Tag: books

Book Review: STAR WARS: TARKIN sheds light on enigmatic character

On By Steven D'AdamoIn On Storytelling, ReviewsLeave a comment

I listened to the audiobook version of Star Wars: Tarkin by James Luceno, a story of one of Tarkin’s endeavors in the early years of the Empire that helped him rise to prominence. This is essentially his backstory for the opening of A New Hope, and it was a solid read about an otherwise enigmatic character in Star Wars lore.

I’ve never read any novel in this universe, and this seemed like a relatively innocuous place to start — a bit in the middle in terms of timeline, but likely not explicitly connected to any other stories, aside from the obvious background/lore pieces.

Tarkin effectively follows Moff Tarkin as he oversees a secret project for the emperor and tries to track down suspicious attacks across the galaxy. Simultaneously, the reader is introduced to Tarkin’s upbringing that made him the ruthless, calculating strategist that he is.

Darth Vader plays a surprisingly prominent role throughout the story, effectively teaming up with Tarkin to track down the “dissidents”, and I found their relationship highly engaging, as Tarkin tries to understand Vader, whose identify he believes he knows, and Vader largely remains a mysterious personality.

As a first-time reader of the Star Wars canon, this was a solid entry point. There were references to things about the universe I’m unaware of, but they did not stand in the way of the main plot, which had a clear trajectory for Tarkin and the growth of the Empire at large.

This book has me interested enough to continue reading Star Wars lore. I’m just not sure which direction I’ll go next: back to the High Republic, or these interwar years.

Steve D

Book Review: Spectacular World-Building in CHILDREN OF TIME

On By Steven D'AdamoIn On Storytelling, ReviewsLeave a comment

I got Children of Time by Adrian Tchaikovsky as a gift from my brother-in-law, who thought I might enjoy it. I had heard of Tchaikovsky before in passing, but was otherwise unfamiliar with his work.

The description of this book certainly piqued my interest, and I didn’t want it to languish on my to-be-read shelf for ages, so I dug in.

Children of Time is a fantastic read that encapsulates both the awe-inspiring technological dreams of epic science fiction and the remarkably grounded perspectives and emotional weight of human stories.

This story is described as “evolutionary world-building”, and it takes place over literal millennia as a ship of human survivors of a destroyed Earth search for and try to claim a terraformed Earth-like world as their own. Only a select few humans aboard this ship are awakened at various intervals to deal with the potentially-catastrophic problems that can befall any deep-space mission. Simultaneously, a new race of beings are evolving on the terraformed world at a super-charged pace, thanks to a bioengineered nanovirus to accelerate their advancement in preparation for their human-creators’ arrival.

This brilliantly “symbiotic” narrative alternates over nearly incomprehensible lurches in time. One human aboard the ark ship is awakened from cryo-sleep several times over the course of millennia, facing new challenges or threats each time in what to him feels like only weeks. On the terraformed world, the narrative follows successive generations of characters as they advance and reach for the stars in their own right.

The first portion of the story is a little jarring, perhaps intentionally so, and the reader is flung from one moment in time to the next, separated by centuries or more. Once the reader figures out this rhythm, though, it is quite enjoyable to see how the dueling plots advance over such inhuman time spans.

Much of the world-building focuses on how such a world could be terraformed, how a massive ark ship carrying the remnants of human civilization survives for millennia, and how a nanovirus can advance a civilization. This is all endlessly fascinating, toeing the line between believability and awe.

The story, however, is an entirely human one, focused on the very existence of one civilization or another. This book delves into what it means to be both the first and the last of a great civilization, to survive and continue living as the world appears to be collapsing around you, and to harness or reject the breakneck pace of social and technological advancement.

I loved this book, and there appear to be two more in this series already. I will absolutely be picking up the next installment, Children of Ruin, in the near future.

Steve D

May Write Day: Continuing the New Mode?

On By Steven D'AdamoIn On Life, On StorytellingLeave a comment

Yard work. Gardening plans. Summer-like weather. Some light air travel with our boys for the first time. April was a cool month, overall. Work was stressful for the first couple weeks, but it’s calmed down enough for me to catch my breath.

I’m still figuring out my day-to-day routine, but I feel like I’m making progress, in that I have ups and downs but generally get things done when I need to. I’m referring to my “new mode” of approaching Second Shift, family time, and my hobbies, which entails trying to stay up and active through the evenings and not falling into a pattern of laziness that ultimately leads to guilt/shame over not being “productive enough”.

It’s gone pretty well.

Last Month’s Goals

  1. Finish three books.
  2. Finish final chapter of New Earth and review story for overall chapter structure.
  3. Contemplate what my vision for my writing/publishing actually is.

Finish three books?

No, but I finished two: MCU: The Reign of Marvel Studios and His Last Bow, as part of the Sherlock Holmes omnibus I’m working my way through.

I’m still relishing the journey of Children of Time, and I’ve started on a nonfiction work about the marvelous world of fungi, called Entangled Lives. This is one of those books that is about science and microbiology and ecology on the surface, but really has some much deeper insights into our perceptions of life, sentience, intelligence, and the connectivity of all things. Both of these books will take me some time to get through and appreciate them in full, so I’m in no rush.

Finish New Earth and chapter overview?

Uuugggghhh no. This is one area I have not been able to work into a consistent routine. I’ve broken myself of the bad mental habit of only writing in long, dedicated sessions, which is a good start.

I was able to write in a couple spurts, but I’ve officially run into book-ending-syndrome, in which I find it impossible to write a suitable ending. I want to play out the scenes in my notes, but I keep watching the word count extend farther and farther over my intended count, and while that doesn’t actually matter, it absolutely distracts me from just writing the damn ending.

Contemplate writing/publishing vision?

Yes, and I haven’t made any firm decisions. I think I know what I would like my next four or five publications to be, which is a great start. Two of them would be the duology of novellas that are my current works-in-progress, and two would be full-length novels, which is obviously way more intimidating.

Identifying a tangible and achievable timeline to write and publish all those stories is the trick. At this point, I’m not even sure when I want to publish my novellas. I could just get them out into the world, but then it could be another few years at least before I publish anything else. What I can’t decide is whether I’m okay with that.

Similar to my previous workout life, spending 10+ hours per week exercising, I haven’t totally shed the notion of publishing at a pace more akin to a full-time writer. I’m not a full-time writer. At this point, I’m barely a hobbyist. But what does it mean for a hobbyist to publish occasionally? Should I try to prepare and publish several works in a shorter timeframe to try to drive real sales pivot into full-time writing? I’m not sure I’m ready for that either.

So, that is part of my dilemma at the moment. Not only the act of writing, but even what my medium- and long-term goals are. I require more contemplation.

Goals for May

  1. Finish three books. I already mentioned my current reads:
    • Children of Time by Adrian Tchaikovsky, and Entangled Lives by Merlin Sheldrake. I will likely finish both in the next couple weeks.
    • Likely next read: I’m eyeing Thor, Volume 1: The Goddess of Thunder for a change of pace, and because I never finished reading Jason Aaron’s run on the Thor comics. After that, I’m not sure.
  2. Finish New Earth, please? Focus on 15-minute writing sprints, a couple nights per week, and I should get this done.
  3. Continue to contemplate my writing/publishing vision. I went into more detail above than I had anticipated, so maybe I’ll end up writing about this more this month to get my thoughts onto virtual paper.

Steve D

Book Review: MCU illuminates the history of Marvel’s films

On By Steven D'AdamoIn On Storytelling, ReviewsLeave a comment

I recently listened to MCU: The Reign of Marvel Studios on audiobook. I heard about the book, because one of the co-authors, Joanna Robinson, has a podcast I frequently listen to (House of R), and she talked a bit about the book in the run-up to its release late last year.

I’ve enjoyed Marvel films over the years and admire what they had achieved through the Infinity Saga. I also really enjoy documentary-style storytelling with behind-the-scenes insights. This book excels at this type of storytelling.

With plenty of quotes and perspective from the people who were involved with these films over the decades, it’s clear that the authors spent tons of hours conducting interviews with all kinds of folks, from production assistants on 20-year-old films, to directors, set/costume/effects designers, to the major actors, to Kevin Feige himself. There are countless anecdotes about snap decisions made in one era of the studio’s history that directly shape how the movies came together years later.

The book is paced and structured like a documentary, with most chapters focusing on a particular film, or a particular piece of the MCU machine, such as visual effects. It begins in the very earliest days of Marvel’s forays into film and television in the 60s and 70s, with projects and people I had scarcely been aware of, and then really picks up in the early 2000s, when superhero films started appearing in greater numbers.

The authors did a good job balancing fair criticism of various parts of the studio’s process with genuine appreciation of its accomplishments. The chapters on The Infinity Saga are rightfully tinged with admiration at how those films were pulled off, while the chapter on visual effects speaks to the issues that VFX artists have faced in dealing with the tight deadlines, scant budgets, and long hours demanded by their contracts with Marvel Studios.

My one critique is that the closing sections felt a little too concise. If this is a history of the MCU – and it certainly reads like one – then I would have wanted a little more summation on this era of Marvel Studios and what the future looks like.

Still a great read, and definitely worth picking up again to absorb all the nuggets of information spread throughout.

Steve D

Book Review: NO GOOD MEN AMONG THE LIVING and the tragic debacle of the War in Afghanistan

On By Steven D'AdamoIn On Life, ReviewsLeave a comment

Last month, I listened to the audiobook version of No Good Men Among the Living: America, the Taliban, and the War through Afghan Eyes, by journalist Anand Gopal.

I was barely a teenager when the War in Afghanistan began in 2001, and I remember the profound effect it had on me at the time.

When the war turned into an occupation and nation-building experiment, and then a resurgence of the Taliban, I knew that I didn’t understand the whole story. In the aftermath of the US’s abrupt exodus from Afghanistan, I was completely perplexed by how fruitless it had all been, with the Taliban back in power, and seemingly stronger than before.

Anand Gopal’s book traces the years before the American invasion, starting with the monarchy and Communist revolution in the 1970s, which prompted Russia’s occupation. From the late 80s and early 90s, Gopal begins following the involvement of various actors in the militias that formed in response to the Russian occupation, leading to the bloody civil war of the mid-1990s. The Taliban had gained control of large portions of the country by the outset of the American invasion, a sudden and confounding incursion, from the perspective of many of the locals interviewed, that was largely welcomed.

Gopal’s accounts of the lives of several Afghan people before and during the American war there is a fantastic narrative. It is also a devastating and infuriating demonstration of the downfall of American policy in the country.

The American policy, as told by several local actors and recounted by Gopal, had been to fight “terrorism” wherever it could be found. This led to local strongmen accusing their rivals of being enemies of the American mission, while American military leaders seemed completely clueless of the tribal rivalries and affiliations that had existed long before their invasion.

It is not difficult to see how the rise of strongmen across Afghanistan, funded by US taxpayers, created a self-perpetuating war machine that favored disunity and brutal politics, even as Afghanistan’s first democratic government tried to establish control.

Even though it was published in 2015, Gopal’s account also makes it easier to understand how the government could collapse so completely and utterly to the Taliban in 2021.

There were parts of this book that made me curse aloud at the sheer ignorance and brutality of it all. This book is not about choosing sides, except perhaps the sides of the civilians trying to survive the war. Gopal speaks to the cruelty of the first and subsequent Taliban regimes, but he also presents the reader with the callousness of American operations, many of which inadvertently targeted civilian homes or facilities (such as schools) that had no connections with the enemies the Americans were hunting.

This was not an easy read, but a necessary one for anyone who wants to understand what it might have been like to try to live through this war. It is tragic, infuriating, and shameful, and it makes me doubt what the American military and intelligence establishment has learned from this war, if anything.

I feel like the figures in this book have more stories that need to be heard, but I fear how they have fared in the intervening years.

Steve D

April Write Day: Setting the New Mode

On By Steven D'AdamoIn Fantasy, On LifeLeave a comment

March definitely felt like typical early-spring time. Lots of goals and ambitions, lots of plans being made for later in the year, and lots of de-hibernation from the grey post-holiday winter.

Last Month’s Goals

  1. Read four books! Like I said, I’ve already finished two this month, and I’m well on my way to finishing two more, so I might as well go for it.
  2. Exercise every other day and get to the gym twice. Same.
  3. Finish New Earth ending and outline chapter structure. Alright, my online class is done, which opens up some time during my week. I fell out of the groove, so I just need to get back in it.

Read four books?

Yes! After a deficit of finishing books in February (but not a deficit of reading), I finally finished a couple of reads I had been progressing through for some time, and added a couple more for good measure.

  • I completed long-time audiobook read Black Leopard, Red Wolf, for which I will post my full review next week.
  • I finished my paperback reading of Last Child in the Woods: Saving Our Children from Nature-Deficit Disorder, which is deserving of its own review because of its thoughtfulness and how it’s influencing how I think about my kids playing in nature, and about gardening/landscaping our yard this year.
  • I read The Valley of Fear as part of my ongoing — and nearly completed — read of the entire Sherlock Holmes omnibus.
  • And I read No Good Men Among the Living, a fascinating and tragically true account of several Afghan individuals trying to survive the early years of the war in Afghanistan. Also worthy of its own review.

That’s a pretty good encapsulation of my overall reading interests: epic fantasy or sci-fi, some mystery/thriller and also classical literature, and thought-provoking nonfiction works about historical events or issues I care about.

I haven’t talked much about my reading of the entire Sherlock Holmes collection by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. It is one gigantic audiobook that I’ve been picking away at story-by-story for about the last year-and-a-half. I knew I didn’t want to try to read the entire collection in one shot, so I’ve just kept the file downloaded on my phone and listened to individual stories piecemeal, trying to appreciate each one in its own right, rather than as a collection.

This is the only way I will listen to these types of collections going forward, and there are certainly other authors I want to tackle next. I’m nearly complete with the Holmes collection, and I’m already eyeing the next long-term collections to work my way through.

Exercise more plus go to the gym?

Not quite, and I think continuing to include this in my monthly goals posts is both distracting me from the real purpose of these posts and putting too much pressure on myself that just turns into guilt.

I’m trying to work exercise more into my day-to-day routine, and I’m getting there in little steps. I think I just need to live it. I keep thinking about exercise in terms of how I used to exercise, which was nearly everyday in dedicated 60-to-90-minute sessions. That’s not my life anymore, and I’m not aiming for that. I just don’t know quite what I’m aiming for at this point, except for more. And that’s not a goal I can reliably track, except with myself, on my own terms.

So I’m leaving it at that.

Finish New Earth ending and review chapter strucutre?

No, and this is one of those items I need to refocus on in this forum. I did make some progress on my final chapter, but I did not complete it.

I wrote last week about finding a new mode, where sheer boredom with doom-scrolling and also general frustration at not feeling like I was doing enough in general had me finding ways to focus on the things I actually need and want to focus on. This could be housework, spending time with the family, or just reading for more than 10 minutes.

The trend has largely held, so far. I just need to expand it to writing as well. One of my strategies to focus more on my writing is to find the time, and allow myself the space, to write in short bursts — 20 minutes, 15, 10, even, if that’s all I can give.

I think another issue I’ve been struggling with is my overall vision for my writing. I have lots of story ideas, but at the moment, it’s difficult for me to visualize actually getting them all done on any kind of tangible timeline. This makes it difficult for me to stick to medium- or long-term goals. So, I need to really evaluate what my medium- and long-term goals are with writing. Not just where I want to end up in some undefined future, but how I can get there from this month, over the next three months, six months, eighteen months.

I’m not committing to what that vision is, not right this second. But I am committing to thinking about it earnestly and honestly.

Goals for April

  1. Finish three books.
    • Current reads-in-progress: Children of Time by Adrian Tchaichovsky, and MCU: The Reign of Marvel Studios by Joana Robinson, Dave Gonzales, and Gavin Edwards.
    • Likely next read: His Last Bow (in the Sherlock Holmes omnibus)
  2. Finish final chapter of New Earth and review story for overall chapter structure. I can definitely do this, even if it takes me twenty tiny working sessions.
  3. Contemplate what my vision for my writing/publishing actually is. I know where I want to end up, but first I need to think about how I want to get there.

Steve D

New Mode Unlocked

On By Steven D'AdamoIn On LifeLeave a comment

I’ve been operating in a slightly different mode of late. Between job-shift, parenting-shift, second-shift, and time-to-myself-shift, I’ve been a lot more focused on doing the things I need and/or want to get done.

I’m not exactly sure where this mode is coming from, but I honestly find it motivating, which helps me get more done. Recent weeks have been up-and-down for me, where I might do the bare minimum on a given night to keep the house in order, and then lazily scroll my phone or watch TV to fill what little time I had before begrudgingly going to bed.

Honestly, I think I got bored of doing that, so I’ve started filling that time with things that actually make me feel good, either because I’m taking more time for self-care, getting things done around the house, or focusing on two hobbies I have paid precious little attention to: reading and writing.

Perhaps my latest paperback read is a part of this — where I’m actually motivated to carve out the time in my evenings to read a chapter. I’ve just started reading Children of Time, by Adrian Tchaichovsky, and after only 50 pages or so, I genuinely look forward to picking up this book each night.

This more motivated mode has also helped me refocus on writing, and I’m aiming to have a meaningful update on that front for my next monthly goals post.

We’re also starting to look into some gardening/landscaping ideas for our first spring and early-summer in our new yard, and I’m looking forward to getting into some of that work.

I’m hoping this mode is more than just a weekly trend. I just need to be able to put the phone down for a bit and let other things occupy my time.

Steve D

Book Review: BLACK LEOPARD, RED WOLF is a portal to an intricate world

On By Steven D'AdamoIn On Storytelling, ReviewsLeave a comment

A couple weeks ago I finished reading Black Leopard, Red Wolf, by Marlon James.

This book took me a while to get through in audiobook format.

I held out because I knew that a story as deep and emotionally resonant as this had to be going somewhere, and I was riveted by Dion Graham’s masterful narration. I’m ultimately glad I stuck with this one.

This is an unbelievably well-crafted story, characters, and world. Based on African myth and lore, it’s difficult to find an apt comparison in modern epic fantasy for this book. Because it doesn’t take from Western fantasy, it feels new and intimidating in a way I haven’t experienced for some time. The world itself is as unknown as the characters and the plot.

James writes with a ferocity of emotion that Graham only elevates with voice changes and ornamentations worthy of the greatest dramatic pieces. Black Leopard, Red Wolf has to be one of the best fantasy epics in recent memory.

My reading and understanding of it was lost during the first third of the story, where I found it difficult to understand what was happening and where the story was headed. It was extremely detailed, and kept jumping around in time between the protagonist, Tracker’s, early life, and his questioning by an inquisitor sometime in the future.

By the middle of the book, I had found the story’s rhythm, and by the final act, I was enraptured. At the moment, I can only recommend this as one of the best written fantasy novels I’ve read in a long time.

I intend to get the novel in hardcover to read it again. As for the sequel, Moon Witch, Spider King — I may just have to read both the hardcover and audio versions, to sink into James’s story and float away with Graham’s narration.

Steve D

March Write Day: Where Did February Go?

On By Steven D'AdamoIn On LifeLeave a comment

Somehow, we’re in another month, and we’re already starting to see hints of spring. I strangely don’t feel ready for spring and then summer. Cold days and occasional snow provide a convenient excuse to hold up inside the house and not be bothered with being social. Now comes spring, and all of our plans for this year. Don’t get me wrong, we have some very exciting plans for this year. I just thought I’d have more time to prepare for them, like, mentally.

Last Month’s Goals

  1. Read 3 books.
  2. Exercise every other day and get to the gym. 
  3. Finish ending for New Earth.
  4. Outline New Earth for chapter structure.

Read three books?

No, and I actually didn’t finish any books in February. However, just a few days into March I finished two books, I’m nearly done with another, and I’ve made a good start on a fourth.

I finished reading Black Leopard, Red Wolf a few days ago, after powering through it the last couple weeks. I really liked it, but I have some more thoughts I’ll share in a review next week. My goal is to make up for lost reads this month.

Exercise every other day and get to the gym?

Not quite. I exercised more like twice per week and made it to the gym once. Not terrible, but also not as much as I’d like. It’s a work-in-progress, as always. I definitely need to get to the gym more this month. That’s been the toughest part to motivate for so far.

Finish ending for New Earth and Outline Chapter Structure?

Noooooooope. My online class finished just last week, and I had one assignment and a group project that took up way more time than I had anticipated. So, while I really tried to work on my story on nights when I could muster the mental energy, I had to focus on the class.

Goals for March

  1. Read four books! Like I said, I’ve already finished two this month, and I’m well on my way to finishing two more, so I might as well go for it.
  2. Exercise every other day and get to the gym twice. Same.
  3. Finish New Earth ending and outline chapter structure. Alright, my online class is done, which opens up some time during my week. I fell out of the groove, so I just need to get back in it.

Steve D

On Why I Continue to Write

On By Steven D'AdamoIn On StorytellingLeave a comment

Existential dread for writing is real, as it probably is for any creative pursuit, honestly.

I often find myself asking “why” I write, why I continue to believe this is something I should be spending my time and energy on. This question doesn’t normally come as an emotional response, as in how can I go on writing? Who even wants to read my stories? It’s a matter of objective reasoning — existentialist — as in, what’s the use in writing if I’m not aggressively pursuing bestseller lists or millions of readers or international fame. Why am I persisting with this?

I think it’s easy to feel overwhelmed by the doubtful voices in your head, so arming yourself with a litany of reasons to keep writing can be helpful when those doubts start to creep in.

For me, in the current moment, the doubt stems not from a lack of desire to write, or even a lack of stories I feel I want to tell, but from the extremely limited time I can spend writing day-to-day, or week-to-week.

Even now, I write this blog post at 11pm, after one long day of work, on the cusp of another, when I should be in bed trying to capture the rest of which I am so often in want. My wife sleeps in our bed across the room from me, as does Teddy, our Jack Russell who loves nothing more than to curl up between us.

In this moment, I’m writing in spite of the things I should rather be spending my time on. At least, that’s what the doubtful voices in my are telling me.

Writing stories is a lot harder than writing blogs, and, as my monthly goals posts will attest, it has become even more difficult for me to find either the time or the mental space to write stories, of late.

So naturally, I’ve begun to question whether it’s worth the effort, the pressure I still put on myself to write.

My conclusion, for now, is that it is. When I was writing my first novel, I felt an urgent need to finish and publish that story. My goal at the time was to publish my first book before I turned 30, and I achieved that with less than two months to spare.

Now, I feel the need to continue to tell stories, but not on any particular timeline. So, for the current moment, I’m writing because I feel as though I should tell the stories in my head, for whoever ends up reading them.

What that means when it comes to publishing them, I’m not sure. They will be published, but the purpose and form of that is more nebulous than it used to be, and I’m okay with that. In some ways, the writing is the point, at least for right now.

Steve D