Karsa Orlong

Gives me goosebumps

Only the one between my ears

Yay!! I hope they'll release Julian May's 'Saga of the Exiles' ...

'The Skiver's Guide: How to Avoid Work By Surfing the Net'

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lqIEGDdrnfo

I've just started that, too Nothing like starting the previous series when the new one has just begun Over the weekend I also watched: Fringe 4x02 - very enjoyable Supernatural 7x02 - scary! Nikita 1x11 - really starting to like this series, it's daft but fun

I do, too. Sometimes the description of a character will remind me of an actor, and then I have that actor playing the part in my head

I sent them an email to complain about their haphazard categorisation of the SF Gateway releases. I got a reply back within an hour saying they'd forward my comments to the Kindle team. Doubt it'll make the slightest bit of difference but I felt better afterwards

I'd just contact Amazon customer services, cos they're usually quick to respond - although I'd imagine they'll refer you to the publisher.

I suddenly seem to have become a Neal Asher fan. I usually make a point of never reading two books on the trot by the same author, yet I'm suddenly on my third Asher book in a row I read The Skinner last year and thoroughly enjoyed it. It is the first of his 'Spatterjay' novels, Spatterjay being the name of a planet. Actually, Spatterjay is a hellhole. It's surface is largely covered in water, and within those depths lurk all kinds of deadly monstrosities which are usually large, usually angry, usually have lots of teeth, and are usually killing either each other or the humans who dare to live on the surface. The humans themselves are known as Hoopers. Almost every human who sets foot on the planet is infected with the Spatterjay virus, a virus which can increase longevity and physical recuperation to the point of immortality - but it does have drawbacks: if the infected person does not have a diet of non-infected foodstuffs then they begin to mutate into something far less friendly. The Hoopers are a seafaring people, of course, and amongst them are the Old Captains, those who were infected early in the planet's habitation and have lived for centuries as a result. Anyway, I finally returned to this series with the sequel, The Voyage of the Sable Keech. It took a while longer to get going than The Skinner but it was worth the wait. Once it kicks into gear it is positively outrageous in the number of threads it weaves together into a coherent whole. Set ten years after the previous events, most of the cast from The Skinner return, along with several intriguing new characters. Janer, Erlin and Ambel all appear, and are usually in some kind of peril. Here, a cult of reifs (reifications - basically dead humans who have been brought back to life - don't ask!) come to Spatterjay on a pilgrimage, with the hopes of being truly resurrected, as happened to the eponymous Sable Keech. They build a huge boat in his name and set off for the island where his resurrection took place. Unfortunately, not everyone is pulling in the same direction, and all sorts of merriment ensues (usually involving violence with big weapons and even bigger enemies). Throw into this mix all-powerful AIs, grumpy but lethal war drones, and the last survivor of an alien ship that crashed into the ocean during The Skinner and has now begun to mutate into something even less friendly, and you have a recipe for glorious mayhem. This book really snowballs and, by the time it reaches its latter stages, it is moving at such pace that it's quite literally breathtaking. I followed that up with Prador Moon. This one is actually a prequel to Asher's entire Polity universe, of which the Spatterjay series is a part. It's quite an old-fashioned book, in that it is only 222 pages long and tells a wonderfully concentrated tale, but he packs so much into those pages that it feels like it holds more content than some authors manage in books three times the size. The Prador are a species of crab-like aliens, and boy are they NASTY. This book tells the story about how the war between humans and Prador first began, and it's a fantastic read. It rattles along at an amazing pace without foresaking characterisation, and also gives a lot of information without resorting to overlong info-dumps. It's the sort of book you read in one or two sittings, unable to put it down until you turn the final page. And now I've moved on to the third Spatterjay novel, Orbus (the name of one of the aforementioned Old Captains [who was a sadist - with a crew of masochists - until he got taken prisoner by a Prador ... ), which - at the moment, at least - seems like it's going to be even better than the others I've read to date. Asher's version of science fiction is like Spinal Tap's version of rock music - it's turned up to 11. It is full of wild ideas, huge action sequences, vivid description, wicked humour, and - above all else - great characters. I'm hooked - but I'll never be able to look at the sea in the same way again The Voyage of the Sable Keech 8/10 Prador Moon 9/10

Watched Terra Nova last night. 'Twas okay in a seen-it-all-before kind of way. It was more fun than Ringer, at least, which was blimmin' awful

Thanks, will try and find it somewhere. I'll no doubt end up getting it - iTunes has got the 'deluxe' version Feeling more tempted to get the new Machine Head album at the moment, although I'm still getting my head around the rather excellent The Hunter, Mastodon's new one

I can't make up my mind whether to get it or not! Insurgentes did very little for me, and I've listened to samples off this one and not been particularly thrilled, yet I keep reading comments like yours. Confused!

Well the countdown has finished but the site still seems inactive to me Apparently - according to the SF Gateway Twitter page - Amazon.co.uk has all the release-day books available but, without a list and with Amazon's usual inability to categorise books in a way where one search finds all (labelling them as 'SF Gateway' would've been a start ... ), it's difficult to know what's actually out there

Watched 7x01 last night - holy cr@p

Added two more Neal Asher books to my TBR pile: Orbus and Cowl

Yeah, I saw that. Seems a strange decision not to bring the Touch to the UK. Also, the £89 version has shorter battery life and less memory than the existing Kindle 3. The cheaper price point is a winner, though.

For you, Frankie, of course not Agree about Ten

A lot of it's going to be down to how Amazon title/categorise things - they're so inconsistent I'm assuming titles are going to be available directly from the SF Gateway site, so that might be the better way to go.

A quick search on Amazon has revealed a lot of SF Gateway ebooks already listed for pre-order: http://www.amazon.co.uk/s/ref=nb_sb_ss_i_1_4?url=search-alias%3Ddigital-text&field-keywords=gollancz+sf&sprefix=goll

If you liked Ender's Game (fantastic book) you should definitely check out The Forever War by Joe Haldeman - it's a classic.

204 books? In less than 9 months? I really don't know how you take it all in

I finally finished Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy (yawn!) and started The Voyage of The Sable Keech by Neal Asher

Crikey, time for some brief comments on recent reads, just to try and catch up a bit The Three Musketeers by Alexandre Dumas Hard to criticise a classic, I suppose, but it wasn't for me. I think I would've enjoyed it more had it not been so long. For the amount of actual plot involved it's an incredibly drawn out book. I did enjoy some of the characterisation. There was a distinct overuse of exclamation marks, though(!) 6/10 Waylander by David Gemmell A man who becomes an infamous assassin after his wife and child are murdered is drawn into a war that he wants no part of, and is sent on a mission to retrieve a set of magical armour that will supposedly bring his people together to fight off an invading force. A fairly standard set up for heroic fantasy, but Gemmell's characters are a step up from the usual, and he concentrates more on them than world building or magic systems. He doesn't waste many words, either, and their is humour and a fair bit of emotion as well. Plus he handles the action sequences brilliantly, and there is a fatalism to it that means things never quite work out in the way you expect. For me, this was on a par with - if not better than - Legend by the same author. 8/10 The Woodcutter by Reginald Hill The son of a Cumbrian woodcutter becomes a millionaire, marries a beautiful woman and builds the life he dreams of, when suddenly he is accused of being a paedophile and of fraud. Thrown in prison, his life falls apart and a psychiatrist tries to get to the bottom of his fall from grace. I enjoyed this one a lot. It's a little far-fetched, but it moves with pace, and it kept me guessing for longer than it really should have, and Wolf Hadda is a very charismatic main character. It's only in the last hundred pages, once its biggest secrets and twists and turns have been revealed, that it falls into rather predictable thriller territory, which is a shame, but up to that point it's a very good read. 8/10 Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy by John Le Carre I'd meant to read this for ages, and seeing the trailers for the new movie version made me pick it up in a 3 for 2 at Waterstones. This tale of the hunt for a Russian spy reminded me, in writing style, a lot of James Ellroy. There are lots of names thrown at you, lots of jargon, lots of short cryptic sentences the meanings of which only become clear pages later. I like Ellroy, but I didn't like this as much as I thought I would. I just didn't care about any of the characters, and by about the 300th page the end couldn't come soon enough. I have to admit, I don't get what all the fuss is about. 6/10

Shame but call me cynical - there'll be a comeback tour in a few years. I liked the headline on The Daily Mash: "U2 still refusing to take the hint"