click pic for a full-sized view
Our 2008 Catalog
is online at this time ...
Click right here to download the PDF (download size is 1.12MB),
and take as read your permission to copy, print, forward, and generally pass it along. (If
anyone gives you grief, send them here!)
Drop us an
email to request a catalog for a friend who
doesn't have internet (or computer) access. We can
mail direct to your friend, or mail to you, and
you forward. (If you'd like a block of catalogs to
send along to multiple friends, let us know how many
to send ... and many thanks for helping us 'get the
word out' that MK is back, and better than ever!)
Sign me up!
Unsubscribe me!
|
BOOKS > Reader reviews
HELLGATE: PROBE
REVIEWED BY ARICIA GAVRIEL
The flavor of CRY LIBERTY/PROBE changes in the middle. The first part is
about running for your life and staying about one inch ahead of the truck
that's about to roll you into the road till you're part of the tarmac
(warning: don't start reading at nine pm. Dumb thing to do. I did it).
The second part is like sitting on the bomb, knowing it's going to go
off and not knowing when. (Another warning: keep tissues to hand. In
the middle of this one, you're gonna need 'em. The toast is, 'Absent
friends,' and no, I'm not going to tell who. But you'll need those
tissues.)
This one is also about a space battle so big, George Lucas probably
wishes he thought of it (;-D).
And a 'hero' so unexpected, I was speechless. Woah! And it's killing me
because I can't say a thing here, because any syllable is going to come
out like plot spoilers! (And DreamCraft will excommunicate me if I
do that.)
Somebody's going to kick my shins for this next remark, but I'm going to
make it anyway. MK's got a vein of high-octane soap opera running
through this series ... and I love it. There's the whole Tonio Teniko
and Richard Varien thing (yes! [punches the air]), and then this other
strand, with Harrison Shapiro and Jon Kim, and is Kim playing Harrison
for a sucker? Is he an agent? For me ... sure, I love the tech stuff
(god knows, I grew up on the trek movies. I speak techno babble better
than I speak English) but you gotta love this thread of soap opera that's
winding and coiling through these books!!! (Don't kill me for that, right?)
HELLGATE: PROBE
REVIEWED BY J GRENFELL
Okay, Aricia, I won't kill you for getting off on the character
development material! Call it soap opera at your peril, young lady!
(LOL ... seriously, guys, we're drinking buds, okay?)
You want soap, try tuning into something like The Young and the
Restless, and you'll see what soap-shmoap is all about!
Seriously, I do LOVE what MK is doing with these characters. I LOVE the
thing that's going on between Mick Vidal and Neil Travers. Also, you get
what they call the 'warm fuzzies' from the Leon Sherratt and Roy Arlott
relationship. These are very, very male characters. Any one of them
would make a superb role model. The soldier, the scholar, the statesman.
The 'fact of their gayness,' if you'll forgive the phrase, is bliss.
Incidentally, I read a review of the HELLGATE series somewhere on the
web (sorry, I have no idea where), and some reader was saying it was
'too technical' ... huh? Sure, there's tech stuff in these books. They're
set against a very real science background, so they better have a firm
tech foundation, otherwise they'll fast bomb out into what Aricia called,
in the previous review, 'techno babble.' Thanks heavens MK either knows
his science or is bloody good at faking it. But the tech background in
these books is exactly that: BACKGROUND. And Aricia Gav just made a
fine point. It's the CHARACTERS which drive these books. You want to
call it soap opera? Oh, boy. The Bold and the Beautiful would kill
to get their hands on these characters and situations. In legitimate
fiction this material is called character development. (And IMHO
these books most assuredly are legit fiction, even if they're SF,
and gay ... what's wrong with gay SF, for cryin' out loud, to quote a
currently well-known icon on the boob-tube.)
Do I have a criticism? Only that MK needs to get his finger out and
write the next one sometime soon! [According to MK, there's a huge
HELLGATE episode due in 2009. Since we now have the printing done at
Lulu.com, we don't have to manacle Mel to the 350pp (about 210,000 word)
limit. Lulu can handle up to 700p in paperback and 800pp in harcover,
so Mel can kick off the leg-irons and let the imagination run. On the
subject of what's soap opera (!), MK just chucked, albeit somewhat evilly.
And we totally agree: the character relationships are getting so rich
and complex in the HELLGATE books, the technological aspect is definitely
'playing second string' since DEEP SKY. And we like it! -ED]
AVAILABLE FROM DREAMCRAFT? Yes.
Browse the book | Sample chapters...*
If you would like to review a novel, please read these guidelines!
*Beware! Nasty plotspoilers for Cry Liberty!
|
HELLGATE: Probe by Mel Keegan
354pp
cover by Jade
Price: US$23.00 + postage
Buy now, from Lulu.com
 All sample readings are in a PDF format which
suits desktops, laptops and palmtops, both Windows PC and Mac, plus ILiad, Palm, Pocket PC and so on. If you need to
download Adobe Acrobat, get it now and install it, before trying to
open the documents. Click on the icon above to visit Adobe.com.
(From our eBooks store, you can also download Microsoft Reader books, suited to the Pocket PC.)
Readings from the novels...
 * READER ALERT / CAVEAT: the sample readings offered here encompass about the first 10% of these works, and they're uncensored, unabridged. Be aware, these are gay books. If you're disturbed by candid descriptions of
same-gender romance, or by realistic violence, please don't download! These samples are not intended
for younger readers. By clicking to open the documents, you agree that you are of age in your local
jurisdiction; you know what you are about to read; and the material won't disturb ... 'nuff said.
|
|
|
...send an eCard!
