Akira (Volume 1) - Katsuhiro Otomo

Last week, I watched the movie, Akira. It was interesting, and when reading about it, I saw that the plot differed somewhat from the manga. It got me interested in the book, so when I saw volume 1 was a reasonable price, I snatched it up. Then I read it in two days. It's classified as a cyberpunk post-apocalyptic manga. I had to look it up, because I wouldn't know how to explain it. It's unusual.

I immediately noticed the differences with the plot. They aren't different to the point where it changes things super significantly, it just seemed like they were sorted around into a different order. Kaneda's character was the most surprising to me. He seemed to have a lot more depth in the manga than he did in the movie. I liked how involved he was in the overall story instead of mostly staying on the outside of the main conflict.

I really liked this. If I dare compare it to the movie, I'm going to lean heavily toward the manga. I understand when making a movie, you have to pick and choose what is included, but I'll give it credit for getting me interested enough in the story to check out the manga. I just found the second volume for the same reasonable price as the first one, and you know I snatched that up! Good Book!

The Legasov Tapes - Valery Legasov

This is actually the transcription of some tapes Valery Legasov made before he died. He was a major player at the Chernobyl site, and considered a national hero. His suicide was shocking to the country. I became interested in him when I watched the HBO miniseries Chernobyl.

A lot of speculation surrounded his death, which occurred the day after the second anniversary of the disaster and the day before the investigation results were to be released. He had been trying to encourage reform and change in the industry to prevent further incidents, but no one listened to him. By reading the tapes, I hoped to learn some insight into the mind of the man.

This wasn't what I was expecting at all. It was mostly scientific terms and explaining how people did what they could at the time. He did place blame a few times, but he was very cautious about it. He kept mentioning the main cause of the incident being waiting 10 years.

Then there was the repetition. The tapes weren't just made for one reason. One part was for an article, so a lot of the previous important information was repeated. He praised the firefighters and made sure it was known they hadn't been there in vain. He also mentioned the evacuation a few times and approved of the way that was organized.

Overall, unless you know a lot about chemistry and are interested in how Legasov viewed the problems he faced at Chernobyl, I think you could skip this one. He doesn't really get into his state of mind. He mainly sticks to the facts when he can. He's a sad figure, and I wish he would've been listened to.

Berserk (Volume 2) - Kentaro Miura

I finally got a copy of the second volume of this, but then I had to wait a while because it smelled funny. I'm sensitive to smells unfortunately, so the weird seaside smell that came out of the shrink wrap was upsetting and mysterious.

Continuing on with Guts' story, I was reminded of the anime series I watched from 1997. It was pretty faithful to the source material and went up to the time with the princess. Griffith is on the scene now, and the initial encounters with Casca are in there as well.

At times, I wasn't looking too hard at the pictures due to the smell, but I was trying to see if people were still getting chopped in half. I think I saw a few here and there. I liked seeing the way the band came together in more detail, but I'm not sure that I learned too much more than I had in the series.

I liked this one, and I'd like to keep going. If I am able to continue, I might have little reviews in here just to remind myself of what happens in each volume. Good Book!

The Legacy (Legacy of the Drow #1) - R. A. Salvatore

It's been a while since I've read one of the Salvatore books I purchased in a Humble Bundle. When I dive into them, I make sure I'm ready to get through a whole series, because I'm not piecemealing it. This series is a little different, though, since it has four books, while most of the time there's only three. I'll still be reading my nonfiction in between, but my fiction books are already settled for this next little bit.

Drizzt and his friends are hanging out in the Mithril Hall getting ready for the wedding between Catti-brie and Wulfgar. It seems like everything is fine. Even Regis shows up out of the blue, but then Wulfgar starts to act strangely. Regis even offers to head off into danger, which isn't like him at all.

Deeper in the Underdark, what remains of Drizzt's family hasn't forgotten him. His sister, Vierna, will do whatever it takes to get back some semblance of glory. It will take teaming up with a human assassin and drow mercenary to track down her wayward brother, but will they be able to bring him back to sacrifice him to the Spider Queen?

This was another good book. Salvatore does it again with his battle scenes. He's the only person I've ever read who can write a battle scene in such an interesting and visual way. I almost always know where everyone is and can see the entire battle in my mind. It's a real gift. 

This one was also sad. We lost one of our comrades along the way, and a side character that I had become attached to. I'm not sure if he was in any other books, but I really liked him for the short amount of time he was in this one. I think we lost a major threat in this one, but I never count anyone out until someone buries the body. No one buried this one's body, so I'm not convinced!

Next up is Starless Night. It'll be next after my nonfiction book. The Legacy earns a Good Book! review.

P.S. I don't know if I've ever mentioned it, but I love Guenhwyvar. If they ever lose that figurine, I'm going to have a fit!

Indestructible - Jack Lucas

Jack really wanted to be a Marine. He left home at 14 and worked his way into combat. Most of the time, it wasn't through normal channels. He ended up on the volcanic island of Iwo Jima, where he jumped on two grenades, saving three of his fellow Marines. This earned him a Medal of Honor and fame. While that initially went to his head a little, he took the responsibility of representing his fallen brothers seriously.

Jack is very honest about his life. He isn't super proud of everything that happened, but he doesn't shy away from it either. I was surprised he received his Medal of Honor around halfway through the book. But this man's life was filled with soap opera levels of drama at times. 

The writing style is easy to read, and Jack's life was one I admire. He mentioned his cousin, Sam, a lot, but there wasn't really an update on him in the later parts of the book. I saw Sam in the photos, though. The other thing I felt was missing was some kind of reference to the men who were saved by Jack. They left him in the trench thinking he was dead. Did they ever check on him? Talk to him after the event?

The section of photos are after the index. I'm not sure why they were placed there, but make sure to check them out. There's a fair number of them, and they're pretty interesting. Good Book!

 

The Man of Bronze - Lester Dent

A while back, I was interested in watching the Doc Savage movie from 1975. It's not that easy to find, though, and when I found out I could read the book, I was in!

Doc Savage has come home, and his father has died mysteriously. He's then almost killed by a man with red-tipped fingers. After that, Doc and his group of men, each with their own specialties, are on the case to find out why these assassins are trying to keep Doc away from his inheritance.

A lost civilization, gold, corrupt officials, and lots of BRONZE (the word was used 71 times!) fill this story with twists and turns. Doc is something between a strongman with superhuman intellect and a superhero. I can't really tell if he's supposed to be a superhero, but sometimes it really seemed like he was doing things that simply weren't possible.

This story was really fun. I liked the characters, and Doc was probably not my favorite. There wasn't anything wrong with him. He was just one of those invincible people who train two hours a day no matter what and are untouchable by the love of a woman. "You're a brick," he tells the woman falling in love with him. That was pretty funny. 

In all, there were 213 (!) Doc Savage stories. In later years, he evolved into more of a scientist, because after WWII, people were more interested in comics and Doc's antics seemed a bit silly after the real life heroics that went on. 

I'd probably enjoy more of this type of Doc Savage, but I'm not sure I'll get the chance. The Kindle versions are a bit pricey for what they are, and the paperbacks are so out of print it's ridiculous. With a character that stuck around this long, I'm surprised he's fallen through the cracks this far. I enjoyed Doc Savage and friends. Good Book!

Side Note: I never figured out what the Green Wigglies were...(look up the movie trailer on YouTube) 

Georges Guynemer Knight of the Air - Henry Bordeaux

Guynemer was a pilot during WWI. He didn't make it through the war, so it was up to someone who knew him to tell his story. Georges fought hard to do his duty to his country. He was rejected multiple times for service for being too frail, but he persevered and became an icon to his fellow countrymen.

A lot of the content here is taken from Guynemer's journal. He describes his flights in very vague details, so it's not very detailed. He was an interesting individual for sure, but I felt like I learned more from his Wikipedia page than I did the book. And I got to see pictures. The postage stamp was especially intriguing.

Overall, this one wasn't as interesting as I'd hoped. Maybe if Guynemer had made it through the war and been able to tell the story his own way, I'd have a different opinion. The problem is, the man was too humble to seek out the attention. I doubt we would've seen it. 

Final Spin - Jocko Willink

Jocko is most well known as being a former Navy Seal and writing books on leadership. I'm not really interested in learning about leadership, so I decided to pick up his sole fiction title.

Johnny is working at a dead-end job. He loves his brother, Arty. Arty's entire world revolves around laundry. He's happy as long as he can do laundry. When Johnny finds out the owner of the laundromat is moving to Holland, he comes up with a plan to take care of his brother and get himself out of town.

The book is different. The formatting is unusual, and the choppy sentences didn't really enhance the flow of the story for me. When it was normal format/writing, I found it easier to read.

The story itself was okay. It was the story of a man who wants to make a quick buck and makes some bad decisions to do it. The consequences of those actions are not shocking, and I'm not sure rooting for Johnny is something I was doing as the story went on. The only real character I liked was Arty. He was wholesome and honest. I'm sure there was another way to keep him doing his laundry. I don't think Arty would've approved of Johnny's method to save his laundry. Honestly, neither did I...

 

Military Dogs of World War II - Susan Bulanda

This book collects stories and describes the important jobs dogs served during the second world war. Some were taken overseas and used as mine detectors. Others were on patrol, alerting the men when an enemy was nearby. Some dogs were taken in as strays and adopted as mascots. Family pets alerted rescue teams to buried humans. Larger dogs were used to pull sleds of munitions or injured men. This is only some of the jobs I read about. Dogs were used by many countries during the war. 

The book tells the story of the famous and the unknown in the genre. It doesn't do it in great depth, which is okay. There are tons of pictures. I couldn't get enough of those. On the flip side of that, this was a war. Some, I'm sure many, of the faithful friends would never make it home. There are stories of those heroes in this book as well.

I think the most heartbreaking part is the lack of regard for the dog's lives by some countries. I will give one of them credit for changing direction when they realized they were losing too many dogs. Even if it was a numbers thing, they changed the policy. On the other end of that was a different country that just made me angry.

Overall, though, the book is super uplifting and for a dog lover, I could've read these stories forever. On a price level, be aware it's only 126 pages, and there's tons of pictures, so make sure to keep that in mind if that's a consideration for you. I got it when it was on sale, so it gets a Good Book! review. I really loved it!

Ash (Asher Benson #1) - Jason Brant

Jason Brant came onto my radar because of his YouTube channel where he watches bad movies with his wife and friends. I didn't know he was an author, but apparently, he has a lot of books out there. Many of them are horror, which isn't my thing, but the summary of this book sounded interesting. It falls into the "diet book" category. It's listed at 215 pages. 

Ash was injured in Iraq, and now he hears the thoughts of the people around him. He uses booze to dull the voices at the end of the day, and his life is a mess. One day, he walks into a bank and stops a robbery. After that, his life takes an interesting turn. Now, he's wrapped up in some strange government group that wants to track down someone with powers stronger than Ash's, and they can't do it without Ash. But they also don't seem to be very good at doing anything when he does find his target.

Ash is kind of a putz. I found it interesting that when he made a link to the target, he didn't have any questions for the man. He didn't really trust the people he was working for, but he decided to antagonize the person who could've answered some of his questions. Later on, I understood the snarkiness and sarcasm, but at least initially, I would've thought Ash would've been at least a little curious.

My favorite character, hands down, was Drew (his girlfriend Melissa sounded like a shrew, and I was upset he still had her at the end - he deserves better!). He didn't put up with any crap from Ash, but he was loyal to the end. It was the kind of friend Ash needed, and he didn't get enough credit. A close second would be Nami. She had a spirit that made me smile a few times.

I liked the plot, even though I found it sad that so many innocent people were dying all over the place. The action scenes are very detailed, which is something I don't see very often, so props for that. I wasn't always 100% sure what exactly was happening, but I got the gist most of the time.

The series has two other books, Madness and Asher's War. I don't know if Drew returns, so I don't think I'll actively look to read these. Ash by himself would probably drive me crazy. Without Drew to balance him out, I'm not sure I would've rated this as high as I am. I did appreciate that it's not longer than it needed to be. The author wasn't trying to hit a page count here, and he just told the story and let the page count fall where it may. Combining that with the plot and my man Drew earns Ash a Good Book! review.

A Kim Jong-Il Production - Paul Fischer

Choi, a South Korean actress, was kidnapped and taken to North Korea. Shin, a filmmaker, was kidnapped later and joined her after going through a much more uncomfortable welcome. He was put into prison where he tried to escape. Eventually, the two were reunited, and they formed a film company.

After eight years, they were able to escape and get away. It took that long to gain the amount of trust and for circumstances to align in such a way they were able to make it to an American Embassy. After that, they were reunited with their family, and they spent some years in the states before making their way back to South Korea.

Unfortunately, their story has undergone a lot of scrutiny. Some people claim they weren't kidnapped at all, and that Shin purposely went to North Korea so he could make films again. Events don't really line up to support that scenario, but people will believe what they want to.

The author has done what he can to portray the facts as they were able to be verified. As with anything like this, there isn't going to be 100% verifiable sources for something like this. Most of the story comes from Choi and Shin, but their stories line up with other events of the time. The author went so far as to use Google maps, visit North Korea and contact any people mentioned by Choi and Shin. If they were unavailable, he tried to get in touch with someone who knew them. I give him credit for that.

I found the book to be interesting. The weird way things worked in North Korea was fascinating and sad at the same time. It was also sad to think of the poor people left behind who were punished when Choi and Shin escaped. Shin's life after leaving North Korea wasn't super amazing, and that's a shame. I'll give it a Good Review!