Welcome

Welcome to my ever-evolving blog. It started out as a blog on Beachbody workouts and products, mainly when I was a Beachbody coach. I no longer coach, not because I don't believe in Beachbody's programs (I subscribe to Beachbody on Demand and use their workouts every day), I am just not a salesperson and hated that aspect of it. I am more than willing to answer questions about my experiences with their products and the various workouts, and I feel freer to do so without the appearance of giving a biased review of something.

I have also started adding reviews for various things I have purchased like movies, books, CDs, and other products. This was brought about by a fight with Amazon in which all of my reviews were removed over a completely bullshit allegation that I posted a review that violated their terms of service. After going back and forth with the morons in the community-reviews department (even after they admitted that my posts did not violate their guidelines) they restored my account (which took them six months to do), but I have been posting my reviews on my blog to have them preserved in case something like that happens again. And here, I will post uncensored reviews so I will swear from time to time and post reviews that may be longer than Amazon's character limit. Everything I post here on any topic or product is my personal opinion, and I take no compensation for any product reviews I post. I am a member of Amazon's vine program and because I get those products for free, I keep those reviews on Amazon only, but everything I have purchased with my own money, whether from Amazon or some other store/website/outlet, I will post here.  

I also plan to do some longer blog posts on various topics, such as how to learn physics, how to get through calculus, and longer reviews of workout programs as I do them. Basically, whatever strikes me as interesting at the time.  As you can see if you navigate around the blog, I had many years in between postings. During that time I was going back to school to get an engineering degree, and learning material that I avoided my first time through college was a different experience and one that gave me a lot of insight into how to do well in those classes, which I will try to impart here for those who are looking to get a science or engineering degree. 

Saturday, June 15, 2024

Book Review: Star Wars: Tempest Runner

 


Tempest Runner, published in 2022 and written by Cavan Scott, is a book set during Phase I of the High Republic. It serves in part to tell the backstory of Lourna Dee, one of the leaders of the group of pirates known as the Nihil, who are the protagonists of Phases I and III of High Republic era novels. It is, like the Dooku book, written in a script format, so it reads a bit differently than a traditional novel. It is set in two time periods, the present, in which Lourna is a prisoner aboard a prison ship (but concealing her identity), and in the past, detailing how she joined the Nihil and ascended through their ranks.

This book probably suffers even more than some of the other High Republic books from not having recognizable characters in it. Lourna has not been in all of the High Republic novels to this point, and even in the ones she is in, she is not always the main character. And, the books have really only established a couple of the Jedi characters well enough for the readers to really get invested in them. Yoda got name-dropped occasionally but (at the time this book was written) had never appeared in any of the novels. This is really a book about Nihil infighting and backstabbing, so I am not sure a lot of people will get all that invested in it. That said, I do think it has a good plot and basically sets up Lourna to potentially be the "big bad" of the rest of the High Republic books and/or to possibly be the one to take down the real leader of the Nihil, Manchion Ro.

The book is pretty long at 568 pages, but because it is a script, some of the text on the pages is very short, and I find these types of books to be a quicker read than a regular novel. But how quickly you get through it really depends on how fast you read and how much time you can devote to reading. It took me 7 days to read for an hour or so at a time before bed to finish it. Chances are, if you collect all the canon novels, you will automatically pick this up. But, if you are one who only reads some of the novels, I'd say if you have enjoyed the High Republic-era books so far, you will probably like this. If you have not, then this is probably not going to change your mind.

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