August 2025 Reading

Published: 2025-09-01 8:00 AM

Category: Books | Tags: raymond feist, riftwar, magician, dracula, bram stoker

Four books finished this month.

Magician: Master - Raymond E. Feist

The second half of the original Magician novel is incredibly powerful. It follows the main characters across two different worlds and many years until they come to the climax and have to figure out how to survive.

Pug and Tomas' stories parallel one another and new characters like Laurie and Kasumi add depth to the cultures of both worlds. This really is a fantastic series and this book is probably the best of the series.

Dracula - Bram Stoker

I needed something to read on a camping trip and this was on sale at he bookstore. Victorian literature isn't my favorite, but this felt okay to me. There were still long sections of exposition in the form of journal entries and letters, but I was invested enough in the characters to plow through the descriptive language.

The dread builds quickly from the start, but then tapered off in the second third while everyone tries to figure out what to do. The final third felt fast-paced again as the group put their plan into action.

This wasn't my favorite book, but I can see why it's considered a classic.

Birds Aren't Real: The True Story of Mass Avian Murder and the Largest Surveillance Campaign in US History - Peter McIndoe

I'm starting to become a Truther.

This was a detailed backstory of the US government's bird drone surveillance program, starting with it's inception in the 1950's through the current state as of 2024. It's time to wake up.

The text includes helpful handouts, kids lessons, how to lead your own local Birds Aren't Real rallies, and how to overthrow the US government to finally put and end to the mass surveillance.

If you're not familiar, "Birds Aren't Real" is very much satire and doesn't take long for the schtick to be laid on quite thickly. It was a fun first few chapters, but started to wane in the middle. I felt like I was more or less skimming by the end just to finish it.

The Dark Forest - Cixin Liu

I picked this up reluctantly because I wasn't thrilled with The Three Body Problem. I thoroughly enjoyed this book and had a really hard time putting it down as I worked my way through. It's a more "traditional" science fiction story that spans a vast amount of time while humans work out a way to deal with Trisolaris. The Wallfacer project was compelling and the arc of Luo Ji and others kept me reading. I was unsure about finishing the series after the first book but now, I'm excited to pick up the third volume to find out what happens.