Ken Newquist 
The 18th edition of Nuketown’s sci-fi and fantasy summer reading list features 16 books (13 novels, 3 non-fiction books), 1 novella, and 2 graphic novels. This summer will be epic, as my son and I return to Philmont for nearly two weeks of b ackpacking in the New Mexico. We went in 2021, and I … Read more
Summer 2025 is coming fast, and while the world is chaos, there is one thing you can be sure of: Nuketown’s Summer Reading List. I’m in the process of assembling the list so if you’ve got suggestions, post a comment or email me at nuketown@gmail.com. There are a few books already on the list because they’re … Read more
Fourteen years ago, we named the dog Indiana. He passed away on Tuesday, April 29, 2025, leaving us to go on his last adventure. Indy re-introduced us to the world of puppies We got him a few months after our previous dogs, Madison (another Lab) and Saint (a German Shepherd), passed away. Our kids were … Read more
Guns. Gas. And only one way to go: Straight! Learn how to play Gaslands Refueled in this introductory session at MEPACON’s Spring 2025 convention (April 4-6, 2025) in Lehigh Valley, PA. All you need to do is get from Point A to Point B without crashing into a wall, sliding into an obstacle, or getting … Read more
Back when the new Fallout series debuted on Amazon Prime, the Lair of Secrets crew geeked out about how good the series was … and about the possibility of running a Fallout 2d20 campaign. That led to David Moore putting together a Fallout adventure as our next actual play for the podcast. After doing a 1st level playlets, we decided to … Read more
Space is a big and lonely place, and that isolation can do strange and terrible things to people’s minds. In S.A. Barnes’ Ghost Station (Amazon), it can lead to a mental disorder known as Eckhart-Reiser Syndrome (ERS). The syndrome leads to mental decline, ultimately leading to a catastrophic break with reality … as well as murder … Read more
Geek Tree 2024 returns to the Star Trek universe, adding one long-wished for ornament: the U.S.S. Enterprise NCC-1701B. The Geek Tree is a long-running tradition in my house. It dates back to the late 1990s, when my wife and I realized my geeky ornaments threatened to overwhelm the family tree. We exiled them to their own, smaller … Read more
Terminus by Peter Cline (Amazon) is the fourth book in his Threshold series. It ups the stacks by shipwrecking its characters on a seemingly deserted island, as a deadly storm approaches. The rain, winds, and high seas are the very least of that storm’s dangers. The Threshold series started with a book called 14. The novel took place in an apartment … Read more
Dune Messiah is the follow-up to Frank Herbert’s sci-fi classic Dune. The first book saw Paul Atreides (Muad’dib) conquering of Arrakis, defeating the Emperor, taking the Emperor’s daughter as his political wife, and unleashing his Freman on a holy jihad to conquer the galaxy. The sequel takes place 12 years later and features a galaxy cowed by … Read more
Age of Ash (Amazon) by Daniel Abraham (half of The Expanse writing team James S. A. Corey) takes place almost entirely in a medieval city, on a world that is not our own. Magic exists, but it is old, powerful, and dangerous. Most people living on the streets and within the walls of Kithamar never experience it. The … Read more