
rating: 3
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date added: 2011/11/06
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]]> <![CDATA[Old Man's War (Old Man's War, #1)]]> 51964
The good news is that humanity finally made it into interstellar space. The bad news is that planets fit to live on are scarce-- and alien races willing to fight us for them are common. So: we fight. To defend Earth, and to stake our own claim to planetary real estate. Far from Earth, the war has been going on for decades: brutal, bloody, unyielding.

Earth itself is a backwater. The bulk of humanity's resources are in the hands of the Colonial Defense Force. Everybody knows that when you reach retirement age, you can join the CDF. They don't want young people; they want people who carry the knowledge and skills of decades of living. You'll be taken off Earth and never allowed to return. You'll serve two years at the front. And if you survive, you'll be given a generous homestead stake of your own, on one of our hard-won colony planets.

John Perry is taking that deal. He has only the vaguest idea what to expect. Because the actual fight, light-years from home, is far, far harder than he can imagine--and what he will become is far stranger.]]> 318 John Scalzi 0765348276 John (Nevets) 4 4.22 2005 Old Man's War (Old Man's War, #1)
author: John Scalzi
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 4.22
book published: 2005
rating: 4
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date added: 2011/04/06
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]]> Spin (Spin, #1) 910863
One night in October when he was ten years old, Tyler Dupree stood in his back yard and watched the stars go out. They all flared into brilliance at once, then disappeared, replaced by a flat, empty black barrier. He and his best friends, Jason and Diane Lawton, had seen what became known as the Big Blackout. It would shape their lives.

The effect is worldwide. The sun is now a featureless disk--a heat source, rather than an astronomical object. The moon is gone, but tides remain. Not only have the world's artificial satellites fallen out of orbit, their recovered remains are pitted and aged, as though they'd been in space far longer than their known lifespans. As Tyler, Jason, and Diane grow up, space probe reveals a bizarre The barrier is artificial, generated by huge alien artifacts. Time is passing faster outside the barrier than inside--more than a hundred million years per day on Earth. At this rate, the death throes of the sun are only about forty years in our future.

Jason, now a promising young scientist, devotes his life to working against this slow-moving apocalypse. Diane throws herself into hedonism, marrying a sinister cult leader who's forged a new religion out of the fears of the masses.

Earth sends terraforming machines to Mars to let the onrush of time do its work, turning the planet green. Next they send humans...and immediately get back an emissary with thousands of years of stories to tell about the settling of Mars. Then Earth's probes reveal that an identical barrier has appeared around Mars. Jason, desperate, seeds near space with self-replicating machines that will scatter copies of themselves outward from the sun--and report back on what they find.

Life on Earth is about to get much, much stranger.]]> 458 Robert Charles Wilson 076534825X John (Nevets) 4 4.02 2005 Spin (Spin, #1)
author: Robert Charles Wilson
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 4.02
book published: 2005
rating: 4
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date added: 2010/05/18
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]]> <![CDATA[Bringing Down the House: The Inside Story of Six M.I.T. Students Who Took Vegas for Millions]]> 514313 272 Ben Mezrich 0743225708 John (Nevets) 3 3.95 2002 Bringing Down the House: The Inside Story of Six M.I.T. Students Who Took Vegas for Millions
author: Ben Mezrich
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 3.95
book published: 2002
rating: 3
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date added: 2010/05/18
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]]> <![CDATA[Ophelia Joined the Group Maidens Who Don't Float: Classic Lit Signs on to Facebook]]> 6562532 Hamlet into a Facebook news feed, it launched the next big humor trend-Facebook lit. This hilarious book is the first to bring more than fifty authors and stories from classic literature back to life and online. Schmelling uses the conventions of social networking-profile pages, status updates, news feeds, and applications-to retell everything from The Odyssey to The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn to Lolita.

Every day 150 million active users of Facebook log on to reconnect with old classmates, add pictures, share quizzes, and post news stories, notes, and videos. In Schmelling-s network, Satan and Beelzebub connect using the fiend finder, Don Quixote vows vengeance against Superpoke, Jane Eyre listens to Jay-Z-s -Hard-Knock Life- on repeat, Ernest Hemingway completes the -Are you a real man?- quiz, and Oedipus works on his family tree.

A loving spoof of the most-trafficked social networking website in the world and a playful game of literary who-s who, Ophelia Joined the Group Maidens Who Don-t Float will have book lovers and Facebook addicts alike twittering with joy.]]> 273 Sarah Schmelling 0452295734 John (Nevets) 5 3.82 2009 Ophelia Joined the Group Maidens Who Don't Float: Classic Lit Signs on to Facebook
author: Sarah Schmelling
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 3.82
book published: 2009
rating: 5
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date added: 2010/05/18
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]]> <![CDATA[Little Brother (Little Brother, #1)]]> 954674
But his whole world changes when he and his friends find themselves caught in the aftermath of a major terrorist attack on San Francisco. In the wrong place at the wrong time, Marcus and his crew are apprehended by the Department of Homeland Security and whisked away to a secret prison where they’re mercilessly interrogated for days.

When the DHS finally releases them, his injured best friend Darryl does not come out. The city has become a police state where every citizen is treated like a potential terrorist. He knows that no one will believe his story, which leaves him only one option: "M1k3y" will take down the DHS himself.]]> 382 Cory Doctorow 0765319853 John (Nevets) 5 3.92 2008 Little Brother (Little Brother, #1)
author: Cory Doctorow
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 3.92
book published: 2008
rating: 5
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date added: 2010/05/18
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]]> <![CDATA[Shadow of the Hegemon (The Shadow Series, #2)]]> 9534
But with the external threat gone, the Earth has become a battlefield once more. The children of the Battle School are more than heroes; they are potential weapons that can bring power to the countries that control them. One by one, all of Ender's Dragon Army are kidnapped. Only Bean escapes; and he turns for help to Ender's brother Peter.

Peter Wiggin, Ender's older brother, has already been manipulating the politics of Earth from behind the scenes. With Bean's help, he will eventually rule the world.]]> 451 Orson Scott Card 0812565959 John (Nevets) 4 3.96 2000 Shadow of the Hegemon (The Shadow Series, #2)
author: Orson Scott Card
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 3.96
book published: 2000
rating: 4
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date added: 2010/05/18
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]]> <![CDATA[The Gathering Storm (The Wheel of Time, #12)]]> 1166599
Tarmon Gai'don, the Last Battle, looms. And mankind is not ready.

The final volume of the Wheel of Time, A Memory of Light, was partially written by Robert Jordan before his untimely passing in 2007. Brandon Sanderson, New York Times bestselling author of the Mistborn books, and now Stormlight Archive, among others, was chosen by Jordan's editor--his wife, Harriet McDougal--to complete the final volume, later expanded to three books.

In this epic novel, Robert Jordan's international bestselling series begins its dramatic conclusion. Rand al'Thor, the Dragon Reborn, struggles to unite a fractured network of kingdoms and alliances in preparation for the Last Battle. As he attempts to halt the Seanchan encroachment northward--wishing he could form at least a temporary truce with the invaders--his allies watch in terror the shadow that seems to be growing within the heart of the Dragon Reborn himself.

Egwene al'Vere, the Amyrlin Seat of the rebel Aes Sedai, is a captive of the White Tower and subject to the whims of their tyrannical leader. As days tick toward the Seanchan attack she knows is imminent, Egwene works to hold together the disparate factions of Aes Sedai while providing leadership in the face of increasing uncertainty and despair. Her fight will prove the mettle of the Aes Sedai, and her conflict will decide the future of the White Tower--and possibly the world itself.]]> 824 Robert Jordan 0765302306 John (Nevets) 4 4.41 2009 The Gathering Storm (The Wheel of Time, #12)
author: Robert Jordan
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 4.41
book published: 2009
rating: 4
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date added: 2010/05/18
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]]> <![CDATA[A Clash of Kings (A Song of Ice and Fire, #2)]]> 10572
It is a tale in which brother plots against brother and the dead rise to walk in the night. Here a princess masquerades as an orphan boy; a knight of the mind prepares a poison for a treacherous sorceress; and wild men descend from the Mountains of the Moon to ravage the countryside. Against a backdrop of incest and fratricide, alchemy and murder, victory may go to the men and women possessed of the coldest steel...and the coldest hearts. For when kings clash, the whole land trembles.

Here is the second volume in George R.R. Martin magnificent cycle of novels that includes A Game of Thrones and A Storm of Swords. As a whole, this series comprises a genuine masterpiece of modern fantasy, bringing together the best the genre has to offer. Magic, mystery, intrigue, romance, and adventure fill these pages and transport us to a world unlike any we have ever experienced. Already hailed as a classic, George R.R. Martin stunning series is destined to stand as one of the great achievements of imaginative fiction.]]> 1009 George R.R. Martin 0553381695 John (Nevets) 3 4.42 1998 A Clash of Kings (A Song of Ice and Fire, #2)
author: George R.R. Martin
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 4.42
book published: 1998
rating: 3
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]]> <![CDATA[A Game of Thrones (A Song of Ice and Fire, #1)]]> 13496
Sweeping from a harsh land of cold to a summertime kingdom of epicurean plenty, A Game of Thrones tells a tale of lords and ladies, soldiers and sorcerers, assassins and bastards, who come together in a time of grim omens. Here an enigmatic band of warriors bear swords of no human metal; a tribe of fierce wildlings carry men off into madness; a cruel young dragon prince barters his sister to win back his throne; a child is lost in the twilight between life and death; and a determined woman undertakes a treacherous journey to protect all she holds dear. Amid plots and counter-plots, tragedy and betrayal, victory and terror, allies and enemies, the fate of the Starks hangs perilously in the balance, as each side endeavors to win that deadliest of conflicts: the game of thrones.]]> 835 George R.R. Martin 0553588486 John (Nevets) 4 4.44 1996 A Game of Thrones (A Song of Ice and Fire, #1)
author: George R.R. Martin
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 4.44
book published: 1996
rating: 4
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date added: 2010/05/18
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]]> <![CDATA[The Awakened Mage (Kingmaker, Kingbreaker, #2)]]> 1116393 678 Karen Miller 1841496057 John (Nevets) 3 3.74 2006 The Awakened Mage (Kingmaker, Kingbreaker, #2)
author: Karen Miller
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 3.74
book published: 2006
rating: 3
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date added: 2010/05/18
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]]> <![CDATA[Richard Stark's Parker: The Hunter]]> 6149789
Darwyn Cooke’s beautifully stylized artwork perfectly compliments the hard-hitting action as originally written by legendary crime author Richard Stark. Parker is arguably one of the hardest hard-boiled characters in all of crime fiction and the original novels feature stories and prose that are as uncompromising as he is. This graphic novel adaptation perfectly matches the style and tone of Stark’s noir world.

The Hunter is the story of a man who hits New York head-on like a shotgun blast to the chest. Betrayed by the woman he loved and double-crossed by his partner in crime, Parker makes his way cross-country with only one thought burning in his mind — to coldly exact his revenge and reclaim what was taken from him!

Winner of the 2010 Eisner Award for Best Adaptation from Another Work.]]> 140 Darwyn Cooke 1600104932 John (Nevets) 5 4.19 2009 Richard Stark's Parker: The Hunter
author: Darwyn Cooke
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 4.19
book published: 2009
rating: 5
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]]> <![CDATA[The Innocent Mage (Kingmaker, Kingbreaker, #1)]]> 1051620
The Doranen have ruled Lur with magic since arriving as refugees centuries ago. Theirs was a desperate flight to escape the wrath of a powerful mage who started a bitter war in their homeland. To keep Lur safe, the native Olken inhabitants agreed to abandon their own magic. Magic is now forbidden them, and any who break this law are executed.

Asher left his coastal village to make his fortune. Employed in the royal stables, he soon finds himself befriended by Prince Gar and given more money and power than he'd ever dreamed possible. But the Olken have a secret; a prophecy. The Innocent Mage will save Lur from destruction and members of The Circle have dedicated themselves to preserving Olken magic until this day arrives. Unbeknownst to Asher, he has been watched closely. As the Final Days approach, his life takes a new and unexpected turn ...]]> 613 Karen Miller 1841496049 John (Nevets) 3 3.67 2005 The Innocent Mage (Kingmaker, Kingbreaker, #1)
author: Karen Miller
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 3.67
book published: 2005
rating: 3
read at: 2010/05/18
date added: 2010/05/18
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]]> <![CDATA[Ask a Ninja Presents The Ninja Handbook: This Book Looks Forward to Killing You Soon]]> 3004130
Carefully consider the joy of your soft-headed ignorance before you begin to run, flip, and jump along the Ninja Path.
  
After much debate and in a spirit of morbid amusement, the International Order of Ninjas has chosen to produce The Ninja Handbook , the first-ever secret ninja training guide specifically designed for the non-ninja.
Most non-ninjas who handle these delicate, deadly pages will die–probably in an elaborately horrific and painful manner. But whether your journey lasts five seconds or five days or (rather inconceivably) five years, all those who bravely take up this text and follow the tenets and trials laid out within will die knowing they were as ninja as they possibly could’ve been.

For the true of heart or the extremely lucky, this powerful and honorable manuscript contains such phenomenal ninja wisdom

•How to create and name your very own lethal ninja clan
•The proper weapon to use when fighting a vampire pumpkin
•Why clowns and robots are so dangerous on the Internet
•Easy-to-follow charts showing when to slice and when to stab
•How to execute such ultradeadly kicks as the Driving Miss Daisy
•Why pretty much every ninja movie ever made sucks
•How to make a shoggoth explode using well-placed foliage
•What the heck a shoggoth is and why you’ll need to make it explode
•Death Aide certification
•And much more ninjafied enlightenment on every shuriken-sharp page!

People do not take the Path, the Path takes people.]]> 325 Kent Nichols 030740580X John (Nevets) 5 3.64 2008 Ask a Ninja Presents The Ninja Handbook: This Book Looks Forward to Killing You Soon
author: Kent Nichols
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 3.64
book published: 2008
rating: 5
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date added: 2009/05/12
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]]> <![CDATA[Acacia: The War with the Mein (Acacia #1)]]> 565335
]]> 576 David Anthony Durham 0385506066 John (Nevets) 4 3.57 2007 Acacia: The War with the Mein (Acacia #1)
author: David Anthony Durham
name: John (Nevets)
average rating: 3.57
book published: 2007
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2009/05/12
shelves:
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]]>