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Recently, I started re-reading a series of books called A Song of Ice and Fire. I first started reading them about 4 or 5 years ago, but I started again because the latest book came out last year and I just bought it last month. They fall in the fantasy category, kind of like The Lord of the Rings. The story is loosely based on The Wars of the Roses which took place in England during the 1400’s.

In so many of the other fantasy series I have read, you don’t see any permanent major misfortunes fall upon the major characters. Any misfortunes are usually made right in the end. George R. R. Martin books don’t follow that same pattern. His characters don’t come across any unnatural string of good luck. No matter how attached you become to them, they may die. No matter how much you hate them, you may start to feel sympathetic toward them. Early on when somebody died, I would always think that person was going to come back, much like Gandalf in The Lord of the Rings. Now I don’t have those delusions. If you are a fan of the genre, check it out. The first book is called A Game of Thrones. The fourth book, A Feast for Crows, was released last year and there should be a total of seven in the series.

It’s come out in the past few days that Robert Jordan has a rare blood disease called amyloidosis. You can read the note he wrote on his publisher’s web site here. He gave a lot of interesting statistics, but is seems like he has a median life expectancy of 4 years. Of course he could live less than that or a lot longer than that.

I think the 12th and supposedly final book in the series was scheduled to be released in 2007 or 2008, but that may be up in the air now. I’ve known since I started the series that he wasn’t a young man. I used to jokingly say that if the died before he finished The WoT, I would find a way to kill him a second time. I don’t really care about all those other books he wants to write, I just want him to finish The WoT. I wonder if we would ever find out what was supposed to happen if the last book was never published.

I know I’m being insensitive by focusing only on the fact that I may not get to see the ending. I don’t know what it’s like living with amyloidosis and I don’t know what it’s like knowing that your life may only have a few mores years left in it. I hope that his treatment is successful, he gets those 30 years that he wants, and he can give us many more books. Where would we be without his long, drawn-out, artificially-inflated stories? We love them and we him for writing them.

So last week was Thanksgiving week. I pretty much had the whole week off. I did as little real work as I could get away with. After pouring more money into my car, I drove it to Jackson and didn’t have any major problems. Whenever I started hearing noises, I just turned my music up louder so I wouldn’t hear them.

Some of the highlights and lowlights of the week:

The week after I saw Serenity I started watching Firefly and when I finished I was left wanting more. Too bad there are only 14 episodes. I want to watch the whole series over again. I need to buy the box set so I’ll have my own copy. I checked Amazon.com and it looks like Serenity will be out in time for Christmas. That’s pretty good turnaround considering the movie just came out in September. This week I hope to begin watching season 1 of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. I hear that it’s not the best season, but I have to start somewhere. If I like it I may watch Angel.

The new book in the George R.R. Martin series “A Song of Ice and Fire” came out last week. I hear that it’s only about half the story it was originally intended to be. I’m not in any hurry to buy it. I have enough books that I need to read first.

Gas prices are dropping.

It looks like I’m going to have more free time beginning now. I’ll have to find some way to pass the time. You know what they say about idle hands. It’s weird because when I was a student this would probably be the most stressful time of the semester.

I started on Mercenaries for the second time the other night. Maybe I’ll finish it this time. No, I am not getting an Xbox 360 when they first come out. It can wait.

I’m looking forward to the new Harry Potter, King Kong, The Chronicles of Narnia, and something else I can’t think of right now.

If you own a PS2, you might want to look here.

I went down to Jackson over the weekend with a friend of mine. This was the first time I’ve been to Jackson since the first week of May. It was nice to get out of Starkville for the weekend. We went to the fair with another friend on Saturday night. I think that was the first time I had been to the fair since I was in junior high. On Sunday, we did a little shopping. Some of my clothes are looking raggedy. I also picked up a copy of the new Wheel of Time book. We went to see a movie at the theater in Clinton later on. My mom cooked a huge meal. I haven’t had any home cooking in a while. I finally got to see my diploma which doesn’t even have my major listed on it. I just got back a little while ago and plan on relaxing the rest of the day.

It was nothing too exciting, but the best part was getting out of Starkville.

The new Wheel of Time book had been out for 2 whole days before I realized it last night. In the past I would have snatched up the newest book on the day it was released. I knew it was coming out in October, but I had forgotten the exact date. I’ve just been so busy lately. Supposedly, this book will please fans who have been upset with the pacing of the past few books. I couldn’t find a copy of it at Sam Goody. Maybe I’ll get a chance to look for it when I’m in Jackson this weekend.

So I went to Sam Goody a little before midnight Friday night to get the new Harry Potter book. There was hardly anybody there. They opened the doors and started letting people in at 11:52 according to the time I had. The whole time I was in the store, I saw around 10 other customers. I guess most people went to the Books-A-Million in Columbus or Tupelo. They had a party at the BAM in Tupelo.

I finished the book this morning. I would’ve finished it sooner had I not forced myself to stop reading a few times to other things. I figured I should spread out the fun some.

I thought it was a good book, though I didn’t like it as much as the last one. I think I liked the last one more because there was more interesting stuff going down. Like one of my friends said, “Did they even go to school that year?” Though I was not really surprised by the ending of this book, I was still a little shocked when the book ended. I kept thinking they were going to say that it wasn’t true, but that never happened.

I wonder how it all will end.

So I was wrong. It’s coming out sooner than I estimated: Feb. 2006.

8 days until Harry Potter…

I told myself I wouldn’t start anymore incomplete series, and so far I’m sticking to it. I was doing some research on my current favorite series and this is what I found. Yes, I was bored.

Harry Potter
Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince is being released on July 16, 2005. This is book 6 of a 7 book series.

The Wheel of Time
Knife of Dreams is book 11 in a 12 book series. The publication date is currently listed as October 11, 2005. They recently released an image of the cover. That looks like Perrin and some other characters I can’t remember because the series has way too many freaking characters.

A Song of Ice and Fire
A Feast for Crows appears to finally be done. It is book 4 in a 6 or 7 book series. It could be out this fall. I think it’s been about 4.5 years since the last book, so he is very late with this book. The book was becoming very, very long and he still had material left to write. Instead of cutting parts of the story out, he decided to break it into two books. He decided to take half the characters out of this book instead of giving us incomplete stories for all the characters. So some of the storylines will be advanced in the upcoming book, but the rest will have to wait until the following book. He finally gets to release a book and can finish working on his incomplete chapters. I’m not sure I like his solution, but at least he’s finally releasing something. The good news coming from this solution is that book 5, A Dance with Dragons, is about halfway done.

Sword of Truth
Chainfire was release in January 2005, so it’ll probably be another year or more from now before the next book. The next one will be book 10 of an 11 book series. It will be the second part of the series ending Chainfire Trilogy.

I’m still working on The Dark Tower. I’m having trouble staying focused on book 4. I don’t think this will be my favorite one in the series. I may take a break and read The Chronicles of Narnia before the new movie comes out this December.

Early this morning I finally finished reading Chainfire by Terry Goodkind. Once again, Goodkind did an excellent job. After the first few chapters, I had trouble putting it down.

Goodkind has said that the Chainfire trilogy will end the series and I am getting a real sense that the end is near. Some of the plotlines are tied directly to events from previous books. Plotlines from almost each of the previous eight books were mentioned, even if Richard was using the events to try to convince everyone he wasn’t insane.

One problem I have is that it takes the characters a long time to grasp simple ideas. This has been true since the beginning of the series. People spend way too long trying to get other supposedly smart people to grasp concepts that I get right off the bat. And they always use some kind of analogy to drive the point home. I guess I would just prefer it if Goodkind sped things up a little.

Another complaint is that by now people should learn to believe Richard when he’s sure that something is wrong. No matter how little proof he has to support his claims, they should at least given him the benefit of the doubt. I guess Richard’s only previous experience with people not believing him was when Kahlan was around. She’s not around this time to stick up for him.

Anyway, I almost wish that I hadn’t read it so quickly. Some moron spoiled the ending for me, but that didn’t take away from the experience too much. I can’t wait to read the next 2 parts of the trilogy. Hopefully, I won’t have to wait too long.