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Boneshaker

Posted on June 25, 2013

This week on Novel Ideas, we discuss Boneshaker by Cherie Priest, a sci-fi steampunk alternate history zombie story about the importance of family. In this episode we discuss characterization, possible racism, the motives of villains, and what about this book could use editing. We also the discuss the possibility of Disney accidentally creating zombies, moms who are also sharpshooters, steampunk naming conventions, and all the ways this book is like Peter Pan. There’s also an announcement at the end about our exciting July project extravaganza (more or that in the next day or two here if you’re avoiding the episode for spoilers).

A quick note: During the episode we wonder what the publication date was for this book, it was in 2009 and nominated for a Hugo award in 2010.

The music bump this week is “The Wall” by Kansas, though I’m pretty sure their version of the wall was not a literal wall containing poison gas and zombies.

Boneshaker

Recommendations:

Ben: 5/10 Definitely not bad, but not memorable

Gabs: 4/10 Not my bag

This entry was posted in Episodes and tagged Boneshaker, Cherie Priest, Disney, feminism, gas masks, how do you define resourceful, just like Peter Pan, lack of characterization, moms who can shoot, needs editing, questionable ending, racism, reader recommendation, sharecropping, special project, Starbucks, steampunk, steampunk naming conventions, strong women, technicians get no love, teenagers acting like teenagers, villainous motives, why fear the Chinese, zombies.

The Fellowship of the Ring

Posted on January 16, 2013

Welcome to Middle Earth (or possibly New Zealand), as we discuss The Fellowship of the Ring by J.R.R. Tolkien this week on Novel Ideas. This is an obscure fantasy tale with an even more obscure feature length movie that no one has seen. Also, the Peter Jackson movie that everyone in the world has seen. In this episode, we cover the big issues, such as: world building, the logical way to divide an epic story in three parts, and the lack of female characters. We also cover more philosophical questions, like whether elves bang, if Gandalf is shy, and Tom Bombadil’s ADHD. I also attempted a tweak with my audio processing, so if it sounds weird on your listening device of preference, please leave a comment.

The music bumps are from Howard Shore’s excellent score to the movie version of Fellowship, specifically the theme that probably comes to mind when you think of that soundtrack.

35 – The Fellowship of the Ring – Hobbits Are The Best

This entry was posted in Admin, Episodes, Movies of books and tagged ADHD, alternate endings, audio experiments, coy wizards, do elves bang?, elven incest, Galadriel like a boss, hobbits are like altoids, imaginary racism, J.R.R. Tolkien, Legsly and Gim Gams, logical sequencing, LOTR fanfic pitches, movies of books, needs editing, obscure references, smoking is awesome, spoiler alert, The Fellowship of the Ring, Tom Bomadil-hole, unnecessary characters, where are all the women at?, world building.