J.B. Sommerset

"The Little Shroom that Could" J.B. Sommerset (c) 2026 Welcome back readers, to the story of how I came to be living up here in the woods on this mountain.  To catch up, here's part 5: " Serious conversations, room mates, and existential dread... " And if you need more than that, here is the start of all this, Part 1: "How I wound up on this mountain..."   If you are current, below is Part 6 . Well, we all know what happened next. The Pandemic, the "VID 19", the cough that stopped the world. If anything, it affirmed why we wanted to move out to the woods and live in a cabin hidden away with the animals.  It all started in the east, the far east, or so we were told. In a wet-market in China. A place where you can buy all kinds of unsavory meats, perishables, and things that can go bad in horrible ways. Chronic, explosive, diarrhea sort of ways. Anyway, some idiot caught the bug that fucked the world up, not sure how accurate that might be. Som...

  Garden Cat Spider (c) 2026 J.B. Sommerset Welcome back readers, to the story of how I came to be living up here in the woods on this mountain. To catch up, here is part 4: " How to get rid of Winnebago prostitutes and Tupperware meth. " And if you need more than that, here is the start of all this, Part 1: "How I wound up on this mountain..."  If you are current, below is Part 5 . After we got rid of "American flag Speedo guy" and his "Winnebago prostitutes", we started having more of those life changing conversations about what we really wanted and how to get there. They were the "long into the middle of the night conversations". We both knew we were no longer happy in our little corner house, and we were also not feeling safe.  Just after the lot was vacated, a drunk driver had been traveling east-bound and flipped his car into the neighbors house. They were okay, but the house had to be repaired leaving them with a boarded up hole ...

The Lonely Cougar (c) J.B. Sommerset 2026 Continued from PART 2: "Hey hon... some dude tried to stab me out in the yard, is our insurance up to date?" Over the next few weeks we talked a lot about that old dream. The one where we sell most of our things and move to the woods. A dream in which get away from it all and make a new life with the wild animals and the trees. We were still kind of joking about it, but also kind of not joking.  After the tattooed miscreant had tried to stab me, "the dream" became a standard conversation in our house. One that got more and more attention as the world became "enshittified" under the Tangerine Mussolini's first attempt at ruining the world. At the time, it wasn't going too good for his diapered ass. Congress and his own incompetence had stifled his forward momentum. But that didn't mean things were hunky-dory, all "gorsh and good times" and shit. No, they were far from that. Most people could fe...

This week I just fell like crushing some skulls and making some dude lament me. That's right, we are going straight Robert E. Howard this week, well, his legacy at least. It's some premium " Conan the Barbarian " goodness. This one is a lot like the last audio book, Tarzan had 23 follow ups, well, Conan had 21 adventures (by Howard ). I plan to own them all someday, but these collections get quite expensive.  This week, I am going to step outside the Robert Howard series, and look at some additions people have written in the Conan sagas, and there are more than I can count. We are going to go with " Conan The Swordsman ", by  L. Sprague de Camp , Lin Carter and Björn Nyberg . A collaboration, great! This is o ne I have never read, so I will be doing this with you this week. I take it the legend himself  needs no introduction so enjoy your skull crushing this week. Cheers! 

That's right, I started " House Of The Dragon " season 2. Let's talk about it, like hard, real hard because it does a whole lot right, especially in todays world where screenwriters and showrunners have completely forgotten how to write a good story and then translate it to the screen. Most modern renditions of my favorite childhood stories are so bad that when I watch them I can smell the sour grape and watermelon vape fumes of the douche-people who wrote them. Because that's the kind of image modern literature and film puts in my head. A douchey one with a whole lot of vape-fumes. What an image, it I could describe it, it would look like this: It's this image of an androgynes guy sitting outside the Star-bucks. He's got whispers of chin hair on his prepubescent jawline, and poorly applied black nail polish on his hands. There's an uncentered man-bun on his head, a snake of ratty coils, unwashed hair that smells of pot smoke. Leaning on his tiny littl...

Well, it's that time again, the audio book of the week, although due to broken links these things are not as reliable as they used to be. This week I was exposed to the Disney film- " Tarzan ". Although it's a great kids movie, the Disney show doesn't really capture even half of the Edgar Rice Burroughs books by the same name. Of which, most people don't realize that Tarzan of the apes had a butt-load of adventures. Tarzan appeared in 24 stories written by the OG himself and numerous adaptations by other authors who loved his work! So, forgive me if this is a repost of an older book, there are too many to keep up with. This week I chose " Tarzan the Untamed ". Enjoy this turn of the century goodness.  Cheers!

  "Driveway Bear" By J.B. Sommerset (c) 2024 Most of the photos I post for the quote of the week are in fact photos I took from at "mountain lair". My 10 acres in the woods where I live, where I am surrounded by trees, animals, and magic. I have too many photos at this point to use in a life time of posts. I capture all kinds of wild life up here, and I do mean all kinds. I have mountain lions, bears, bobcats, elk, moose, deer, etc. This guy (in the photo above) was passing across my driveway as he moved down the mountain to a place with less secure trash cans. Sometimes it can be a little interesting and also a little dangerous, but I love being this close to nature. So, to honor that, this week I am posting an old quote about the subject at hand. “Consider all beings and where our progress puts them. Nature is not exclusive; it is inclusive with all its children, even it is chooses to eat them.” J.B. Sommerset Cheers!

  "Trillium Goes Pink" By J.B. Sommerset (c) 2024 There's not much to say this week, busy is as busy does- super busy to be exact. So here I pulled something from some of my literature I thought was a good quote. Here it is, the quote of the week.  “Always keep promises, and always make true apologies. Do not exhaust their credit with overuse...” J.B. Sommerset Cheers!

Sometimes it's hard to keep the bi-weekly audio book up because often there are broken links, bad readings, missing chapters, and so on. A lot of the time they don't stay up because of this. They will get flagged and I will remove them. I hope that doesn't happen with this weeks audiobook. Speaking of... This week I chose to post a different, more contemporary book from a very prolific writer- James Patterson. I hope you enjoy! Cheers!

Every once in a while I see a preview that strikes my science-fiction bone and makes it feel all warm and tingly. There are a couple of things that can do this to me, the first is a story's premise, the second is execution. Sadly, this week I was very, very disappointed. This week I am reviewing that thing we all saw on Netflix, " Atlas ". We all saw it because Netflix put it front and center. It looked okay in the previews, but in our hearts we knew... We knew it was going to suck. We watched it, to be sure, and yup, we were very disappointed.  That's right, I said "Atlas". I watched it so you don't have to. No, really, I mean it. Don't watch this movie if you love science fiction and your health, this will only hurt you in places you can't recover from, like in that tiny sliver of hope, way, way, down in the bottom of your heart.  If you want a really good story about A.I., giant robots, cool gadgets, machine love, and the whole works, you shou...

I have talked about this subject before, and it's critical to good story telling. I don't know how many more times I will bring this up, but I will... So just be prepared for it.  This topic is going to come back like the blood everyone thought they totally got cleaned up, but under luminal and black light? Yep, it's still there. It will come back like the drunk guy all of us in the car know we hit but aren't sure is dead. Or that stalker that sneaks back into our house after we got the restraining order. The one that sits quietly in the dark waiting to talk in a distant and mysterious tone... you get the idea. The technique I am speaking of is, of course, the " show don't tell " technique. The "TLDR" is simple, it is a narrative technique that assumes the audience aren't morons and also that they can figure things out for themselves. Things like subtext, language usage, foreshadowing, use of senses, thoughts, feelings, (ad nauseum) the get t...

Before I get started, just as an F.Y.I., a couple of my audiobooks have been flagged because of broken links, this should be fixed soon.  Moving on, this week I am going to call back to a favorite. This week I am calling back to H.P. Lovecraft , one of my favs. I have posted his work a couple times but I hold back a bit when it comes to him. A person can get tired of the same thing over and over. I ration it well. This week is going to be one of the times when I was in the mood for some out of this world body horror and occult mayhem. This week it's " The Horror at Redhook ". I hope you all enjoy! Cheers!

As promised in my review of Rebel Moon part 1 , I return with a review of Rebel Moon part 2: The Scar giver . So, strap on them Imperium uniforms and prepare for this Space-Viking-cowboy-Nazi-science fiction space opera.  This is the second part, and the thrilling conclusion of Rebel Moon... Wait, what's that, it made too much money, there's going to be a third? Maybe? We don't know yet... um okay. We'll just move forward with this review and cross that bridge when the enemy comes to shoot us all to crap. By now, you might have heard, or at the very least surmised there would be more rebel moons out soon, 4 more if old Zach has anything to do with it. However, I am not so sure the next one, Rebel Moon 3 has been greenlit. There are rumors it has, and also that it will start filming in 2025. If they make it, I will review it. For now, let just focus on Part 2. Don't want to get caught up in the assumption game and get taken out of context. I liked the first one, and...

I really don't know how to feel about this review. I don't know how I feel about the show I just watched, hopefully, this can help sort it out. The fact that it's Amazon that did made this show, somehow makes it worse. Not sure if they are telling us about how they will manage the apocalypse, if they are just providing entertainment at this point, or if we are the entertainment or both... Anyway, here's an honest review of " Fallout ".  That's right, grab your two headed cow, get all your Stem packs together, and finish off that "nuka-cola", then lets ride out into the atomic sunset together- This week I will be reviewing Amazon's " Fallout " series. Buckle up vault-dwellers, strap on yer' pip-boys and enjoy the show. There is something to be said for the story telling and mastery thereof in certain video games, especially those made by old school "Bethesda". Some of the best story telling came from those early years. ...

When I was a kid I used to read every fantasy book I could get my hands on. Short stories, novels, comics, graphic novels, it didn't matter. Among those were some of the classics. I have posted a number of them over the years here on my site. But there is one author I can't seem to recall ever posting, and I really don't know why. If this is somehow a repost, I apologize. I don't think it is. This week we are going back to the The land of Narnia . I say back to, because most of you out there are very familiar with " The Chronicles of Narnia " by C.S. Lewis . If you haven't read the books, you most likely have seen one of the many film adaptations of them. My biggest disappointment was that only four of the books were ever made into movies, which is a shame because my two favorites were never even considered- " The Horse and his Boy " and " The Magician's Nephew ". I like " The Last Battle ", but it isn't my favorite. S...

Okay, for some reason this didn't post like it should have 2 weeks ago, so I am going to make up for it and post it now. Moving forward these will be on schedule, I am adding them to my workflow. Anyway, moving forward. We all know how much I loves me some Mark Twain , I have posted a lot of his works, form " Tom Sawyer " to " Huck Finn ", but for some reason I have never posted this one, which is weird, it sort of falls into his well known works. So, here it is, this week I am posting " The Prince and The Pauper ", Bon, appetite! Cheers!

While straggling through the wilderness of Netflix shows the other day I came across " The Three Body Problem ". I know of story, mostly of the Chinese novel   by the same name. It's on my reading list, I just haven't gotten to it yet. My list is pretty big, so I prioritize which ones I will read first. This one was high on my list, and that hasn't changed. I suspect there is more in the book than there was in the show. Normally I don't like to watch the show before I read the book, but in this case, I didn't see any good options- There's not much on Netflix I haven't seen, at least from a critical stand point. So when I see something new, I typically like to give it a spin. A lot of my friends recommended the book, so I knew something about it. It went on the old reading list when it was first translated. I decided to watch the show which made it to my plate first.  " The Three Body Problem " is an award winning Science Fiction book by ...