The Book Count 2026

[Dr. Ivor Yeti]

I'm switching to Bouncy House until Carl & Princess return

[Greg]

Yeah, that's on order from the library.

[Greg]

Since we are talking about Dungeon Crawler Carl in this thread, I'll leave this here.

Dungeon Crawler Carl
Variety also has word Christopher Yost (Thor: The Dark World, Thor: Ragnarok) and Seth McFarlane (The Orville, Ted) are developing a TV series based on Dungeon Crawler Carl—Matt Dinniman‘s series of comedic, dystopian science-fantasy LitRPG books—at Peacock. The story is set after “an alien invasion has wiped out most of humanity and any survivors are forced to fight for their lives on a sadistic intergalactic game show” and follows Coast Guard vet Carl as he “finds himself stuck with his ex-girlfriend’s award-winning show cat, Princess Donut the Queen Anne Chonk, as they try to survive the end of the world, fighting monsters, aliens, an insane A.I. and even other survivors—all for the sake of good TV.”

[Dr. Ivor Yeti]

Harrumph.

[Greg]

Vagabond by Tim Curry

I was a bit disappointed by this book. I thought it would be more fun, but it comes across as a bit dour. Not a great childhood, Curry's father passed away from a stroke when he was young. He didn't seem to get along with his mother. The stories he tells about his times in his most well known pictures comes across as a bit dull. And the stories don't have a lot of depth to them. There are a few good anecdotes but they are few and far between. He does devote a lot of time to the craft of acting and what he does and doesn't like about it. He talks about his process. Voice acting holds a special place for him especially now that his voice is all that he has left. And even the stroke wasn't given a lot of drama.

All told a pretty dull book

[Drunk Monk]

Any good anecdotes on this?

[Greg]

Not really. Early on his career he was torn between acting and singing. He devoted a couple years to the rock after being signed by Lou Adler. But lost interest when Adler lost interest in him.

[Drunk Monk]

That’s too bad. It’s a great tune.

[Greg]

Clown Town by Mick Herron

More adventures of the Slow Horses. More of the same from Lamb and crew. This time a group of older spies who did bad deeds in Northern Ireland look to blackmail the head of the Park. But things go tit's up. The slow horses do their bad things. Lamb comes in for the clean up. 

It's really well written but at this point the series doesn't seem to be heading anywhere. It's like permanent limbo.

[Greg]

King of Ashes by Raymond E. Feist

Raymond Feist is still writing. Who knew? I came across his name on Facebook, where is quite active railing against the government. I can't remember the last book of his I ready, but it has to be over twenty years. But Feist continued to write Rift War novels. I think there are over 20 of them at this point.

But King of Ashes is not that. It is not part of the Riftwar Saga. (At least not for now. There are hints that might change) It's starts with a major battle where one of the five kings of Garn is betrayed by the other four. That whole line is wiped out save for one boy who is whisked away and sent to live with a mysterious clan to be raised. There is also a smith who also picks up an orphan as his apprentice.

Fast forward fifteen years. There is fractures between the remaining four kings, as the one king who put together the betrayal plan embraces the one true god and seeks to gain control of all of Garn. The story follows the lives of the two orphans. The one being trained to be basically a mob boss/ninja while the other becomes a great sword maker which will be important because all of a sudden all the kingdoms need swords.

My steady diet of grim dark fantasy makes this Fantasy romp kind of pale in comparison. Lots of cliches I've been reading for years especially the orphan who comes to realize he has magic powers. I was thinking I wouldn't need to visit any more Feist books but the ending kind of picked up with a few good curve balls and I want to see how it ends.