Thumbs down for Sliding Scales

Alan Dean Foster’s latest novel, Sliding Scales: A Pip & Flinx Adventure was a major disappointment. In the story, Flinx is encouraged by his ship’s AI to take a vacation on the out of the way planet Jast. Just like Flinx, this book certainly takes a vacation. It does almost nothing to advance Flinx’s [...]

39 Books

Amazingly I read (or listened to) 39 books during 2004. While most were Science Fiction in nature, there was a smattering of other types including: a history of Catholic church, a book about single sex education, a great bread cookbook, and an autobiography. You can check out the complete reading list on my Book List [...]

Updated Book List

I’ve updated my Book List. The list is the running collection of all of the books that I have either read or listened to on tape (unabridged of course) since January 1, 2004.
When I used Movable Type for my blog system, I had a great plugin that let me create my booklist. In moving to [...]

Behavior Changes

Ellie is doing really well adjusting to being the big sister, but there has been some regression in her behavior and we are struggling with ways to effectively disciple her. Our feeling is that it is partly her age (we sometimes forget that she is only 3 3/4 years old) and partly the change in [...]

Books on Tape woes

I have a love – hate relationship with books on tape. I love them for a great many reasons, but I borrow them from the library and sometimes they are damaged. I’ve been listening to The Bear and Dargon by Tom Clancy. It’s a 31 tape book, and the last 5 tapes are all damaged. [...]

To read or to listen

I am continually amazed at the enjoyment that I get from listening to books on tape. My all-time favorite book is Ender’s Game by Orson Scott Card. I’ve read it numerous times. The sequel to Ender’s Game is Speaker for the Dead. While part of the Ender Saga, Speaker is a much different book. It [...]

Review: Close Combat

I just finished listening to W. E. B. Griffin’s Close Combat (yes I said listening to, I listened to the unabridged version). It is the sixth book in the Corps series. While I’ve never actually “read” any of his books, I’ve listened to many on tape. This one continues the stories of the Marines during [...]

Books-on-tape

When I used to have a really long commute (1+ hours each way) at my old job, I used to listen to a lot of books-on-tape. The unabridged kind. It was really a great way to spend the while sitting in the car. When I was at the library last week checking out my books, [...]

Review: The Skies of Pern

Late last night I finished The Skies Of Pern by Anne McCaffrey. It was the latest (I think) of her Dragonriders of Pern books. It was an enjoyable novel, it has been many years (at least 4 or 5) since I have last read one of her books, so it was a little tough remembering [...]

Review: Dragon’s Kin

When I used to commute over an hour each way to work, I would listen to books on tape (the unabridged variety). I listened to a number of Anne McCaffrey’s Pern books. Although it has been a couple of years since I last read/listened to one, I really enjoyed this easy book. I was a [...]