What am I reading this summer
Jul 06
I love to read. If there is anything that is powerful enough to slow down my ever raging mind, then it’s a good book. But finding the right one is always a hassle caused by the abundance of choice. If you go to the library, you lend out a bo9, put it in your pocket and read it till you bring it back. Reading on an ereader is a different experience. You have a TON of books to choose from and you can carry around a 100 of them at the same time. So picking (and sticking) to a book is sometimes harder then you think.
Stuttering impulse drives
The last couple of months I have been going through a little bit of a crisis. You see: I used to LOVE Star Trek novels and could be enthralled in a good Star Trek story for days. I remember reading entire series of Star Trek books on holiday and enjoying every minute of it. Lately finding a ‘good’ Star Trek novel has been hard. The last series I finished was the ‘a Time to’ series that took place in the TNG era. When trying out the ‘Destiny’ series the impulse drive of my engagement with the story started to sputter. The reason that all the post TNG – post Nemesis books just didn’t ‘click’. Wether its Riker on the Titan or Ezri Dax as Captain of her supership it .. just does not feel right. So I decided to dive off the deep and an go looking for something else.
The Expanse Series: James Corey
Enter James Corey and his series of books called ‘The Expanse’. If you have seen (and enjoyed) the TV show, go pick up the books ..now. 8 massive books later (I even read book 4 and 5 ON PAPER) I put down the cliffhanger book of one of the most intriguing, actually ‘believable’ hard scifi books. The series greatly reminded my of the works by Arthur C Clarke: great scifi where all the math and science lines up. The last book still has to come out by I am already looking forward to it.
Seveneves by Neal Stephenson
After that I decided I would sink my teeth into some of the classic scifi authors of the cyberpunk genre. I had tried to get through Neil Stephenson’s Snow Crash as an audiobook. But I had a hard time keeping up my interest with the book. It might be considered blasphemy, but to me the book is a little dated looking at todays technology, and although i’m Belgian and Surrealism is part of my culture, pizza-maffia just doesn’t do it for me. So when I accidentally stumbled across Seveneves I was amazed to find out it was by the same author! The story: The moon breaks up after getting hit by a black hole and the resulting meteor cloud wipes out all life in earth. Earth has 2 years and 12 people on the ISS to get shit organised for the survival of our species. This tantalisingly realistic read will have every scifi nerd perched on the tip of his chair while challenging him or her to Google stuff about orbital mechanics, pooping in Zero G, Dna and genetic manipulation AND how to turn a floating piece of space ice into a steam-rocket. I had a bit of a hard time with the second part of the book (the story jumps ahead 5000 years) but the first half put Deep Impact and Armageddon to shame.
No love for Solo
So time to go on my summer holiday. Problem: I had not found a good fiction book to read. I tried re-reading the original Han Solo trilogy (The story about how Han Solo becomes ..well Han Solo) starting out with Han as an orphan all the way up to the moment where he and his wookie buddy meet this old guy and this young boy in a Bar in Mos Esley. But again, the story just didn’t get me. Although I greatly enjoyed ‘Tarkin’ by James Lucino, the ‘Force’ wasn’t with me this time.
Dan Simmons: The Terror
To spend our first evening in our cottage I decided to try watching the first episode of Amc’s ‘The Terror’ a series based around the failed Franklin expedition: 2 British ships that got stuck in the artic ice in 1845 and their race to stay alive while being chased by a giant ‘thing’ on the ice. I am a sucker for books, tv shows and movies that will have you Googling and Wiki-ing your way through facts and tidbits, so I was thrilled to see that the series was based on a true story AND the novel for the series had been written by Dan Simmons, one of the classic Authors who wrote the Hyperion. So i was hooked, paused the series, downloaded the book on my Kindle and started reading.
The story is great, the characters are believable, the monster on this ice is well, a monster, but a lot of the story and scenes are based on historical facts. These facts are abundant in pictures on wikipedia and historical documents online. Some letters in the book written by Captain Crozier: Can be found in a museum in Canada. The book one shipmate lends to another as they leave the boats behind ? It’s part of an exhibition. Even the mummie of a dead crewmember recovered more then a 100 years later is on display. This makes all of it very “real” and very very interesting. The book is well written and prods you to find out more about rigging, masts, sailing, navigation and shipboard life in 1845 and about the technology they used. Very very interesting stuff and a great holiday read. The book of course diverts from historical events (it’s a Novell) but is a great read I would surely recommend.
Links.
Star Trek: A time to…
James Corey: Expanse Series
James Luceno: Tarkin
The Terror: Amc
The Terror: Dan Simmons
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Game week : The Dark Mod : Cross platform first person “Sniper”.
Jan 27I am old. It is a shocking statement, but there are some facts that back up that statement. For one : I am absolutely terrible with console games. My fingers turn to putty whenever I need to press the right combination of buttons on my controller. I either turn ‘Need for Speed’ into a farming simulator (trying to plow a field with my 500 million dollar Bentley) or turn ‘Call of Duty’ into a charity game by giving my enemies my rations in the heat of battle. ( Army food is a lethal weapon .. right ? ).
But with age comes a certain kind of grace : the ability to completely own & pown when you can get your hands on a keyboard and a mouse. From a very young age I was trained by master-gamers in the secrets of Doom, Quake and Counter Strike. The latter proved to be something I was very good at. I was a lethal opponent in stealth and my sniper rifle killed more men then I fired bullets. Yes .. I was a camper .. but a damn good one. Mock me and you will look over your shoulder for the rest of your life. I was ‘death invisible’.
Since stealth and secrecy so becomes me, I found ‘THE DARK MOD” a great game to play. Based on the Doom engine, the goal of the game is to sneak around, kill your enemies and try not to make a sound. Hiding the body prevents tripping off the alarms, Lurking in the shadows means opponents can’t see you … Using knives instead of guns helps you go unnoticed. I love it.
The Dark Mod is gloomy, has atmosphere and is pretty addictive to play. The great part is that this game is available on both Windows, Mac and Linux and it is for free.
Get your copy of “The Dark Mod” here.
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Knightwise.com at F.A.C.T.S. 2013 : “Behind the scenes” preview.
Oct 21Inside every geek there is a string of DNA that jumps up and down with joy once you mention the words “Anime, Manga, Scifi and Cosplay”. The proof is in the pudding as thousands of geeks travel to dragon and Comicon every year. In the little country of Belgium we have a similar movement of geeks and like minded people to the annual F.A.C.T.S. event ( The Belgian version of Comicon) and every year the Knightwise.com crew walks in the daylight to go out and cover the event. With two cameramen, a photographer and an anchorman we try to bring you a sense of what it’s like to wander the show floor in Belgium’s biggest Nerdfest. Last Saturday we pounded the pavement and shot over 13 interviews with cosplayers, fanclubs, game developers, comic artists and toysellers. While we are hard at work editing all that footage down into a video podcast (Its gonna take some time ,we all still have dayjobs) we CAN give you a sneak peek at what to expect. Knightwise.com’s new star photog Niejana gives you a nice ‘behind the scenes’ view of what you can expect when we release the video footage later on this week. Stand by for Trolls, Timelords, Red Riding hoods and giant Tie-Fighters with the “FACTS 2013 Behind the scenes photo shoot”.
CLICK HERE FOR THE ENTIRE SET.
The video footage will be released later on this week, in the meantime hit the SUBSCRIBE page and make sure to paste the link to our MEDIAFEED into your favorite podcatcher (itunes, etc ..) to automatically subscribe to our podcast and get the video podcast downloaded automatically .. Until then : Watch this space and GEEK ON.
Links :
Our previous coverage of the FACTS events (Video)
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kw701 : Cross platform tech support.
Oct 14We kick off season 7 of the Knightwise.com podcast with an extra long episode of the Knightwise.com podcast. Since we are proud to announce we joined the ranks of the Podnutz podcast network and are now reaching out to many more podcast listeners across the world .. it was time for a treat. This week you get a slightly obese episode of the Knightwise.com podcast (Over 90 Minutes) as we showcase an episode of “Podnutz Daily” where Cody Cooper interviewed me about cross platform tech support. So perk up your ears and get ready for the next season of Knightwise.com.
Shownotes.
- Season 7 of Knightwise.com
- Episode 368 of Podnutz : Cody gets Knighted.
- Feedback from Gerard.
- http://todotxt.com
- http://www.moonenmoonen.nl/blog/files/ideaalteamuncluttertodotxt.html (use Google translate!)
- http://unclutterapp.com
- We are going to F.A.C.T.S. Belgium.
- The Podnutz Network.
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Get your geek on and join us at F.A.C.T.S. : Belgians answer to ComicCon.
Oct 14If one percent of your DNA is “Geek” and you live in the Benelux area, there is only one thing you can do next Saturday : Immerse yourself in your true geekdom and join us as we do our annual coverage of the F.A.C.T.S. event in Ghent. Next weekend the Expo halls in Ghent will be the “event horizon” for everybody who is into Scifi, Cosplay, Anime, Cartoons and all things geek. As by annual tradition Knightwise.com will also be doing an extensive coverage of the event and you can join us.
We will be roaming the grounds next Saturday afternoon interviewing Cosplayers, Fans, Sellers of strange and desirable geek-toys and if we are lucky we MIGHT just catch one of the celebrities that is attending the event. Hit us up on Twitter ( @knightwise) if you are going and get a chance to shake hands with our crew in “realspace”.
For more details you can visit the official F.A.C.T.S webpage to see what is going down, who is coming and how to get your hands on that inflatable life size doll of Lara Croft you have been craving for. See you there !
Links.
Our previous coverages of the F.A.C.T.S events.
