Keeper of the Bones - ABOUT

Keeper Ormund is in charge of bringing the bones of dead soldiers who died in battle home to Kettle Hill for proper burial.  When a Bone Whisperer, a cleric with the power to read the lives of the dead in their bones, joins him, Ormund fears what the readings will reveal of his own sins.  The cost of his guilt will be his soul.

As Ormund and the Whisperer make their way to Kettle Hill, each of the fallen soldiers gets their own story told through their own eyes.  In their stories, an evil forest spirit, an agent of the enemy, seduces members of the army.  Her charms and the assignments she gives them threaten not only the sanity of the Kettle Hill soldiers, but also their lives.  With each reading, the Whisper draws closer to discovering Ormund's involvement and the more determined Ormund becomes to keep his secrets hidden.

Daniel Steeves Connaughton - Newsletter

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Imora - About

IMORA

For centuries, Imora the Ice Dragon Imora has watched the fierce Dengals expand their empire across the high, cold mountain ranges.  While she works to drive them back, claiming the mountains as her own, each time she sleeps for a century, they regain their footing.  When they kill her son, she finds his heart struggling for survival in a pool of its own blood.  First, she must find a way to preserve the heart while she prepares to resurrect her son.  Her journey takes her deep beneath the mountains and to the highest cloud tops.  Forced to surrender to the long dragon sleep once again, a thief steals away with the heart.  When she loses her wings in battle, she must not only find a way to exist as a creature of the ground, but find the thief and save the heart before he uses its powers for himself.

For more information, see here.

Back to paperback_ Is this the end?

For 2015, I conducted an experiment. You can read about the start of my journey here.  After several years of reading only eBooks on the Nook, I wanted to see what it would be like to go back to reading those "old-fashioned" paper books.  You remember those?  Those books made out of paper and backs. Those books that you had to actually had to manually lift the page to turn. Anyways, I knew I'd feel a certain amount of nostalgia and as the months and books went on, I started to feel the urge to get back to the Nook.  Hey, it's convenient as long as I can charge it, it’s easier to look up words in the dictionary… and be distracted by the internet. 

Back to Paperback

However, let's just say the Nook is now merely a mobile Netflix device and mostly a dust collector.  Yeah, I'm back on the paperback wagon.

It's 2016 and I'm still reading paperbacks.  There's just something about a book...

Leave a comment. What are you reading? Is it in ebook or paperback?

Back to the Paperback - VIPERHAND

As I wrote in the first post for “Back to Paperback”, this is not a review of the novel.  This is about my experience reading it in paperback.

If you would like to read my review of Viperhand, it can be found at Goodreads.

This was a nostalgia read for a two reasons.  First, it’s a Dungeons & Dragons novel and I haven't read one of these since I was a teenager.  Second, it’s a standard paperback mass-market/pocketbook size which I haven't read since I got the Nook.

The copy I read was from the library, so it looks as if it was well-used/read over the years.  The binding was somewhat creased and a little torn and wrinkled in places, the pages tinged that aged grayish-yellowish color.  One page had a tear in the corner.  And, this is no fault of it being a library book, but Chapter 13 had the title "Chapter 3".

When I purchase a paperback I like giving it some TLC such reading it in a way to carefully make sure no pesky creases show up on the binding.  Anyone else do this?  Admittedly, I didn't feel the urge to treat the library book quite the same way, which I'm going to attribute to its already well-used condition.  I was careful enough.

I was somewhat expected the feel of the paper to bring back some memories or feelings, but that didn't really happen.  What did evoke feelings of familiarity more than anything else was the size of the book.  It was handy to carry around.  I was able to read in bed on my back while remain comfortable.  There's that saying about curling up with a good book and that certainly pertains more to a paper than it does to the Nook for a reason I haven't figured out yet.

One big difference I noticed was that I read more while reading.  As long as I stashed the Nook away in another room, I was able to avoid the pull of the internet and the desire to just watch some Netflix instead a few nights a week.  That being said, it feels like it's taking forever for me to get through Season 2 of Ripper Street!  And I really can't wait to watch Turn now that it's finally on Netflix.

That’s it for Viperhand.  Next up, I'll be reading The Barrow by Mark Smylie.

Anyone out there prefer the standard paperback mass-market/pocketbook size book?  Any recommendations on some oldy but goody D&D novels?