Consider Phlebas

A starship, it's engines trailing smoke, descends toward a blue-white ring world

Consider Phlebas is a sometimes thrilling, often meandering, always morally gray novel about people caught up in a galactic war. It’s antihero is Horza, a human shape changer working for the Iridans, an alien civilization of religious zealots hell bent on breaking the galactic strength of The Culture, humanity’s own star-faring civilization.

Star Wars: The Essential Atlas

A blue-white map of the Star Wars galaxy depicting star systems and trade routes.

Star Wars: The Essential Atlas is the best source book never released for any edition of the Star Wars RPG. While Del Rey is publishing the Atlas as a general interest reference book, it’s beautiful maps, graphical timelines, and planetary write-ups make the book an excellent for gamers, regardless of whether they’re playing d6, Saga … Read more

Radio Active #4: Dreamcatcher, Finding Serenity, KODT #100 and a Geek Dad on the Xbox

Radio Active #4 reviews Stephen King’s alien invasion novel Dreamcatcher and the movie adaptation, discusses the new essay collection Finding Serenity, about Joss Whedon’s Firefly series, talks about Knights of the Dinner Table Magazine #100.  finally offers some thoughts on gaming when you’re a geek dad. Getting the Podcast You can get the podcast in two … Read more

Radio Active #2: Conan, Hitchhiker’s Guide, and Nintendo DS

Radio Active #2 includes an comparison between the upcoming (and sure to be awful XXX2 and the possibly hilarious movie The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. It’s also got my thoughts on the Nintendo DS, including why I bought it, and why I prefer it to the Play Station Portable, and a review of Robert … Read more

Radio Active #1: Snowcrash, Age of Apocalypse, The Incredibles

The first edition of Nuketown Radio Active, the ol’thermonuclear’s podcast, is available for download. The podcast includes a review of Neal Stephenson’s cyberpunk novel Snow Crash, speculations on the need for Marvel’s 10th anniversary Age of Apocalypse mini-series, thoughts on Elements of Style applied to e-mail, and a quick review of The Incredibles movie and … Read more

Wil Wheaton Proves He’s Just a Geek

I got a bunch of books for Christmas — the Robert E. Howard’s The Bloody Crown of Conan, Stephen King’s The Dark Tower, a bunch of D&D source books, and Star Trek alum-turned-writer Wil Wheaton’s autobiography Just a Geek. It’s a measure of how good Wheaton’s book was that after reading a page or two … Read more

Kings of the High Frontier

Victor Koman’s Kings of the High Frontier shows us a world a few years in our future where a number of individuals, from billionaire Larry Poubelle to smuggler Marcus Grant, seek to shrug off the combined shackles of Earth’s gravity and Earth’s government to live among the stars. Caught between the astro-entrepreneurs and the sinister … Read more