RogerBW's Blog

A Bit Too Much Good Work, A. T. Rain 31 March 2020 - 1 comment

2016 science fiction novel, fanfic in the Vorkosigan universe (set around and among the events of Captain Vorpatril's Alliance). The narrative follows Byerly Vorrutyer, agent of Imperial Security, as he negotiates politics, bomb threats, and his personal life.

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Perl Weekly Challenge 50: merged intervals and noble integers 30 March 2020

I’ve been doing the Perl Weekly Challenges. The latest was about merging intervals and determining noble numbers.

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Kitty Rocks the House, Carrie Vaughn 29 March 2020

2013 urban fantasy, eleventh in the series. Kitty Norville, the late-night DJ who has become the world's most famous werewolf, has multiple problems in Denver.

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A Case For Paul Temple 28 March 2020

The BBC has occasionally been rebroadcasting the Paul Temple radio plays, dealing with a professional novelist and amateur sleuth. This one is a 2011 remounting of a lost 1946 original, starring Crawford Logan and Gerda Stevenson. Someone's supplying drugs in London, and that must be stopped!

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A Memory Called Empire, Arkady Martine 27 March 2020

2019 science fiction, first in a projected series. The Teixcalaanli Empire is huge, and Lsel Station has only just managed to maintain its independence from it. So when the Empire requires a new ambassador, Mahit Dzmare is sent. Then she discovers that her predecessor has been murdered…

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Marlow Tabletop and Board Games 17 February 2020 26 March 2020

This Meetup-based boardgames group continues, in normal times, to meet at the Marlow Donkey.

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Clarkesworld 162, March 2020 25 March 2020

Clarkesworld is a monthly on-line magazine edited by Neil Clarke.

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Azur Lane 24 March 2020

2019-2020, 12 episodes: AniDB. Schoolgirls with the spirit of WWII Japanese fighting ships take on an alien navy. Hang on, this sounds familiar…

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Vendetta in Death, J. D. Robb 23 March 2020

2019 SF/mystery; sixtieth (roughly, or 49th novel) of J. D. Robb's In Death series (SF police procedurals). Someone's torturing and killing abusive men.

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Perl Weekly Challenge 49: multiples and LRU cache 22 March 2020

I’ve been doing the Perl Weekly Challenges. The latest was about searching for particular multiples of a number, and implementing a fixed-size cache.

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Stormy Petrel, Mary Stewart 21 March 2020 - 1 comment

1991 romantic suspense. Rose Fenemore is an English tutor at Cambridge, as well as a poet and author. She takes a cottage on the western Scottish island of Moila to have a writing retreat free of distraction. But why do two young men end up in her living-room one stormy night?

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How To Hangouts 20 March 2020 - 3 comments

I've been playing RPGs over Google Hangouts for a while, and recently several people have asked how to go about this as their regular groups move on-line. So here are my notes.

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Kitty Steals the Show, Carrie Vaughn 19 March 2020

2012 urban fantasy, tenth in the series. Kitty Norville, the late-night DJ who has become the world's most famous werewolf, goes to London to give the keynote speech at the First International Conference on Paranatural Studies. It will not go smoothly.

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Star Trek Ascendancy games 2 and 3 18 March 2020

Star Trek Ascendancy is a huge game which I don't get to the table very often, but I managed it on a blustery February weekend.

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Clarkesworld 161, February 2020 17 March 2020

Clarkesworld is a monthly on-line magazine edited by Neil Clarke.

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Perl Weekly Challenge 48: survivor and palindromic dates 16 March 2020

I’ve been doing the Perl Weekly Challenges. The latest was about calculating the survivor of a stabbing game, and determining palindromic dates.

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Blue Lightning, Ann Cleeves 15 March 2020

2010 mystery, fourth in Cleeves' Shetland Island series. Jimmy Perez is taking his fiancée Fran Hunter home to meet his parents on Fair Isle. But over at the Fair Isle Field Centre, tensions among the isolated birdwatchers may be building up to murder.

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Charlie's Angels (2019) 14 March 2020

2019 thriller, dir. Elizabeth Banks, Kristen Stewart, Naomi Scott; IMDb / allmovie.

The Townsend Agency is a covert international force for justice. Now they have to prevent a new technology from being turned into a universal assassination tool.

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Clockwork Lies: Iron Wind, Dru Pagliassotti 13 March 2020

2014 steampunk fantasy romance, second in the Clockwork Heart trilogy. Taya, an "icarus" flying courier, is now the wife of the Ondinan ambassador to Mareaux. But between the assassination attempts and the more conventional betrayals, her life is rarely boring. vt Iron Wind.

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2020 Hugo Nominations 12 March 2020

I'm not planning to vote in the Hugos this year, but I am eligible to nominate. Nominations close early on Saturday morning, UK time.

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Health Advice and Sanitary Precautions 11 March 2020 - 4 comments

“Wash your hands like you persuaded your husband to murder the rightful king.” Author unknown, but it inspired me.

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Ancestral Night, Elizabeth Bear 10 March 2020

2019 space opera, first in a projected series. Haimey Dz is the engineer on a salvage tug; her latest job uncovers both a terrible crime, and alien supertech.

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Perl Weekly Challenge 47: roman calculator and gapful numbers 09 March 2020

I’ve been doing the Perl Weekly Challenges. The latest was about doing Roman arithmetic and generating gapful numbers.

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Sixteen Ways to Defend a Walled City, K J Parker 08 March 2020 - 1 comment

2019 fantasy of sorts. The Imperial City has been suddenly besieged, and its defences will be commanded by Orhan, Colonel of Engineers… not by his choice.

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Marlow Tabletop and Board Games 3 February 2020 07 March 2020

This Meetup-based boardgames group continues to meet at the Marlow Donkey.

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The City in the Middle of the Night, Charlie Jane Anders 06 March 2020

2019 SF. On a tidally-locked colony world that's slowly decaying, a few people will make a difference. But not necessarily in a good way.

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Stitchers season 3 05 March 2020 - 2 comments

2017 science fiction, 10 episodes. Kirsten Clark continues to have her consciousness inserted into the minds of the recently-dead.

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Gods of Jade and Shadow, Silvia Moreno-Garcia 04 March 2020

2019 fantasy. In Jazz Age Mexico, Casiopea Tun is a drudge working in her rich relatives' house. But when she frees a captive Mayan god…

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Brother HL-L6300DW laser printer 03 March 2020 - 3 comments

My old laser printer, a Brother HL-5270DN which I've been running since 2006, was getting mechanically unreliable. They don't make it any more, so I looked for the nearest equivalent. Almost. I wanted a paper tray that would take a whole ream at a time.

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The Private Life of Elder Things, Adrian Tchaikovsky, Adam Gauntlett and Keris McDonald 02 March 2020 - 1 comment

2016 Lovecraftian fantasy/horror anthology by three authors.

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February 2020 Trailers 01 March 2020

Some trailers I've seen recently, and my thoughts on them. (Links are to youtube. Opinions are thoroughly personal. Calibration: Hatreds are the cinders of affection.)

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