Fun Fact: My First Publication was a Dungeons & Dragons Character!

My first publication (except items in @Caltech's newspaper) was not mathematical or scientific in any way. It was a Dungeons & Dragons character!

I won a contest to design the thief on a cover of Polyhedron.

(For it, I corresponded with editor @erikmona.) #myfirstpublication pic.twitter.com/tTfFHVFdPk

— Mason Porter (@masonporter) May 15, 2018

"Brimstone Angels" Series of Forgotten Realms Novels

This evening I just finished the 4th book in the Brimstone Angels series of Forgotten Realms novels.

I read the 3rd book on the series last fall as part of my read of The Sundering series (which is the main track covering the transition from 4th edition Forgotten Realms to 5th edition), and I bought the first two books to introduce myself to the characters in that book. However, I decided to read the book, The Adversary, to go through the whole Sundering series (though with occasional break to read other books, such as following Drizzt Do'Urden and one or two things from other genres, as some of the books in The Sundering series weren't all that great) before getting back to the first two books.

I found that I enjoyed "The Adversary" a great deal. It was one of the best D & D novels I had read in a long time. It is well-written, and the characters are interesting --- and I also do enjoy Planar beings and politics in my novels. (I really dug the Planescape setting back in the day.) The occasional draconic swearing mixed in with the English also reminds me of Firefly, so that is a nice touch too. To keep this track going, I decided to read the 4th book first and will treat books 1 and 2 as preludes. (Book 4, called Fire in the Blood is also very good.) I'm not sure if I will get through them both before the 5th book comes out in December (and I would like to jump to that to keep the story going), especially as I want to read the next Do'Urden book that comes out next month.

Every time I go on sabbatical and have some more time or it's the summer and I have more time, if I find a good fantasy novel, I am reminded how much I enjoy them --- even though during the school year, it's hard to spend much time at all reading novels. Around the last month or so, I have tried to make it a point to at least read a little bit of a novel on most days. (It would be really nice to keep that up; it makes me happy.) I also really miss playing in a D & D campaign, so between wanting to find a way to play RPGs regularly again and enjoying a really good D & D novel, I have been thinking about D & D a lot lately (including reminiscing about adventures from days gone by, browsing a bit through some 1st edition books, etc.). I used to have so much more time for reading novels and playing D & D, and it would be really nice to recover that. I have become so busy in the last few years.

So, this is my book recommendation for the day. I think it's been quite a while since I blogged about a novel!

New Dungeons & Dragons Film

I have my fingers crossed that the newly announced big-budget D & D movie will work out a bit better than the previous attempts I witnessed. (At some point, I should actually watch the animated film that was based on the first book in the Dragonlance Chronicles. I do own a copy of it, after all.) Supposedly this new film will be based in Forgotten Realms, which is a good sign. Dragonlance would have been even better.

I am cautiously optimistic. I did find some entertainment in the 2000 film, but clearly there needs to be a D & D film that is much better than that. It did have a few good moments, but it had a lot more not-so-good (or even worse) moments.

But past experience compels me to remain cautiously optimistic until further notice.

I never saw the tv show, but I have heard good things about it. Also, I have heard excellent things about The Gamers, which I really need to watch one of these years. I should also watch its sequel.

Strange Googling

This google search for future of those born on 10th February, 1976 has one of my web pages in the top spot. This is two spots ahead of a web page about Celine Dion on Oprah, because apparently in celebration of my 34th birthday tomorrow Celine Dion is apparently going to appear on Oprah. Let me just say that this is not what I wanted for a birthday present. Sheesh.

Update (right after original post): Except that now when I try the link to the search, my web page comes up 2nd instead of 1st. I'm not sure which parameter got changed, and I'm going to finish reading Salvatore killing off some major characters instead (just a few pages left). Given that I don't think any of you read his book's anymore, I don't feel too guilty about that spoiler.

2007: The Year in Literature (and other reading)

We're almost at the end of the year, so it's time to start writing up my end-of-year summaries.

I'll start with literature and other readings. Here is what I wrote in 2006.

Just like last year, I am defining "literature" rather broadly, as I really just mean whatever I read this year.

The book I am currently reading is the final book in the Taladas Trilogy, which is the first set of Dragonlance novels covering events on Krynn's other continent (that is, on Taladas rather than on Ansalon). The first book in the series was ho-hum, but I liked the second one a lot, so I immediately moved on to the third one.

In the Forgotten Realms world, I have read the first book in a new series that follows Halistra Melarn from a recent 6-book story on "The War of the Spider Queen." I also read the first book in a series that follows an alu-fiend from that same series. These were two of the interesting surviving characters from those books, so I am pleased to read about more of their adventures. I also read the second book in the Dragonlance "Lost Chronicles" series, which allowed me to read about old friends again. The two main foci this time were Kitiara and Laurana.

I think I also read another book or two from my old queue of D & D novels (and perhaps one or two that spent a much shorter period of time on my shelf), but they aren't coming to mind at the moment.

I also finally read Flatland and Neuromancer, which I intended to read years ago. I read Oath of Fealty as well because part of it was inspired by life at Tech. I read some more short stories by Philip K. Dick and Harlan Ellison. In fact, I finally finished my Ellison collection, so I ought to buy a new one at some point.

I think I read other literary things, but they're not coming to mind at the moment. I'll add them to this entry later if I can think of them.

I read my usual websites: friends' blogs, ESPN.com's baseball page, baseball-reference.com, pages from various academic societies, and so on. I also made it a point to read The California Tech online after I moved to Oxford.

I also read my usual magazines: Electronic Gaming Monthly, various Caltech publications, and so on.

And of course I read lots of technical scientific material --- I always do.

Once I am done with the third book in the Taladas trilogy, I'll move on either to the new Drizzt book or to Amber and Blood, if the latter is out by the time I am ready for it. (Amber & Blood got delayed from last summer until February, and I've been anticipating that one for a while because it is the conclusion to the current trilogy containing the main Dragonlance storyline.)

I think that's about it. I'll post some other year-end reviews later.