Nate > Recent Status Updates

So I totally thought Batu was gonna be the new Jochi, but then he goes all Chagatai on me. The Golden Horde's epic rampage in eastern Europe has been the most interesting part although the palace intrigue and Ogedai's grappling with the Mongol cultural problem of settling and building versus nomadic reaving can easily be classified as Good Shit.

Definitely liking my suspect for this one...but it doesn't correlate to the tertiary case and it's got me worried. Why you gotta fuck with me, Tana French?

This is one of those debut novels where it's just like...this writer came out of the gate at full fucking gallop. Very vivid characters and an extremely creepy atmosphere and mystery.

So this book basically takes the heroism and legendary quality of the Hereward story and pisses on it with harsh realism. Side note: I find the Norman haircuts to be very interesting.

Ever have a review backlog so spotty and lengthy you can literally hear the sobs of baby Jesus when you open Goodreads on your computer/tablet/phone?

GUYS I WANNA DEDICATE THIS ONE TO MEGGRIG AND FINN.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p9PAu...

Same edition as this one, but mine has the much-cooler moodily-shaded blue cover with the 80s hangover and the broken lily. Great stuff so far, Patrick and Angie have an interesting dynamic and working relationship and Lehane has already laid out several witty riffs and twists of phrase that are indicative of great crime/mystery writing.

Even at its most convoluted and chaotic points, fucking A Song of Ice and Fire isn't as violent, confusing and filled with double-and-triple crossing as this book is.

This book is brutally badly-titled and has a horrible stock-looking fantasy cover (even though it's directly relevant to the story and Cadoras and Meggrig are clearly recognizable.) But The Cartel and The Wake are giving me fucked up nightmares and I just wanna stay wrapped up in my warm David Gemmell blanket.

Waylander and Cadoras have a total Batman-Joker fucked-up dynamic thing going on and I'm loving it.

Is it just me, or is every David Gemmell book an awesome fantasy variation on Seven Samurai? (If anyone on this site has somehow not seen that movie...please do. Do it for your health. Do it for your family's health. Do it for your friends. And most importantly...do it for your country.

"So Arturo "Killer" Keller (who has a literal 2 FUCKING MILLION DOLLAR BOUNTY ON HIS HEAD) just met and is falling for a beautiful, intelligent, morally and ethically admirable and politically involved woman in the middle of a psychotically violent Cartel war. I'm really happy for them, and I think it's actually gonna turn out great!"

-The Literal, For-Real, Dumbest Guy on Earth.

Enjoying this one so far; it's using its graphic, shocking moments as a way to instill true fucking fear and discomfort and not just be pointlessly gross (although it is gross as fuck.) Also, this has to be one of the most truly scary, nightmarish idea for novel. Truly goddamn creepy and wrong. Really, really rooting for Sarah here.

Finally starting to (I think) get a better handle on Cameron's world here...it's like if medieval England (Alba) was on North America (Nova Terra) with a Byzantinian Greece (Morea) to its direct east and then France (Galle) across a small Channel-type ocean (the North Cross.) And by North America, I mean like straight up Canada but with a Hadrian's-esque huge wall and native iron age tribes. Solid gold awesome.

Gonna use a gun metaphor here because that seems like what Winslow would do: if Power of the Dog was a shotgun of a book, The Cartel is a goddamn M60.

Switching back to the paperback (which is beautifully made because it's by Orbit.) Thorn just came up with some disgusting shit--falcon-sized assassin moths with one giant proboscis that sticks you and literally turns you to jelly.

Awesome.

Gemmell is like the Bernard Cornwell of fantasy--reliably entertaining, consistent, prolific stories about heroic motherfuckers defending against invasions of some form or another, complete with requisite anti-heroic but likable unkillable badasses. Except Gemmell has werebeasts and magical armor and that kinda thing.

I suspect this will be a cricket-chirp-inducing post on my part, but are any of my fellow Netflixers watching Narcos? Show is fucking good, guys.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_w4Xu...

Guys...how awesome would it be if I was the Shrike for Halloween? I mean, I'm lazy and talentless so I'm not gonna be...but it'd be tres neat.

"Who told you that?" I asked, twisting to look at her.
"My mother. She was a detective, you know. She once had a divorce case where she followed a married guy and his girlfriend for three weeks on the River Tethys."

Dear Mr. Simmons,

No one could disagree that your already-existing detective novels are awesome. But I need a pre-Hyperion Brawne Lamia series immediately.

we will not do it ecceard of holland we will not lie in the street and be walcd on so thy can cepe thy beallucs if thu efer has had any
then what will i do he saes and he is lic a cilde who has lost his poppet in the fenn and thincs his world is gan
go fucc thyself i saes and let thy frenc freonds do the same

LOL. I love the way the shit-talking sounds in this book.

Opened this intending to just look at the language and got totally sucked in...as an American it's probably harder for me to understand the trauma and weirdness of 1066's place in English history but this book helps, even though the protagonist/narrator is a weirdo.

I'm really trying to make it stop, but the theme music from Peter Gunn keeps playing in my head every time the Shrike shows up.

Okay, is it just me or are these books scary as fuck?

Continuing with my renaming books fetish I will be hereon referring to this book as Attack of the Space Catholics.

Okay, the Romans were unquestionably the kings of doing fucked up shit but the Tullianum is one of the worst. Getting thrown into a dank, dark stinking stone fucking cave and then strangled at a random point in the future and shoved out of a sewer tunnel...fuck, man. Getting pitched off the Tarpeian Rock is a mercy compared to that.

Okay, this is like the tenth time in these books that Adan has "screamed his orgasm." What the hell, man? It's ridiculous. He coldly orders the killings of men, women and children then the second he gets near a vagina he starts screeching like he's Robert Plant or some shit? Utterly bizarre.

Second time with this beautiful beast of a novel, because I promised myself I'd finish this series sometime this year and I forgot a ton of shit.

Uuuuuuuggggggggggggghhhhhhhhhh.