Tag Archives: david lee summers

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Around the Sphere April 2013

Yes, it is that time again. Time for me to be social. Which usually means snarking on things. In this case, other folks have already put together the snark for me. Enjoy!

I love making fun of Disney heroines. Mostly because they are not particularly heroic. Or rather, running through the woods, cleaning house, or reading a book all while looking gorgeous is heroic for the female form. Sigh….

Here is a really cool article about the what ifs of drawing female superheroes fully clothed. I love the idea and I think a competent, mostly clad superhero (of any gender) is far more attractive than stepping out to fight crime in a bathing suit or highheels and thong-bustier combo.

http://www.geeknative.com/38733/drawing-the-impossible-fully-dressed-superheroines/

Remember Mr. Smith (Hugo Weaving) from The Matrix? Yeah, I do. Here he is again in the GE commercial. If all ads were this cool, I would spend more time rotting my brain watching them. Are you ad companies paying attention?

Cracked.com is a great place to visit if you need to kill some time waiting for the bus, that last load of laundry, or you’re stuck at work and can get away with it. Not that I would ever encourage folks to be slackers. Not me. This particular article is on real life places that could be sets for science fiction or fantasy movies. I wish some of these places made up my lawn art.
http://www.cracked.com/article_20357_7-modern-ghost-towns-that-look-like-sci-fi-movies.html?utm_source=thechive.com&utm_medium=referral&utm_campaign=7-modern-ghost-towns-that-look-like-sci-fi-movies-pics-article

I’m sure you have seen this trailer by now, but hey, it stars two of my all time favorite actors – Jodie Foster and Matt Damon. So there is no way I was not going to plague you with this trailer one more time.

Ever wonder how to make that superhero Aquaman sexy, useful, and manly all in one go? Well, yeah, I hadn’t actually spent much time thinking about Aquaman either. I mean, who does? Here a cool pic of Aquaman, medieval style. It does the trick.

http://www.ilyke.net/i-thought-this-deserved-to-be-seen-by-more-people–batman–aquaman-medieval-garb/25303/?utm_source=u212&utm_medium=p212137&utm_campaign=aff

Confession time. I love the Riddick movies. I have watched Pitch Black like dozens of times since I first caught on the once appropriately names SciFi channel. When The Riddick Chronicles came out, I hauled my main man off to the theatres to watch it. It was great. Now, a third movie is nearing completion.I know, some of you….perhaps most of you, are quirking your eyebrow at me. I’m OK with that, because I am picturing you all in The Next Generation combat leotard. You look smashing.

This last video is Honest Reviews. Now I love me some Harry Potter – books first, movies second, trick jelly beans third. This video covers all the movies, so beware of spoilers, if you care about such things. Had me chuckling out loud.

Finally, stuff about me that you may or may not care about. I care, and that is good enough. First, I gave an interview over at the Book Store Book Blogger Connection. If you haven’t heard of this, it’s a great site where you can provide little snippets about books you love. Then bookstores, usually small, independent ones so far, print off those snippets and place them on their shelves to entice book browsers to pick up the book and perhaps take it home. Genius. (both the site and my interview).

http://bookstorebloggerconxn.com/2013/04/03/bloggers-who-win-dab-of-darkness/

Almost finally, David Lee Summers, an author, scientist, blogger, and all around fun guy, passed the WordPress Family Award on to me. This is my first bloggity award and I am still figuring out what to do with it. The rules with this award are simple – chat about some other blogs that you enjoy. I assume from the title of the award they are suppose to be WordPress blogs, but I am not one for rules really. I think rules, as well as recipes, are really just guidelines. In some cases they really only denote some end goal and how you get there is up to you.

So, let me take a moment to talk about a few blogs that have been in my life recently. On Starships and Dragonwings has one of the snazziest looking blogs around – not too much glitter or flash, and plenty of dragons. If you love your YA SFF, that’s the blog to check out. We recently wrapped up Book 2 of The Wheel of Time series and we’ll shortly be starting Book 3 (The Dragon Reborn). The Little Red Reviewer, who is also the power and master mind behind the Book Store Book Blogger Connection I mentioned above, has always got something SciFi good going on. I recently participated in her The Emoticon Generation blog tour. Stainless Steel Droppings is running his annual Once Upon A Time reading event that runs the duration of spring and is a celebration of anything fantasy (mostly books and film). It is a wonderful, fun event. We just finished up the Stardust Read Along this past week. Coffee, Cookies, & Chili Peppers has been joining me on all my crazy read alongs, including The Shadow of the Sun Read Along which goes to the end of the month. Barbara Friend Ish is giving away digital copies of her book on her site (just follow the read along link to download yours). Let me just say that Sue from Coffee, Cookies, & Chili Peppers always has such great comments. She really takes the time to read the post and leave meaningful comments. Lynn’s Book Blog has been teaching me UK words, like numpty. Lynn has also been a big participator in recent read alongs. And what is a read along if you ain’t got nobody to play with? Yes, I left the bad grammar in. Yes, I can see you wincing. You’re cute when you wince. There are many more to name, but I think I will save some for the next bloggity award or the next time I am feeling social. Yes, you may very well be on that list. It’s better than being on the Other List.

And just yesterday, Lynn from Lynn’s Book Blog awarded me the Liebster Award. So, I had to come back in here and edit because this was the perfect place to stick this.  She gets a wicked chuckle from me on timing alone. First, she has these questions I am suppose to answer. She says I can’t say ‘both’. But she also says rules are for breaking. Hehehehehehhe.

  1. Beer or Wine - Chocolate milk stout or muscato dessert wine. But not both together.
  2. Dogs or Cats - I have to say both as I live with both and if I picked one, the other would find out and kill me in my sleep. For Reals.
  3. Fantasy or Sci Fi - This is a cruel, cruel question. How about Scitansy? The best of both worlds.
  4. Book or Film – Book. Except for The Hunger Games trilogy. That is one series I hope the movies end better than the books did.
  5. Star Wars or Star Trek - Star Wars for the women and star trek for the bald headed men.
  6. Batman or Superman - Batman all the way. There is nothing sexy about a grown boy scout in a blue and red unitard.
  7. Anime or Manga - Manga
  8. Gaiman or Tolkien - Gaiman for the everyday. Tolkien for the once a decade read.
  9. Reading or Music - Reading. But you knew that already.
  10. Chocolate or Cheese - Chocolate. Unless there are fresh local cheese readily available.
  11. Morning or night - Morning. Shit needs to get done in the morning.

On top of that, I am suppose to reveal 11 things about myself. Well, I already told y’all about my Riddick fascination above. That should really count for 2. My favorite bookmarks are the ones my aunt made several years ago. We live on a small farm and I rather clean chicken houses than fold laundry. Alas, folding laundry happens like every other day, and cleaning the chicken houses happens likes 3-4 times a year. Yes, I do wear a respirator when doing that. I often salt my icecream. I know you want to also. Oh you think it might be weird, but I bet you love other sweet & salty food. I have two addictions in my life – my man and Dr. Pepper. I once hit a puppy with my car on a dark night. I broke it’s neck, but it was still alive. I took it home and my man helped me grant him mercy. He is buried near the apple tree. I have a consuming fear of ladders. No, shaking the ladder while I am on it to prove how stable it is DOES NOT help. Just being clear about that. I have been with the volunteer fire and emergency response for 6 months now and seen two fatalities. The only girly thing about me is my super secret cutsy wutsy collection of My Little Ponies.  I have been peed on by a cat more than once. No, I am not on speaking terms with that cat. I have spent quality time in a public place with one boob hanging out of the bra (still covered by shirt). Lots of odd stairs went my direction, but no one took me aside and chatted about wardrobe malfunctions.

This last part is where I torture others. But I am going to mix it up (see rule breaking previously in this post). Instead of nominating 11 others and posing 11 questions to them, I am going to leave it open to you, my dear readers. Leave your answers in the comments.

1) I love interviewing folks, digging into their lives, etc. Would anyone like to do a real interview on my blog? Leave your email or twitter handle, and I will get in contact.

2) If you took the main characters from Robert Jordan’s The Wheel of Time, Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings, Brandon Sanderson’s Mistborn Trilogy, and Brent Week’s Night Angel series and stuck them in a gated, locked grove, who would come out in the end?

3) Honestly, are the fig leaves really necessary?

4) Should they have a third go at turning Dune by Frank Herbert into a movie?

That’s all I got folks. This turned out to be a longer post than expected, but for anyone who makes it to the end, leave me a raspberry in the comments!

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The Pirates of Sufiro by David Lee Summers

Why I Read It: Loved the author’s latest book Owl Dance.

Where I Got It: My book shelf.

Who I Recommend This To: If you are into very fast-paced space operas, you might enjoy this.

Publisher: Commonwealth Publications (1996)

Length: 328 pages

Series: Book 1 The Old Star Saga

This book opens with some privateers, Captain Firebrandt and crew, having it out in space with a military ship captained by a relative of Firebrandt, which leads to some awkward decisions. After loosing most of his crew, Privateer Firebrandt barely manages to land his ship on an uninhabited world. He has his first officer Roberts and his woman Suki for companions. Without the ability to gain space in the near future, they set to making a life on their planet, including the next generation.

This book spans 4 generations of the Firebrandts and can skip ahead decades at a time. As the planet Sufiro becomes known to the galaxy, pioneers from cramped human worlds make the trip to farm and raise a family in open air. This idyllic setting lasts until a rare and expensive metal integral to space flight is discovered on one of the large continents of the planet. This is where the true drama starts.

Over time, the mining communities become rich and technologically-advanced. However, they also become dependent on cheap labor, often ‘imported’ from the farming communities of the metal-dearth continent. Throw in the pressure of needing a beefed-up space fleet to combat a superior alien species, and you get Great Needs versus What Is Right.

This book read like a series of short stories, with the constant fast pace and the leaps in time. While this meant that the characters often lacked depth, I still found myself growing attached to the Firebrandts and their Sufiro neighbors, such as Espedie Raton. It was very interesting to me to have read David Lee Summers‘ latest book (Owl Dance) and then to have jumped back in time to his first published work. I can see how his skill as a writer has grown in the near-two decades in between these books.

What I Liked: The unexpected happens and you have to be able to roll with it, like many of the characters in this book; the women were sexually independent and free to make their own choices as equally as the men; lots of Spanish lingo.

What I Disliked: Not much character depth; for the most part, the women were wives and didn’t play a large role in the book; I sometimes found the leaps in time a bit much and would have liked the book to slow down at certain points.

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Owl Dance by David Lee Summers

Why I Read It: A good chunk of this book takes place in the desert Southwest, like my life so far.

Where I Got It: Courtesy PDF ARC from the author (thanks!)

Who Do I Recommend This To: If you like your genres all mixed up with steampunk, cowboys, & attempted military take-overs, then this is for you.

Publisher: Flying Pen Press (2011)

Length: 270

Series: Book 1 (I hope, with reason – see author’s Web Journal)

In David Lee Summers seventh novel, Owl Dance, he explores the American Southwest in a crazy 1800s Wild West Steampunk adventure. This was the perfect brain candy for me and diving into the first chapter, I felt right at home. Ramon Morales, a Mexican-American sheriff, and Fatemeh Karimi, a Persian healer, are our two main heroes. Throughout their travels across NM, AZ, and CA, they come across a variety of delightfully unexpected characters – from the gun-slinging kid Billy to entrepreneurial scientist Maravilla, to the California Coast inventor-turned-pirate Cisneros, to General Sheridan.

Ramon and Fatemeh have to avoid several trips and falls of life, such as being burned at the stake, or killed by miners, or shot, or blown up, or captured by bounty hunters. But their greatest challenge doesn’t come from the Southwest. No, there is something much more ominous brewing in Mother Russia. A land dispute between resident Russian descendants in CA and a powerful rancher sparks off the drive for Russia to grab some land in the American West. But this time, they are aided by an unlikely source…..which I will leave for you to discover.

Clockwork wolves and owls, cutting edge submersibles, dirigibles, and one Persian lady who whistle-talks to owls. It’s a great ride. If you’re looking for a good read and satisfying adventure, jump into Owl Dance.

What I Liked: Multi-cultural book; alternate history is always fascinating; a touch of steampunk never goes amiss; owl- whistle talking.

What I Disliked: Pretty much just 1 main female character surrounded by lots of male main characters.

Note: This review was originally published on Darkcargo.com on 11/22/2011 and republished, and reformatted, here with permission of Lady Darkcargo.

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BTIBMTGT: David Lee Summers & Johan Harstad

Space Pirates on my exercise equipment!

Books That I’ve Been Meaning to Get To (BTIBMTGT) is an idea from the depths and crannies of Lady Darkcargo (check out her stuff at Darkcargo.com). On a random basis, I plan to bring you a post about 2 or more books that have been on my TBR Mountain Range for longer than I like to admit. In that spirit, check out these other bloggers and their TBR lists.

Lady Darkcargo

Chuck Parker

Paula S. Jordan

David Lee Summers‘ The Pirates of Sufiro (1995) has been on my list since I met My Main Man (M3) back in 1997. M3 and his family has been friends with David and his wife Kumie and their kids for years. While I myself have only met David twice, I have enjoyed some of his later works Like Owl Dance (2011). So, yes, this signed book has been kicking around my house since the glory days of college. This past week, I sat and read the first chapter, all in one sitting, easily ignoring one of my favorite action movies (Salt with Angelina Jolie). If this pirate scifi book can distract me from Jolie being a badass, then it has got something going for it. I fully intend to finish this one, so be on the look out for a forthcoming review.

172 Hours on the Moon by Johan Harstad is a hardback I recently won in a giveaway. In the first chapter, the story is well set up: mysterious coverup by the government, mystery on the moon, and a plan to revitalize the space program – a lottery draw to send youngins up in the next ship. Yep, teenagers in space. So far, everything intrigues me except the teenagers bit. I can see great potential for this book if the highschool shenanigans don’t take over on the moon – and end up saving the day. Will keep you posted.

So what’s been sitting on your cushioned, coddled, dusty, shadowy TBR pile?

UPDATE:

Review: The Pirates of Sufiro

Review: 172 Hours on the Moon