Review – Mind Games
LitRPG is riddled with overpowered characters and underpowered weenies with overpowered women carrying him. Marc Whipple’s entrance into the World Apocalypse genre brings a type of character that’s refreshing, given this: a character with a unique power that could be used for good or for ill, yet is surprisingly grounded given the gravitas of the threat facing their world. The worst thing I can say about this book is that it has tropes typical of its genre. It’s amazing System Restart. Quit reading this review, go buy it (or read it for free with Kindle Unlimited.) Purchases made through the above affiliate link may benefit the website. The premise is…
I Was Baptized When I Was 9. I’ve Questioned God Ever Since.
Few events in my young life showed the depths of the emotional abuse my stepfather inflicted upon me as the night after I was baptized into the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. I grew up in an interesting cross section of faiths. On my stepfather’s side I had a grandfather I held a lot of respect and admiration for. He was strong willed pine tree of a man, willing to fight for the things he believed in but often not needing to due to stature alone. He often told a tale about how he witnessed “Brother Owen” bring an infant child back from the dead just by holding…
Review – Soul Bound to a Dragon
Kurtis Eckstein‘s books have been recommended to me a number of times, usually because of his series “Immortal Supers” (which starts with The Daily Struggles of an Immortal for those interested.) So when I saw he had written a book about a catgirl AND a dragon, and they were both in the same book together, I had to jump on it like it was a grasshopper, and I was a cat. Not gonna lie, if we’re stretching this simile, or this metaphor (on the one hand, we’re discussing two things in an interesting way; on the other hand, I don’t think I’m really a cat) I’d knock this book so…
In High School Someone Was Arrested For Planning a Shooting. In the Aftermath, Everyone Thought I’d Be the Next Assailant
Wikipedia states that between the year 2000 and the year 2001 there were 11 school shootings in the US. There could have been 12; several of my classmates were found to be on a hit list by a student who allegedly was making active plans to strike out. In the fallout, people would come up to me… not to ensure I was okay, or to ask for help, but because they genuinely believed I was the next likely candidate to be a school shooter. They wanted to make sure I wouldn’t shoot them. This is a hard topic for me to discuss, for a myriad of reasons. It’s no secret…
Review – Logan and the Cartographer’s Lackey
Logan is a farm boy who fancies his bow and arrow more than kissing the girl at the farm next door. His world is under a strange curse in which everyone is sure they’ve forgotten something, but they simply aren’t sure what it is. And then darkness fell, and the demons attacked. After coming to terms with his new world and assisting in gathering the surviving families into something of a Township, he heads out to a capital city to gain answers and encourage trade, with the caveat that he knows its time for him to make a name for himself. Logan wastes little time in doing so. Disclaimer: the…
Tips and Tricks to Attack and Dethrone God
It’s 2020, and the apocalypse is in front of us. Famine. Disease. War. There’s an old saying: “You reap what you sow.” And if you’ve lived in America, you’re aware the political infrastructure has been sowing these seeds since the last harvest in the 1960’s. The phrase “Attack and Dethrone God” is trending on a lot of social media right now, largely because of a piece on Fox News that mentioned the Weather Underground Organization. When stating what the goals of this group were, an infograph was shown on the air that listed this militant group’s goals, as taken from the Prairie Fire manifesto. Listed among these? “Attack and Dethrone…
An Exhaustive List of Everything I Love About K-Pop
K-Pop – or “Korean Popular Music” if you will, has exploded worldwide. Major groups such as the Bulletproof Boyscouts, LUNA, and EXO were once confined to the South Korean radio airwaves, but can now be heard around the world. People enjoy their deep lyrics, dance moves, and paying $1600 to see them in concert. Below is a long, exhaustive list of everything I love about K-Pop, including my favorite bands of the genre:
7 Steps to Reviewing Media for Fun and Profit
I have a Twitter account, which I do not use very professionally. And that’s okay! (It’s not okay. I have a social media problem. Someone, send help.) It has proven fun for networking. I recently asked some of my followers what sort of “instructional” blog post they’d like to see me write. Author Chad Davis wrote the following Tweet: How to review a book. I'm really shit at reviews actually, no idea how to structure it or what to talk about in them — Chad Normie Davis (@anactualchad) May 20, 2020 Chad, as many of you might remember, is the author of The Komochi Warui Diary, a coming-of-age story I…
3 Indie Authors You Should Give a Chance (Despite Their Book Covers)
For going on two years now I’ve tried to read a fiction novel a week. Sometimes this is easy, because I choose a fiction novel that is slightly over a hundred pages long. Other times this is more difficult, because the book is a 700 page manifesto. It also doesn’t help that while most people choose authors they are familiar with topics and settings that they are comfortable with, the stories I read are literally all over the place. One day I’m reading a seemingly standard “another world” novel and the next day it’s gay literotica. I’m like a kid at an all-you-can-eat buffet who knows his parents are going…
Midrasche’s Education Guide for New Players
The following is a guide for players of the hit text RPG game Torn City. One of the aspects new players are often overwhelmed by is Education, which allows players to unlock new perks while bettering their working stats. This guide hopes to clear that confusion. The forum thread this guide was originally posted on (and the best place to post feedback in-game) can be found here. — Education is a thing I have spent way too much time thinking about and discussing with other players in this game. There are choices I’ve made that in hindsight I wish I hadn’t, and choices I’ve made others question that I’m personally…
