Scott Ciencin (1962–2014)

“Well, no cats, at least,” Paige muttered. “Can’t explain why, but if there were cats, too, I’d find this downright creepy. Hundred-year-old witch sitting us down with pie and a story. Add in some cats? I’d be out of here. It’d just be too much.”


When I read a Charmed entry, it’s usually to relax between more substantial reads, and/or I’m working on something of my own which drains me. These books associated with the show are meant as pure escapism, so I rate them on how show more well they fare as light and enjoyable entertainment for fans, and how well it recreates the feel of the show. The previous entry I read was one of the most enjoyable yet, and this one isn’t that far behind it. In fact, I might have enjoyed it even more than Hurricane Hex. There’s a lighter spirit — no pun intended — in High Spirits than in some entries to the series. While we get some danger, and a rather nasty demon or two get vanquished, this is mostly about an old Hollywood mansion haunted by a ghost who is quite the ham, and has a sense of humor.

The prolog is set in 1926, giving us background and context that the sisters don’t initially have. It’s nicely done, setting the tone for the story. Cut to the three sisters at the Moon Festival in San Francisco’s Chinatown. Phoebe is enthusiastic about the festival but is quickly reminded by Piper that they’re there to battle the Demon of Illusions. There is a rooftop battle the sisters win, of course, but Phoebe finds the demon’s nearly unworried promise that he’ll be avenged, a tad more disturbing than Piper and Paige, who shrug it off as typical of those being vanquished.

Paige’s very good writer/director friend — for a moment she thinks he’s going to propose to her — has just bought silent film star Robert Maxwell’s old mansion, and he is throwing a party. Kevin needs Paige’s help at the party because he actually loves Cassie — ouch! — but Cassie doesn’t know how he feels. When the sisters all attend the party, Cassie’s heartbreaking news that she’s going to marry Ryan is the least of their problems. A rather mischievous ghost is putting on some spectacular shows for his new audience. No one has really gotten hurt, and everyone thinks some new film magic is being used and premiered at the party. But then Piper is chased by a very large and menacing cat, and Phoebe begins getting impressions from the mansion itself. A diary written by someone in the prolog clues the Charmed Ones in on the fact that Maxwell isn’t a ghost at all. A sweet but klutzy witch named Emily may have been responsible for what’s happened.

An enchanted mansion, a rather sweet romance, some nefarious goings on which are non-magic related, and an engaging reason for what’s happening in the present make this very enjoyable. And don’t forget about that promise the illusion demon made. This would have made a wonderful episode, even though we had no Cole or Darryl, and really only an off-stage Leo. I loved the easy flowing narrative, and the breeziness to it. It has only one minor continuity issue regarding some early dialog, where Paige wants to address someone’s mention of hearing things; in fact that person had not said anything of the kind. Edited out, perhaps?

For fans of the show, this is a breezy and fun entry with a very nice ending. Highly recommended. show less

A coming of age story involving dinosaurs, secret island nations, shipwrecks, dolphin rides, and characters who get to ride on the backs of pterodactyls!

This book is short, yet it deals with some pretty interesting subjects. I can relate to Hugh a lot, and in some ways to Raymond and Windchaser, as well. Accepting the way things are, even if at first they're scary, is a big lesson to learn. So is learning to move on and find your own place in the world, even when moving on means confronting show more pain and fear and loss. And what happens when you stagnate and lose confidence in yourself.

I think it deals with those subjects very well, a lot better than I was expecting actually. The adventures are also pretty riveting! I think there's something for everyone in this book and I think I'd recommend it to just about anyone.

I wasn't too sure what to make of the way the Dinotopians introduce themselves, though. I don't quite get the lineage or why it's important to state that when you first meet someone. But, maybe the answer to that lies in some of the other books. :) It's not a thing that happens too often in the book and I didn't spend a lot of time thinking about it when it wasn't currently happening so it didn't make it difficult to understand the book. show less

I got this "Star Trek Classics" collection from Hoopla; it contains three Star Trek: The Next Generation comic stories from the early 2000s, originally published by Wildstorm. The first is Perchance to Dream, a four-issue miniseries; this is set shortly before Star Trek Generations (it even features the film's mismatched uniforms), with the Enterprise-D coming to a Federation member planet where the aliens have three genders—but the new governor is being attacked by terrorists show more because she only has one partner, not the traditional two. It's a good premise for a TNG episode, but it's not a great comic: way too much dialogue and narration, plus art and coloring that makes the aliens largely indistinguishable from one another. Too many side characters on the Enterprise as well. There's a clever conceit here, in that Picard is sort of like a victim of multiple personality disorder (he also has the minds of Sarek, Locutus, and Kamin in his head), but this feels a bit tacked on as the resolution to the central maguffin, as opposed to being the central conception of the story.

The second story, "Embrace the Wolf," is set during season seven of TNG, and has the Enterprise encountering Redjac, the incorporeal alien from the original series's "Wolf in the Fold" which was supposedly Jack the Ripper. The story's best part is that it has Data battling Redjac in a holodeck simulation of Victorian London, with Data as Sherlock Holmes... but it just doesn't do very much with this idea, which really ought to have been the crux of the whole plot! The art is hit or miss; the artist seems to do particularly poorly with Troi and Crusher.

Lastly, there's The Killing Shadows, where the Enterprise-E (in the year before First Contact) battle evil alien ninjas. It's kind of incoherent and ridiculous, but I sort of admired that about it; it felt like a comic book in some ways, not just an attempt to render an episode on the page. But unfortunately it got dumber as it went on; I found it hard to believe that Riker could defeat a bunch of alien superninjas just because he stole their outfit. The inclusion of Sela is totally random. And I didn't really follow the climax at all.

So, yeah, "classics" may be a bit of an exaggeration, but as a Hoopla borrow this was fine. Glad I didn't pay for the print edition, though. show less

The Riddled Past - There's a distress call from a dilithium planet's outpost and the DaVinci gets assigned to go and check out the situation. They find nearly all the outpost (except for the power station) destroyed and only two survivors. They set about trying to figure out why it was destroyed. I was happy that the linguist on board, Bart F. had a bigger role, hopefully every few books the authors/editors remember that Carol A. and Bart F. exist in the book too. A good story.

Here There Be show more Monsters - I really like most of what Keith R.A. DeCandido writes and this story wasn't any different. This takes place after the Star Trek novel series Gateways. I haven't read the series yet, but the story didn't give away any big unexpected twists from the novel series so I'm still on track to go back and read the original novel series still. Add to that the fact that ASL was mentioned in the story and this was a very fun story.

Ambush - This was a fast paced story. Lots of action and interesting ways to think outside the box for the crew members of the DaVinci ship. A fast read and a great read.

Some Assembly Required - That was different. There's a computer that a prospective Federation planet has acquired. But that's the usual part of the story. The interesting part is the race that bought the computer. The authors didn't just change what color blood or how many fingers, but went deep into a totally different mindset for these aliens. It was awesome! show less