Finished Holmes on the Range by Steve Hockensmith yesterday. As you can probably guess from the title, this is a mix of a western and a mystery but it doesn't actually directly involve Sherlock Holmes. Instead, it is about two brothers in 1890's Montana who are down on their luck. One has become a fan of the Sherlock Holmes stories, read to him by his brother because he is illiterate, and he gets to put his new hobby to the test when they both become involved in a mystery when they are hired on as ranch hands at a remote, and shady, ranch.

I'm a huge fan of the Sherlock Holmes stories and I was very into mysteries back in the first year of university. That year, I burned out on reading mysteries and only read them occasionally now. This is a decent mystery and the author does a good job of creating a reasonable Wild West setting as a backdrop.

It's a light read but if you are into light mysteries, I would recommend it.

Amazon Link: Holmes on the Range

I finished Dead Air by Iain Banks a few days ago but I've been to busy to write about it. I'm a big fan of Bank's books but only his non-science fiction ones. He writes science fiction as Iain M. Banks and even though I read a lot in that genre, I don't like his books very much. On the other hand, his non-science fiction books are mostly excellent and Dead Air is no exception. It is more in the vein of my favourite book of his, The Crow Road, than his stranger books like The Wasp Factory.

Dead Air starts right around the time of 9/11/2001 and the main characters are introduced at a party in London that ends with the news of the attacks in New York. The book follows the mis-adventures of a surly and sarcastic London "shock jock" as he sleeps around, parties and discusses politics with various friends. As I've commented before, UK writers seem to have an ear for colourful dialogue that is lacking in most North American writers. Banks is one of my prime examples of that and this novel doesn't disappoint. Highly recommended.

Amazon Link: Dead Air

Finshed two books over the last few days - the first is The Depths of Space by Mark Wolverton. It's a non-fiction look at NASA's Pioneer program, the first program to send space craft out as far as Jupiter and Saturn. Though short, it's a good read if you are interested in the history of un-manned space exploration. The Pioneer program is also one of the few programs not run by JPL for NASA. It was run from the Ames Research Center in the San Francisco Bay area.

The second is a fairly inconsequential book, The Protector's War by S.M. Stirling, the second in a low end, post-apocalyptic series. In the first, Dies The Fire
, the laws of physics change making anything depending on electricity or fast combustion stop working. It follows a fairly predictable path - the characters struggle with living without technology, deal with other survivors who have turned savage, and try to re-build a new society. The Protector's War continues the story with medieval style power struggles amongst groups of survivors. The book does have one unique viewpoint - that Wiccans and refugees from the Society for Creative Anachronism will be indispensible in a post-technology society.

Dies The Fire had some good moments but The Protector's War just seems to be going through the motions.


Amazon link: The Depths of Space
Amazon link: The Protector's War