STG's

The Unnamed Way, by Ian W. Sainsbury, continues the Seb Varden series, where magic is just alien nanotechnology. This volume goes back to Seb Varden, and where he was most of the previous book. The whole thing was interesting enough, including the last battle. Of course, Joni's reset power makes setting up elaborate kills just to take them back almost mandatory. Overall, quite nice, with a fair and pleasant ending for Seb Varden's story, while at the same time not being a end to the series at all.

The Delirium Brief, by Charles Stross, is the latest novel in the Laundry series - a Lovecraftian horror/spy mix. The last book ended after a massive invasion by elfs, and this one deals with the follow up. Suddenly the Laundry is a public matter, and the government is very interested in it. As are other enemies... It was nice that this was a Bob Howard book. Bob is now more powerful, which was entertaining. There was a little scene where someone says he went from tactical to strategic, and I'm kind of sorry this wasn't really necessary in the story. The move in the end was interesting, and I'm very interested in seeing how that follows up in the next books.

The Unmaking Engine is the sequel to The World Walker - a fantasy/SF mix where magic is actually advanced alien tech. There are magicians hidden all over the world. But Seb Varden has a 2000 year newer version of it. His enemies are hunting him down, though... I liked the Mason reveal and background. The very end was a little frustrating, but fair enough, I guess. Overall, I liked it a lot, and plan to continue reading the series.

The World Walker, by Ian W. Sainsbury, is a cute fantasy/SF book about magic as a tech gift from advanced aliens. Seb Varden, the main character, kills himself. But then he meets an alien... Overall, very good, I mostly liked the way the tech was handled.

Infinity Born, by Douglas E. Richards is an SF novel that covers em drive, brain scanning and emulation, and AIs. While the book was overall enjoyable, I felt there were some silly moments, and way too many explanations. What was happening in the opening scene felt a little too obvious to me, but I expected something like DollHouse's brain control - audio/video as a way to get control when you have no other data access felt nicer. The "magic" way actually used in the novel feels a little cheap. Major props for explaining all of the tech used and pointing to research (and even having excerpts). This is all too rare, and I feel it is very interesting to educate readers.