Category: Books

Mind Storm by Andrew Greene

~ Veselin ~ 1 Comment

The prettiest cover from the first 6 books I purchased during the book fair is already on the “read” bookshelf. It’s the second book I read this year that doesn’t have a Goodreads entry. If any of my readers here is a Goodreads Librarian, please add it – I posted two requests on Goodreads for book additions.

From what I see, the gamebook writers in some countries that aren’t Bulgaria, seem to prefer publishing their works on Google Drive as a PDF and just let them be available to anyone for free. This one is published in English here.

The photo of the cover is from an angle on purpose – to see all the shiny letters. Then each page has decoration, and the illustrations are stunning. I’m not sure why and how that happened but this is a first edition and a translation at the same time.

The story is Gibson-style cyberpunk, with some references to Gibson and other gamebooks. The gameplay felt linear – you must go through most episodes for a successful read. I’d consider it easy. The writing is good, and the story is engaging.

4/5 for the book, 5+/5 for the editing/illustration/publishing. It’s a piece of art.

International Spring Book Fair Sofia – 2024

~ Veselin ~ Leave a comment

I love the International Book Fair in Sofia. I have a system where I visit the fair multiple times before buying books to get the full experience.

This time I violated the system. Here’s my harvest from Day 1.

Rebecca Yaros, 2x Brandon Sanderson, and 3x game books. 5 out of these 6 books are likely to be 5/5s.

And here’s a photo from the book fair with no books:

The book fair will be open for 10 days until June 2nd.

All Systems Red

~ Veselin ~ 3 Comments

A wonderful novella by Martha Wells, beautifully published by Artline Studios. The book is tiny and is a quick read. It’s about a very human murder bot whose job is to protect a group of planetary explorers. I’ll probably wait for the translations because the hardcover is so pretty.

The suggestion for this book came from a fellow blogger and friend @dni.

5/5, and the best book I read this month so far.

Peledgathol – The Last Fortress

~ Veselin ~ 2 Comments

I read a gamebook that’s not on Goodreads. It is, however, available to download in English for free here, most likely submitted by the author. From what I understand, the only paper edition is in Bulgarian.

It’s beautifully made in Bulgarian, with original illustrations by famous illustrators. Dimo and Ivanchev are credited.

The story is about Middle-Earth-type dwarves who are running away from an invading army. You’ll have to navigate through a brief maze of episodes and find a few keywords, one of which is particularly difficult. There’s no way to read that from the first time. It’s only 100 episodes but the way it’s made, the success sequence is specific and hard to find. I didn’t attempt to fight the battles and only tried to find the codes, which was difficult enough.

Overall, a good book, about 4/5. The artwork, translation, and editing of the Bulgarian edition is 5/5.

Avogadro Corp by William Hertling book review

~ Veselin ~ Leave a comment

I’m interested in using AI to optimize things and got the nudge to read this book because of my interests. I find this book quite depressing.

A team of engineers in the Google-sized company Avogadro Corp implements a software called ELOPe. It optimizes emails based on the desired outcome. ELOPe has access to everyone’s main communication channel, which gives it instant and infinite power. It quickly takes over the company by sending bogus emails. The software is good enough to self-improve, manipulate, and survive.

Although very unrealistic from an engineering point of view, the book is a good warning of what could happen one day if AI is trusted. I find Skynet or the Matrix more likely scenarios than this but it should be kept in mind that although it may not play out this way, we can achieve the result in some other way.

4/5 – it’s a good warning, and a great idea, but unpleasant to read due to its unrealistic characters. I’m not sure if I’ll dare to touch the follow-ups.