Barnes, John Books

Dark Heresy: The Inquisitor's Handbook (Dark Heresy)

Alan Bligh, Owen Barnes, John French, Andy Hall, Tim Huckelbery, Andrew Kenrick, Mike Mason, Sean Schoonmaker, T.S. Luikhart, Robert J. Schwalb

Amazon Price: $32.97 List Price: $49.95 Usually ships in 24 hours By: Fantasy Flight Games Amazon Marketplace: 32 new & used starting at $30.97

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 1 Average rating: 5.0 of 5

Beautiful hardback players handbook adds a lot to a great RPG. 5 out of 5 stars.
2 of 2 people found this review helpful.

This hardback expansion to the Dark Heresy roleplay game is just gorgeous. It's 255 pages of pure creativity, adding all kinds of terrific depth to the Dark Heresy game universe, such as:
- Advanced Character Generation
- New "Calixian" Career Paths
- Feral and Feudal World Background
- Hive and Forge World Background
- Frontier World and The Void Background
- War Zones Background
- Holy Ordos Background
and more.

Seriously, the artwork, history, charts, and new rules for Dark Heresy take it up to a 5-star gaming system. This book really fills in the cracks of the already wonderful Dark Heresy core system. With the discount offered here on Amazon at the time of this writing, it's a "must-have" book for Dark Heresy players and game masters. Highly recommended.

Editorial Review:

Packed with new rules and careers, as well as all manner of essential gear, The Inquisitor's Handbook is perfect for players and Game Masters alike. With a host of weapons and gear, advice on establishing alter egos and informative contacts, plus in-depth commentary on the Calixis Sector, this tome covers everything you need to create a completely unique character in the 41st Millennium. Additionally, information on advanced character generation, alternative ranks, and Calixian careers, plus details the Black Priests of Maccabeus, Metallican Gunslingers, and the Adepta Sororitas, is also included.

Dark Heresy Game Master's Kit (Dark Heresy)

Owen Barnes, Alan Bligh, John French, Mike Mason

Amazon Price: $13.57 List Price: $19.95 Usually ships in 24 hours By: Fantasy Flight Games Amazon Marketplace: 24 new & used starting at $9.56

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Editorial Review:

This lavish Games Master's screen is just what every Game Master (GM) needs to help keep their Inquisitorial secrets safe. Behind the sturdy full-color screen the GM can hide dice rolls and keep players from reading his notes. Printed on the GM's side are numerous, handy, quick reference charts that make running the game that much easier.

Encounter with Tiber

Buzz Aldrin, John Barnes

List Price: $6.50 By: Aspect Amazon Marketplace: 53 new & used starting at $0.01

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 52 Average rating: 4.0 of 5

One of the Best I've ever read 5 out of 5 stars.
5 of 5 people found this review helpful.

In my long and often fruitless search for decent sci-fi once in a while a gem is found. This is one of those cases. Also this book written in '96 predicted a 2nd shuttle accident which of course happened in Feb. 2003. The current science is very well researched and yet also leads us to see how future things may develop. The characters and the plot are very believable: characters and events are subject to wise decisions but also the flaws that exist in even the best people and governments have their part to play.

Not since the original writings of Asimov have I seen such decent and well planed out sci-fi writing.

Note to the 1st reviewer: B. Aldrin has a doctorate in astronautics from MIT. How can he be "in over his head" in writing a sci-fi book???

Editorial Review:

Buzz Aldrin, one of manned space flight's pioneers, has helped create a stunning, possibly prophetic novel of the future of space exploration. A radio beacon from an unknown world leads an astronaut to disaster on the Moon -- and his son far beyond that as he searches for the key to the mystery of Tiber, a civilization who left artifacts in the solar system some 9,000 years ago, with sufficient impact on human affairs to explain some odd references in the Bible. The villains of the book are not the aliens, but the benighted politicians with the minds of accountants who won't fund the necessary scientific derring-do to save the world -- apparently an affliction which alien astronauts also have to bear.

You can read an exclusive interview with Buzz Aldrin written by Frank Braun.

In the Hall of the Martian King

John Barnes

List Price: $6.99 By: Aspect Amazon Marketplace: 30 new & used starting at $0.01

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 5 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Totally delightful 5 out of 5 stars.
3 of 6 people found this review helpful.

By the thirty-sixth century mankind has spread all over the universe. Jak Jinnaka has finally graduated from the Hive and was employed by the Protectorates Administrative Service Corps, stationed on Mar's outer moon Deimos. He is actually a double agent working to further the Hive's interests and goals. When his supervisor leaves him in charge of Deimos, he is given a mission that will take him to Mars.

In the ruins of Chrysepolus, an archeologist finds the lifelog of Paj Nakagen, the founder of the interstellar religion known as the Wager. The Martian king possesses the diary that Jak must retrieve by persuading the monarch to turn it over to him on behalf of PASC (actually, the Hive). Others will do anything to get their hands on these priceless records, but the most dangerous is Jak's ex-girlfriend the evil princess Shyf of Greenword. She conditioned him to love her unconditionally and give her anything she wants, an obsession that he has not been entirely erased which makes success for Jak quite difficult to achieve.

If one can imagine a futuristic version of the TV series Get Smart, than readers will have a very good idea of what IN THE HALL OF THE MARTIAN KING is like. The hero of this fast-paced, action-packed space romp is an adorable man who tries to do his job and ends up alienating even more people than he did in his last caper (see A PRINCESS OF THE AERIE). John Barnes has put the fun back in space opera and readers will love him for doing that.

Harriet Klausner

Editorial Review:

A Martian monarch has taken possession of a priceless relic: the lifelog diary of the mysterious messiah who founded the Wager, the religion that forms the basis of all interstellar society. The Hive Intel conglomerate wants the lifelog and hires Jak to get it. It's a simple job, until other spies-including Ambassador Dujuv, Uncle Sib, and Jak's evil ex-girlfriend-arrive on Mars and turn the assignment into a wild ride of mind control, murder, and looming interplanetary war. For the lifelog contains a devastating secret that can overturn the status quo of whole worlds-a secret that Hive Intel will suppress at all costs. In the past, Jak has completed missions by betraying his friends. Now in order to succeed, Jak Jinnaka must betray the entire human race...

Orbital Resonance (Meme Wars)

John Barnes

List Price: $4.99 By: Tor Books Amazon Marketplace: 53 new & used starting at $0.01

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 18 Average rating: 4.0 of 5

Enjoyable, classic SF reminiscent of Heinlein 4 out of 5 stars.
3 of 3 people found this review helpful.

This book is a worthy addition to the sub-genre of SF which focuses on the young man or woman growing into themselves within a new frontier of space. It stands well alongside books like Heinlien's immortal "Have Space Suit, Will Travel" and "Space Cadet," Or Clarke's "Islands In The Sky." I have found it to be entertaining, stimulating and as good as anything written in SF in the past 5 years. Anyone who enjoys this particular sub-genre will enjoy Orbital Resonance immensely.

Editorial Review:

Melpomene Murray's concerns are those of any teenager: homework, friends, dates. But Melpomene lives on the Flying Dutchman, an asteroid colony located thousands of miles from an Earth almost destroyed by disease, war, and pollution. She and her spaceborn classmates are humanity's last hope, and Mel's just starting to realize how heavy a responsibility that is. Her parents and teachers have trained her from birth to lead mankind into the future.

What they never realized is that Melpomene might have plans of her own...

Earth Made of Glass (Giraut)

John Barnes

List Price: $5.99 By: Tor Science Fiction Amazon Marketplace: 43 new & used starting at $0.01

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 20 Average rating: 4.0 of 5

Editorial Review:

In a sequel to A Million Open Doors, John Barnes writes another novel in the universe of the Thousand Cultures. Humanity dwells in colonies (some natural and some artificial) spread over hundreds of planets that lost touch with each other for over a thousand years. Due to the invention of the springer, an instantaneous teleportation device, the worlds are communicating again. But after centuries of isolation, reunification results in intense cultural and economic stress.

Giraut and Margaret, characters from the earlier book, are now a husband and wife diplomatic team for the Council of Humanity. They also do clandestine work for the Office of Special Projects, an undercover organization that deals with serious problems that result when local governments prove intractable. Their next assignment: promote peace and cooperation on Briand, a hellish planet whose physical hostility is matched only by the hatred its two cultures show to each other.

Tamil Mandalam was founded by classical Tamils, and Kintulum was founded by classical Mayans. Tamils believe themselves to be perfect and believe that once the springer does open Briand to humanity, they will show the rest of the universe how to live. The Mayans, when they communicate at all, apparently feel the same way. The magnificence of each culture's accomplishments in art and literature is overshadowed by citizens' bigotry.

A difficult assignment indeed; as if high gravity, high temperatures and ethnic attacks weren't enough, Giraut and Margaret's mission grows even more troublesome because of their marital problems, Margaret's depression, and the bureaucratic thick-headedness of Briand's Ambassador. --Bonnie Bouman

The Merchants of Souls (Giraut)

John Barnes

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 10 Average rating: 3.0 of 5

Very weak entry in the series 3 out of 5 stars.
2 of 2 people found this review helpful.

This is the third in the series, and the weakest entry so far. It begins immediately after the end of the second book, with the OSP having to deal with the political ramifications accompanying the shocking loss of an entire world, and with Giraut having to deal with being used by his friend and boss, Shan -- although Giraut seems to react pretty emotionally for an intelligence agent. In fact, only the last third of the book contains any amount of action or plot. The first two-thirds is divided between back-story -- how Giraut acquired his close group of friends in boarding school, plus a series of isolated anecdotes (mostly involving his wife, Margaret) set in the decade between the first and second books -- and a deep psychological dissection of what it's like to have a dead friend's personality living in the back of your brain for a couple of years while his cloned body is grown and made ready for his reoccupation. Barnes also uses the rather thin ostensible plot -- protecting these "canned" personalities from commercial exploitation for entertainment purposes -- as an excuse to explore Earth's own society, and to show that it's just as bizarre as any frontier world in human-occupied space. While all this is fascinating in itself, it doesn't make for much of a story. And when the real action begins, with a very public assassination, the plot that unfolds turns out to have had nothing whatever to do with anything we were told earlier in the book. Talk about left field!

Editorial Review:

The sequel to A Million Open Doors and Earth Made of Glass

Special agent Giraut Leones, betrayed by his superior and closest friend, swore he would never work for the Office of Special Projects again--but now he must. A new movement on Earth seeks to use the recorded personalities of the dead as helpless virtual reality playthings, and to the worlds of the Thousand Cultures--where the reborn are accepted as normal citizens--it's a monstrous crime. If Giraut cannot stop Earth from ratifying its plans, the tenuous structure of interstellar human civilization will collapse.

Complicating matters, Giraut's brain now hosts a second consciousness-the revived mind of his long-dead friend Raimbaut. Together, Giraut and Raimbaut must confront their shared past while struggling with a deadly present.

Apostrophes & Apocalypses: The First Collection From One of the Most Acclaimed SF Writers of the Decade

John Barnes

List Price: $14.95 By: Tor Books Amazon Marketplace: 14 new & used starting at $0.45

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 5 Average rating: 4.0 of 5

Editorial Review:

John Barnes writes hard SF with a heart; his speculations are always grounded in working things out from first principles, but he remembers to think also about how his imaginary situations might feel. "Gentleman Pervert, Out on a Spree," for example, starts with some speculation about tagging, and the speed with which an information age can make a marginal life worse--Ken is photographed curb-crawling and is then divorced and fired before he even gets home.

It moves, though, in unexpected directions--no excuses are made for Ken and his compulsions, yet we get to know and even love him like a deeply flawed younger brother. When Barnes writes of the fall of civilization to Christianity and/or barbarism, his rationalism does not rule out empathy for other ways of seeing--and there is a sense that armed conflict always involves collateral losses of more than just lives. The doomed soldier of "Advice to the Civilized" knows that in that regret lies the whole difference between civilization and barbarism. The stories come packaged with some nonfiction--Barnes writes well about building a world and his views on style and criticism; he writes inspirationally about education and his hopes for the future. --Roz Kaveney, Amazon.co.uk

Kaleidoscope Century (Meme Wars)

John Barnes

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 29 Average rating: 3.5 of 5

Josh, the quintessential evil anti-hero 5 out of 5 stars.
5 of 5 people found this review helpful.

This is a VERY good story about a VERY evil man. How do you become emotionally invested in a main character who is a rapist, murderer, KGB spy, and all around selfish bastard? The answer is here. I have no idea how an American KGB spy is made but chances are the answer is in this book.

It is the story about how Josh became a spy for the wrong side and did their dirty work--and let me assure you, the work is about as dirty as you will ever read. You become emotionally invested when you find out his father was an abusive drunk and his mother was a commie activist nut. No wonder he is such a basket case! In fact, this story would be a good text book in a "How to make an anti-hero" writing class.

The main story details his search for security (since he had none growing up). He never looks beyond himself. He has no love of communism, certainly no love of capitalism and not much love period. He is out for himself and the rest of the world can go to hell.

If the story interests you so far then read the book. It's a dark, fascinating, downward spiral into depravity. Quite frankly, you hate the main character but you keep reading to find out what happens to him at the end of the story. If, so far, this is not your kind of story, then don't read it. It's doubtful you will like it.

Not knowing much about John Barnes, I find it interesting that later on he worked with all-American Buzz Aldrin on some other projects making him a truly complex writer. Five stars for showing me something I've never seen before.

Editorial Review:

Joshua Ali Quare wakes in 2019 at the age of 140 in a strong youthful body with no memory of his past, to find he is at the center of a vast and deadly conspiracy. The only clues to his identity are the records he has left--messages from the man he once was...

As Quare journeys through his past, he discovers he has been a key figure in the history of a turbulent, violent century--soldier, criminal, assassin, spy. A century filled with killing plagues and warring cults, ruthless corporations and dying nations. A century where treachery is often the only way to survive.

Now someone is looking for him. Someone from his past. And Quare must learn the terrifying secret of his history before it unleashed devastating consequences for the future of the human race.

Caesar's Bicycle: Caesar's Bicycle (Timeline Wars)

John Barnes

List Price: $5.99 By: Eos Amazon Marketplace: 19 new & used starting at $2.68

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 6 Average rating: 4.0 of 5

Fun but flawed 3 out of 5 stars.
2 of 2 people found this review helpful.

This wrapped up the series and was entertaining. It was annoying that he made several mistakes - for example the character was back in the time of Julius Caesar and the civil war (pre Christ by several decades) and yet he is wandering around looking at the Aurelian wall (built in 271 -280 AD by the Emperor Aurelian) in Rome and also another wall built by a similarly late Emperor. So I would have to say this is sloppy.

still a good read 4 out of 5 stars.
2 of 3 people found this review helpful.

The conclusion to the somewhat harrowing Timeline trilogy by Barnes, this is perhaps the weakest volume. The ubersadistic Closers go out perhaps a bit too easily, and this book should be definately read only after the first 2, but it is a satisfactory conclusion. The protagonist's leftist political outlook is perhaps more strongly underlined in this volume too, but does not substantially figure in the story. Recommended, especially for fans of the subgenre, and for others who enjoy laconic heroes in an ultraviolent setting.

Editorial Review:

Mark Strang is asked to travel far back in time to the period of Caesar and the great Roman Triumvirate, in order to investigate the disappearance of a fellow time agent. What he discovers is that Caesar has been subverted by a Closer representative and that the Triumvirate has been undermined with civil war, mutual destruction, and the rewriting of history looming in the near future.