What I missed in Podcasts in my Year In Review, I think I made up in Audiobooks and Comic Books! My goal was to read 20 books (admittedly a low goal...) and I ended up reading 255 books, audiobooks, and comic books in 2022. I think the headline here is that, yet again, audiobooks save the day.  I listened to a number of books that I normally would not have read on paper because I was able to find

Gears of War: The Rise of Raam by Kurtis J. Wiebe My rating: 3 of 5 stars This comic compilation was fine.  In the game, I don't recall really getting a ton of the backstory for the locusts given that the entirety of the story gets told from the human perspective. As such, I found it a little hard to care a ton about the story in this collection.  Interesting,

Gears of War Omnibus, Vol. 2 by Karen Traviss My rating: 4 of 5 stars I enjoyed both volumes of the Gears of War omnibuses.  The first omnibus bridges the gap between Gears of War 1 and 2, followingMarcus Fenix and Delta Squad in the battle against the Locusts! Find out what happened after the Lightmass Bombing and how the Locusts will react to this devastating

Assassin's Creed: Brahman by Brenden Fletcher My rating: 5 of 5 stars I think this is my favorite comic story to date. While you do have the who assassin/templar thing going on, the protagonist is just a regular Joe Schmoe working for Abstergo.  His significant other is of an Assassin heritage (something she doesn't know) and ultimately becomes a victim

Assassin's Creed: Volume 3 Homecoming by Anthony Del Col My rating: 3 of 5 stars This was an OK story. Reading it made me wonder if they had more in mind as a continuation to this, or if it just fizzled.  It wasn't bad, but it was also not super exciting. Publisher's summary:The Brotherhood of the Assassins is in trouble. Resources depleted by their

Assassin's Creed: Assassins Vol.2: Setting Sun by Anthony Del Col My rating: 5 of 5 stars Fun continuation to the first volume.  The animus components of the story take place in the Incan Empire during the Spanish invasion. This is not addressed in the comic book or the lore, but I'd love to get more background as to how the Assassin Order's numbers dwindled

Assassin's Creed: Assassins Vol.1: Trial by Fire by Anthony Del Col My rating: 4 of 5 stars Interesting story. I was pleasantly surprised to see that the past life/animus sequences take place in Salem during the Salem Witch Trials and the hysteria that ensued.  Of course, it was all a templar ploy ;-) I do like that at the end of the individual comics they've

Star Trek: Mission's End by Ty Templeton My rating: 4 of 5 stars This is probably the 4th ending to the original series that I've read or seen on screen (through some fan film.)  Interesting. It keeps with the Strange New Worlds, New Life, and New Civilizations theme.  The mission aliens were not humanoid, they weren't even warp-capable on their own,

Kingdom Of The Damned by Michael Jan Friedman My rating: 3 of 5 stars A collection of stories where Q is being Q and turns the entire crew (except for Data) into Klingons just to mess with them.  Of course, the Enterprise is playing taxi service to a bunch of aliens that don't like Klingons, so Q is getting his laughs in.  Not bad, overall.  I

DC Star Trek: TNG: The Pilot by Michael Jan Friedman My rating: 3 of 5 stars Pretty good follow-up.  This collection collects DC TNG 7-12. At least in this one, everyone's not a bodybuilder and the characters seem more true to themselves. I read these separately, but it's easier to mark a collection than to add 50 different entries into Goodreads :-).