This is the second season, which consists of three ninety-minute episodes. Next week’s is based on The Hound of the Baskervilles, probably the most famous Holmes story written by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. The first season is available through Netflix, both on DVD and through the streaming part of the service.

They’re well written, funny, intricate, and impeccably acted. Highly, highly recommended, and well worth your time.

I’m hoping it’s a bit of misdirection, but it feels to my like more of a linear synopsis of the movie rather than highlights. Consider yourself warned.

I may or may not update while I’m away. If I don’t, enjoy the weekend, and I’ll see you again next week sometime!

So what was great? Tyrion, of course. Peter Dinklage owns this role with such force and charisma that it brings a smile to my face every time he’s on screen. His Machiavellian maneuvering of the Small Council to ferret out Cersei’s rat was brilliantly shot and edited and showed that Tyrion is smart and cunning and knows how to play the Game of Thrones far better than poor dead Ned Stark.

Cersei’s dinner with her children and Sansa was a reminder of how casually cruel she can be, and how much she relishes her petty displays of power. The smirk on her face when she forces Sansa to admit she would still be a good member of the family if and when Joffrey kills Sansa’s brother Robb was that of a true sociopath.

But turnabout is fair play, as Cersei learns the hard way when Tyrion tells her that her daughter Myrcella would be married off to the the Martells to cement their loyalty to Joffrey’s throne. Her violent tantrum and refusal to allow it was perfectly countered by Tyrion’s cool demeanor as he informed her that the deed was already done. Cersei was more than likely tormented by the thought of the Martells being as cruel to Myrcella as she’d been to Sansa. (At least I hope she was!)

The introduction of Brienne was very well done. They found a great actress for the role. I found her chararacter to be trying in the books, especially as her story wears on, but at the start I recall being a bit more fond of her.

This was a Stannis and Danaerys free episode this week, which I think is a good thing. Not that they were missing, but that they’re not trying to cram every character into every episode. With as many characters as the show has, it’s counterproductive to try to fit everyone in each week.

Diana Rowland’s My Life as a White Trash Zombie is not the book I thought it was going to be. From the title, I expected a  humorous take on the zombie tale, something closer to Zombieland than Night of the Living Dead. But this book was nothing of the kind.

At its heart, My Life as a White Trash Zombie is a study of addiction. And not just the obvious addiction of a zombie to brains, but also alcohol and pills and even addiction to the poisonous people who can make our lives a living hell. Often these people are family members, who make us feel not only powerless but filled with guilt–guilt for being unable to help them to guilt for enabling their demons, there’s nothing like someone we love who’s caught in the throes of an addiction to mess up our lives as well as theirs.

Enter Angel, daughter of an alcoholic father and mentally ill mother who committed suicide when Angel was a teenager. She is understandably a mess: a high school dropout unable to hold down a job,  a pill-popping druggie who spends her time getting wasted so she doesn’t have to deal with the wreck of her life, involved with a guy who really doesn’t care about her other than as a chick to party with.

The story begins with Angel waking up in a hospital after an apparent drug overdose. She has no memory of the events that landed her in the ER, but that doesn’t surprise her much, though she is embarrassed by the manner in which one of the nurses treats her.

What does surprise her is the note she finds telling her that there is a job waiting for that she has to get and keep for at least one month. If she doesn’t, the note tells her she will die.

And so begins Angel’s process of discovery that she is, in fact, a zombie, and needs a steady supply of brains to keep her “alive.”

The job in question is as a van driver for the morgue. There are lots of great details about this job, and the overall running of the morgue itself. Since Rowland once worked in a morgue, we can assume most of the details are accurate. (And if they feel accurate in the story, and make it more believable, that’s really all we can ask.)

Rowland’s zombies aren’t cut from the same cloth as the classic George Romero zombies, or even the “fast” zombies of movies like 28 Days Later. Rowland’s zombies can think, feel, eat normal food (though it provides little nutritional value and isn’t enough to sustain them), and pass as a regular person when properly fed.

But here, “properly fed” means a steady diet of human brains. Animal brains won’t do. And if that steady diet gets broken, the zombie quickly begins to rot and decay, regressing to a feral state in which it might even commit murder to satisfy its hunger.

Fortunately, Angel figures out a clever scheme to acquire brains on the sly from the morgue. Unfortunately, someone out there is killing people and cutting off their heads. Angel thinks it might be another zombie who’s gone feral. But what, if anything, can she to about it?

Rowland’s writing has improved since her first book, Mark of the Demon. Her prose is steadier, and she has a sure hand with her characters. Angel is a wonderful creation (though I will pick one nit and say she’s far too young to remember the Wonder Twins from the cartoon Justice League!). The book also manages to have an incredibly cool and kick ass cover. You really can’t go wrong with cover art like that.

My Life as a White Trash Zombie is a great read that manages to bring something new to the increasingly tired zombie genre. Highly recommended.

This was a really fun read: Forbes has sketched out three very cool worlds (two that I suspect are connected in One Term and Spindles) that harkens back to a sturdy space opera future for humanity. Each of the stories are character-driven: One Term follows an estranged father and daughter. The Merlin Plague looks at what happens when a third of humanity is suddenly endowed with magical powers while the best story of the group, Spindles, is a fantastic military SF short tale following a disgraced military officer and a game-changing discovery. This story has the most potential, in terms of worldbuilding, and I hope that we’ll see more stories like this soon. My only complaint? I’m left wanting for some more stories within this Transit System universe.

Tales from the Transit System is only $0.99 in the Kindle store! Why wait?

John Noble’s Walter Bishop character is one of the all time great TV scientists. A genius with a habit of blurting out … well, why don’t you watch the clip below and see for yourself the kinds of things Walter says? They’re laugh out loud funny. Even if you’ve never seen a frame of the show, you should still find this pretty entertaining.

The latest trailer for Prometheus is below. Enjoy!