‘The Gathering Storm’ Audiobook – The First Two Discs…

As you all know, I’m really having difficulties getting into books at the moment. It’s just an ‘End of the Year and Tired’ thing, hopefully things will pick up soon. I hope so as I have some great looking stuff on the pile waiting to be read! :o)

One of the things I’m doing to get round this is to try listening to audiobooks instead. I’ve had mixed results so far but at least I’m keeping the momentum going and that’s a good thing!
‘The Gathering Storm’ weighs in at a bulky twenty six CDs in audiobook format, a quite incredible thirty four and a half hours worth of listening all in all. Just so you don’t all end up waiting forever for a full review I’m going to be giving you lucky people occasional updates of where I am with this monstrous undertaking…

The first two discs are mainly about telling us where all the main players are and what they’re doing. I’m not as big a fan of the ‘Wheel of Time’ as certain others but even I can see that there are two people writing this book now. The good news is that Brandon Sanderson is very much after letting telling Jordan’s story and keeping himself out of the picture as much as possible. There are two names on the book but it’s all about the name that counts. I’m looking forward to getting into this some more, we find out what the storm means and I want to know what happens next!

I’m having trouble with one of the narrators though and that’s not such a good thing seeing as I still have a long way to go. Kate Reading is ok but Michael Kramer’s voice and tone follows a set pattern that you can almost set your watch by. This has meant that I’ve found myself listening to his voice more than what he is actually saying resulting in multiple rewinding of the CD…

It’s not looking good so far but I’ll definitely stick it out for a bit longer and see where it takes me. If I get my reading mojo back then I’ll probably put the CDs down and pick up the book. Wish me luck!

The 'Beowulf really wasn't that good was it?' Link Up Spectacular!

In case you've been wondering where all the reviews have gone, I've actually been on holiday all of last week and very nice it was too. We're talking a luxurious lodge in the middle of the woods (and it was snowing!) where all you could hear were birds and my swearing at the Playstation as the cops busted me (again...) on 'Grand Theft Auto' ;o)
We finally got round to watching 'Beowulf' and all I can say is that I'm glad I didn't pay to see it at the cinema. Now there's a film that's all about the creators saying 'look at what we can do with animation'... shame they didn't pay as much attention to the rest of it.

While I was away, loads of cool stuff has been happening around the blogosphere. Here are some links to the best bits...

Neth has his Best of 2009 list up and it's looking pretty good. I need to get round to doing mine...

Adam reviews Carrie Ryan's 'The Dead Tossed Waves' and says it's 'enjoyable and disturbing by turns'. There are zombies to be found here so you can expect to see a review here very soon :o)

James has Assorted Author News for us. All I'm saying is 'The Scarab Path' is a great name for a book!

Harry shows us what's been coming through his letter box. It's Books, don't worry!

I love Rob's 'Books in the Mail' posts and here's his Latest One...

Is This the winner of the 'Ugliest Dog in the World' competition?

I'm not going to link to a specific post here because the whole damn thing is just great! Check out Smugglivus! (I really wanted to be a part of it this year but... no time unfortunately)

Mark wasn't too impressed with War of the Soulites. With a title like that I'm not surprised...

Last but not least... Pat is a big fan of 'The Windup Girl.

What am I doing? Trying to read but just cannot get into anything. I do have some reviews lined up though so stick around :o)

From My Bookshelf… ‘The Winter of the World’ (Part 2) – Michael Scott Rohan

It was way back in November 2007 that I gave a quick plug to one of my favourite fantasy series, the initial trilogy in Michael Scott Rohan’s ‘Winter of the World’ series. I said that I’d write more about the somewhat looser trilogy that followed it another time and then promptly forgot about it. Until now…

I was already reading a lot of fantasy and sci-fi back in the nineteen eighties but Michael Scott Rohan’s ‘The Anvil of Ice’ was once of the very few books that really got it’s claws into me and had me looking for more books like it. It’s worth mentioning that you can pick up ‘The Anvil of Ice’ for 1p (second hand) on Amazon and I’d recommend that you give it a go. You can’t really go wrong spending 1p can you? :o)
I got to the end of the trilogy and it was very clear that there was no way Elof’s story could go any further (read ‘The Hammer of the Sun’, you’ll see what I mean); I was sad to see it end but knew that it couldn’t go on so kept the completed trilogy on my shelf and moved on to other things.

Fast forward fifteen years…



The last thing I was thinking of was ‘The Winter of the World’ trilogy, I was escorting a psychiatric patient into town for some shopping and was more concerned with making sure that he didn’t do a runner! We stopped off for a quick browse in Waterstones and there was ‘The Castle of the Winds’… A new Michael Scott Rohan book. The story couldn’t possibly continue… could it? At that point I didn’t really care; I grabbed myself a copy ready to read when I got home. For anyone who’s interested, I did make sure that the psychiatric patient made it back to the hospital first…

Knowing that he couldn’t go any further forwards with his series, Rohan decided to take things right back into the past; a thousand years into the past. There would be no Elof, Kermorvan, Roc or Ils but there were new characters to meet and follow on new adventures. ‘The Castle of the Winds’ saw the mastersmith Kunrad undertake an epic journey to recover his stolen work. Everything was there that made the original trilogy a standout piece of writing; a richly drawn world with characters you wanted to give up your time for and battle sequences that gripped me right when it counted. Something wasn’t quite right though and it took me another two books to work out what it was…



I found myself a copy of ‘The Singer and the Sea’ about a year later followed swiftly by ‘Shadow of the Seer’. ‘Singer’ followed on from ‘’The Castle of the Winds’ with Kunrad’s apprentices making a name for themselves on the high seas. ‘Shadow of the Seer’ went in a completely different direction with a story of love that takes place on another continent entirely (and perhaps even further back in time, I’m not sure…) Again, all the ingredients were there for typically excellent stories from Rohan but something was still missing for me.



It took me a while to figure it out but I got there in the end. The original trilogy was so complete in itself that any following books really needed to be prequels, and feed into the overall arc a lot more closely if the whole thing was to feel a lot more cohesive as a sequence. Good as they were (and they are!) the new books had nothing to really connect them to the first trilogy, only the world in which it was all taking place. These books stand well on their own but there was a real sense of ‘disconnection’ (with the first three books) that I found myself trying to resolve while I was reading them. I never really resolved it, at least not to my liking…

While the books will always have a place on my bookshelf (not only am I a completist but they are good reads) I’ll always wonder what could have been if Rohan had decided to tie them in with the main trilogy a little more closely. What I wanted was the story of Vayde and the fate that befell him, that would have been brilliant…

Your Favourite Reads of the Year...

This is a bit of a 'cheat's post' really, life has got in the way of a proper review being posted but normal service will resume soon!

It's the time of year when I start thinking about all the books that have really stood out for me this year in readiness for the 'Big Fat End of the Year Post' (for 'thinking', read 'scrolling back through the blog to see which books scored highly, I really am too busy to think hard at the moment!) This time round though, I thought I'd throw that question out to you while I'm putting my list together. What are the books that really hit the spot for you in 2009? It doesn't matter if it's just the one book or a whole list, bundle your thoughts into a comment and leave it beneath the post!

Thinking about it, I'd also be interested to hear from anyone who feels that they haven't read a decent book in 2009 (just to balance things out a bit)...

‘Thunder from Fenris’ – Nick Kyme (Black Library)

I had a couple of issues with ‘Heart of Rage’ (the last audiobook that I listened to from the Black Library) but overall it was a lot of fun to get stuck into and a great way to spend those early hours when you just know you’re not going to go back to sleep any time soon. With this in mind, when ‘Thunder from Fenris’ came through the door I was definitely looking forward to more of the same. I got what I was hoping for but at the same time, it wasn’t quite the same this time round…

Of all the Space Marine chapters, the Space Wolves are the most feral of all. Hailing from the planet Fenris, these proud warriors carry the wulfen curse into battle with them; the lupine spirit that can burst forth at any time…
The ice planet Skorbad has come under attack from the forces of Chaos and a squad of Space Wolves is assigned to the war effort there. In the aftermath of battle, one of their number suddenly goes wulfen and leaves a trail of destruction in his wake. His remaining brothers must rescue him before he can do any more damage but is he really the warrior behind the death of his Space Marine brother? The wulfen warrior’s rampage must be stopped but the Space Wolves will find that the war for Skorbad is not yet over…

Since I listened to ‘Heart of Rage’ I’ve had a go at a few more audiobooks so found this one easier to follow. That’s not to say that I didn’t hit the rewind button a few times but this was more to do with being stuck on the tube (and not being able to hear what I was listening to) than anything else!

Toby Longworth takes on the narrative duties once more and does a sterling job much like the last time. You wouldn’t believe that he’s providing a different voice for each and every character but he is. Every character is distinctive from the rest (although one of them sounded very much like Arnold Schwarznegger…) and I never got confused about who was talking at any one time.
I wasn’t too convinced by the accompanying sound effects though… You never really got much of a sense of where it was all taking place. I know the characters needed to be heard above the background but… this was an ice planet! Where were the howling winds? Where was the crunching of footsteps in the snow? I wasn’t too impressed by the fight sequences either, it sounded like they were playing the same ‘grunting track’ on a constant loop. In ‘Heart of Rage’ you actually felt like it were the characters who were fighting, not this time…

On the plus side, Nick Kyme does give Longworth a tale worth telling. I could tell what was coming but the journey to get there was what it was all about. Kyme gives the listener plenty of moments where you think it’s all going to happen. You get worked up for the finale… and then it keeps going. The tension is skilfully racked up to a suitably impressive finale that I was glad to be around for. It didn’t end there though; the Space Wolve’s original mission was still to be completed and although you never see it through to the end you are left in no doubt as to what must happen. Here’s an ending that smacks you in the chest like a bolt round and leaves you quiet for a long time afterwards…

I felt that ‘Thunder from Fenris’ suffered from a lack of the care and attention that made ‘Heart of Rage’ such an atmospheric experience. The story itself saved things though, here’s a tale that will be on my iPod for a while to come…

Eight and a Quarter out of Ten

Didn't Finish the Book...

As much as I’d like to, I don’t finish everything that I read. This can be for a number of reasons ranging from ‘I couldn’t get into it’ to ‘the author obviously didn’t check the spelling before self publishing...’ Despite not finishing them I still like to mention these books on the blog. After all, people were kind enough to send them my way so the least I can do is say why they didn’t work for me!
So, here goes...



‘Chapterhouse: Dune’ – Frank Herbert (Ace)

How long have you left it, between books, when reading a series? You’re normally looking at a couple of years between books being published (with some notable exceptions) and that’s not too much of a gap really. Twenty years though...? I was about fourteen (maybe a bit younger) when I read Frank Herbert’s ‘Heretics of Dune’ and never got round to picking up ‘Chapterhouse: Dune’... until now.
Here’s a book where you really need to have recently read the rest of the series if it’s to make any sense at all. I had no idea what was going on! This is a book that I will no doubt re-read once I’ve been back over the rest of the series but when will I have the time to do that...? I don’t know. In the meantime, ‘Chapterhouse: Dune’ has gone back on the pile.



‘The Templar’ – Paul Doherty (Headline)

Here’s the Amazon blurb...

1095 and crusading fervour has swept Europe. Christ’s fief of Jerusalem has been seized by the Infidels. The Frankish Knights of the West are to march east to liberate the Holy City. Hugh de Payens and Godefroi of St Omer, the soon-to-be founders of the Templar Order, and Hugh’s younger sister, Eleanor, leave the security of their homes in Burgundy, France, with a plan to join Count Raymond of Toulouse's army, and march across the known world to Jerusalem.

Follow the crusaders as they march through Europe into the glories of Byzantium and onto Syria and witness the hardships, bloodshed and trickery they encounter on their treacherous travels to the Holy Land.

I was after something a little different and ‘The Templar’ sounded like it could fit the bill nicely. It’s a real shame then that the book was so dry, in tone, that I ran out of steam trying to read it. While there was a real sense of history to the work I didn’t get the feeling that the same level of attention was being paid to the characters. The pace was a little too slow for my liking as well although I did expect it seeing as the author is dealing with the mass migration of thousands of people!
I know someone who will like ‘The Templar’, and its sequel, but it wasn’t for me...

Another Dip into the Comic Pile...

Would you believe that I’m still trying to catch up with reading stuff that I got for my birthday? It’s obvious that there is far too much going on for me to able to enjoy the simple things in life like comic books and... erm... fine chocolate (actually, I’ve always been able to make time for that) Things are set to get even busier next year so we shall see what happens to my comic book reading then. In the meantime, a slightly shorter ‘comics post’ than normal but one that’s full of goodness nevertheless...



‘The Goon #33’ – Eric Powell

It’s finally reached that point where I have to choose between sticking with the trades or collecting individual issues of ‘The Goon’. In typical fashion, I put off the decision for a little longer and got myself a copy of #33. It’s a one shot, it’s allowed!
‘The Goon’ never ceases to touch a soft spot in my hard old heart and this time was no exception. Powell’s art is as spot on as ever but what really got me this time was his ability to tell a story with no dialogue whatsoever. It’s all in the artwork and I was surprised (in a good way) as to how much of the meaning came across. You can really tell what’s going on with these guys. Hopefully things are gearing up for the next big story arc and I’ll be back in the action very soon.



‘Conan the Cimmerian #16, Free Companions (Part 1 of 3)’

Despite the fact that I’m really erratic at picking this one up regularly, ‘Conan the Cimmerian’ is a real favourite of mine with artist and writer combining almost perfectly to give the reader the definitive picture of the barbarian himself. Issue 16 sees our free spirited hero starting to really chafe under the restrictions of life in Khoraja and the Princess Yasmela start to tire of his excesses. Things are about to explode and the very beginning of the story tells us how it all ends up...
I haven’t read a bad issue of ‘Conan’ yet and it looks like I’ll have to wait another month to see of the trend of goodness continues. As I’ve said before, Truman and Giorello complement each other perfectly (although I’m really looking forward to seeing Darrick Robertson’s one off issue next month) and combine here to tell another great story. I wasn’t so sure about telling it in a series of flashbacks though...
This is only the first part of three so I’ll be making sure that I’m back next month to see how it continues...



‘The Silver Surfer: Origins’

This is the book that I haven’t got round to reading since my birthday in September. I always thought the Silver Surfer looked really cool (he does, look at him!) but it was only recently that I realised I hadn’t read a single one of his stories. That had to change! Marvel Pocket books are a great way for people like me to catch up with early stories without having to resort to ebay... ‘The Silver Surfer: Origins’ gives us some of the Surfer’s earliest tales of a life on Earth amongst people who fear him as an alien. If it wasn’t bad enough already, our hero has to cope with the attentions of Loki, The Stranger, Mephisto and the alien Badoon. Who’d be a superhero?

I wasn’t too hot on John Buscema’s artwork which seemed to swing between being really intense, vibrant or just dated. It did the job though.
Stan Lee’s stories are full of honour misunderstood (on the part of the Surfer) and I ended up feeling more than a little sorry for a man who only wants to do the right thing. It’s also interesting to see our world through the eyes of a newcomer and Stan Lee seems to enjoy showing us just how petty, and quick to judge, we can be.
I’m not sure that I’d pick up more ‘Silver Surfer’ stuff (the guy is practically invincible, where’s the fun in reading about that) but ‘Origins’ is a great place to dip in and find out what the Surfer is all about.