A while back I was brought into a facebook group for local authors, Spilled Ink (Virginia), unfortunately, I was not very active in the group. I did not participate in the conversations on the channel nor did I go to any of the events. That is until I went to Jirani Coffeehouse last Friday for my very first Spilled Ink event. It took me a little while to find a parking space in Manassas and then a bit more time to locate the coffeehouse, and when I did, I discovered that I missed the very beginning of the event. But based upon the images the group posted of the event all I missed was the opening and a bit of the first reading...

I vividly remember seeing the series finale of Farscape, and it left me heartbroken. The ending was absolutely terrible. But then we were treated to the Peacekeeper Wars mini-series, and we were given a fantastic finish to this absolutely fantastic show. Though just like any good show the tale never honestly felt like it had completed...

Fresh off of Monster Hunter International’s heroic defeat of the Nightmare, Larry Correia once again shakes up the series by giving us a new perspective. But instead of picking any Monster Hunter International employees, he let Agent Franks, Frankenstein’s monster tell the story. Up to this point in the story, Frank’s history has been shrouded in mystery, but we finally get to hear the monster’s history...

What do the letters ICMHP mean to you? Before reading this book it looked like nothing but gibberish, but shortly after stating Monster Hunter Legion we are told it stands for the International Conference of Monster Hunting Professionals. The conference, the first ever, was set up to pull hunters from around the world together in an effort to make them better at their job. Once again we are treated to Owen Zastava Pitt’s point of view, which makes sense since he is such a central figure in this series. His team arrives in Las Vegas just having completed a job, and he is trying to enjoy a buffet, when his past runs into him quite literally...

Sorry for the rant, but one of the most important things in anyone’s life is their mattress, and since we sleep for roughly a third of our lives it is crucial to have an exceptional mattress when we sleep. Now over my life, I have had a few mattresses, and the quality ranged from a standard Serta mattress to my new Purple Mattress. And without a doubt the Purple, for my sleep and my wallet the purple mattress reigns supreme. I remember the first time I saw the raw egg test on YouTube, and I was amazed, and honestly enthralled, by the almost four-minute commercial...

I remember when I first heard that Disney was taking the entire written collection of star wars novels and making them no longer canon, I was disheartened. While I hadn’t read all of the books out there, I do remember reading many of the novels, and those stories did an absolutely fantastic job of bringing a rich history to the universe that had been crafted by just a handful of movies. From the Heir to the Empire trilogy that detailed the work of Grand Admiral Thrawn five years after the events of Return of the Jedi; which was beautifully written and despite not being canon is a fantastic read. However, the trilogy that was loosely in my mind when I went to see Han Solo movie was the Han Solo trilogy...

With the third installment of the Monster Hunter series we are not following Owen Zastava Pitt, instead, we are given the first true insight into Earl Harbinger’s life. This is an interesting change of pace rather than having to follow Pitt in yet another battle to save the day we are treated to the point of view of the unstoppable force. Another wonderful thing about the change is that it opens the possibility that we will get other points of view in the other books in the series. But back to Alpha, we were teased with the strength and knowledge the cantankerous old werewolf possesses, but we never get to see the events through his eyes. We get it now, and it is a fantastic change of pace...

Let’s roll back the clock ten years ago, it’s 2008, and Iron Man was coming around to theaters. No one outside of Kevin Feige’s inner circle truly knew what he was planning or even if they did no one would have thought he would succeed. He has been spending the last decade orchestrating the production of comic book movies all that share the same universe. This connection has genuinely led to wonderful crossovers like The Avengers films or even a mini Avengers film like Captain America: Civil War...

I remember when I got my first Kindle way back in 2008, it was a clunky wedge-shaped device, but I was excited to get my hands on my very first e-reader. Though by no stretch of the imagination was the Kindle the first e-reader, at the time the devices were an extremely niche and expensive. In fact, shortly before the launch of the product, I remember listening to a technology podcast, and one of the hosts was talking about the sheer uselessness of e-readers in general. He thought that the Kindle would come and go amounting to nothing but a footnote in history. Well the Kindle did a little bit better than what that particular host thought it would, a lot better...

At the close of Monster Hunter International, the Monster Control Bureau (MCB) launched a nuke at the climax in an effort to neutralize the situation. However, the nuke went into the Old One’s dimension and hit one of them injuring it, and it placed a bounty upon the person who hurt it. Unfortunately for our hero from Monster Hunter International, Owen Zastava Pitt was named as the one who launched the device. Though he doesn’t know that. All he knows is that he is at the top of his game. He works for the best monster hunting company, and in fact, he is a member of the flagship team of hunters, Earl Harbinger’s team. While they are on a job in Mexico without Earl, since the job is happening during a full moon, a shadowy man seeking to collect Owen for the rewards promised by the Old Ones...

Going through my Audible library I saw a series that I enjoyed, Monster Hunter, and I saw that there was a new entry Monster Hunter Siege. I quickly added the new book to my library, but I did not want to start it right away since it had been so long since I had read any of the books. So now that I held a new entry in the series, I went to the Audible app on my phone and downloaded Monster Hunter International so I could once more begin my journey in the Monster Hunter series...

White Sand Vol.1 was the first installment of Brandon Sanderson’s first foray into graphic novels, and it blew me away; from the story to the artwork it was a stunning beginning to a truly epic tale. The second installment begins right where the first one left off with Kenton flying away from Duchess Khrissalla, so he could try and wrap his head around the fate of his diem. Of course, the Duchess is furious with the young leader of the Sand Masters because he hid who he was from them...

Sorry for the rant, but I spent a fair amount of the day reminiscing about significant events in my life, and one of the ones that my mind spent some time on recently was my daughter’s kindergarten graduation, and play. I don’t remember all of the details of the play but a strong memory was that it was adorable and that my daughter did an excellent job with her lines. After everything that was done, we spent the rest of the day together just having a good time. One of the places we went to was a local park that was built back in the… well, it was around back when I was her age, and my daughter loves it, especially the tire swing. I remember as we came close to the park I asked her if she knew where we were, and as soon as she could see the tops of the playground’s structures the joy in her voice was evident as she cried out, “We’re at the tire wheel park.”..

Ever since Iron Man came to the big screen in 2008, Marvel Studios has been building to Avengers Infinity Wars and its next installment Avengers 4. This past weekend I left the theater, and I was blown away by the breadth of the film. Given that I didn’t see the movie on opening weekend, I was thankful that I had managed to not hear anything about the movie before I walked into the theater. That said, I had a pretty good idea of what was going to happen, the web is always flooded with various rumors about upcoming movies it especially seems that Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) rumors are particularly rampant...

After reading the rest of the Pillars of Creation series, I picked up the last installment with great eagerness. From Mage Alain’s vision in the first book to the Master Mechanic Marie’s dread of her ultimate destination throughout the series to the end of the Servants of the Storm, I had a rough idea of what the story was going to be. As I read each page my hope that I would get a satisfying conclusion to the series grew and grew, and while the series was ended with a satisfactory completion, it did create another new thread that would be continued in another series, The Legacy Of Dragons...