Feralia – Home of the Feralia fantasy novels by Clint Cassa

The Darth Plagueis novel has been on my list of books to read forever but my busy schedule has made it super difficult to get any reading done. However, as I mentioned a little while back, being on the road a lot is the perfect opportunity for audio books. It’s the audio book version that I’ll be reviewing. I’ll mention the audio features later but for now let’s start with the story itself.

First off, it had been a while since I’d read any of James Luceno’s work, and I had forgotten just how great of a writer he is! It reminded me that as an independent writer I need to continue to step up my game. So his writing alone was inspiring. His descriptions painted the perfect picture and he’s a master of keeping a great viewpoint while describing all of the characters in a scene wonderfully.

In 2014 it was announced that the Star Wars Expanded Universe would be redefined. In short, this left previous EU titles, including Darth Plagueis, under the Legends banner, and no longer part of the official canon. This is where it gets interesting, as the novel Darth Plagueis explores not only the origins of Plagueis, but Darth Sidious as well. Unlike the post-Return of the Jedi books, none of this (to my knowledge so far) has been changed. This leaves me to wonder if we can still consider this the definite origins of these characters. I feel like we can, at least until another story perhaps rewrites it.

Regardless, Darth Plagueis was a blast, lending a very strong back story to the prequel trilogy movies, especially The Phantom Menace. While a lot of the political details can be a bit overwhelming and perhaps even a bit exhausting at times, they come together perfectly and help the overall story that we see in the movies to have more of an explanation.

I won’t spoil anything, but the book has some nice surprises that shed some light on not just to characters from The Phantom Menace, but also to some from Attack of the Clones and Revenge of the Sith as well.

My favorite part is the insight into Palpatine’s conversation with Anakin at the opera in Episode III, which to be honest, was my main reason for choosing this novel. By the end of the story I was quite satisfied with what I’d been wondering about, while still left with enough questions to keep some mystery.

The audio book version, read by Daniel Davis, was a lot of fun and really added a lot to the experience. Even the complicated political parts mentioned earlier were easy to get through thanks to the ambiance, sound effects and even music added at key parts. I was really impressed with the production that went into it.

To sum up, I would definitely recommend Star Wars: Darth Plagueis, despite it now being under the Legends banner. The history and insight it provides will be appreciated by Star Wars fans, especially those searching for a deeper examination of the Force.

Verdict: Thumbs up!

-Clint

I’m usually big on keeping things positive here on the site and blog; I normally won’t even do a review unless I have something good to say. But this time I felt it necessary to make an exception. For a while now I’ve been keeping on the lookout for a good, small writing laptop. I ended up with an HP Stream Notebook, which ended up being a mistake.

My first oversight was hastily selecting a laptop with a great price as I passed it in Wal-Mart without doing the research. Needless to say, I learned a lot.

It really is a shame because in so many ways I love the Stream Notebook. It has the majority of the features I’d been looking for:

It’s super lightweight.
The battery life is amazing.
Works perfect with Microsoft word as well as One Drive for auto back up.
Runs (or ran, as I’ll get to later) very fast.

However, there is a huge fault with the hardware in the Stream, and it’s two-fold. First, the hard drive is only 32 gb. What’s more the internal memory is not upgradable. This is a major problem because, although you can add an SD card, operating system cannot be moved to external storage. This leads to the real killer: the hard drive is not large enough to hold Windows updates! Even after moving all files and programs over to the SD card and uninstalling all of the unnecessary pre-installed software, there is just not enough room.

In short time things got worse. The Notebook is bogged down due to the lack of memory and can’t even be used as a web browser without constantly deleting files. And even then, it’s painfully slow to the point that it’s not worth the effort. I wish I could have back the time I spent searching for a solution.

I decided that when my four year old daughter is old enough and ready for a tablet that can run MS Word (and little else, I must add), I’ll give it to her.

If you’re stuck with one of these notebooks like I am, however, I did find one solution to at least make it usable. Using Splashtop Personal Remote Access I’m able to jump onto my desktop PC, essentially making it a way to use the desktop anywhere in the house. It’s not super convenient, but it actually works well and is free.

In conclusion, anyone looking for a reliable laptop/notebook for writing should stay away from the HP Stream Notebook. Save your money and put it toward something better.

But hey, at least mine has cool stickers!

-Clint