Just got it on Monday and finished it this morning. Very short read. Wasn't too bad. Definitely went back to the punkish roots of cyberpunk. A good primer manual for getting people interested in general. Not worth the $10+sales tax canadian that I spent but Chapters has very loose return policies so I'm not overly concerned.

What I don't get is why it is set in SR3? Maybe this is why I work in baseball and not game development but it seems like you'd want your supporting products to support your main product. I.e. the new edition you just released. The world presented in this book and the world presented in SR4 are different enough to cause problems. I was expecting a book that'd give an idea of the flavor that FanPro was going with for AR but alas! Not so. Instead it's set sometime in early 2060 (not 2053 like the back of the book says unless Fuchi happened to suddenly collapse earlier than in the rpg). Probably has to do with the fact that it was released so fast that the author didn't have time to work with the new material. Oh well...mine is going back and will more than likely be sent back to the publisher.

Don't get me wrong...it's a good read if you set aside a whole afternoon or day to read it. I'd recomend getting it from the library however.

Too be honest I did not think it was worthy of Steve Kenson. His older work was far superior to this. "Born to Run" was read in a day and given to the Used Book Store the next and I still have all the Shadowrun Novels save one or two.

To echo Cheops reply "Why was it set in 3rd Edition" Why did we not see the much vaunted 4th Edition novel.

I am sorry Steve, but you can do so much better. When the next book comes out it better be set in the 4th Edition Timeline. Otherwise it is a library book for me.

Please take your time and do a great job.

QM

It's a WizKids novel, not a FanPro novel; they originally contracted it to support the Shadowrun Duels game line, and ended up sitting on it for awhile after Duels was cancelled. WizKids has six novels on the current contract with ROC, and it's my understanding that after those six, if they continue doing novels, they'll be pushing the timeline up to the 2070s.

Yeah i'm looking forward to the 4th ed novels.

I'd ahave to agree, but not on the lesser-expectations of Mr. Kenson's writing. This novel was intended to introduce new people the the SR Duels game, and I think it's been slightly retooled to act as a lead-in to future novels. If nothing else, it's still better than no books at all.

What Adam said is right on the money, but let me add a little more. Due to the different publishing schedules of novels and games (and other factors), my book (upcoming SR novel #4, Drops of Corruption) was underway before SR4 was even announced. The completed manuscript, with revisions, was submitted to WizKids in early August 2005, before the release of S4 at GenCon. So as you can guess, moving the book forward to the SR4 timeline would have been tricky to say the least.

Jason H.

If only it included Drop Bears.

Noooo!

Sometimes it's just too easy to convert new followers

It sucked.

The main character show up and within a day or so is trusted by hard core shadowrunners? Yea, that was a good one. Let's put our neck on the line ont he word of someone who just breezed into the city.Yea good idea.

And whole idea that the Johnson should be up forth in what they want. Bull! Johnsons use shadowrunners to bad things.That is what shadow runners do.BAD THINGS. IF there wasn't a hidden motive they could higher in company men to do the job.

Hell Sleeper Cell would be a batter introduction to how to make a shadowrun team than this book.

Born to Run is a very bad novel. But to it's defense, it isn't a proper Shadowrun novel—it's a book about toys. That's right, all the characters are based off of action figures. It's also got a lot of very cheezy game world info tucked in that just doesn't fit. These things are no faults of Kenson's. Other than having a bit poor taste in general (not refering to sexual orientation here), he's a pretty good writer for this genre. I liked Burning Time. Kenson does internal monologues and love affairs really good, and the whole intrigue is involving and inventive. It's propably the best Shadowrun novel I've read since Nigel Findley. Examples of bad taste would be things like ally spirit motorcycle and the rigger who's really magicly active and gets her cyber eyes regrown by SURGE... It's mostly about magic. That's fine until you realize he always writes mostly about the magical aspects. Heck, Talon has even channeled Lofwyr.

Jesus, I nearly blew a blood vessel. Why don't you just shoot me in the face and be done with it?

The second novel, Poison Agendas, is out & I picked up my copy 3 days ago. I'll post a review when I'm finished reading it.....in about 2 weeks or so.

Eh, it was ok. But I also havent read any of the Sr novels before. Mostly I dug on the 'instructing magic' bit.
Once I got done with that, I was much happier reading the 'bonus' novellet in the back of the Sr4 Le. But I also love to see peoples soul getting crushed.

Hmm, I remember reading a lot of the SR novels. My favorite one was actually the one with the vampires, the troll with the minigun, and the lesbian physad.

I actually emailed that author and complemented him, and he replied!

Can't remember the title though...it was the one about experimental vampires. The Terminus Experiment?



I also remember reading a bunch of Lisa Smedman, but they were, you know, character orientated, instead of troll minigun-orientated.

Figured that the runners rolled low for their Etiquette that day. You know, sometimes, the dice just says that the hardcore guys act atypically.

Geez, I read both of the new ones and they weren't THAT bad. The biggest downside I see is that they were too short. You don't learn enough about the characters to care about them. They need more detail.
Also, there were a few screw ups, namely calling Seattle a city and Lindstrom a Mayor, Oops.
I like that it's set in SR3 personally, but I'm a grizzled old man in a 25 year old body. I don't like change and I hate new fanggled gagets.

In 2053, Lindstrom was a mayor, and Seattle is a city. It's also the name of the city-state metroplex.

really, i was dissapointed. I've liked other stuff that Kenson put out, and this one, not so much. The visualization that he gave to developing spellcasting and defense was interesting. The Epilogue was neat. As for the rest, if it wasn't a SR novel, I would not have bought it, much less go for the sequel. As it is, I'll probably buy the sequel, even though it will most likely be as dissapointing as the first, if for no other reason than to sayt o the publishers "Yes, we like SR novels, print some more please." Hopefully they won't think it means that it's ok to keep publishing this kind of dross though.

I've liked Kenson's stuff that he's written, even if Talon does tend to get over the top in power and relations at times. It reminds me a bit of games. I've seen plenty of games where runners do things that, if they told other people, they would just roll their eyes and go "riiiiight". Harlequin's Back for example, would certainly fall in to this category, if it wasn't a published adventure. "What's that you say? You ran an astral quest on behalf of Harlequin, where he got the crap kicked out of him, but you lived, and saved the world? Riiiight...." So yeah, I can take some of the things with a grain of salt. The decker wanting a sex change to be able to date Talon is a bit wierd, but wierder things have happened.

As for the acutal meat and drink of the novel, for one, I disliked the simplicity of it all. For example, the second run on the truck, they decide to do it, then they go do it. THat simple. Wanna convince a team of runners to do something? Simple, jsut be a newbie runner and appeal to their inner greed/pride/sense of revenge. I REALLY disliked how he portrayed Green Lucifer though. GL has always been one of my favorie characters in SR, and he just killed him IMO. Orion was a bit of a dope. I really would have liked to see some of Lord Torgo as well. OR perhaps seen some ramifications of dealing the Spikes against the Ancients. Oh well.

Never fucking mind.

He's also a forum member, and due a little respect. You don't have to like he work, but you do have to be polite regarding him. This is your guys' last warning on the subject.

Bull

Never fucking mind.

Is Drops of Corruption a continuation of the new trilogy? Or is it new?
I can't seem to find the plot or even a blurb online

So here's my guess - it's a thrilling adventure of a human Street Samurai and his bout of Pink Eye

Figures, one minute after posting I find the blurb on the back of it online. Grr!
Let's see, a Scottish (if it's not Scottish, it's CRAP!) burned out mage is taken in by a crime boss,helped out,then forced to fight in a mob war.

COOL!

cool, a burnout! Sounds like a good start! Already fighting the Kenson Formula for Shadowrun too!

Suddenly I have this image of Steve Kenson as a hermetic mage writing up an ally formula , which, of course, involves the sorcery power and includes very passionate feelings as part of the personality. THe Kenson method. Right on, I'm using that one next time I make an ally.

I hope Steve gets to put more in to the next novels. The first seemed .... well... cookie cutter-ish, and I know he can do better. Kind of had a reined-in, shetlin pony-kiddie-fair -ride feel, except for a few choice bits. Hopefully they'll give him more rein.

Anyone read Poison Memories yet? Hasn't hit the shelves where I live yet.

Hardy: Looking forward to picking up your yarn.

mundanes can write formula

*whoooosh*

*points fist to SK's homepage*

I've known SK for quite a while now, originally through an SR-themed amateur press magazine called Scrawls From The Sprawls. A lot of his later SR work saw print in this mag, and I have yet to be trully disappointed in his work, both gaming & fiction. His help clearing up some points from MitS made for sopme good gaming a while back.

Stephen, if you see this, keep up the good work my friend.

BTW, Fistandatilus3.0, I just got the book. I need a few days to fully devour it.
Now, where did I put that honey-mustard? ah, there it is.........

'preciate it James, but for some reason, my work comp blocked it. Go figure. Thanks anyways.

BookWyrm, the honey-mustard's in the pantry, right next to the swordfish mustard ball. Hope it goes down well.

Swordfish mustard ball was in the SR5 april's fool joke, right? I forgot the context already.

hehe, yes

Hehe. I remember now. It was like a FAQ, and one of the answers to a question was simply "swordfish mustard ball". Man, that's funny in retrospect. On one hand, we had it coming. On the other, that's exactly what they were telling us in the real FAQ .

Actually, Swordfish Mustardball did not come from FanPro in any way; it was the answer to one of the question's in Bull's totally unofficial jokey "FAQs".