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I have noticed that a number of recently popular fantasy books feature criminal protaganists. It’s kind of like a mini-trend. Here are the ones that I know about or have recently read: Mistborn by Brandon Sanderson. Vin is an orphan who starts out as a small time thief in a small time crew and gets recruited into a new crew with supernatural...

I recently completed The FIrst Law trilogy and wanted to share some of my thoughts on it. The First Law consists of The Blade Itself, Before They Are Hanged, and Last Argument of Kings. I find the titles all fresh and intriguing, if a little confusing. They’re all quotes from history. “The blade itself incites men to violence” is from Homer. “We...

I ran across some great videos today that I just had to share. Have you ever really wondered about the SHHHHHING! sound of a sword being drawn in the movies? I never had until I saw this video: If you watched the video, you probably got a clue about what he thinks of the mystical katana. If not, this video will make it very clear indeed: A...

A few weeks after I started my job as a proofreader, I was sitting there reading some document with my headphones on, jamming to some of my favorite music to screen out all the office noise. The guy in the cubicle next to me, ignoring my efforts, asked what I was listening to. “Rush,” I said. “Oh.” And he ducked back into his own cubicle with...

It’s been over three weeks since I wrote anything for the blog, and a lot has happened since then, to wit: we had a baby and bought a house. The house is our first; the baby isn’t. For the grisly details on the baby, check out my wife’s blog. Although I’ve been able to get some moderately good sleep and had snippets of free time most days, I ha...

I mentioned a while back that I attended a book signing by Brandon Sanderson. It was a new experience for me. I’ve never attended a con and never heard of an author I liked doing a book signing here in Utah. Luckily for me, Sanderson lives here, just about 45 minutes from my house. I skipped the actual release party for The Hero of Ages because ...

I just finished reading Brandon Sanderson’s latest book, The Hero of Ages, last book in the Mistborn trilogy. I loved Mistborn 1: The Final Empire, but was a little disappointed with Mistborn 2: The Well of Ascension. So I was really hoping that the third book would be good and make good on the promise of the first one. I was not disappointed. ...

The Well of Ascension is the second book in Brandon Sanderson’s Mistborn trilogy. Although the first book is usually called just Mistborn, its full title is Mistborn: The Final Empire. I don’t really know how to do this review without giving at least a few minor spoilers (such as which characters survive the first book), so don’t read this if y...