My copy of the Blue Sun expansion to Firefly arrived yesterday. What's inside?
We went back to Goring on Sunday, and things had changed quite a bit since our walk in May. Images follow: cc-by-sa on everything.
This small one-day boardgaming event happens twice a year in a village hall in Deepest Buckinghamshire, and has been going for quite a few years. This was my second visit, and probably the last autumn one I'll get to for a while as it will clash in future with YSDC Games Day.
Here's what I've read in August.
Fourth of Buchan's books about Richard Hannay; 1920s thud-and-blunder.
After I did the scythe course in August, I ordered one from The Scythe Shop, and now I've put it to use in the garden. Images follow: cc-by-sa on everything.
Sixteenth mystery in the series about Kate Shugak, part-time private investigator in a national park in Alaska. Gold's been found on park lands, and that means mining, and that means objections from the locals. The mining company's hired a minor celebrity to be their spokeswoman. But that doesn't solve everything.
Quite a small meeting this time, just three of us. (The main meetings are on two Wednesdays a month, but I have role-playing commitments then.)
Novella; eleventh in Lippman's contemporary mystery series about Tess Monaghan, private investigator in Baltimore. Restricted to bed thanks to difficulties with her pregnancy, Tess passes the time watching people in the park outside, particularly a young woman in a green coat (with a greyhound in a matching one). One day, the greyhound passes by on its own…
Third in this series of one-day conventions in bustling metropolitan Baildon (suburban Bradford), and a shift to a new time of year. All images are cc-by-sa.
2014, 13 episodes: AniDB
A nostalgically strange series about the dandiest man in space.
Technological fantasy. Sixty years after the Aztec-like city-state of Dresediel Lex was "liberated" and its gods killed, someone seems to be trying to break the hold of the company that replaced those gods.
2014, dir. Brian Horiuchi, Frank Langella, Rosario Dawson: IMDb / allmovie
As a runaway biological weapon devastates the world, three couples consider the meaning of love.
Sixth thriller in the series about Charlie (Charlotte) Fox, former soldier and currently private bodyguard. Charlie guards a woman whose ex-boyfriend is causing trouble after a lottery win, but it soon becomes more complicated than that.
Bristol has a commuter ferry again. With images; cc-by-sa on everything.
Thirteenth in Fairstein's contemporary mystery series about Alexandra Cooper, sex crimes prosecutor in Manhattan. When a burned, decapitated body is found on the steps of a church that used to be a synagogue, there could be any number of reasons. When a second body is found at another church, things start to come together.
2014, 12 episodes: AniDB
Two shut-ins, a brother and sister game-playing team, are arbitrarily transplanted into a magical world where all conflict is resolved by games. They take to it well.
Contemporary fantasy ("urban fantasy" gives the wrong idea now, even if it's much more appropriate to this book than to many published under that banner). New constable Peter Grant is about to be sent off to the paperwork unit, but while he's standing guard over a murder scene in the small hours a ghost starts to talk to him. Then things get stranger.
Quite a lot of games have some sort of hidden identity component: for example, Lords of Waterdeep and Discworld: Ankh-Morpork both deal each player a random role which then gives them a secret way of winning the game; Battlestar Galactica and Shadows over Camelot, while nominally cooperative, may assign a traitor role to one or more players; and the UFO faction in Illuminati can even covertly choose which victory condition to aspire to. But some games are entirely about the hidden roles and working out who's got which, and I seem to have been playing a lot of them lately.
Lightweight but lengthy fantasy, the first in the Dhulyn and Parno series.
Situation comedy based on a manga artist, his assistant, and various other workmates.
SF/mystery. Turing Hopper, an AI emergent from research assistant software, is worried about her programmer: he seems to have vanished, and the records she can find aren't helping. So she turns for help to the two humans who are aware of her nature.
It was a warm night… the moon was full (actually it was just past new)… one of the Reading Boardgames Social guys was selling off his X-Wing collection… (With images.)
Robin Hudson had a promising career as a TV journalist, but blew it with some public embarrassment. Now her ex-husband has a younger and prettier fiancée, her job for not-CNN involves investigating a sperm bank, and she's about to be blackmailed. Then the blackmailer turns up dead…
2012, dir. Brandon Cronenberg, Caleb Landry Jones: IMDb / allmovie
In a world where the cult of celebrity involves taking on their diseases… pretty much everything that can go wrong with such a setup does.
Self-published industrial fantasy romance. The relict of a bishop inherits her mother's great airship, and tries to avoid becoming the mistress of the Emperor.
As always, spoilers abound. See Wikipedia for production details
Doctor Who - Tom Baker Doctor Who - Peter Davison (briefly) Romana - Lalla Ward K-9 (voice) - John Leeson Adric - Matthew Waterhouse Nyssa - Sarah Sutton Tegan Jovanka - Janet Fielding
Fourth mystery book about Bernard Rhodenbarr, professional burglar in 1970s New York.
2013-2014, 24 episodes: AniDB
On the Star of the East, Oda Nobunaga fights his local battles against other warlords (with Giant War Armour, of course). But the Star of the West is approaching, and the stakes are about to get vastly higher.
Airliners over the Atlantic are being shot down by submarine-launched missiles. How can this be stopped? Spoilers.
Continuing with David F. Chapman's RPG a Day. Part 1 is here; Part 2 is here. I've also talked about these at greater length in the latest episode of Improvised Radio Theatre with Dice, a role-playing podcast which you should be listening to.