Artifacts of the Niagara Gorge - A History of Human Folly

It's been a while since I've done much photography, but it's also been a while since I've wandered off the beaten path to find something new. Well, today was just such a day, with a morning hike down into the Niagara Gorge.  I didn't go down with any particular purpose or plan in mind, but once I'd taken the first few photos of man-made ruins scattered amid the beauty, I knew I was onto something

It started innocently enough with a cast-iron post and a fence gate. The first had clearly been there for sometime, and likely once served a purpose, but the gate was new.

And then I found the car, one I don't recall having stumbled across before.

For the next little while, it was just some random debris, all of it weirdly out of place within the beauty of the Gorge.

It was the old cable and pulley that caught my eye and dragged me farther off the makeshift trail than I had planned.

Which brought me to the old motorcycle, probably the most unique bit of wreckage I've found in many a year.

After that, mostly just another random collection of rust and ruin, nestled within the greenery.

And, finally, ending with one of the saddest, most nostalgic bits of debris down in the Gorge. When I was a kid, this was still a recognizable safe, sealed shut against the ages, and a target for my imagination. For the better part of ten years I would drop a couple of big rocks on it every time we hiked by, try the handle, and move on, defeated again.

At some point, the trickling steam rotted its way through the underside, making it top-heavy enough to tumble about 20 meters down the incline. It's hardly recognizable today, but every time I see it, I see that old safe, full of - to my young imagination - untold riches.

Tim Curran's Worm - a crazy, claustrophobic tale of gruesome horror (REVIEW)

Taking place over a single day, in a single stretch of neighboring houses, on a single suburban street, Worm is a crazy, claustrophobic tale of gruesome horror that hearkens back to the days of 1950s b-grade horror movies, re-imagined through the lens of contemporary torture-porn. It's a hell of a lot of fun, a story that wastes no time in getting to the good stuff, and which never lets up, yet somehow managing to maintain its terrifying gore-splattered intensity through to the final page.

Tim Curran is clearly an author who has seen and enjoyed his fair share of monster movies - Tremors most immediately comes to mind - but one who understands that the monsters themselves are only part of the horror. If you really want to bring the horror home, then you allow the monsters to upset the normal, everyday, domestic comforts we so easily take for granted. Let them worm their way (pun intended) into our lives and our homes . . . let them inconvenience us, incapacitate us, and invade the very place we should feel most comfortable . . . and the sense of inescapable dread becomes immediately familiar to the reader.

The true horror of Worm begins with exploding lawns, overflowing toilets, backed-up sinks, and flooded streets. Before long, greasy, slippery, excrement-like worms begin emerging from toilets, sinks, drains, and faucets, wiggling and bubbling their way up from beneath the earth. Just as you're beginning to wonder just how scary a worm can be, the first of them coils up, opens its ravenous maw, and then launches itself forward, tearing through flesh and bone as easily as bathroom doors.

If you're sitting there right now, stuck with a mental image of just such a beast launching itself up from the toilet bowl while you sit above, rest assured that we do indeed go there, exploring the horror of being eaten alive, from the inside, by a horror you never saw coming.

Of course, it takes more than just monsters to sustain a story, and Curran populates the houses of Pine Street with a small cast of well-drawn characters to add a human element to the tale. We fear, we suffer, and we fight alongside them, watching helplessly as friends, family, and neighbors succumb, one after another. It's a largely hopeless situation, and even though you know it's only destined to get worse, once the survivors assemble, you can't fault them for wanting to make a last stand.

It's there, in the last stand, that Curran pushes his tale over the top. We've already seen an unfathomable depth of horror and gore by that point, and it's easy to become a bit desensitized to it all. I won't spoil just how he accomplishes it, but Curran manages to arrange a final confrontation gleefully that surpasses the horrors that have come before.

Like I said, a hell of a lot of fun, and well worth the read!



Published May 14th 2013 by DarkFuse
ebook

Freebie Friday!

Good morning, all - if it's Friday, then it must be time once again for some Free Feeds for your e-Reads! I've put together another list of free reads I think might be of interest to my fellow wanderers through the ruins, so take a look, click through, and stock your digital library today . . .

Available via AMAZON

The Spirit Clearing by Mark Tufo - After a horrific accident Mike wakes to find himself blind in one eye. He now sees things that others can't and nobody will listen to him. That is until he meets Jandilyn Hollow. Will she be able to pull him out of the depths of his despair?
Can love transcend even death?

I, Hell by Ben Stevens - No one has ever escaped from Hell. But when one determined young man finds himself sentenced to eternal damnation, he hatches a daring plan…

Deathgrip by Brian Hodge - For thousands of years, a secret cabal has guarded the lineage to which Paul is heir — scapegoats who have been forced to bear humanity's anguish upon themselves. Now, while the cabal searches for him, and one man seeks to destroy him, Paul makes a lonely, frightening journey to the core of his identity and to his destiny … to all the pain his soul can bear, to all the redemption he can give, to the freedom that is death.

Storm on the Frontier-Part One (The Demonstar Series) by Dalton Wolf - In an effort to save the border worlds Pilot Baran Igashu must set out with an elite, handpicked team on a hazardous mission to unfamiliar and unknown destinations. But their perilous journey might very well uncover an ancient menace so evil and irrepressible that it threatens to annihilate the whole of the known galaxy, leaving no trace their civilization ever existed...

The Dark Djinn by JJ Timmins - Tara's greatest wish was to break free from the confines of her small Vermont town, and never look back. And so, when she finds a magical totem and becomes the owner of a dark spirit who calls himself a djinn, who offers her three wishes, she is given the chance to make her dreams come true. But when she decides to use the djinn to benefit the whole world with one powerful wish, she finds herself at war with those who will do anything to possess him. Meanwhile, the dark djinn has wishes of his own.

Turn a Dark Phrase by David Coy - Crafted by David Coy, the author of the Dominant Species Series, each story in this collection will take you to some new and terrifying place. There are alien parasites, murderous children, and people who get nothing more than they deserve. Turn a Dark Phrase reminds us that the most horrifying things live in the darkest corners of the human mind.

A Hymn Before Battle (Legacy of the Aldenata) by John Ringo - With the Earth in the path of the rapacious Posleen, the peaceful and friendly races of the Galactic Federation offer their resources to help the backward Terrans—for a price. Humanity now has three worlds to defend. As Earth's armies rush into battle and special operations units scout alien worlds, the humans begin to learn a valuable lesson: You can protect yourself from your enemies, but may the Lord save you from your allies.


Available via Kobo Books

Road Kill - Dan Shamble Zombie PI by Kevin J. Anderson -  When Dan Shamble, Zombie PI wakes up in a coffin in the back of a semi truck, he knows it's not going to be a good day. He has to escape, figure out what's going on, foil a black-market blood-smuggling ring—and make sure he's not dead on arrival!

The Black God's War by Moses Siregar III - Against the backdrop of epic warfare and the powers of ten mysterious gods, Lucia struggles to understand The Black One.

The Written by Ben Galley - Something has gone missing from the libraries of Arfell. Something very old, and something very powerful. Five scholars are now dead, a country is once again on the brink of war, and the magick council is running out of time and options.

The Monsters in Your Neighborhood by Jesse Petersen (REVIEW)

The Monsters in Your Neighborhood by Jesse Petersen
Expected Publication July 29th 2013 by Pocket Star
ebook, 224 pages


Synopsis:

As one of Frankenstein’s Creatures, Natalie Gray knows that unique parts sometimes make up a great whole. Still, leading a diverse support group for monsters—now including Cthulhu!—isn’t an easy task. Especially not since the internet arrived.

New York City embraces the different and the bizarre. Still, even for such a fun-loving city, the supernatural and monstrous might be a bit too much. It’s been six months since the members of “Club Monstrosity” overcame the most recent spate of anti-monster violence and they’ve reestablished their routine of meeting in a church basement once a week to (ugh!) talk about their feelings. Still, they also know a war against them is brewing.

Natalie and Alec (the werewolf) have begun dating, and the mummies Kai and Rehu are tighter than a bug in a…well, bandage. But when modern means (YouTube, Twitter, bits and bytes) are used to chilp away at the solidarity of these ancient monsters, it’s up to Natalie to save the day. #MonstersInNewYork may be trending on Twitter, but this girl’s trending toward saving the day…somehow.



Review:

The story starts out 6 months later from where Club Monstrosity left off. This time around the Van Helsings are causing drama trying to expose the monsters.


Half-way through, the group starts to turn on each other, with all the confusion going on as to how to finish this war with the Helsings.

Great action scene at the end, with the final Twitter post.

The monsters are coming #dontbescared. Can't wait to see what Jesse does with the next one.

(as posted by Donald on NetGalley & Goodreads)

Waiting On Wednesday - Alien Hunter by Whitley Strieber

"Waiting On" Wednesday is a weekly event, hosted by Jill over at Breaking the Spine, that spotlights upcoming releases that we're eagerly anticipating.

This week's pre-publication "can't-wait-to-read" selection is:

Alien Hunter by Whitley Strieber
Aug 13, 2013 (Tor Books)

A young wife disappears in the night, never to be seen again. There is no evidence of kidnapping—in fact, everything indicates that she left on purpose. Her husband, a brilliant police detective, cannot believe this—but he also can't find her. 

Flynn Carroll’s lost love becomes his obsession. He begins amassing a file of similar cases nationwide. His conclusion is unavoidable: somebody is taking people and making it look like they walked out on their own. As Flynn’s case files grow, his work comes to the attention of Special Agent Diana Glass, a member of the most secret police unit on the planet. This police force seeks the most brilliant and lethal criminals who have ever walked free—thieves and murderers from another world. 

Without fully understanding what Glass and her team are doing, Flynn steps into a hidden world of extraordinary challenge and lethal danger. The job is the most difficult police assignment ever known to man, but the idea is the same—find the bad guys. Stop them.

Magician's End by Raymond E. Feist (REVIEW)

The End is Here! The Riftwars are Over!

And so we find ourselves at the end of another long-running fantasy series, left with nothing more than the pages we hold in our hands to provide some sense of closure. The final book of any series is always a difficult one to read, and it often seems as if the longer the series, the greater the potential for disappointment. With an open-ended series like this, where each subsequent book has added more characters, more plot threads, and more mythology, the demands upon the author to nicely tie up all those loose ends in one final book often seem to get in the way of the story.

Fortunately, despite a hiccup at the halfway mark that nearly relegated this to the did-not-finish pile (more on that in a moment), Magician's End turned out to be one of the most satisfying concluding volumes in quite some time. Raymond E. Feist has done an admirable job here of returning to his roots, recapturing the magic of those first few books, and providing us with a satisfying end to the saga. It's a book that pays homage to the past, touching on key characters who've long since left the page, without getting distracted by the need to tie off every possible loose end.

At first, I cringed at the dreamlike encounters with dead friends and allies, fearful that Feist was trying to do too much, to satisfy the demands of too many fans. Yes, it was nice to exchange words with the likes of Kulgan, Borric, Marcos, and all the rest, but did they really need to come back, even if just for a while? Well, maybe they didn't need to, but Feist certain gives them a purpose, which is all a reader can ask. Their conversations with the likes of Pug, Magnus, Nakor, and Miranda are important, imparting lessons that are needed to see the heroes through to the final confrontation.

On that note, for those readers who've become accustomed to the leaner, harsher, simpler books that seems to rule the series for a while, it must be said that this is a book that's quite philosophical. The nature of reality, the role of the gods, and the balance of good and evil are all themes that Feist explores quite openly and directly, seizing the opportunity to really drive home some of the key themes from the series. It felt like a 'big' book, like a truly 'epic' fantasy, which was precisely what I had been hoping for. He opened my eyes and made me nod my head in more than a few places, especially in the penultimate chapters.

Now, as to that hiccup, there's a point at which Marcos makes a key speech about the prophecy under which Pug has suffered since making his noble sacrifice during the first Riftwar:

“Pug believes his life will end soon. A crux is coming, a confluence of probability which none of you may survive,” said Macros. “But the future is now unfixed, and whatever prophecy or foretelling that may have directed his behavior is almost certainly moot. However, he must not know that. He must believe he will sacrifice himself to save . . . everything.”

I cringed when I read that, sure that Feist was providing himself with an 'out' to negate the corner into which he'd written himself, negating every sacrifice Pug has suffered, and artificially creating the potential for a happily-ever-after. Fortunately, it's a bit of a red herring, a narrative twist that does precisely what it's intended to do - shake up the reader, make us question the finality of what's the come, and leave us wondering as to whether Magician's End is the literal reference we've all come to expect. Somehow, he manages to adhere to the original prophecy, while also doing something pleasantly unexpected.

As a trilogy, the Chaoswar Saga felt like three very different books, each of them linked together by some entertaining, yet largely inconsequential threads. It didn't really feel like we were building up to the conclusion of a trilogy, but instead scattering chess pieces about so as to enable a final end-game. Had this not been the end of the series, that sense of disconnect would likely have irked me more than it did. Looking back, however, I can appreciate the ways in which Feist did precisely what was necessary to set the stage, define the odds, and set events on their way. More importantly, unlike Sanderson's attempt to bring the Wheel of Time to a close with a trilogy that felt bloated and overlong, Feist's final trilogy feels as if it's exactly the right size and scope to deliver the goods.

Magician's End is a book in which heroes die, sacrifices are made, and the fate of universes is ultimately determined. It's ambitious in scope, especially with this third and final volume, but it never loses touch with the humor, the wit, and the adventure that we've come to love. I do wonder if this is well-and-truly the end of Midkemia, for there are a few threads left deliberately dangling, but it is clearly the end of the core story arc we've followed for so long. It does feel like an end - if not the end - and I can honestly say I came away from the final page content with how it all played out.


Published May 14th 2013 by HarperCollins US
Hardcover, 576 pages