Welcome Bryce!

Michael and I have the great pleasure to announce our newest contributing member, Bryce Lee aka Seak! Bryce has agreed to share a weekly review with our readers and an op-ed every now and then, so look forward to some exciting new posts starting tomorrow.

For those of you who aren't in the know, Bryce runs The Stamp and is an active member on a number of spec fic forums. More importantly, he is pregnant, so a hearty round of congratulations are in order.

Enough of my meager introduction, lets let Brice speak for himself.

1) How in the name of creation do you find time to read and review so much while going to Law School? Would you say that reviewing is your priority, as it should be?!

Well first off, that's a great question, one I've been asking myself for the last 6 months or so. And one that my classmates cannot even begin to understand. I definitely know where my priorities are, but most of it is about time management. They always say the busiest people get the most done. I know, a very perspicacious statement.

At first I had a really hard time separating reading for fun and reading for school. School reading ends up being at least 50 or so pages a day (on an easy one), which takes a while and hurts my brain. Luckily I've been able to separate that from pleasure reading. Plus, I don't watch much TV. When you're watching the top 100 list of richest celebrity dog-walkers, it's time to turn the thing off and that's what I finally convinced myself to do.

2) What brought you to spec fic and reviewing in particular, notably starting your own blog?

This probably started in elementary school where I found the Chronicles of Narnia and blazed through the whole series. Reading waned for a while until I read The Lord of the Rings in High School and was blown away. I had no idea you could get that attached to characters in a book. Insert another relatively long break from reading and in my sophomore year of college one of my best friends at the time (Go Matt!) had piles and piles of fantasy books. He turned me on to Melanie Rawn's Dragon Prince trilogy and I've been addicted ever since.This is probably more than you ever wanted to know.

Reading A Song of Ice and Fire got me looking on the internet for updates where I found SFFWorld and Westeros forums and in 2008 I finally joined up. After a little over a year of that, I started to feel like an expert on the subject (I know, feeling like and being are two completely different things). People in book stores would tell me, "Did you know A Game of Thrones is going to be a movie?" I'd be like, well well, let me stretch my genre muscles and correct your heinous misstatement. Hence the beginning of my own blog.

3) Desert island, a book, and you. Choose.

Should I do a cop-out and say Lord of the Rings *pushes glasses up higher* because they are really just one book. Non cop-out answer would be A Game of Thrones. Love it.

4) Any things that really tick you off in/about the genre?

Trolling. Genre discussion is awesome. Like-minded people discussing the things they love is a great thing and we can all benefit from it. I even think it's been a big help with law school trying to come up with defenses and arguments about certain subjects. But it can be brought down by people taking things personally and attacking others for no reason other than their own hurt feelings.

5) Do you write as well as read?

I have an "outline" of my novel that I update with all my latest ideas and it's definitely a dream. Will it ever see realization? Who knows. Like Scott Lynch, I tend to bury everything down deep and I think it would be the hardest thing in the world to have anyone critique me. Props to all authors who do so day in and day out.

6) How do you deal with the topic of ebooks?

To be honest, I've enjoyed a few ebooks in the last year and each one has been great. The only real problem is that when they're on my computer, I tend to get distracted really easily. I should really just disconnect from the internet, but I have to know. Tell me I'm popular!! Love me! Ok, it's not really that bad, but it's an addiction.

7) Tell us a secret about yourself you have never told anyone. You can take the 5th if you need to...

This is more of a thing that no one on the interwebs knows about me. I used to be a swimmer in High School and college. I've even raced Michael Phelps. J kidding, but I have raced Aaron Piersol and he smoked me. Now I've reformed my ways and only work out mentally, hence my huge gut.

8) How awesome are your reviews going to be?

Oh, you just wait. I'd check the wall behind you after you read my reviews because they just might blow your mind.

9) Anything you want to add?

I told this to Alec a few weeks before he asked me to collaborate, but Only the Best Sci-Fi/Fantasy has seriously become my favorite blog in the last few months or so. So much information in the Weekly Round-ups, awesome reviews, hilariously encouraged snarky comments, and great giveaways. They weren't joking when they said only the best. Thanks for this opportunity everyone, I'll try not to let you down.

Also...

(Bryce, apparently Google Images thinks you are a dog...)