October Read's

• Scattered, Smothered and Chunked - Bubba the Monster Hunter Season 1 by John G. Hartness
• Since I have read Larry Correia's MHI series the concept of a redneck monster hunter isn't too far of a stretch for me. But Bubba is a distinct voice. Working, for of all groups, the Catholic Church as a freelance monster hunter the stories in this book were varied and entertaining. We don't learn the whole truth of what formed the personality of Bubba until the final novella, which goes into his origin story, but overall the flow works. There were a number of LOL moments in this book that kept me entertained throughout.
• CTRL ALT Revolt! by Nick Cole
• Set in the not too far future, this is the story that addresses why a large fear of the tech community, artificial intelligence (or machine sentience), represents such a fundamental threat to the human race. Gaming plays a big role in this story, focusing on Fish, a game developer, and Mara, a blind DD girl who is trying to rise above it all. The pace was a little anemic at first, but things slowly come to a boil and people are racing around both in the real world and in the electronic games worlds which play such a key role to the plot. And now I learn that the author has another book (Soda Pop Soldier) that this basically the prequel to, so that just got added to the pile.
• The Trafalgar Gambit (Ark Royal #3) by Christopher Nuttall (Goodreads Author)
• Breaking away completely from the BSG-yness from the first the first book, this story yet again focuses on the mission and crew of the HMS Ark Royal. Shifting a little more into the geo-(galacto?) political realm, we find the crew on a last ditch attempt to open up diplomatic relations with the aliens (which they determine to have seperate factions based on the actions of some of the ships in the second book). But war is politics in another form, so even with the diplomatic mission there is still a lot of action left in this story to satisfy. The trilogy is ended in a satisfactory manner (and only because of a hunch did I realize that there was a follow-on series).
• Dead Six (Dead Six #1) by Larry Correia
• Parallel stories about two black-ops operators dealing with a murky world. Both of the main characters, Valentine and Lorenzo, are engaged against the terrorists that exist in a fake middle eastern country similar to Qatar.  Valentine works for Dead Six, an black CIA backed set of operators who are tasked with taking the war to the terrorists homes/vacation spot. In the end they are deemed to be disposable and are themselves marked themselves. Lorenzo is more of an independent operator with a small team that is being blackmailed to complete a mission of obtaining a key (which opens a special door.... the contents of which aren't explained but are very mysterious/supernatural). There is some overlap, characters die and in the end you have Valentine and Lorenzo up against their respective organizations as a team. I am interested to see where this goes in the next book.
• The Gap Into Conflict: The Real Story (Gap #1) by Stephen R. Donaldson
• This is kind of a twisted perverse little story. The two main characters are pirates, in a future where the area of space they are operating in is fairly lawless. The more twisted part is what happens to the female space cop, who is captured and controlled by Angus Thermopyle who takes advantage of her and is also the focus of attention of the other main character (also a pirate) Nick Succorso. I am not sure why this series is so popular but since I already have the second book I guess I will find out.