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Janine O (2 KP) rated Fortune's Pawn in Books

Oct 18, 2017  
Fortune's Pawn
Fortune's Pawn
Rachel Bach | 2017 | Science Fiction/Fantasy
9
9.0 (1 Ratings)
Book Rating
the characters (0 more)
Science Fiction meets complicated Romance
I am both a romance fanatic and a science fiction buff and one day I was just poking around looking for something that would blend these two things without being...you know...bad. I've read a lot of things about some lady in an experimental ship who accidentally ends up on a planet where a hot alien alpha dude wants to make her his interplanetary bride.

I did not want that. I wanted a complex story with romantic themes set in space...and that's exactly what this book gave me.


Fortune's Pawn rocked. Devi Morris is a badass, power armor clad mercenary with a dream to join an elite merc unit...but she has to get some expedition references first. So what does she do? Chooses the one ship with the worst track record in the hopes it with fast track her ambitions to the top. While I wont put spoilers I will say she gets her wish...kinda. She finds romance...that gets VERY complicated, mystery, and tossed into what is bound to end in an interstellar war.

9/10, highly recommend.
  
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Suswatibasu (1701 KP) rated Solaris in Books

Dec 1, 2017  
Solaris
Solaris
Stanislaw Lem | 2016 | Fiction & Poetry
8
7.3 (4 Ratings)
Book Rating
High-brow science fiction
Solaris is a perplexing, impossible world - endeavouring, somehow, to exist and endure in the presence of binary stars with a toxic and corrosive atmosphere constantly enveloping its ink black ocean of intrigue. Hovering above the waves is Solaris station which is an armoured and secluded human outpost, a crumbling and half-forgotten castle in the air.

Scientist Kris Kelvin comes upon an unusual scene in which one of the researchers at the facility has apparently killed himself, another appears to have lost his mind and Snaut, who has a shred of humanity left, is still deeply suspicious. Soon after we discover that apparitions seem to be tormenting them, though they appear to be manifestations or projections of their own deepest, darkest feelings, created by the mystery that is the living ocean of this world. Testing their minds to the limits, we see if they can truly overcome their repressed memories.

It is a haunting novel, and almost parallels the mental health issue of post traumatic stress disorder, and that it can be present in anyone in varying degrees. A visionary science fiction novel.
  
Terraforming Mars
Terraforming Mars
2016 | Business / Industrial, Economic, Environmental, Science Fiction, Territory Building
Massively replayable (0 more)
Quite simply, my favourite game. Being able to play from solo, to five players, with hundreds of different technologies and businesses, means you will never have the same game twice. If I go away with work, I pack this before my clothes.


While the game can be a little difficult to play in the first game, the second, third etc games will be played much quicker, easier, and more enjoyable. Every one will be different, too. It typically takes about 90mins to 2h to play, in our experience, but there have been longer games - there is an element of luck with both the cards drawn, and what everyone else does! Holding on to a card because it needs the Temperature below -8 degrees, then seeing everyone else pumping the temperature from -12 to -6 means the card is (probably) worthless.

The science is obviously science-fiction but is based heavily in reality, albeit simplified, and very interesting on it's own right.

Expansions do add further flavours and variations, but the base game is absolutely able to stand on it's own two feet.