Author Archives: smellincoffee

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About smellincoffee

Citizen, librarian, reader with a boundless wonder for the world and a curiosity about all the beings inside it.

Star Trek: The Entropy Effect

Posted on November 7, 2025 by smellincoffee

By the Great Bird of the Galaxy, is this really only my second Star Trek read for 2025? Star Trek: The Entropy Effect is, despite its modern cover, a 1981 classic TOS tale that plays with the chaos of time … Continue reading →

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All Systems Red, SFM #6, & Dune Two

Posted on November 6, 2025 by smellincoffee

All Systems Red is a fun action-mystery thriller in a SF context. Our narrator, as the series title “Murderbot Diaries” might suggest, is not quite human. Murderbot is instead a robotic-organic construct that prefers humans see it, or him, as … Continue reading →

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WWW Wednesday + SFM #5

Posted on November 5, 2025 by smellincoffee

WHAT have you finished reading recently? All Systems Red, Martha Wells. An action-mystery short novel featuring a sarcastic robot helping colonists on another world. WHAT are you reading now? The Nazi Seizure of Power, though that will be a slow … Continue reading →

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Top Ten Tuesday, Teaser Tuesday, & SF Month Prompt 3

Posted on November 4, 2025 by smellincoffee

Today’s treble T is ten random picks from bookcases. Well, alrighty then. But first, a Tuesday Tease! “I do think of it as a person,” Gurathin said. “An angry, heavily armed person who has no reason to trust us.”“Then stop … Continue reading →

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The Time Traveler’s Passport: Six Stories

Posted on November 3, 2025 by smellincoffee

When checking Amazon for the Old Man’s War series, I noticed a new short story series created by Amazon. I’ve read their FORWARD and WARMER collections before and figured this might be fun. Unfortunately, this skewed more toward the level … Continue reading →

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October 2025 in Review & SciFi Month 2025

Posted on November 1, 2025 by smellincoffee

Well, so ends October! In Alabama cooler weather finally began drawing near, though it’s rare for it to come inside and take a seat so soon. The cold actually kicked the door down last night: it’s 38 (3 C) at … Continue reading →

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Moviewatch, October 2025

Posted on October 31, 2025 by smellincoffee

Rush Hour 2, 2001. I watched this a few times back in the day, but it’s been fifteen, twenty years I’d say. I remembered it for three things: one, a ridiculous fight scene in a massage parlor in which two … Continue reading →

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The Last Jeffersonian

Posted on October 31, 2025 by smellincoffee

My political biography began during the War on Terror, when I developed strong feelings about foreign intervention and the military-police surveillance state.   While reading Howard Zinn in my college years, I was astonished and delighted to learn of a … Continue reading →

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Ten Strange Ways to Die In Colonial Alabama

Posted on October 31, 2025 by smellincoffee

I’d intended to post this list earlier in the week for the Top Ten Tuesday freebie, but couldn’t remember the name of the book I was using, Alabama Mortality Schedule (1850, Seventh Census of the United States). I stumbled on … Continue reading →

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WWW Wednesday

Posted on October 29, 2025 by smellincoffee

WHAT have you finished reading recently? Against the Machine, Paul Kingsnorth. Quotations to be posted today. WHAT are you reading now? The Last Jeffersonian, a biography of Grover Cleveland I picked up a week or so ago at a local … Continue reading →

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