Unlike the first season’s finale, this one does not include as many answers to long-running mysteries, or revelations about Blood Magic, although I am hoping to work some answers to world history questions into the second part. It is what it is: a dynamic story with a little more plot than character. Not that there isn’t plenty of emotion and character development contained in this episode, especially with how this first part ends. Since I do have two parts to work with, I also took the time to do a little more development of side characters and plots than I otherwise would. Oh, and I apparently have a bad habit of leaving characters stuck on islands in dire straits at the end of books. Sorry about that.
Missing Books
None of those advantages have changed, but I've recently reached a position where the possibility of having bookshelves again is more viable, and I've been thinking about what kinds of books would be on those shelves. Mostly, my physical book collection consists of nonfiction tomes, and books from my childhood. Contemplating this, I've been thinking how nice it would be to have some of the books that I've read on Kindle, the ones I've really enjoyed or reference/re-read very frequently, as "real" books. Yet buying duplicate books seems terribly inefficient.
The Gates of Athens Review
Maybe it’s because Herodotus is so aptly referred to as “history’s screenwriter,” but I was less impressed by Iggulden’s interpretation of the events in The Gates of Athens than I was with his interpretation of Xenophon’s adventures. Where the story he told of Xenophon’s exploits was very faithful to the history, The Gates of Athens seemed to include a lot more supposition on Iggulden’s part, mostly to add interpersonal drama. Yet he is telling a story about some of the most dramatic moments in recorded history, and I wonder if added drama is really necessary.
What’s Next?
We recently announced the upcoming third season of Blood Magic, which will also be the final season, and I promised you in that post some thoughts on what might be coming next. While there’s still more than a year before it will be time for the next thing, that’s not too early to be thinking about it. However, please note that nothing is certain yet, and until I make a formal announcement around this time next year, all of what I say here should just be considered possibilities.
Dragon’s Egg Review
I like to consider myself open-minded, and I have long argued for the inadequacy of our definition of life and the limiting ways in which we conduct our search for extraterrestrial beings, but even I would not have considered the possibility of life existing on a neutron star. Sometimes, I think the more we know about a thing, the more limited our view of it becomes. It’s not that I had dismissed the possibility of life existing on the surface of a neutron star, but that I had never even considered it. Fortunately, Dragon’s Egg corrected that unfortunate deficit.
Announcing: Blood Magic Season Three
Last year around this time, I was having doubts about whether I should do a second season of Blood Magic, much less a third. The response to the first season had been lackluster to say the least, many of the episodes had been a struggle to write, and there was a significant opportunity cost to continuing to work on something that seemed to be a dud, instead of turning my focus to something that might be better received, like Fo’Fonas. This year, I am pleased to say that I did not have any hesitations or reservations about continuing with the third (and final) season of Blood Magic.
Blood Magic S1:E11: Old Blood, Part One Re-Release
s I’ve gotten deeper into the season one revisions, I’ve found myself less and less excited to do them, mostly because there was less and less to do. Many of the early episodes featured significant problems that I was eager to address through the revision process, but the later episodes are stronger, and more importantly, they are more complex in their continuity. While I know that there are ways in which I could improve them, doing so would require me to make more significant changes that would alter the series in more fundamental ways than I promised to make when I started these revisions.
The Abbot’s Tale Review
The Abbot’s Tale, though, is something different, and in this Iggulden is serving more as a translator than a writer, or even a researcher. It is drawn almost entirely from a surviving manuscript written by Dunstan, a tenth century English monk, and the titular protagonist of The Abbot’s Tale. That manuscript is a sort of memoir or maybe a personal confessional, and it is clear that the original author never intended for it to be read, or even to survive.
Opportunity Cost
There is a concept that gets thrown around in economics classes called opportunity cost. In that context, opportunity cost is simply the fact of life that if you invest in one thing, you are necessarily no longer able to use those resources to invest in another. If you put ten thousand dollars into buying a car, that’s ten thousand dollars that you can’t use for the down payment on a house. If you invest 30% of your salary each month in your retirement accounts, that’s 30% that you can’t use now to go on vacation. A fairly simple concept, really, and it rarely is discussed outside of economics classrooms.
The Heart Led Leader Review
mans are staggeringly complex systems. An incalculable number of reactions and events must occur correctly, and in proper synchronization, every moment of life for a human being to live. It is a level of complexity which for all of our science we are still unable to completely understand, and tiny variations produce all of the immense variety of unique individuals in our world. It is therefore no wonder that so much time, effort, and words have been spent in an attempt to understand how those complex individuals interact together in this chaotic organism known as society. The Heart Led Leader is another text to add to that body of literature.
IGC Publishing 