Sci-Fi book # 42 The Andromeda Strain by Michael Crichton

One of the first "grown-up" authors I discovered as a kid in middle school was Michael Crichton. Despite reading a bunch of his books I never read The Andromeda Strain. I didn't even know what it was about... for some reason I thought it was about space travel or aliens or something. Instead it is about a mysterious organism/virus that is brought to Earth from the upper atmosphere and seems to instantly cause death in anyone exposed to it. Luckily the U.S. has readied a team of scientists and a special laboratory just in case this were to ever happen.

Overall I enjoyed it. My only real problem is that the ending is a bit anti-climactic. Also it was interesting that the theme of mankind causing problems for themselves by over exploiting science is the same as in Jurassic Park and Westworld. I'll give it a B+

Book # 12 - On the Road by Jack Kerouac

Of all the books on the list that I had previously read, On the Road was probably the one that I wanted to reread the least. I read it maybe fifteen years ago and I wasn't that impressed then. On a second reading my opinion hasn't changed that much. Overall it is well written and mildly entertaining and I can see how it tapped into a certain feeling back in the fifties but it isn't something I'd call an all time classic. Some qualms I have with it... first Dean Moriarty isn't the greatest character to be around. Even on the second reading I quickly grew tired of him and his destructive ways. Next, the narrator doesn't exude that much personality... I still don't get why he always felt the urge to get away and travel. He just gives into Dean way too much. Also, for a relatively short book it just feels so long... the whole book is just one thing after another without much thought given to the narrator's feelings. There's one chapter that's maybe 15-20 pages in which the author falls in love while in California that has enough material for an entire book... but afterwards he just moves on and barely thinks about that incident. I guess I just find the book a bit frustrating and overrated. I'll give it a B. Also it mentions Of Mice and Men.

Horror Book # 25 - Something Wicked This Way Comes by Ray Bradbury

Since Halloween was last week I figured it would be a good time to read Something Wicked This Way Comes. Funny thing (and I didn't know this beforehand)... the book specifies a specific day in October that the story starts and that was actually the day I started reading it. The story follows two boys as they encounter a mysterious and sinister carnival that comes to their small town right before Halloween. They discover some of their secrets and soon the leader of the carnival tries to capture them.

The mix of fantasy and horror was fun and I also enjoyed the theme of aging that runs throughout the book. The boys wish they could be older to experience life and the father of one of the boys wishes he could be younger so that he could interact more with his son. But of course the plot shows what would actually happen if you chose to change your age. Just like his stories in The Martian Chronicles, the fantastic elements of the story are just a cover to tell what is actually a very relate-able story. I'll give it an A.

Also, it quotes Moby Dick.

Horror Book # 23 - At the Mountains of Madness by H.P. Lovecraft

I really wanted to love At the Mountains of Madness... but I ended up just really liking it instead. Previously I had read a collection of Lovecraft's short stories and absolutely loved it, so I was eager to read some more of his work. The premise here is great... a team of Antarctic explorers discover a huge mountain range that shows evidence of being inhabited by a weird alien race millions of years ago. The whole book is eerie and has a great dark and foreboding tone. Just a few qualms... for the amount of plot the book is a bit stretched out (and it is already a fairly short book so maybe it should have just been a short story), the story also follows the usual Lovecraft plot structure of someone surviving a horrible ordeal and relating it to us with the hopes that we believe him, and the whole sequence in which the narrator is able to tell the entire history (including names) of this previous civilization from a series of sculptures seems a bit unlikely. I'd still recommend it though but I'd go with one of his short story collections first. A-

Horror Book # 37 - Midnight by Dean Koontz

Wikipedia gives a pretty accurate summary of Midnight by Dean Koontz by saying that it is a combination of The Island of Doctor Moreau and Invasion of the Body Snatchers.  Set in a secluded California coastal town, the story is about a tech company that is experimenting with the residents of the town and inadvertently giving them the ability to transform their bodies. This was the first Koontz book I had read and I enjoyed it. It wasn't the most memorable or original book out there but it did have some good scary scenes and it was fun following the main characters as they tried to avoid any of the transformed citizens and escape the town. I'll give it a B+.

Also it mentions Frankenstein.

Star Trek: New Frontier - The Returned

Sometime around ninth grade I really got into Star Trek and started reading a ton of the books that they put out... like maybe one hundred of them. One of my favorite sub-series was the New Frontier series that was mostly written by Peter David, my favorite of the Star Trek authors. In this series he introduced a new main character, Captain Calhoun, and added a bunch of minor characters from The Next Generation to a crew that takes the Starship Excalibur on crazy adventures. While I stopped reading other Star Trek books I've always kept up on the New Frontier series and was pretty excited when I saw that the LAPL had the newest volume which was released only as an e-book. This volume didn't disappoint... Calhoun goes on a quest to get revenge against an alien species that wiped out his planet and ends up encountering an even worse alien race... and then Q shows up. I'll give this one an
A-.

Also, it mentions Alice in Wonderland.

Book # 150 - The Iliad by Homer

I'm pretty sure that The Iliad is the oldest book on any of my lists. Its age makes it a bit hard to really judge. Basically the whole book is just battle scene after battle scene. And it is surprisingly super violent too. There are tons of stabbings and beheadings and dead bodies being mutilated. And after seven hundred pages I feel like I still don't know everything that I should about the Trojan War. Overall it was a bit of a chore reading it but it had some interesting stuff in there like the interactions on both sides with their gods. I guess I'll give it a B+.