dullgloomy

The 2011 Summer Screen Review (Part V)

2011-09-05T22:01:00.003-04:00

I managed to squeeze in one more film before Labour Day was through. It's another that I've been sitting on, waiting for the time when I was in the proper frame of mind.

Precious: Based on the Novel 'Push' by Sapphire was disturbing, saddening, hopeful, and beautiful. Mo'nique puts in a powerful, Oscar-winning performance as Precious's abusive mother, and I felt a curious desire to give Mariah Carey (usually glammed out for every public appearance) kudos for allowing herself to strip every ounce of glamour away for her role as a social worker. The cast of girls in Precious's class were spot-on, and Gabourey Sidibe makes a pretty incredible debut as the title character. Watching a segment of her audition tape as a DVD extra makes it clear what a find the producers had before filming of the movie even began. A difficult, wonderful film.

The Summer 2011 Reading Spectacular #10: The Finale

2011-09-05T15:04:00.004-04:00

I doubt I'm going to finish any of the books I'm reading before the end of the day (including, The Fall by Guillermo del Toro and Chuck Hogan, Death of an Ordinary Man by Glen Duncan, The Thief of Always by Clive Barker, The Black Hole War: My Battle with Stephen Hawking to Make the World Safe for Quantum Mechanics by Leonard Susskind, and The Gift of Thanks by Margaret Visser, among other things), so here's the official photo of my summer reading!

Now comes the challenging task of figuring out where to put this collection on my numerous -- but generally jam-packed -- bookshelves.

The Summer 2011 Reading Spectacular #9

2011-09-05T12:30:00.003-04:00

Two more books to add!

Several years ago I picked up and read Something Rotten by Jasper Fforde. I hadn't realized at the time that it fell several books into a series. I still read it, filling in the essential blanks using clues within the text (how's that for teacher talk?) and enjoyed the book immensely. It seemed appropriate, naturally, to go back and start at the beginning, and that's what I did this summer, reading The Eyre Affair, book one in the Thursday Next series.

Oh, how to describe this book? Imagine a world (a 1985, specifically), in which Dodos have returned as housepets thanks to cloning, in which the English and Russians are at war over the Crimea, The Goliath Corporation holds suspicious power over politics, and disturbances in the time-space continuum sometimes occur along the highway. Even better, works of art and literature are like pop-stars, with rabid fans but also inspiring criminal masterminds to attack them. Oh, that's just the tip of the iceberg. So much absurd fun!

I also read Amulet: Book Four - The Last Council by Kazu Kibuishi. I reported briefly on the first book in the series as part of my first ever Summer Reading Spectacular entry. A kid-friendly fantasy series, I'm still enjoying the series, though the sparse dialogue makes for a very quick read, leaving me feeling, at times, that I'd like the story to make more progress in a given volume. The artwork is quite nice, with backgrounds particularly impressive in their detail and beauty contrasted with very simple, flat character designs. Characters can also look a lot alike -- the facial design is very simple and used often -- so pay attention to hair and clothing to help keep everyone straight. I'm not sure how long this series is expected to last, but word has it a movie is in the works.

The Summer 2011 Reading Spectacular #8

2011-09-04T20:35:00.003-04:00

Not far from the finish line for another summer...

First up in this entry, Mockingjay by Suzanne Collins. The final entry in the Hunger Games trilogy, it was a satisfying conclusion to the series, though I can't deny that the love triangle thread (between Katniss, Peeta, and Gale) has become a bit tiresome by the time we reach the halfway point in this, the third book in which it figures. I was unbothered by the unresolved pieces of the puzzle (I'm not a fan of everything being too tidily resolved, at the best of times). All told, it's a young adult series worth reading, and adults will find it an enjoyable light read, too. I'm hoping the film adaptation doesn't mess it up. Previews look good, at least.

Another issue of The Believer (No. 82 -- The Music Issue) was completed early in August. Who knew that they tried putting turntables in car dashboards in the 60s (other than those who were looking to buy luxury cars in the 60s)? Where else would an article about the bassoon (and its reputation as the orchestral comedian) be entitled 'The Farting Bedpost'? Did you know that KPOP (Korean Pop Music) had a rabid fanbase that would make Beatlemaniacs blush? Good times (with bad comics, again).

Showcase presents The Flash, after a shelf-sitting hiatus, came back into the reading circulation and was finished at last. A collection of black-and-white reprints from the 60s (over 500 pages' worth!), it is highly amusing to see how the tone of comics has changed since the Silver Age. Apart from a general sense of camp in the storytelling, it's also entertaining to see how the prevalence of "radiations" of all sorts reflects the times.

Keeping in the comics genre, I re-read the graphic novel Batman: Dark Joker - The Wild, an Elseworlds story from 1993. I'd pretty much forgotten the whole thing until I unearthed it while sorting things from the basement in the Spring. While the concept is intriguing (in a Medievalesque fantasy land, Dark Joker is a powerful and evil wizard; the Batman is the disfigured hero who will bring about his fall), the storytelling itself isn't quite as strong as I would like. The artwork, on the whole, is quite nice, though, with a little gore to spare.

The 2011 Summer Screen Review (Part IV)

2011-09-04T19:43:00.002-04:00

Okay, there's no way this will make me appear cool, but I did see Glee: The 3D Concert Movie with Sonya. A combination of stage footage, improvised backstage shenanigans by the cast (in role as their Gleeful characters), and fan stories and interviews, it was an enjoyable enough afternoon at the movies. There was some lip syncing, some singing, and lots of dancing and hey, that can be reasonably happy-making, right?

Out of the proverbial frying pan and into the metaphoric fire, I watched the original A Nightmare on Elm Street, which I picked up in a cheap bin. I'd seen it sometime in the 90s, but remembered little (and wasn't really that impressed at that time), but thought I'd give it another go-round, expecting to be amused rather than frightened. My expectations were met. There's really nothing very scary about the movie, to be honest, but Wes Craven does create a few nice images (particularly the face in the wall). Wow, though, Heather Langenkamp wasn't much of an actor, was she? Perhaps she's improved since then...

Still think it's curious and inappropriate that the 80s saw a whole whack of Freddy Kruger toys and children's costumes...

In June I was given the gift of Curb Your Enthusiasm: Season One. For some reason, I had semi-actively avoided watching this show for a decade or so. Little did I know what I was missing! If Seinfeld and Britain's The Office were put into a blender and set to blend, you might get Curb Your Enthusiasm. Social awkwardness and everyday irritants abound. Thanks, Sean!

In the more classic television vein, I also finished watching Benson: The Complete First Season. I watched this show all the time back when it was on and was pleasantly surprised to find it still enjoyable today. I'd completely forgotten that Rene Auberjonois didn't arrive until the second season. Can't lie, I preferred him to Taylor (his equivalent in the first season). Other little unexpected tidbits? I looked up Inga Swenson (who played Krauss) on YouTube and who knew that she was a cutie back in her young days as a performer in Broadway musicals? Also, it occurred to me that Benson and I might be cut from the same sarcastic cloth.

Have you noticed how often I watch things I found in the cheap bin? Exit Speed was another such pick. I bought it because it starred Lea Thompson (of Caroline in the City, Back to the Future fame and Howard the Duck infamy). Very clearly direct-to-video fare, it wasn't as bad as I'd expected. There's not much story here (bus passengers have a run-in with a trick-riding biker gang that apparently like to pick violent fights at random and end up holed up in a junk yard trying to keep the bikers at bay) but it moves along nicely, the stock characters at least have things to do, and the filmmakers have no qualms about killing off significant characters. Having cast stunt performers as most of the bikers, the filmmakers also decided to make the villains wordless. Brilliant? Of course not. Enjoyable enough for a mindless action romp? Sure.

Oh, and I recognized one of the actors, but couldn't figure out from where. He won the Tony Award for his work on Broadway as Billy's father in Billy Elliot. Go figure.

Finally (and then I'll be caught up on the Summer Screen Review, just in time for its finale), I sat down to watch Catfish, after having it in wait for a couple of months. Billed as "The Real Facebook Movie", it's a documentary following a young man and his developing online friendships and relationship with members of a family halfway across the country. Curiously fascinating and with more moments of pathos than I expected, it certainly isn't the "thriller" that promotional materials made it appear, but that's actually a good thing, in the end.

As of this moment, that's the Summer Screen Review up-to-date! If I've missed anything (or watch something tonight), I'll wrap it up tomorrow, because it's Labour Day in a few hours!

The Summer 2011 Reading Spectacular #7

2011-09-03T20:48:00.003-04:00

Well, I thought I was getting close to caught up, but here I am, having fallen behind yet again. I've got three days to finish up, because it's almost Labour Day! Yikes!

Juxtapoz: Issue 127 was more of what I enjoy from the magazine, art and artists with whom I'm generally unfamiliar. Though I think the magazine may focus too frequently in graffiti artists from month to month, I particularly enjoyed the articles about Emek, a poster designer/graphic artist, and Mary Iverson, who draws shipping containers on landscape photos, and the interview with Gus van Sant.

Among my lighter reads this summer was Pop by Gordon Korman. Korman has been trying to branch out a bit in recent years, experimenting more frequently with adventure serials (Island, Everest, etc.) and with more "young adult" novels (Son of the Mob, Born to Rock), and Pop falls into this latter category. While it's not as whimsical as Korman's earlier teen novels (Don't Care High, A Semester in the Life of a Garbage Bag, in particular), it was still a decent, light read.

Marcus moves to a new town with his mother and finds himself dealing with the politics of the local High School Football team. He is buoyed, if stymied, by the unexpected friendship of an eccentric, middle aged man he meets in the park and who ends up participating in Marcus's informal training. When the nature of his new friend begins to come to light, Marcus finds his life more complicated than he'd first realized.

Back to a magazine (my favourite magazine, incidentally), Issue 81 of The Believer was another eclectic and enjoyable read. Highlights of this issue included "The Forefather of Charm", an article about the Genuine Fakir of Ava, a magician with a knack for enticing audiences with the promise of prizes (and to whom shows like The Price Is Right owe a debt of gratitude, I'm sure), and an interview with photographer Lena Herzog. A low point, as always, were the stupid comics, which are not generally insightful, witty, or funny. The magazine is so wonderful that the comics always make me a little sad.

Later in the summer, I read yet another issue of The Believer, which I'll get to mentioning before Monday leaves us.

Dexter is Delicious, fourth in the Dexter series by Jeff Lindsay, was next on the completion list. An enormous step up from the third in the series, which went off the rails, in my opinion, it seemed that Dexter was getting back on track story-wise. Though I still think the character seems to be pretty consistently sloppy for someone who has been established as obsessively careful and systematic, I generally liked where things went. Though I'm not sure that I'll be able to "buy" where things are headed with elements of Dexter's happy home life, I'll still be picking up the next book when it's out in paperback.

The 2011 Summer Screen Review (Part III)

2011-09-03T18:26:00.002-04:00

Having been watching more TV on DVD than anything else, a few movies have snuck into the mix, mostly at home, but occasionally on the big screen.

Having finished reading The Girl Who Played With Fire, I was able to watch the Swedish film of the same name. Though less effective an adaptation than The Girl With a Dragon Tattoo, it was still a decently executed film which does an admirable job of streamlining the book's complicated details. Gone is some of the tension of the book, along with a shuffling and compacting of timelines, but the changes have the feel of having been thought-out and deemed necessary to bring the book to the screen. As before, the cast is impeccably assembled (or reassembled, in the leads' cases) and apart from one glaringly obvious technical/factual flaw (which was an odd substitution for a moment in the book, anyway), the film holds itself together nicely. I'm waiting on the final book to be released in the paperback size to match the two on my shelves so I can read it and then view the final Swedish movie, which already lies in wait in my living room.

Onto much less reputable fare, I picked up the notoriously bad Masters of the Universe DVD, starring Dolph Lundgren as He-Man and Frank Langella as Skeletor. I'd seen it before, many years ago, but upon finding it in the cheap bin, I couldn't resist the trainwreck I remembered it to be. The biggest problem with the movie from the get-go is that the script fails where so many adaptations of cartoons and "old school" shows fail: it betrays the very core concept of the show. Presumably in the interests of saving a whole lot in set construction and location work, the filmmakers transport He-Man and company into modern day America for the majority of the story, in search of a Cosmic Key (which is, in itself, a ridiculously conceived object, a technological portal-opener that happens to play like a synthesizer). Abandon Battlecat (who is never mentioned) and essentially replace the mildly annoying Orko with the VERY annoying Gwildor, stick everyone on a distinctly 80s Earth and, combined with a hundred other flaws, you've got a hot mess of a movie, it still can entertain a little for all the wrong reasons. It's also fun to see Courtney Cox in her pre-friends days, hoping, I'm sure, that this will be her big break.

On the animated front, I watched Superman/Batman: Public Enemies, part of Warner Brothers' DC Animated Universe line. Based on a graphic novel, the movie's storyline centres around Superman being framed by the newly-elected US President Luthor and his battle, alongside ally Batman, to clear his name and save the world from destruction. You know, the usual. Despite the misfires that seem to occur with big screen adaptations of DC properties (Catwoman, anyone? Superman Returns? Joel Schumacher ever having anything to do with a comic book movie?), the DC animated adaptations -- starting with the 90s Batman: The Animated Series -- are generally pretty strong, even if they stray significantly from the source material. This one isn't their strongest, but it's a decent animated flick nonetheless.

The Summer 2011 Stage Review (Part IV)

2011-09-03T17:49:00.002-04:00

Wow. Where has the summer gone? I'm way behind once again. Luckily (for writing purposes), August has been less filled with theatre, so I only have a few things to catch up about here.

Office Hours at the Port Mansion Theatre (Lakeside Players)
Back at the end of July, I saw Office Hours at the tiny Port Mansion Theatre, a very fun little venue in which to perform and view shows. I'll be the first to admit that the apparent popularity of Norm Foster is, to a great degree, lost on me. Sure, he tosses in some great comedic lines, but I don't necessarily find his shows (as a body of work) overly funny or original -- particularly when placed side by side, when their similarities one to another become glaringly evident. That said, I think Office Hours was one of my best Foster viewing experiences. The show, made up of five short segments stitched together with common story threads, generally worked well, though a couple of segments simply don't have enough forward movement to make them essential to the bigger picture. Nice work on stage, though, and some good laughs made the evening quite enjoyable.

Sea of Sand on Spanish Banks West Beach in Vancouver (The Only Animal)
The concept here -- to perform a piece of theater using the beach and ocean as set -- is intriguing, but the end result was a bit washed out. The story, involving an amnesiac piecing back together his own back story in relation to two women -- one his wife and the other a mystery woman who came from the sea -- seems a bit try-too-hard and doesn't have the teeth it thinks it has. The use of pre-recorded dialogue, played on loudspeakers on the beach, could have worked, though the sometimes-live dialogue that overlapped it again seemed a bit "artsy" without real clear purpose. The event is what makes the show, not the show itself. It's just nice to go and sit on the sand and see some quirky little theatre piece with friends.

Les Miserables at the Fifth Avenue Theatre (Seattle)
The 25th anniversary production of Les Mis was well worth seeing. Having seen several productions of the show, it's good to know it can still keep my attention and surprise me, now and then, as well. This production stands out for two main reasons for me: the use of digitally altered and projected paintings by Victor Hugo as backdrops was surprisingly effective, and the edgiest (and slightly vicious) Mme Thenardier I've yet seen in the show. Fantastic. The kids, also, were excellent in this cast.

Come Fly Away at the Four Seasons Centre for Performing Arts (Dancap)
Regardless of what the promotional materials say, this is not a musical; it is a contemporary ballet. I know that "Musical" will sell more tickets than "Ballet" on the Broadway touring circuit, but I take exception to the misleading nature of it. Told entirely in dance (see? ballet) with a live orchestra and prerecorded vocals by Frank Sinatra (see? not a musical), the extent of story is simply that four couples meet at a night club, fight, and then get back together. The choreography by Twyla Tharp is pretty brilliant, as is the dancing. I'm a bit thrown by how we, the audience, are meant to respond to one of the four couples' storylines, as we see a rather abusive relationship play out before they reconcile for a happy ending. Are we meant to be happy for them? I really wanted the woman to kick him in the plums and move on, not get back together for a sunny reunion. Odd...

The Summer 2011 Reading Spectacular #6

2011-08-07T00:37:00.003-04:00

Almost there.

Remember when I was writing about Novel and I mentioned how sometimes a book doesn't live up to what it should have been? If you don't remember, you can check it out here. Well, I've another to add to that list: Zorgamazoo by Canadian writer Robert Paul Weston. Where to begin? Okay, how about with the basics of the book? It's a light little fantasy romp about a girl (being pursued by nasties who want to give her a lobotomy) who winds up having an adventure involving mythic and fanciful creatures including the Zorgles from -- where else? -- Zorgamazoo. It's written in rhyming verse. That's important.

So what's the problem, you ask. What's not to like about rhyming verse, you ask. Don't you like Dr. Seuss, you ask. Don't you enjoy adventures, you ask. Do you not thrill at the magical worlds of fanciful creatures, you ask. Well, I answer, stop asking so many questions so I can explain.

First off, the verse. I indeed DO love Dr. Seuss! The verse here, however, becomes so tedious, as it goes on page after page after page after page! And even worse, I often felt like I was reading an early draft of Weston's work. If I could stomach re-reading the book, I'd take a count of how many times he filled in syllables with one of his pet phrases: "you see" and "in fact", as I recall, appeared with alarming frequency. Ug.

I'll barely say anything about the title, apart from mentioning that almost none of the story takes place in Zorgamazoo, and to clarify that it's of minimal importance to the plot at all.

Finally, the story is just underdeveloped. So much time has been spent on trying to force the rhyme and rhythm that Weston seems to have neglected to notice that he doesn't have the character or plot development to justify a novel at all. The whole thing would have been better served as a picture book. The book is divided into rather short chapters, and I'm not being facetious when I say I seldom read more than one chapter in a sitting.

In fairness, I should point out that the book has been given several honours, including the E.B. White Read Aloud Award and the Silver Birch Award (which is selected by children). I can only assume that the givers of this award were distracted by the rhyming verse and ended up giving an award for the book's writing structure rather than for its actual literary merit and content. I'm sure kids will enjoy it, but I'm finished with it.

On a better note, July also found me reading The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian by Sherman Alexie. I'm not entirely sure why the title claims the content will be a diary, because it doesn't particularly read that way, but I suppose it's due to the inclusion of cartoons and drawings "by the narrator". In any case, I had a much more positive response to this book than to a certain other recent read (whose title rhymes with "Borgamazoo").

The book is written in the voice of Junior (Arnold Spirit, Jr.), a Native American teenager who makes the difficult and unpopular choice to attend an all-white school off the reserve. The book deals quite frankly with several issues including poverty, abuse of various types, and racism and, as a result, has been the focus of both praise and controversy. It's apparently been banned in a few US school boards. Alexie has mixed a fair bit of autobiographical material into his novel and, perhaps in view of this, it becomes difficult to see the inclusion of some coarse language, mature themes, and sexual references as simply being salacious.

The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian was awarded the National Book Award.

The 2011 Summer Stage Review (Part III)

2011-08-06T01:38:00.002-04:00

I guess it’s time to look back a few weeks and catch up on some of my live theatre viewing, as well.

Camelot at the Festival Theatre (Stratford Shakespeare Festival)

The shortest way to discuss Camelot at Stratford is to say that it’s a good production of a bad show. I know that certain people out there (and one who might actually be reading this, in particular) will disagree with me on the latter half of that statement, but the fact remains that if one really looks at the show’s structure, major difficulties become evident. Be that as it may, giving credit where credit is due, the production at Stratford is decent. The cast is the show’s saving grace, with Geraint Wyn Davies bringing a rather modern humour to the text (though his vocals sometimes seemed a bit unenergized in the lackluster music numbers he’s burdened with) and Brent Carver pretty much saving the day every time he’s on stage as Pelinore (probably the best written role in the show, period). Unfortunately, Jonathan Winsby as Lancelot seems to have a French accent that comes and goes with the tide twice daily, and Lucy Peacock is pretty much wasted in the terribly written part of Morgan le Fey, but still the production looks and sounds good and they do their best to keep things moving along. That said, they were still unable to convince me to like Camelot, the show; I still think it’s a hack job of writing. (The original production had many challenges – the first show in Toronto went until nearly one in the morning and major cuts came afterwards, and one can only wonder if at some point they should have said, “Wipe the slate clean. Let’s start from scratch.” – and Loewe didn’t even want to write the music in the first place. Hmmm.)

Next to Normal at the Four Seasons Centre for the Performing Arts (Dancap)

More than a show about a family dealing with mental health, Next to Normal is about a family dealing with each other on many levels: dealing with grief, with marriage, with parenthood and childhood, and with the struggles that come when things (and people) don’t live up to expectations. The music serves the story well, though I can’t say one leaves the theatre singing anything in particular – I couldn’t for the life of me hum anything from the show right now – and the writing keeps things moving along without feeling rushed. Though some of the … ahem … people of a certain generation around me expressed some confusion regarding some of the story, I didn’t find it that difficult to follow (and neither did my theatre-viewing companion, who doesn’t even read long books). If I have one complaint about the production, and I do, it’s that Alice Ripley in her Tony-winning role sang horribly. Not just “not that well”, but horribly. Her acting was top-notch, but that singing! Yikes! Her voice was being held somewhere back in her throat, her vowels were all over the place as she created diphthongs where none were to be found, and the result was that it was difficult, at times, to even understand her. Wondering how this could be a Tony-winning performance, I looked up some clips of her on YouTube and something was immediately evident: she had vocal coaches who helped her solve those problems. Evidence of bad habits was to be found in those earlier performances, but there were strategies being applied to overcome them. I can only conclude that, as the tour neared its conclusion, the quality control and vocal coaching had been abandoned. I would have liked to have seen her at her best. Still, at the end of the day, Next to Normal was a show worth seeing.

(It also reminded me of the television show The United States of Tara. There just didn't seem to be a good place to mention it above.)

The Summer 2011 Reading Spectacular #5

2011-08-06T00:51:00.003-04:00

Getting there.

I read the second book in Stieg Larsson’s Millenium Trilogy in July, as well. The Girl Who Played With Fire took a little bit to get the momentum rolling, but once going, it was another quick and easily-motivated read. I normally spread out the reading of books by the same author (particularly those in a series), but I picked up all three of these movies (the Swedish films, obviously, as the North American versions haven’t yet come out) and won’t watch each until I’ve read its book. There are odd little things about the series (I don’t understand why so many characters need to have such colourful sex lives, for one thing, as they're minimally relevant to the plot), but the stories themselves are fun, well-crafted and full of enough interesting turns of plot to keep me reading. It’s not particularly high-brow literature, but hey, who says it has to be? Now I have to wait forever for The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest to come out in a paperback edition that matches the two I’ve already got. [Insert dramatic sigh here]

Speaking of not high-brow literature …

Onto some relatively trashy reading, I whipped through The Missing by Sarah Langan, an author I’ve come to enjoy in the past year or so. I don’t normally profess to be a rabid fan of the horror genre (in books or in movies), but I enjoy a good creepy-weird read now and then (and Betsy and I do enjoy watching awful “scary” movies together and laughing). The Missing blends elements of zombie, killer-viruses, and cannibalism together into a decent tale, complete with graphically unpleasant images to spare. Not entirely unlike The Strain by Guillermo del Toro and Chuck Hogan, but preceding it by two years, it moves along between story threads that necessarily become linked, and dives headlong into gore, moving quickly and inexorably toward unpleasantness at nearly every turn. I unwittingly bought this book twice, once under its UK title, Virus, and also under its less-sensical title, The Missing. It was this edition that I read, because it was smaller for carrying around.

Towards the end of July, I also read Promise Not to Tell. I discovered Jennifer McMahon in the same way I discovered Sarah Langan – at a big sale at The Book Depot. (Book Depot, have I told you lately that I love you?) I read another of McMahon’s novels, Dismantled, a year or two ago and enjoyed it immensely. Unlike many suspense/mystery/thriller/whatever this genre really should be called, in which you essentially know the outcome but you’re just seeing how we get there, I found myself having to continually modify my expectations as I moved through Dismantled’s pages.

In some ways, Promise Not to Tell is more straightforward than Dismantled (perhaps this was due to its being a debut novel), but McMahon makes the reader walk the line between supernatural and earthly explanations for what’s happening quite nicely even as she jumps between the story’s present day (2002) and the past (1971), in search of the connection between a recent killing and the unsolved murder of an outcast girl those many years ago.

A curious sidenote is that Promise Not to Tell was released in Germany as Das Mädchen im Wald (The Girl in the Woods). Dismantled was released in the UK under the title Girl in the Woods. How’s that for needless confusion?

The Summer 2011 Reading Spectacular #4

2011-08-05T00:29:00.001-04:00

Still catching up.

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, by Rebecca Skloot, is way up on my recommended list. If you were told, “It’s a book about a woman whose cancer cells were harvested in the 50s and ended up being used in innumerable medical studies and breakthroughs since then,” and your response was, “That doesn’t sound so fantastic,” I would understand where you were coming from, but you’d be very, very wrong. This book is pretty amazing.

It’s partly a book about the ethics and principles surrounding cell cultures as commodities. It’s partly the story of an impoverished black woman and her family. It’s entirely readable, entirely fascinating, and entirely a page-turner. I know – who would have thought?

That Rebecca Skloot somehow manages to cover all of this ground and more – the story of her own struggle to convince members of Henrietta Lacks’s family to even talk to her is quite a thread – while time-jumping between the 1950s, the 2000s, and several places in between, is quite remarkable, even more so since she manages to keep the material logical, followable (imagine that is a word), and quickly paced. The little timelines that head each chapter certainly assist in this.
A seriously good read.

I also read The Complete Essex County by Jeff Lemire, which collects three interconnected full-length stories with two mini-comic stories into one graphic novel. All set in a fictionalized version of Essex County, Ontario (the author’s hometown), the book captures grief, secrets, and hope over several generations in the community. Not really for kids, the graphic novel has gained quite a following as a piece of contemporary Canadian literature. The first story in the trilogy, "Tales from the Farm", is apparently in development as a movie (under the unfortunate name “Super Zero”).

The 2011 Summer Screen Review (Part II)

2011-08-04T21:08:00.003-04:00

Okay, it will likely come as no surprise that I haven't watched all that much this summer, though TV series on DVD have been my mainstays of home electronic entertainment.

I finished up 30 Rock: Season Four last week and I continue to find this show endlessly entertaining. There are so many quotable little lines and running amusements. With viewing on DVD, you also get enjoyable commentaries on several episodes, some of which are comprised mainly of people laughing as they amuse themselves (particularly if it's Jack McBrayer and Jane Krakowski), and the occasional fake fact. Highly entertaining.

I also watched that new classic of western cinema, Paranormal Activity. What can I say? It was what it was, and it wasn't bad for what it was. That husband was pretty obnoxious, though. I guess it was only time before someone said, "Hey, remember how that faux home-video documentary The Blair Witch Project really took off? We should try something like that." (I think I prefer this to TBWP, simply because ... you know ... something actually happened during the 90 minutes.

The 2011 Summer Stage Review (Part II)

2011-08-03T02:29:00.003-04:00

July was very busy theatre-wise for me. In all, I saw eleven shows, so I’ve got a lot to cover. Here’s the next installment on my way to recovering from my dreadful lapse in posting.

The Railway Children at the Roundhouse Theatre (Mirvish)

First off, let me say that the big whoop-de-doo about the real train in this production is silly. Yes, there’s a real train, but they certainly could have skipped it. They do an excellent job for most of the show using lighting and sound design (and the sound design is excellent, I assure you) to let us all believe in trains we can’t see, that to introduce the actual train a couple of times seems a bit needless. Be that as it may, on to my comments.

On the day we attended, we had an understudy for one of the three main children. She, and the actress who played the youngest sister, were quite good at playing children in that they just played characters who happened to be children and allowed the text to drive their performances. (The youngest sister certainly is written with the most fun, and is the most entertaining as a result.) The man playing the brother, however, is – to be blunt – dreadful. Unlike the others, he has tried to paste “childishness” on top of his performance, leading to an obnoxious, over-drawn caricature of children that should leave actual, living breathing children insulted. Yikes. The story suffers, at times, from too much telling and not enough showing, but the staging, based upon railroad tracks that run the length of the theatre space, is quite brilliant in its simplicity. Train platforms on either side, along with a bridge over top at one end, provide the permanent set of the production, but moving stages provide the real genius of the production. These platforms glide on and off without a sound or bump, thanks to the skilled stage hands (who, thankfully, take part in the final curtain call). Sometimes they disappear and reappear with a new arrangement of props or furniture, providing a new locale or setting, but when they are at their best, they contribute directly to the storytelling. When the children’s father is taken away from them, he hugs his wife, takes a step backwards, and then simply glides away from them, the distance between him and his family growing while they look helplessly at one another. Smashing. Another wise staging choice occurs during a scene in a train tunnel, when scrims are pulled across the stage area, alongside the tracks, creating the dark tunnel into which we, the audience seated on either side, can watch the goings on. Again, simple and effective. Is it a ragingly brilliant piece of theatre? No, it’s got its flaws in spades, but it still provided an entertaining (though very, very hot) afternoon and it was nice to watch the elements that worked work.

Moving from a mediocre script with good staging, we move to a good script with poor staging:

Titus Andronicus at the Tom Patterson Theatre (Stratford Shakespeare Festival)

I was greatly anticipating Titus Andronicus, as one of Shakespeare’s plays which I know only by reputation, its story known to me only in generalizations.
The story, while lacking the emotional colouring and layering of plot found in others of Shakespeare’s tragedies, certainly has the potential to be a relentless exercise in grief and revenge, an emotional pummeling of the audience. I left the production interested in seeing another production, or the critically-acclaimed film by Julie Taymor with Anthony Hopkins in the title role, but ultimately left the theatre dissatisfied, having been distracted by what I take to be self-indulgent direction by Darko Tresnjak.

Rather than being drawn in by the story and characters, I found myself conscious of the actors setting up a number of “pictures”, detached from character- or plot-driven motivations, and noticing several structural gimmicks in the storytelling that I can only imagine began with the phrase, “Hey, wouldn’t it be neat if…”

In the moments leading up to Lavinia’s abduction, the two brothers – Chiron and Demetrius – very disturbingly and convincingly degraded her with their actions, fondling her in the most grotesque and heartless of ways, foretelling of the rape and maiming she will receive at their hands and then … and then they picked her up in a very artful and “stagey” way, tossing her over a shoulder and, in the most absurd moment of the scene, Chiron suddenly crouched down, making way for her to reach out pleadingly to the Queen and to speak her lines without a brother in her sightlines. Quite a shift there.

Later, when she has returned with bloody stumps where her hands once were, a trail of blood streaming from her mouth to indicate her missing tongue, both her uncle and father in turn speak a multitude of poetic lines about her wretched state and their grief (a difficulty with the text, I acknowledge), but neither convincingly explain their physical distance from this poor, maimed girl they profess to love so dearly. If they do not rush to her side, trying in vain to somehow alleviate her pain, they must somehow communicate the tension that exists in that moment when they desperately WISH to rush to her side, but cannot for some reason, be it repulsion, helplessness, wrath, SOMETHING. The physical space between a father and his bloody, dismembered daughter cannot go unexplained as nothing more than “blocking”.

In perhaps the greatest example of misplaced direction, the final scene, for me, went so far off the rails as to negate any benefit of the doubt which I may have been holding in store for the director. By offering members of the theatre audience little tarts, the director invites us to join in the feast, making the viewers, in essence, characters in the play – guests at this most gruesome of feasts. If invited to participate in the feast, however, the audience cannot suddenly and inexplicably be left out of the ensuing bloodbath. We cannot be there as participants in one moment, only to be ignored in the next. The final nail in the proverbial coffin came in the director’s abysmal reworking of the play’s ending, placing the laurel wreath of authority on an audience member’s head and (ug) giving her a campy thumbs-up. Ridiculous and inappropriate.

(This, incidentally, is the short list of complaints about the direction in this piece. Yikes.)

Wishful Drinking at the Royal Alexandra Theatre (Mirvish)

I’ll keep this short. Wishful Drinking is Carrie Fisher’s autobiographical one-woman stage show.

It’s exactly what one expects: an evening with Carrie Fisher as she tells stories about her childhood, her parents (and their many marriages and romances, not necessarily with one another), her experiences with George Lucas and Princess Leia, her dark days of drugs and alcohol, and living with bipolar disorder. It’s candid, funny, and enjoyable. There were a few segments that seemed to move a little slowly, but still, it was fun to hear from the proverbial horse’s mouth some of the stories we’ve heard through the media. It’s worth it for “Hollywood Inbreeding 101” alone.

The Summer 2011 Reading Spectacular #3

2011-08-03T00:33:00.004-04:00

Yes, I already find myself in the circumstance of playing catch-up. As someone was so kind to point out, I’m on vacation, but I’ve managed to spend most of the past month in places with intermittent internet access and, when at home, I found myself trying to cram in as much as possible.

In any case, here I am, and I plan on bringing everything here up-to-date over the course of the next few days.

Back in July, I managed to get a lot of reading done, mostly thanks for my amazing talent for procrastination. Homework? Peh! I’ve got some serious reading which demands my attention! (Fear not, concerned reader, I did my homework, too.)

I managed to at last read one of those books that it seems everyone read in highschool except for me: J.D. Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye. It’s funny, because part of the appeal for me was that almost everyone I knew who had talked about reading it ended with, “I hated that book.” I suppose there was part of me that wanted to test those waters, to see what was so (seemingly) universally hateable about the book, but that was still meritful enough to be on everyone’s reading list. (Of course, Margaret Laurence’s The Stone Angel is also on the same list, it seems, and I did read that one.) Funnily enough, I went into the reading with very little knowledge of the book and therefore with almost no expectations story-wise. I knew it was about an angry young protagonist, but that’s about all I knew. Surprisingly enough, I did not hate it. Maybe it’s because I’m reading it as an adult, and not as an an angsty 15 year old, but I didn’t find Holden Caufield intolerable. (I even find him less of an icon of teenaged rebellion than I was told he would be.) What I found so interesting about the character was that he’s not simply disenfranchised; he’s disenfranchised, but desperately wants not to be. He wants to have heroes, he wants to connect, but somehow cannot get past being let down. Those he expresses admiration for are those who haven’t yet proven themselves to be “phonies” or, perhaps more accurately, fallible. He’s somehow reached the place where he’s confronted with the reality of the flawed nature of … well … everyone, but can’t quite resign himself to it. In any case, and without going on an enormous diatribe about the whole book, I enjoyed the character study quite a bit. (I also enjoyed finally reaching the point in the book where I understood the cover image.)

Next up, I read The Believer: Issue 80. As you may already be aware, this is one of my favourite magazines, and when people ask me what it’s about I usually find myself scrambling to explain, “It’s sort of a non-fiction magazine about … I don’t know, all sorts of things that I wouldn’t end up reading about anywhere else. And book reviews, too.” This issue featured such eclectic content as a humourous and fascinating article about the Barkley Marathons (look it up – it’s crazy), a discourse on Bulgarian street-obituaries, and an interesting interview with Darren O’Donnell who works with Toronto students in a curious theatre-based artist-in-residence program.

After having it on my shelf waiting for several months, I finally cracked Room by Emma Donoghue. I’ll not say much, for fear of ruining anything for future readers, but I will say that I was surprised to discover that only half of the book was what I expected it to be. I will also say that I certainly recommend it. Interestingly enough, a day after I finished the book, I happened to catch Donoghue on some CBC talk show discussing the book. How’s that for timing? She writes a good book AND gives a good interview.

More to come as the days go by!

The 2011 Summer Stage Review (Part I)

2011-07-10T07:53:00.003-04:00

That's right. There's a third feature this year in The Summer Stage Review. Basically, it's turned into a summer of much theatre viewing, so I figured I'd toss this into the mix to keep Sonya happy.

I'm no review writer, so I'll just drop a few thoughts and comments about the live shows I see between July 1 and Labour Day, and there will be a few. Already, I've several shows to comment upon and we're only a week in. Here we go.

9 to 5: The Musical at the Toronto Centre for the Performing Arts (Dancap)

They've taken the movie from the 80s and developed it into a musical with music by Dolly Parton and featuring Ms. Parton in a video-recorded narrative role to bookend the show.

In a nutshell, three women working under an absolute chauvenist end up working together to take revenge upon him for his abuses and to take charge of the company where they work. Is this high art? No. Does it pretend to be high art? No. Is it good fun? Absolutely!

Two things stood out for me.

One: Dolly Parton truly is a skilled songwriter.

Two: Diana Degarmo, runner up in season somethingorother of Americal Idol does a decent impersonation of Dolly.

The Admirable Chrichton at the Shaw Festival Theatre

I wasn’t familiar with this play of J.M. Barrie’s so I was intrigued to see it.

The play plays with the notion of classes and their “natural order”. Crichton, a butler to end all butlers, is mortified by his master’s monthly tea parties in which servants mingle with the aristocracy to prove that they are all equal. Each in its place is his preference. When the family, along with Chrichton and one other servant, are marooned on a desert aisle, the natural order shifts dramatically, as the servants are the only ones equipped for survival. Upon a return to England some years later, the question becomes whether things can be as they once were.

The show is still in previews and suffered, at times, from some pacing issues as energy and momentum waxed and waned a bit. Lighting was also a bit erratic, particularly during the second and third acts. Overall, though, it was an enjoyable performance. Of particular note was the use of a narrative structure which, I’m quite certain, was developed specifically for this production. Anthropomorphized animal narrators contribute to the storytelling using (I’m quite certain), stage directions – the wit and detail of stage directions is something for which Barrie is known – and documented comments he had made about the performance. Unlike Stratford’s narrator-based structure for Peter Pan last year, which for me conflicted with the intent of the original and continually caused me to withdraw from the play’s action, this use of narration brought new energy and helped to keep momentum going, and further acted to highlight the play’s core in social commentary.

In short, while not a spectacular production, at this point approaching opening in a few days, it was solid and pleasant.

And then there was ...
The Grapes of Wrath at the Avon Theatre (Stratford Shakespeare Festival)

I went into this show feeling really pumped up, eager to learn the story – I’ve read several of Steinbeck’s novels, but not this one – and open to being moved, touched, and wrecked by the performance.

The lights dim.

The haunting sound of a saw being played with a bow fills the theatre.

The lights come up behind the scrim revealing a trio of musicians, whose melancholy melody accompanies the arrival of Tom, home on parole from prison.

And that was the moment in which I was most emotionally engaged in the performance.

That probably seems terribly sarcastic, but it’s true. Those first moments held so much promise, but the promise went unfulfilled. My greatest disappointment amidst many disappointments was the lack of connection I felt with the characters. I felt nothing and I was very much a viewer throughout, watching the action from an emotional distance and basically waiting for it to end. The characters, on the whole, seemed painted with very broad strokes, creating a “folksy” tone that kept them at an arm’s length. It was too comedic for The Grapes of Wrath, not comedic enough for an episode of the Hillbillies.

Believe me, that’s the short version of my critique.

Jesus Christ Superstar at the Avon Theatre (Stratford Shakespeare Festival)

I was told to expect good things from this production and was not disappointed.

Jesus Christ Superstar is a show which, as a vehicle, I like but don’t necessarily love. I’ve seen good productions, I’ve seen weak productions. This was certainly the strongest I’ve ever seen.

From the overture, staged to establish the tensions between Jews and Romans, to the final scenes, in which Jesus’ body suspended before a stark white cross is backdropped by scrolling text from the Gospels, I was quite gripped. Choreography was inventive, but not intrusive. Vocals from the entire cast were strong (though Paul Nolan as Jesus seemed to be a bit strained at times), and the set was versatile yet deceptively simple.

Most importantly, however, was the clarity of the story. Judas’ struggles with conflicting emotions about Jesus and his celebrity come to the forefront. He betrays his friend because he cannot fathom, or even envision, the scope of Jesus’ mission. The ending, often controversial for its lack of a resurrection, allows for interpretation without seeming contrived or like a safe “out”.

Incidentally, a friend of mine is in his first season at the Festival, and plays Simon Zealots in this production. Needless to say, he’s thrilled to have his Stratford premier in a show getting the sort of “buzz” that JCS is getting. He also does a darned good job.

Richard III at the Tom Patterson Theatre (Stratford Theatre Festival)

I often enjoy going to see plays by Shakespeare with which I'm unfamiliar, as it allows me to judge the production based on its storytelling, not any prior knowledge I have to "fill in the blanks". Going into Richard III, I was doubly intrigued to see whether I believed their casting of a woman -- Seana McKenna -- in the title role would transcend "stunt casting".

I was utterly impressed with the production as a whole and complete sold on her right to play the part.

The story of Richard III and his bloody quest for power was simply and effectively staged on the thrust of the Tom Patterson theatre, with minimal set and strong lighting design, and Seana McKenna played the role without a hint of self-consciousness about the cross-gender casting. She became Richard and brought a wry humour to the part which made us think, "You're horrible, I hate you ... but I can't wait to see what you do next." She was well-supported by a strong cast and, most importantly, the story was clear and engaging.

Excellent!

The Summer 2011 Reading Spectacular #2

2011-07-07T21:22:00.005-04:00

Just a short entry to bring things up-to-date here, I finished reading Juxtapoz No. 125. This issue of the arts and culture magazine focuses primarily on artists whose work would likely fall under the category of "outsider art" -- tattoo artist Don Ed Hardy, American graffiti artists, among others -- and the Bread and Puppet theatre troup. I find it remarkable how interesting I can find articles and interviews with people whose work is so far from my experience or usual interests.

The 2011 Summer Screen Review (Part I)

2011-07-07T21:10:00.002-04:00

It's time to play catch-up.

On the weekend, I sat down to watch The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, having finished the book a few weeks ago. Those Swedes know how to make a movie, don't they? (Of course, I'm basing this opinion primarily on this film and Let the Right One In. Ha!) The filmmakers did a nice job of streamlining the story as necessary without missing the essence of the story, and Noomi Rapace is downright riveting in the title role. The film is sometimes uncomfortable, but never needlessly so. I'll watch the two Swedish sequels once I've read their respective books.

Then to utterly change gears, I watched Bad Teacher which, while having some amusing moments, is essentially bad. Even more problematic than the crass, juvenile humour (which was expected) is the nearly non-existent arc of the film. About ten minutes in, the action plateaus, and it's confirmed that we're essentially in for a one-trick pony show that will last the next 80 minutes or so. I'm not criticizing it as a teacher (though anyone in education will scoff at the supposed "way things work", but again this is to be expected), but just as a film that should have been better. I have to agree entirely with the following quotation from Rotten Tomatoes: "In spite of a promising concept and a charmingly brazen performance from Cameron Diaz, Bad Teacher is never as funny as it should be."

Summer 2011 Reading Spectacular #1

2011-07-01T23:14:00.003-04:00

So, apparently this weblog really only comes to life in the summer. I wonder why that would be. Hmmm...

In any case, it's the first of July and time for the Summer Reading Spectacular to begin! And begin it has! Today I threw caution to the proverbial wind, neglected the domestic drudgery which beckoned, and had a rather productive reading day, finishing off a few in-progress reads and reading one other volume start-to-finish.

First off, I wrapped up Novel by George Singleton. In the interests of full-disclosure, I should point out that I started this novel months ago, but it ended up shelved for quite some time before I came back to it. Why? Well, it's a bit of an absurd comic novel that's ... how to put this ... not so funny. It promises to be a hoot, with its fancy dust-jacket-flap-teaser, but it just didn't really pan out for it. George Singleton is widely known for his comic short stories, and maybe it just works better in smaller packages. The book has its moments, but as a whole it just didn't engage the way I'd hoped. I won't even get into the details of why, as it would end up being a hodge-podge of seemingly random points, much like the book itself. I'm not saying it's irredeemably awful, but I'll not be finding a place for it to reside permanently on my valuable shelf-space. (Sorry, George! It wasn't my figurative cup of tea.)

Moving along, I wrapped up Elephant Magazine: Issue 4. You may recall, if you were reading last summer that I discovered and love this magazine about art and "visual culture". This issue spends quite a bit of time discussing graphic design and designers. It also features an article about Supermundane and his work, which led to a series of art lessons in my class, who loved his work. (Check out his website here!) Crazy fun!

I also finished Jeanne DuPrau's The Diamond of Darkhold, the fourth book in the Books of Ember series. I'd started it a few days ago, having been loaned it by a former student of mine, and whipped through it quickly. It's a breezy, quickly paced read intended, of course, for young readers. While it does, in many ways, tread similar ground to the original Ember book, that was somewhat refreshing after the third book in the series, which, in attempting a prequel to the previous, rather fell flat and seemed misplaced within the sequence. There's not much new brought to the series by this book, and in fact the central plot point of the book seems a bit forced, but it's fine for what it is. The final few pages, however, are a bit much. I'll leave it at that in order to avoid typing the phrase "spoiler alert". (Incidentally, the word "Darkhold" only occurs once, perhaps twice, in the book itself, and of very marginal importance even then, leading me to believe that DuPrau snuck it in just to give the book a snappy title.)

Finally, I read Pocket Book One* of Jeff Smith's RASL. Not child-friendly fare as his previous (and multiple award-winning) Bonewas, this is a time-and-space jumping Sci-Fi graphic novel. Though Smith's drawing style isn't quite as well-suited to this type of story -- the distinctly cartoon nature of his human figures worked quite brilliantly opposite the Bone cousins, but doesn't quite match the grittier concept here -- the writing is somehow both briskly paced and patient simultaneously. Towards the end of the volume, a significant number of panels gives over to exposition in the form of background information about Nikola Tesla, but by then, we've been given enough story and action to forgive the lecture. The latter third also gives us the most striking visual of Book One: a mysterious and eerie little drooling girl with a cocked head.

And that's the start to the summer. Not bad for Day One.

*This "Pocket Book" would require a pocket able to accommodate its 8.9 by 6.4 by 0.6 inch size. (Thank you, Wikipedia, for not making me find a ruler or measuring tape.)

Cutting

2010-09-25T18:27:00.002-04:00

Ages and ages ago, I lost my spare car key. One day, I'm going to do something random -- move the dryer, unpack a box of Christmas lights, or open a bag of pasta -- and there it will be, inexplicably revealed after years of absence. Until that happens, it's probably smart to have a spare on hand.

To that end, I went and had a new key cut.

And that's where it gets a bit odd.

I tried it in the door of my car and was thrilled when I was greeted with the telltale click, the wee button in the door popping up obediently to tell me that the key was working like a charm.

Getting into the car, I inserted it into the ignition and ... it wouldn't budge. Nope. Not even going to entertain the notion of turning. Nope. Nuttin'.

Apparently the ignition has higher standards than that loose and easy door, that will pop it's lock for any old substandard key.

A Pinball Wizard (I Wish)

2010-09-17T20:01:00.003-04:00

Alright, I have a confession to make.

I enjoy Wii pinball more than I expected. A while back, I picked up the Pinball Hall of Fame: The Williams Collection in a cheap bin but, having loaned the actual Wii to a friend over the summer, hadn't actually played.

Now I have.

And it's enjoyable.

Though not quite like the real deal, they've done a decent job of recreating pinball glory. I rememember playing some of the tables back in the days when you could easily go to an actual arcade and play actual video games and actual pinball because everybody and their dog didn't have a video game console at home. While Wii pinball can't really replace the real thing, it's still giving me cause to waste more time than is advisable, I'm sure. (Of course, that's by my standards, which are bound to be quite different from those of rabid video game players.)

Hooray for fake pinball!

Summer 2010 Reading Spectacular #10

2010-09-06T13:02:00.004-04:00

With one final entry, this year's Summer Reading Spectacular comes to a close.

After misplacing Eric Shanower's and Skottie Young's graphic novel adaptation of L. Frank Baum's The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, I found it, picked it back up, and finished it off. The cover rightfully places Baum's name in large letters above Shanower's, as this is definitely a return to the original text both in plot points -- included are brief encounters with Kalidahs, the field mice, Hammerheads, and such -- and in the text itself, much of which is lifted directly from the original novel. Shanower has done a credible job of maintaining his commitment to the original story while keeping the pace going from panel to panel. Skottie Young's illustrations are full of whimsy and the occasional darkness, with hints of anime influence but uniquely his own, with inventive designs of the main characters and the world of Oz. Included at the back is a nice bonus: along with a cover gallery, the creators have included a "sketchbook" which shows some of the variant designs explored on the way to the characters' final looks in the book. The duo has already completed (if memory serves me) their follow-up, a graphic adaptation of The Marvelous Land of Oz.

And so, good readers (both of you), below is a lovely photograph of my summer reading. Though I certainly missed the Hermitage, the reading retreat I've taken for the past few years, I certainly managed to squeeze some reading into the summer. Looking it over, I realize I read fewer young people's books this summer than usual.

I had thought to include a photo for the Summer Screen Review; however, since some were in theatres and others belong to friends, it would have been an incomplete image in any case.

Summer 2010 Reading Spectacular #9

2010-09-06T10:35:00.003-04:00

With the hours ticking down to the end of another Summer Reading Spectacular, it's time to reflect upon two more reads.

A few days ago I received a smashing surprise in the mail, all the way from BC (that's British Columbia, not through time from the days before Christ): a copy of SAD MAG, issue 4. But wait. This copy of the arts and culture magazine was signed by cover girl Suzy Shameless, roller derby chick extraordinaire! Woohoo! (And the contents of the magazine were enjoyable, too; in particular the cover story about the culture of the roller derby community in the area was a good read.)

Today I finished up Catching Fire, Book Two in the Hunger Games trilogy by Suzanne Collins. The series has been a bestseller among the young adult audience, but a lot of adults I know have also been reading and recommending it. Part Running Man, part Survivor, part The Lottery, the basic premise isn't all-new, but it's handled quite well and puts a decent original spin on it that makes it new enough for a new audience. Though the romantic triangle elements of the story have gotten a bit weary over the course of two books, this volume continues to move along at a nice pace and sets up nicely the final book in the trilogy which will find its way into my "Currently Reading" pile sometime in the next twelve months, I'm sure. Certainly a series worth checking out if you're a reader of young people's literature or just enjoy a little SciFi adventure story now and then.

The 2010 Summer Screen Review (Part IV)

2010-09-03T20:56:00.004-04:00

Watching the first season of One Day at a Time was a great trip down Memory Lane (which corners on Nostalgia Boulevard, and runs parallel to Man-Do-I-Feel-Old Avenue). I wonder how many of these classic sitcoms which have been released, as of late, in Season One sets will see their subsequent seasons released? Probably not as many as I'd like. I was struck by a few things while viewing this enjoyable program:

1. Even after all of these years, I can sing along with the theme song.
2. The opening titles are curiously more blurry than any of the episodes themselves.
3. There was a lot of yelling between mother and daughter and between sisters, making this probably one of the more realistic portrayals of family life on television at the time.
4. I still find it odd that there's a window beside the front door in an apartment.
5. It really was "pushing the envelope" for its time by addressing divorce, teen drinking and sex, and moustaches.
6. If only we could learn from sitcom families that we don't have to sit around watching television all the time. TVs only appear on TVs when they're necessary to the plot.

It was also nice to see, through a little Reunion special feature, that they really had a family-like affection for one another during the show's run, even when Mackenzie was struggling with addictions. (And they spoke openly about those times, too.)

Summer 2010 Reading Spectacular #8

2010-09-03T20:45:00.002-04:00

As I cling mercilessly to the final days of summer, I wrapped up another book mostly whilst sitting on my porch, pretending that work was not to be done.

The Mysterious Benedict Society and the Perilous Journey is the follow up to The Mysterious Benedict Society (convenient, isn't it?) and has since been followed up with a third in the series (The Mysterious Benedict Society and the Prisoner's Dilemma, for those who like to be informed). The story reunites the young heroes from the original adventure and, naturally, throws them into another adventure which makes use of their considerable and varied skills. While the "set-up" of this plot had me a bit concerned (Mr Benedict, their benefactor and leader, has been captured by his brother and arch nemesis while setting up an elaborate follow-the-clues hunt for his young friends and so they must start out following his clues until they figure out what has happened to him), once things got rolling, all was forgiven. It's a nice, silly little romp that Trenton Lee Stewart has created to follow up on his first Benedict hit.

Summer 2010 Reading Spectacular #7

2010-08-30T19:47:00.002-04:00

Reading right up until the last minute, I finished another book today. Not bad, since I started it yesterday.

It was the debut novel from George D. Shuman, 18 Seconds. The title refer to the approximate amount of time that something is held in short-term memory and, as a result, the duration of the final moments of a victim's life seen by blind psychic Sherry Moore upon physical contact with the deceased. Though the novel is ostensibly Sherry's (and three have since followed in the Sherry Moore series), the interwoven characters of the story are given their share of page space. (The book arguably belongs more to Lieutenant Kelly Shaughnessy -- a recently promoted New Jersey officer coping with office politics, a troubled marriage, and a pair of violent abductions on her caseload -- than to Sherry based on narrative focus alone.) The result is a satisfyingly well-developed story where police work gets as much attention as the psychic element. While certain revelations are less-than-revelatory, they don't particularly detract from the reading in any notable way. I good first outing for Shuman, and one for which he was apparently nominated for a Best First Novel award from the International Thrillers Association (didn't know such a specific organization existed) and for a Shamus Award (had to look that one up, too).

Summer 2010 Reading Spectacular #6

2010-08-29T20:29:00.003-04:00

With this entry, I will be completely up-to-date with the summer reading spectacular, and with not too much time to lose as there's only a week to Labour Day!

I picked up The Strain by Guillermo del Toro and Chuck Hogan, and subsequently discovered it was the first in a trilogy, so now I'm playing the waiting game until the second book comes out, and then it'll be all about whether or not to get it in hardcover or to wait until it's in paperback to match the one I've got. But, I'll happily deal with those dilemmas, because I really enjoyed the book! Sort of a revisionist vampire thriller, I found it slick, smart, and entertaining, and I could certainly sense del Toro's visual influence in the writing, and wouldn't be surprised to find this is adapted into a film at some point. I'm always intrigued with co-authored works, and would love to know how that collaboration operates on a practical level.

Skinny Dip by Carl Hiaasen (can anyone confirm for me exactly how his surname is properly pronounced?) was the first adult fiction I've read by him, having read Hoot a few years back. After her husband throws her overboard from a cruise ship on their anniversary, Joey Perrone doesn't die as expected and rather than going to the police, decides to seek her own revenge -- and get a few answers to her questions along the way. The book is witty, filled with quirky characters (the bulky and shockingly hirsute bodyguard, Tool, is such fun to read), and a well-paced plot. Enjoyable.

Finally, thanks to Sarah, I have received some very useful (?) advice thanks to The Recently Deflowered Girl, illustrated by the incomparable Edward Gorey. Ladies, have you ever been deflowered by a marimba player and been at a loss for the correct thing to say? Then you should have had this book on hand! Hilarious fun.

Summer 2010 Reading Spectacular #5

2010-08-28T15:29:00.002-04:00

Nearly caught up!

Starting off with some young people's literature, I picked up The Secret Order of the Gumm Street Girls by Elise Primavera because the inside flap read well, describing quirkily amusing characters and an odd little adventure involving The Wizard of Oz.

How disappointing, then, to get into the book and find it remarkably unremarkable. What showed promise in the opening chapters quickly degrades into one of those, "The author threw in a bunch of supposedly fun ideas and hoped to create a story out of them." The Oz connection is strangely corrupted, only marginally leading anywhere, since the girls end up in some un-imaginative alternative-to-Oz lands called "Spoz" and "Spudz" that lack any of the wit and charm of the Oz stories to which the author is ostensibly paying homage. The witches (with names like Cha Cha and Bling Bling -- seriously) are concerned with fashion, makeup, and cell phones (yack) and all-in-all, the book is just a mess. I was shocked to discover that it was a (reasonably) established author (which explained why a big, reputable publisher such as Harper Collins was putting this piece of garbage out there), but it made more sense when I realized that this was her first novel, having been known for picture books. Shock and dismay returned, however, when I heard that she was working on a sequel. Avoid this book, as I had to force myself to finish it just for the sake of finishing it.

More positively, I read The Boy in the Dress, by David Walliams, one half of the duo responsible for Little Britain. Walliams (of "I am a LAY-dee!" fame) even includes an author photo of himself as a young boy, complete with wig and gown, with his sister, proving that he, also, was a boy in a dress from time to time. This breezy little humourous tale took an afternoon to read and, despite the occasional comment for the adult reader, keeps the tale simple and clear. Dennis enjoys fashion secretly, the most beautiful girl in school finds out, and becomes his confidante and accomplice in discovering that he enjoys, on occasion, putting on a dress. Naturally, social disaster occurs. One of the enjoyable elements, I find, is that Walliams bucks the obvious explanation. Dennis just enjoys dressing up now and then. That's all it is. Deal with it. Ha!

Finally, for this entry, a friend of mine recommended Andrew Davidson's The Gargoyle (a Canadian author, no less). An engrossing story of a burn victim's personal struggle to define himself with the assistance of a (possibly) schizophrenic artist, The Gargoyle kept me turning the pages, wondering how all of the stories within the story would be resolved and connected. The title refers to: (a) sculptures made obsessively by the talented young artist; (b) the disfigured protagonist; (c) the true character of the once-beautiful protagonist before his disfiguring accident; and (d) probably even more, to be noted on a second reading some day. While the "once he was made ugly, his inside had an opportunity to become more beautiful" theme isn't a surprising one, the journey of the two characters over the course of several or several hundred years (depending on what you make of it all) was certainly worth the read. Thanks for the suggestion, Rob!

That's it for now. The next time I update, I should be completely up-to-date, and just in time for Labour Day!

The 2010 Summer Screen Review (Part III)

2010-08-28T15:19:00.003-04:00

Sonya very helpfully reminded me that we finished watching Season One of True Blood. What I am about to write may not make me popular (well, it might not if anyone actually read this), but I haven't exactly boarded the True Blood Fan Train and hugged the engineer. While the main story thread is intriguing and nicely developed, and the actors' performances are great, the show itself hasn't grabbed hold of me. I find that it suffers from the trap of several cable dramas in hitting the audience over the head with, "Look what we can do because we're on cable!" Sure, it makes the shows immensely popular with teenaged boys, but it's so deliberate that I find it distracting. In watching a commentary for an episode of Six Feet Under (see below), the show's creator makes mention of HBO saying, "Can you make this more f***ed up?" If that's not an indication of where they're coming from, I don't know what is. In theory, these cable shows are supposedly able to make the shows without the networks interfering and censoring so much, but obviously it's just a different sort of pressure at work. Just tell a story worth telling and I'll be happy. I don't particularly care if I see any other True Blood seasons.

I also finished watching Six Feet Under, season one, after the show was recommended by lots of people. Much more enjoyable than the aforementioned show, if you ask me, and even though I periodically find myself asking, "Seriously? Who does that?" the characters with all of their flaws are quite engaging and the storytelling's good. (And those fake dead bodies are top-notch! Ha!) Frances Conroy as Ruth (the mother) is fascinating. What a great actor!

Summer 2010 Reading Spectacular #4

2010-08-24T21:49:00.002-04:00

Wow. I took a moment to actually see how much I need to catch up on and ... it's a fair amount. Let see how far I get now. In no particular order (because I can't remember in what order I read these), here are the latest titles from my summer reading.

Book sales are ... um ... dangerous. I love them -- don't get me wrong -- but for someone who already has a lot of books on the "waiting to be read" shelves, it's ridiculous how I allow those shelves to grow and grow and grow.

At one such recent sale, I picked up The Keeper by Sarah Langan just because it seemed to have potential and I'm happy to say it was a nice find. I've always found the idea of "horror" genre books odd, because I don't find them scary. Interesting, page-turning reads? Yes. But do I get scared reading them? No. And I didn't get scared reading this, either, though it falls into the horror genre, I suppose. A supernatural thriller, it focuses on a pair of sisters: one an elective mute with a reputation as the town crazy and her younger sister. When Susan starts appearing in the dreams of the citizens of the village, it's surely an ill omen, right? Right...

Rick Riordan's The Lightning Thief (first in the Percy Jackson and the Olympians series) found its way onto my reading list primarily because it's popular with the kids I teach. So, dutifully, I cracked it and read it. Well ... while I didn't hate it, it didn't do what I hoped it would, which is convince me that it's not just a reactionary Harry Potter knock-off. Yes, there are obvious differences to the Rowling books, and yes, even the formula that she uses (a young protagonist discovers his/her place in a much bigger and supernatural world) has been around for a long time (see Susan Cooper's amazing The Dark is Rising sequence), so it's not like it began with Harry Potter, but in the end, The Lightning Thief just wasn't well-written enough to cut the mustard with me. There's so much telegraphing from chapter to chapter, from scene to scene that only children will be surprised by what happens. The writing itself isn't terribly sophisticated, so it doesn't elevate itself above its pulpy nature. It's fine. I understand why kids like it. It's just nothing special. For similarly themed books done better, see those mentioned above.

Another in the "Meh. I could take or leave it" pile is James Lecesne's Absolute Brightness. When Phoebe's flamboyant cousin Leonard comes to town to live with them, he starts affecting those around him in various ways, not all of them to Phoebe's liking. When he goes missing, he somehow manages to become an even bigger part of her life. The inside flap reads, "This is the story of a luminous force of nature: a boy who encounters evil and whose magic isn't truly felt until he disappears," and ... well ... that about sums it up. What's my problem, then, you ask? Well, it's such a book written to make a point (namely that point so succinctly expressed on the book flap) and it's all there to make the point. It's not a point that comes out of a story needing told, but a story told to make a point. It was no wonder when I got to the "about the author" and saw that the term activist was applied to him. Again, it's not crap, and lots of teenagers will like it because it puts a version of themselves on page, but it just doesn't come off as authentically as I would like.

Let's step away from novels for a moment, shall we?

The sensation which is Bone is a bit fascinating. The black-and-white alternative comics by Jeff Smith were not originally intended for young readers when they were published in the 90s, but with Scholastic's new, fully-colourized books, they've found a new life and an enormous new audience. Since the original series' story has been completely re-issued in these new editions (and were big hits), several companion books have been released. The lates is Bone: Tall Tales by Jeff Smith and collaborator Thomas Sniegoski are a collection of sort-of prequel short stories linked with a campfire story arc. As good as the original series? Of course not. Fine for what they are? Absolutely. It'll certainly be a welcome fix for kids I know who have read the cycle and hope for more from the world of Bone.

Probably my favourite magazine/periodical right now is The Believer, published by McSweeney's. This summer's issue (Number 73) is their annual music issue complete with a CD. What I like about The Believer is that it's essentially an eclectic mixture of non-fiction articles about topics that I (a) don't know much about, often, and (b) that I wouldn't otherwise read about (or think to read about). Where else would I read about MIA, the history of the drum machine, and the "slackness" of Lady Saw?

Okay. That's enough for today. I'll try and fully catch up by the end of the week!

The 2010 Summer Screen Review (Part II)

2010-08-23T22:32:00.002-04:00

Having fallen way behind on this list as well as that of my reading, I figured I'd take a few minutes to quickly bring it closer to up-to-date.

In late July, Sonya sat me down to watch my first ever (as far as I can recall) Woody Allen movie. I went in with a little bit of trepidation (suspecting that Woody would bug me) and some hopes for enjoyment (since the movie of choice was Annie Hall, the one Woody Allen movie that I've wanted to see). Well ... I'm glad I saw it. While it was true that Woody himself did annoy me -- quite a lot, actually -- I did enjoy Dianne Keaton's performance and understand why it's such an iconic role in her career. So, I'm glad I saw it ... I'm probably done with Woody Allen movies for now, at least the ones that he's actually in. I could probably enjoy some of the ones where he's behind the scenes.

We also watched The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus, which I enjoyed thoroughly. While it's not likely to be everyone's proverbial cup of tea, it certainly had a nice blend of surreal comedy and fantastic visual style that appealed to me greatly. Their way of handling the untimely death of Heath Ledger was ingenious and worked well in the context of the story. There were a few points in the movie where I thought the pacing lagged a bit, but in light of the whole, the consequence is negligible. Very enjoyable.

On the home front, Sonya came my way and together we watched Whip It!, the delightful (if unsurprising) roller derby movie starring Juno's Ellen Page along with Kristen Wiig, Drew Barrymore (who made her directorial debut as well), Juliette Lewis, and other familiar faces. Again, it's not a revolutionary film, but it's good fun.

Later, I re-watched Die Hard with a Vengeance, the only Die Hard movie I've ever seen from start to finish. The only reason I've seen that one is that Sam Phillips, one of my favourite singer-songwriters, has a role as a mute assassin. Mute, and she still manages to be one of the more interesting characters in the movie.

Of course, I also spent a little time watching less pulpy fare, with Carnage, from France, being an international entry in my summer viewing. Essentially a character study in which we see the lives of several people linked by a single bull, killed and divided after it gores a bullfighter in the ring. That's right. Sunshine and lollipops all around.

And while watching foreign-language films from France, I also watched The City of Lost Children, borrowed from ... who else? ... Sonya. Also not to everyone's taste, but certainly to mine, this bizarre film about dream stealers (sort of) was visually delicious and suitably off-kilter for an evening's enjoyment. I'm a fan of Ron Perlman and found it intriguing that the poor fellow managed to perform the entire movie in French ... which he does not speak. Given that he was also surrounded by a French cast and crew, I'd love to sit down and discuss the experience with him sometime. Ha!

On the TV-on-DVD front, I've been very active. (Why not? There's nothing on television these days anyway. Add to that the fact that television episodes come in nice, digestible lengths and BOOM, I'm watching a fair bit of it.)

I watched the entire live action series of The Tick and found it quite delightful. Seriously. Patrick Warburton was pretty much genetically predisposed to this character in every way. It's a shame it didn't last longer, because its writing was witty, focusing mostly on the less heroic aspects of a less-than-heroic group of superheroes' lives.

I also enjoyed a trip back in time, thanks once again to Sonya, with the first season of WKRP in Cincinatti. What a great show that was. My joy was further multiplied when I realized that both the famous Thanksgiving episode ("As God is my witness, I thought turkeys could fly!") and the Fish Story episide (in which Johnny Fever's reaction times miraculously improve as he gets more drunk) were both in the season. Hahaha! So much fun.

Later, it was off to the movies with Jackie and Jeff to see some goofy comedies.

Dinner for Schmucks was your typical frustration comedy, not particularly worthy of recommendation, but I didn't die either.

Grown-Ups featuring ... well ... most of the male cast of SNL from the mid-nineties. I'm happy to report that it wasn't as bad as I expected. Is it revolutionary? No. Is it more than a few fart jokes? Thankfully, yes.

Oh! And I almost forgot my most recent completion! The third season of 30 Rock! That show kills me to no end. Seriously. It's one of the funniest things on television today.

Summer 2010 Reading Spectacular #3

2010-08-12T20:29:00.002-04:00

Continuing my catch-up on my summer reading, earlier in the summer I read David Almond's Clay. Like his Michael Printz award-winning Skellig, this book is a mostly-realistic character driven study with a dusting of the supernatural. In this case, an English altar boy becomes the reluctant accomplice of a troubled newcomer to the town, whose intricate clay sculptures may (or perhaps not) come to life.

A couple of quick reads came next. Mrs. Dole is Out of Control is part of a series of early "chapter books" by goof-master Dan Gutman. Essentially a silly little dessert book, I'm sure it's good fun for those just starting their novel-reading careers. I have a few of the series heading into my class this fall for that reason.

Odd and the Frost Giants by Neil Gaiman is a bit more sophisticated as a work of writing, but also taking a mere hour or so to read. Essentially this novella is a folktalesque little adventure featuring Norse gods and a plucky little hero named Odd. While it's nothing to be compared with Coraline or The Graveyard Book, it's a decent little read. Apparently it was written for World Book Day, originally.

Continuing (completely out of the order in which I read these books), I whipped through Thomas Lakeman's Chillwater Cove. Early on, I realized that this was preceeded by a first novel (The Shadow Catchers), but apart from establishing a few relationships which aren't particularly integral to this story, it was clear that this could be read on its own. I'm at a bit of a loss to write my thoughts. It kept my interest and had a lot going on, but perhaps it had a bit too much going on. Ever read something where the plot twists and turns seem a bit forced, as if the author was throwing too many socks into the laundry? I felt quite a bit like that once I reached the two-thirds point in the book. I still wanted to see where it all lead, but I was less interested in the landscape of the story along the way. Decent, but not exemplary.

Thus endeth this episode of Reading Catch-Up. I've still got a few more to chronicle before I'm caught up, but I'm getting there.

The 2010 Summer Screen Review

2010-07-27T17:49:00.003-04:00

For Sonya, I'll comment briefly on my film and DVD viewing this year as well. Don't worry, rest of the world, I'll keep it brief.

A couple of weeks ago, I went to see Toy Story 3 and was pleasantly surprised. Don't get me wrong -- it's not that I expected it to be bad, but I was a bit wary of returning to the characters after such a long hiatus and possibly feeling like it was a purely cash-grabbing move to produce the movie at all. (I'd recently watched a very interesting documentary about Pixar.) What I got was a story that took into account that hiatus and had some decent heart along with its fun, adventuresome story. But man, that baby doll is creepy. Ha!

That covers my trips to the movies, to be honest, but I have been active with DVD, particularly with television on DVD.

Being a fan of Veronica Mars and working my way through its third and final season on DVD (and might I say that, had the show been on a stronger network, it might have lasted longer), I picked up Pulse, since it starred Kristen Bell and was seriously cheap. Hmm. Yeah, it's also really, really bad.

Yesterday, Betsy at long last had a long-overdue movie night and watched two movies. Drag Me to Hell was an enjoyable little romp from Sam Raimi, the brains behind The Evil Dead, which pretty much showcases what he does with a budget. It has a lot of the fun and schlock-horror elements but with some money behind the effects. Not brain-busting, but fun.

Then it was time for Let the Right One In, an unconventional vampire film from Sweden. So unlike the movie that would have been made in America, it is graciously calm in its storytelling, not really qualifying as horror so much as supernatural drama, I suppose. It is generous with stillness and silences, with a score I'd love to get on CD. Perhaps not everybody's cup of proverbial tea (and probably not for the teenaged gore-crowd), but a fine film.

Summer 2010 Reading Spectacular #2

2010-07-27T17:28:00.003-04:00

Alright, I've fallen behind already, thanks to a hectic few weeks with very limited internet access. I'm going to divide my reading update over a couple of entries here.

Firstly, I read Issue Two/Spring 2010 of Elephant, an Arts and Visual Culture quarterly from the UK. It was something I picked up when disappointed that I couldn't get my hands on the latest issue of The Believer and I have to admit that it was a good consolation prize. It's quite a beautiful and hefty magazine, sitting at just over 200 pages of image-laden articles and almost no advertising (and a bargain at $20, might I add). A particularly interesting idea for a section of the magazine interviewed several artists about their work and the cultural and arts scene in Madrid, each giving their thoughts, favourite places to eat, and places to visit. I'll certainly consider grabbing Issue 3 when it's available (which should be soon, if not now, I suppose).

The Society of S by Susan Hubbard is a novel about vampires with a rather misleading title. The Society is mentioned fleetingly during the book and doesn't seem central, at all, to the plot, although a certain affinity for the letter S is expressed repeatedly. I'm assuming that it becomes increasingly relevant as the series of books progresses. My main complaint about the novel is that it doesn't really arrive anywhere notable. Yes, there is a protagonist, and yes, she experiences events which set the plot in motion. Yes, she embarks on a personal quest, and yes, she even arrives at a conclusion. What is my problem, then, you ask? My problem is that the rising action doesn't rise that much. When you arrive at the end, you're left saying, "Oh. Well there you go." Sort of like embarking on a "Thelma and Louise" road trip and realizing that you're just heading to the grocer's for some milk. Having already purchased the second book (it was a sale), I'll probably read it at some point and hope for more.

Next up was the latest from one of my usual summer reading authors, Jonothan Santlofer. The Murder Notebook is his second to feature forensic sketch artist Nate Rodriguez and the first which doesn't feature the art world centrally in the story. The drawings (provided by Santlofer, a visual artist himself, and representing Rodriguez's work) are less integral to the plot than in Santlofer's previous books. While I have preferred his earlier trilogy featuring Kate McKinnon, I still enjoyed The Murder Notebook. I'm not sure if Santlofer will have a new novel ready for my 2011 summer reading, but I hope so.

The update will continue...

Summer 2010 Reading Spectacular #1

2010-07-03T22:47:00.005-04:00

So, it's been a hectic year. Just take my word for it; I don't plan to bore you with the details. I'll try to do better.

I'm planning to finish off the 52 Pages project which clearly didn't turn out to be a once-weekly entry in the end, but I'm determined to get to 52 pages in total regardless. I'm also considering another little project, but we'll see whether I get it up and running any time soon or not. Biting and chewing and all of that.

But here I am, and if nothing else, I'm back with this year's Summer Reading Spectacular, or, "What I Read Between the Beginning of July and Labour Day". I'm sure Sonya will be thrilled.

I finished up a few things just at the end of June, but technically those don't qualify, so I'll start with the things I've finished in the past few days.

I whipped through The Flash: Rebirth by Geoff Johns and Ethan van Sciver. It's a graphic novel which chronicles the return of Barry Allen, the second and "Silver Age" Flash from seeming death/obliteration back during the days of Crisis on Infinte Earths in the DC universe. Yeah, if you're not a comic reader, that probably makes little sense to you. I was around and reading back in the days of Crisis on Infinite Earths, DC's attempt to tidy up its mythology a bit, but I don't remember that much about it, to be honest. In any case ... I picked up Rebirth just out of interest since I don't read much comic-wise any more.

My reaction is somewhat lukewarm, though, perhaps because I'm removed from the current climate in the DC universe, but compounded by the fact that there just seem to be too many Flashes and Flash-like characters. There's Jay (the original Flash) who is around again these days (don't ask me). There's Barry Allen (who has returned). There's Wally West, the latest Flash. There's some teenaged Flash character, Bart Allen. There's Wally's kids, one of whom becomes the new Impulse. There's some Liberty Belle woman and some Johnny Quick character. Then there's the baddy, Reverse Flash. Seriously. Enough with the fast characters. We get it. I had thought they might be creating this storyline in order to whittle it down to one or two, but not so much. So there you have it. Maybe current Flash fans ate it up, but I just sort of went, "Huh?"

Next, I finished reading Just In Case by Meg Rosoff. You might recall that she wrote How I Live Now, winner of the Michael Printz medal and on my list of reading last summer. While I enjoyed Just In Case, it didn't grab me quite so immediately or firmly as her debut novel. This time around, she tells the story of David Case who has an experience that triggers an obsessive belief that Fate is out to get him and who subsequently tries to hide from Fate by changing his identity and name. That's just the start. It's a rather complicated narrative, in many ways, full of freak accidents, an imaginary dog, a male rabbit named Alice, mixed in with some teenaged hormones. The result is one of those "young adult" novels that I suspect has less appeal to its target audience than to those who have already passed the young adult stage. I'm not sure how readable the majority of adolescents will find it, though I have no doubt that a rather sophisticated sub-group of teen readers would eat it up.

Next up, I read Judith Guest's The Tarnished Eye, a very digestible suspense story about the vicious murder of an entire family in their summer residence in Michigan. Short, energetically written chapters and more insight than usual into the victims' characters helped to motivate quick, page-turning reading. I will keep my eyes opened for other Judith Guest titles; apparently she wrote the book Ordinary People, which was turned into a movie in the 80s.

Finally, a few minutes ago I finished reading Elephant: Issue 2, an "Arts and Visual Culture Magazine" from the UK. It's quite a hefty volume for a magazine, sitting around 200 pages, but one to read from front to back. Of those 200 pages, as well, very few are advertisements, though the magazine is quite lushly illustrated with images and works of art. I'm definitely going to watch for Issue 3 of this quarterly. I wish I'd discovered it at Issue 1. Darn.

There you have it. The start to my summer of reading. I've got five things on the go right now, so hopefully I'll manage to get through a few this coming week and keep you (both) up-to-date.

Timely

2009-09-12T11:19:00.002-04:00

Check out this strip from A Softer World. Happy Birthday to me.

Summer 2009 Reading Spectacular #14

2009-09-07T19:21:00.002-04:00

Well, August was a busy month and, although I didn't read as copiously as I am usually wont to do during the month, I thought I should wrap up this year's Summer Reading Spectacular. Today, being Labour Day, marks the end of the Summer Reading Spectacular.

While vacationing, I did manage to read a few things.

First, I finished Dismantled by Jennifer McMahon, an author new to me. Dismantled concerns itself with a group of individuals who, as art students a decade ago, fancied themselves quite the revolutionaries until a fateful tragedy alters their paths. In the present, several unsettling events force them to revisit that event from their paths and threatens to expose what they've worked so hard to conceal. The author is quite masterful at jumping between times and events, revealing the mysteries of the past in increments, looping foreshadowing, fractured flashbacks, and connecting it all to the current situation. A whim purchase, Dismantled certainly kept my attention. (It's not a book for my parents, though. Ha!)

Next, I finished Trenton Lee Stewart's The Mysterious Benedict Society, a good humoured romp for young readers. Through a newspaper ad and a series of unusual tests, Mr. Benedict (or, as I like to think of him, The Mysterious Mr. Benedict) puts together a team of young spies who, using each of their unique strengths together, must get to the bottom of nefarious goings-on at a curious private school on an island. Silly and fun, I'll have to read the sequel, especially since the first chapter was provided as a sneak-peek at the back of this edition.

Upon returning home, I read American Born Chinese, a Michael L. Printz Award winning graphic novel by Gene Luen Yang. You may recall that I had to read this because it beat out The Book Thief for the award that year. Now, I believe that it's the format (it's the first graphic novel to receive the award) that eked it out the winning slot more so than any other factor, but that is not to say it's not good. The novel follows three seemingly unrelated stories all related to the Chinese American experience. The structure (yes, all three stories prove to be connected, in the end) is inventive and works well, and there is a very truthful core to the book. The artwork is clean and infused with humour (as is the story itself). (I still believe The Book Thief should have won, but I can't really begrudge this book its win, either, because it is genuinely good.)

Finally, I finished A Widow for One Year by John Irving. While in BC, I finished the books I'd brought with me and, seeing this on the shelf where I was staying, knew it was a safe choice to start, since I had the exact book on my shelf at home. I took note of the page at which I left off in BC, came home and continued with my own copy. I'm not overly familiar with Irving, though I have read and enjoyed A Prayer for Owen Meany. I'm a bit torn on A Widow for One Year, simply because it's preoccupation with characters' varied sexual appetites isn't particularly my usual fare. Still, I like Irving's writing style and the book kept me reading, if only to see where the group of distinctly flawed folk would end up.

There you have it! Another summer of reading is behind me. I don't feel like I managed to read quite as much as I did last year, but I did manage to clear a few more titles off my "to be read" shelves. Of course, I did accidentally arrive at a store for a huge book sale, so ...

Here's a photo of this summer's reads (give or take any books, like Velocity, which I may have forgotten to set aside for the photo).

Thematically Linked

2009-07-29T00:51:00.001-04:00

When one reads many books in a short period of time, seemingly coincidental connections between them become evident. Not long ago, for example, I suddenly realized that three books in a row made mention of the drug laudenum.

Here are some thematic links I’ve noticed so far during this Summer Reading Spectacular:

art and artists (particularly Impressionists) -- The Mysterious Edge of the Heroic World; False Impression;

wars -- The Mysterious Edge of the Heroic World; How I Live Now, False Impressions, Maus: Volume One, The Book Thief;

The Second World War, in Particular -- The Mysterious Edge of the Heroic World, Maus: Volume One, The Book Thief;

pregnancy and birth -- Feathers, Edward’s Eyes, 11 Birthdays;

deafness -- Hate That Cat, Feathers;

hiding places -- The Invention of Hugo Cabret, Ordinary Ghosts, Off the Road, False Impressions (sort of), The Book Thief, Where I Live Now, Maus: Volume One;

metaphors about bowling balls in stomachs (seriously) -- The Book Thief, 11 Birthdays;

the sentiment that you can’t eat books -- The Book Thief, Maus: Volume One;

death -- almost all of them.

Summer 2009 Reading Spectacular #13

2009-07-25T23:59:00.000-04:00

(Five months to Christmas!)

As this was my last day on the Hermitage, I wrapped up a few things I was reading, but that didn’t stop me from starting a couple of others.

First off, I completed The Underwood See by Michael Lawrence. It’s the final book in the Withern Rise trilogy, and I have to admit that I’m a bit split in my opinion. The series deals with alternate realities of a family and homestead in England, called Withern Rise. The first book (A Crack in the Line) got things off to an interesting start as two kids, Alaric and Naia, accidentally find themselves moving between their worlds. In one, Ivan and Alex(andra) had a boy and later Alex dies. In the other, they have a girl and the mother lives. After discovering one another, the two dimensional travelers accidentlly end up stranded in the other’s reality. In the second book (Small Eternities) things got more complicated, with other realities colliding and other characters entering the scene. In this third volume, the story gets further complicated before being resolved. And yes, things are reasonably resolved, which is a good thing. It kept my interest.

But the flip side is that this volume took on a distinctly darker tone, in places, and it didn’t seem quite to fit with the tone of the other volumes. Now, it has been quite some time since I read volumes one and two, so perhaps I’ve just forgotten, but if not, then I find it a bit disappointing that this one wandered off the path a bit. Course language, an attempted rape, and some moderate religious disdain seemed to come out of nowhere. An interesting series, but I just wonder if the author became a bit self-indulgent by this point.

Next, I read Maus: A Survivor’s Tale Volume One – My Father Bleeds History by Art Spiegelman. The first half of a graphic novel (originally serialized in Raw magazine), it’s a biographical comic based on the author’s father’s experiences as a Jew in Germany and Poland during the Second World War. There are several interesting things about the book. First off, perhaps inspired by the quotation on the back of the title page (“The Jews are undoubtedly a race, but they are not human,” by Adolf Hitler), the characters are represented as animals. Jews are mice (hence the title), Polish are pigs, and the Germans, cats. Secondly, the narratives are a combination of conversations between the author and his father and step-mother (as mice, of course) and the stories themselves passed on by the father during these interviews. There’s a real sense of transcription to the manner in which the story is told. Finally, the book is interesting in that the characters, particularly that of Vladek, the father, are not idealized. At one point, in fact, the author, as represented within the body of the text, distresses that his comic’s representation of his father might reinforce awful stereotypes of the Jew.

I’m looking forward to finding and reading Volume Two, but also to finding out more about the comic, its history, and the author. The name “Art Spiegelman” rings a bell, but I have no idea why.

Finally, I finished a fluffy little dessert book for kids called 11 Birthdays by Wendy Mass. In a nutshell, it’s a “Groundhog Day” story about a girl who, having had a falling out with her lifelong friend the previous year, begins to relive her eleventh birthday over and over again. It was ... fine. What made it meh for me, in particular, was the feeling that the author seemed to try and overcomplicate matters, trying too hard to add “layers” to the mystery of what is happening to Amanda and how to resolve the problem. A simpler, cleaner resolution (perhaps one about the need for this slightly whiny, self-indulgent protagonist to suck it up and stop thinking only of herself) would have rung more true to me; instead the second half of the book took on a sort of “just ‘cause” feeling. I’m sure many kids will like it.

Summer 2009 Reading Spectacular #11

2009-07-24T23:59:00.000-04:00

Today, I pretty much marathon-read The Book Thief by Markus Zusak. I started it yesterday, alternating as I usually do between it and other books. This morning, I took up residence in my little beach chair and read several more chapters, skipped over to another book for a few chapters, and then returned to The Book Thief. Apart from breaking for a meal, I read it straight through from there until I was finished.

Wow.

I don’t even want to bother clumsily summarizing its plot, other than to say that it’s set during the Second World War. I’ll quote two sentences from its narrator instead:

I wanted to explain that I am constantly overestimating and underestimating the human race – that rarely do I simply estimate it. I wanted to ask her how the same thing could be so ugly and so glorious, and its words and stories so damning and brilliant.

This is one of those books that I’ll be sharing with others without a doubt. It was given the Michael L. Printz Honor in 2006 and I’m left with one itching question: What the heck won the medal that year?

[I looked it up. American Born Chinese, the first graphic novel to receive the award, won. I just ordered it.]

Production Values

2009-07-23T23:59:00.002-04:00

Have you ever noticed the variety and sheer number of producers working on television shows? No? Let me talk you through it.

Here's what you'll find during the opening credits of Episode Two of 30 Rock, a show I find fatally enjoyable.

Executive Producer: Tina Fey

Executive Producer: Joann Alfano

Executive Producer: Marci Klein

Executive Producer: David Miner

Co-Executive Producer: Robert Carlock

Co-Executive Producers: Brett Baer and Dave Finkel

Co-Executive Producer: Jack Burditt

Co-Executive Producer: John Riggi

Supervising Producer: Adam Bernstein

Producer: Jeff Richmond

Produced by Jerry Kupfer

Still not enough for you? Then let's look at the closing credits, as well!

Executive Producer: Lorne Michaels

Co-Producer: Irene Burns

Co-Producer: Matt Hubbard

Co-Producer: Margo A. Myers

Associate Producers: Jennifer Danielson and Andrew Singer

Them's a lot o' producers.

Summer 2009 Reading Spectacular #10

2009-07-23T23:59:00.000-04:00

Two more books finished today and four currently in the works.

Fist, I finished up the short novel Edward’s Eyes by Patricia MacLachlan, author of the Newbery Medal-winning Sarah, Plain and Tall. One thing that has always struck me about MacLachlan’s books is the gentle, sincere nature of the storytelling. She deals with emotion in a way that rings true without ever using it sensationally. One of my students had read Edward’s Eyes and told me I should read it, which I’m glad I did. It’s the sort of novel that my ten-year-old self would have loved, too.

I also finished the Michael L. Printz Award-winner How I Live Now, by Meg Rosoff. I went into reading unknowingly, basically having bought the book from the bargain shelves because it seemed vaguely interesting and had the Printz seal on its cover. I was pleased, then, to finally pick it up and start reading and to be sucked in quite readily. In a nutshell (and an overly simplistic nutshell this will be), the book follows Daisy, an American sent to live with unknown relatives in England, as she arrives in the countryside home of her cousins and quickly finds herself cut off from everything she finds familiar when the country becomes an Occupied Territory in the midst of War. The narrative voice is distinct, a big part of the book’s appeal. The storyline is engaging, affecting, and will have certainly (I’m sure) drawn the attention of the Southern States who are so much in love with making lists of books to ban. A quick, but satisfying read, it’s certainly one I’d recommend.

Summer 2009 Reading Spectacular #9

2009-07-22T23:59:00.001-04:00

The weather has been odd up here this year. Apart from being generally cooler, we’ve been getting a lot of those little showers and mini showers. It has seriously made scheduling my reading-on-the-beach sessions complicated.

Today I finished Jeffrey Archer’s False Impressions. Stupid me just realized this very minute that the little fingerprint graphic on the dustjacket is a picture of Van Gogh, not just a multicoloured fingerprint. Yeesh.

I admit that I’m an Archer fan. I enjoy his books. Deal with it. This book, involving financial fraud, stolen artwork, and hired assassins helped to make up for the fact that this year I didn’t plan ahead sufficiently to have a Jonathan Santlofer book up here with me. (Santlofer’s books are always art-related thriller-style novels.) For the past few years, I’ve included a volume of Jeffrey Archer’s A Prison Diary on my Hermitage reading list.

Anyway, like most of Archer’s novels, this was an engaging, quick, enjoyable read. Sure, I ‘called’ a few of the plot twists along the way (and even predicted – incorrectly – one that I think Archer should have used), but that didn’t really detract from my enjoyment.

I also finished Feathers by Jacqueline Woodson. The cover says, “Winner of a Newbery Honor,” but I’m not entirely certain if that means the author is a winner of a Newbery Honor or if this book, specifically, is. I’ll have to check. In any case, Feathers is a slim little novel set in an all-black neighbourhood in the 70s and Frannie, the narrator, takes us through a few days in which she tries to sort out relationships and emotions connecting her with her best friend Samantha whose father is a minister, Jesus Boy the new – and surprisingly white – boy in her class, Sean her deaf brother, and her mother who is pregnant. Despite this seemingly complicated summary, it’s really quite a simple book about complex ideas. A poem by Emily Dickinson, presented by the teacher before the first page, is the thread that ties it all together. Hope is the thing with feathers...”

(Wow. This is a very poorly articulated entry. Okay, several of them have been, lately, but this one is particularly bad!)

Summer 2009 Reading Spectacular #9

2009-07-21T23:59:00.003-04:00

Today I finished two books started yesterday, continued one, and started two others.

Off the Road by Nina Bawden is sort of a blend of Lois Lowry’s The Giver and ......, with a bit of M. Night Shamalamadingdong’s The Village thrown in for good measure. In a society in which only-children are the law, and where Oldies are sent on their sixty-fifth birthdays to vague fates at Memory Theme Parks, Tom makes a fateful decision of his own when he follows his grandfather who goes “over the wall” and into the Wilds beyond. There he meets a family he never knew existed and discovers a way of life he never imagined. But he is there as an Illegal and the authorities on the Outside will only look the other way for so long. Perhaps my only real criticism of the book is that Bawden could have taken the story further; the premise has potential for so much more. In a roundabout way, I guess that’s a compliment.

I also finished Richard Peck’s Here Lies the Librarian, another example of what Peck does so well – turn-of-the-century(ish) historical / whimsical fiction. This book brought me back to The Teacher’s Funeral and could conceivably be considered a companion work. Here Lies the Librarian deals with tomboyish Eleanor and her brother as they try to operate a garage during the advent of the automobile age in small-town America, while the town is carried along into a miniature renaissance of sorts by a quartet of affluent young women from Indianapolis who take over the local public library. Enjoyable if you like that sort of thing, which I do. Ha!

The Ghost in the Machinery

2009-07-21T23:59:00.001-04:00

The DVD player here operates according to a set of mysterious rules that I’m trying to define. Here’s what I’ve seemingly established to this point:

1. When loading a disc, the player will make a rather loud and intrusive mechanical noise through loading, any previews, and the home menu. The noise will stop once you move to an episode-specific menu (X-Files) or an episode itself (30 Rock).

2. When watching any episode after loading the disc certain rules appear to apply. With 30 Rock, this may or may not result in the subtitles being turned on upon initial viewing. With The X-Files, the subtitles will CERTAINLY be turned on to English. Once the subtitles are turned off, the episode will, for reasons unexplained, play without subtitles, but any on-screen text (such as locations and times) will also appear in French.

3. If an episode of The X-Files includes a deleted scene, accessed by clicking “select/ok/enter” on the remote when an X appears in the corner of the screen, and if this feature is turned on before viewing, then no subtitles will appear.

4. A second episode viewed without removing the disc will cancel out any odd subtitle behaviours.

Weird, weird, weird.

Summer 2009 Reading Spectacular #8

2009-07-20T23:59:00.000-04:00

Today I finished Eireann Corrigan’s Ordinary Ghosts. Emil is coming to grips with the recent death of his mother, and the abrupt and unexplained departure of his older brother. Using a secret master key to the private boys’ school where he attends, he starts sneaking into the school buildings late at night, meeting a mysterious girl who’s sneaking in for her own reasons, and trying to find a way to leave his mark.

The story has a lot going for it, most notably Emil’s complex and somewhat tormented relationships with members of his family, each absent in its own way. There was a story worth telling here. Where it disappointed, though, was in the author’s seemingly insistent “edginess”. I’m fine with books which address the teen experience in a forthright manner, but Corrigan seemed a bit too in-your-face with it. (I told you I’d get to it.) Within pages of starting it was clear that the book was going to include foul language, drug use, and frank sexual references, and that we would be reminded of the author’s commitment to such elements on a pagely basis. Yeah, we get it. Ooo. Edgy. Can we move past it and get on with the story? If I had to read the word “ricockulous” again, I was going to smack someone.

Dear Ms. Corrigan:

I get it. You take pride in being all gritty and for “keepin’ it real”. If you want to see how to do it right, read the works of E.R. Frank. Let it flow from the story; don’t force the issue.

Sincerely,
Me

I also read Volume One of Bizenghast, a manga by M. Alice LeGrow (“Marty LeGrow”). In a nutshell, this little gothic horror maga is about an orphaned girl who somehow finds herself in a dark contract that binds her to the task of freeing lost, pained souls bound to a mysterious cementary in the town of Bizenghast. Heck, I read the book and I still find myself using the term “somehow finds herself in a dark contract” because I don’t know how that happened. It just sort of ... is.

Still, a promising premise, right? Right? Well, here’s the problem ... or two. Each ghost must be freed by solving a riddle on its headstone and then helping the spirit to resolve it’s issues. These mini-stories within the bigger are woefully underdeveloped, unfortunately, and the “rules” which govern this middleworld are nebulous at best. Sometimes attacking the ghostly apparition of a victim’s attacker is what’s needed, sometimes turning into a tree (?) works, and throwing a girl off a rooftop might be what frees her. Huh? Add to that the inconsistent quality of the artwork, and I’m left a little cold. The story is further complicated by the fact that the graveyard is apparently run by a manager, a staff, and a cleaning crew (who are, apparently, bad) and the real-world dilemma of Dinah’s perceived dementia. I so wanted to enjoy Bizenghast, as I’ve not really become a manga person, but want to understand the appeal better.

Plus, why do guys in manga look so darned pretty? At one point, I didn’t realize that the character in front of me was Vincent in another setting, though I’d already spent a third of the book with him. Hmmm.

Summer 2009 Reading Spectacular #7

2009-07-19T23:59:00.001-04:00

Today was quite a productive day, when it comes to recreational reading!

First off, I finished Brian Selznick’s The Invention of Hugo Cabret, winner of the 2008 Newbery Medal. Prior to this, I knew Selznick as an illustrator, and this book makes extensive use of those abilities. In telling the story of a boy, clockworks, early cinema, and mystery, the author combines narrative prose with wordless, illustrated passages (and some photographs), creating a silent-film feel which compliments the subject matter brilliantly.

Next, while sitting down by the lake, I read The Autobiography of My Dead Brother by Walter Dean Myers. Coincidentally, this also makes a point of integrating drawings and comic-style strips (by Myers’s son Christopher) into the narrative about a boy struggling with live on the streets of Harlem. Also coincidentally, both Walter Dean Myers and Christopher Myers are integral to the plot of Hate That Cat which I read yesterday. I read the book cover-to-cover in one sitting this afternoon. It’s interesting to note that Myers was unflinching, in many ways, in addressing harsh realities in his book but never became in-your-face or look-at-how-edgy-I-am-being about it, a problem I’m having with another book I’m reading. (I’m sure you’ll be hearing about it soon.) The Autobiography of My Dead Brother was a National Book Award Finalist, and it’s interesting to note that it was one of those books I’d had on my shelf, waiting to be read, and I kept skipping over it and, when I finally sat down to read it, I whipped through it.

Finally, I read The Death of Superman trade paperback, which had been giving to me last month. I’d read the comics back in the day when the whole Death of Superman storyline was unfolding, but sat down this evening to read it through again, since I’d been given it. I kept thinking, “Oh yeah!” about characters who popped up throughout the story and vaguely remembering how they fit into the bigger picture of the ole DC Universe back in the day.

Little Nemo in Vampland: The Musical

2009-07-19T11:01:00.000-04:00

So, I had a rather random dream last night. Like many dreams are wont to do, it sort of flipped from one storyline to another rather abruptly and illogically, though in the dream, of course, it seemed to make perfect sense. One moment I was trying to explain to my visiting mother that both the box of Medieval Times materials in the basement and the one in the hall closet were needed and neither could be thrown out. This was, of course, happening in a house that was both mine and not mine.

Next thing, I am arriving late at the opening of a musical version of Twilight in which, apparently, I am acting. For reasons unexplained, I was never involved in any of the rehearsals but am quickly put into a costume including a very bad wig and reminded that I’m playing the part of Frankie. Having never read or seen Twilight, I have no idea if a Frankie even exists in its context. (If I had internet where I am currently typing, I would check.) After faking my way through the opening scene by staying far stage right, and after somehow getting gum in my wig, I’m able to make an exit and find myself scrambling around backstage begging for someone to give me a copy of the script so I can figure out what I’m supposed to be doing in my next scene. Finally, my friend Tracy (who was apparently in the cast with me) gives me hers, but warns me that it’s a side and, lo and behold, there’s no Scene Three since her character doesn’t appear in it. Just as I’m throwing my arms up in the air and asking, “What do they expect me to do?”, I wake up.

Odd.

Summer 2009 Reading Spectacular #6

2009-07-18T23:59:00.000-04:00

Today I started and finished Hate That Cat by Sharon Creech, which may seem quite impressive until I point out that it’s a short novel for young readers that’s written entirely as a collection of free-verse poems, as was Love That Dog, to which this is a follow-up, and as such is a lightning-fast read. The protagonist, Jack, finds himself with the same poetry-loving teacher, Miss Stretchberry, that he had the previous school year. I went in wondering if it was going to read as an opportunistic retreading of old ground from the other book, but was pleasantly surprised that Creech has woven in the threads of Love That Dog, but managed to make it a successful continuation of Jack’s development. Charming and engaging, with Jack’s voice really being the star of the show. Thanks, Sharon Creech.

Summer 2009 Reading Spectacular #5

2009-07-17T23:59:00.000-04:00

Uncle Montague’s Tales of Terror by Chris Priestly is a charmingly gothic series of spooky tales for kids housed within the framework of a story. It hits quite nicely that level of “fun to be creeped out” for kids that Coraline rides on. As a series of shorter stories, of course, none of them are as developed as Neil Gaiman’s novella, but that’s fine; instead they work as (and indeed are presented as) oral narratives in the vein of campfire ghost stories. Fun, slightly silly, and sure to give the nine-to-eleven set a nice case of chills.

Summer 2009 Reading Spectacular #4

2009-07-15T23:59:00.001-04:00

Maxx Comedy: The Funniest Kid in America by Gordon Korman was, disappointingly, not very funny.

I am a Korman Fan, having read his books all through the 80s and still collecting them for my own enjoyment as well as for the class library. Sure, there’s a certain formula to many of his books, but it’s a formula that works, one that taps quite nicely into the humour of kids. I guess that’s why this was such a disappointment. It just plain wasn’t that funny. The “surprise ending” is not only 100% predictable, it’s also very anti-climactic. It’s not satisfying. It’s not even believable within the world of the book.

I can only wonder if this one was somehow churned out to satisfy a contractual obligation. You let me down this time, Mr. Korman, but don’t worry; I’ll return for more and continue to expect better.

Summer 2009 Reading Spectacular #3

2009-07-08T23:38:00.000-04:00

I just finished reading Bike Path Rapist by my friend Jeff Schober. It's a true crime book about the serial rapist and killer that was active for nearly 30 years in the Buffalo area.

Reading a friend's book can be a dangerous thing. What if it's bad? Yikes!

I didn't have to worry about that, though. The book is surprisingly readable and Jeff avoided sensationalizing the crimes themselves. He plays with chronology in the telling, too, maintaining an overall arc that takes the Task Force's work from start to finish while looping timelines, weaving together the threads of years of events and activities into the fabric of the story. Well done, Jeff!

Summer 2009 Reading Spectacular #2

2009-07-05T19:31:00.002-04:00

While in New York (oh, did I mention I went to New York for a few days? I did.) I was in need of a book. When Sonya caught me reading the back of a Band-Aid box, she said, "Let's go. We need to find you some reading material." Off we went to the Wal-greens to find a paperback and the result was Dean Koontz's Velocity. In truth, it just seemed like the best best of what they had.

I was pleasantly surprised, then, at how engaging I found it. In a nutshell, Billy Wiles, unassuming bartender, finds himself at the whim of a killer after he finds a note on his car windshield.

If you don't take this note to the police and get them involved, I will kill a lovely blond schoolteacher somewhere in Napa County.

If you do take this note to the police, I will instead kill an elderly woman active in charity work.

You have six hours to decide. The choice is yours.

Quickly paced, it kept me turning the pages and interested to the end. Having never read anything by Koontz (that I can recall, anyway), I was relieved that my wee-hours-of-the-morning purchase proved fruitful.

Summer 2009 Reading Spectacular #1

2009-07-04T23:59:00.002-04:00

The summer is here and I'm back to reading with some regularity.

I just finished reading The House of the Scorpion by Nancy Farmer and highly recommend it. I'd previously read The Ear, the Eye and the Arm by the author and loved it, so it was only a matter of time before I read more of her stuff. (The Sea of Trolls is on my bookshelf waiting to be read, as well.)

The book chronicles the life of Matteo (Matt) Alacran, the clone of the drug lord known as El Patron who rules the strip of land called Opium, which lies sandwiched between Azatlan (formerly Mexico) and the United States. Treated as livestock by most, but like an heir by El Patron, Matt grows up knowing little of the world outside Opium and little of the true character of El Patron until he realizes the function and purpose of clones -- spare parts.

The book has earned accolades such as the National Book Award, the Newbery Honor, and the Michael Printz Honor, and rightly so, as far as I'm concerned. Set in an unspecified near future, it's science fiction that barely reads as such.

The Return of Dullgloomy

2009-07-04T23:58:00.000-04:00

Okay, as will be clear to even the most oblivious of readers, things at dullgloomy (not to mention anywhere else I post anything) have been less-than-active for quite some time now. Life became ridiculously hectic and something had to give.

If all goes well, we should be back on track ... at least for a while here. (Of course, I doubt anyone's actually checking in here any more, anyway.)

Baggage

2009-03-12T23:50:00.002-04:00

Okay, over the past few weeks there have been lots of things about which I've thought, "I should mention that on dullgloomy", but as you can see, it hasn't happened.

Today I went to The Bay to purchase something small. Very small. About the size of a DVD case, but 1/3 as thick. I went to pay for it, and can you guess what the gal did? She put it in a bag. A gift-bag-styled bag.

"That's quite a bag for this one thing," I said.

She just sort of looked up out of the top of her eyes and said something non-commital like, "Uh huh."

"Seems a bit excessive doesn't it?"

No response.

So I flipped the bag over and said, "I hope this is recyclable."

"I think it is," she replied.

Come on, people! It's so silly that I bought a pair of shoe laces at Walmart the other day and had to say, "Wait. I don't need a bag for that." And now a heavy-duty gift bag for one small thing? Yeesh.

International Holiday Greetings #1.7

2009-01-29T00:01:00.001-05:00

I know you've been waiting, Aucklanders, for your due, so "HAPPY PROVINCIAL ANNIVERSARY", Auckland, New Zealand.

(And yes, I know you won't ACTUALLY celebrate until Monday...)

International Holiday Greetings #1.6

2009-01-26T00:01:00.000-05:00

Okay. I'll do what I can here to cover the bases.

"HAPPY CHINESE / LUNAR NEW YEAR FESTIVAL and/or its beginning!!!"

This applies to several places including, but not necessarily limited to, China, Korea, Singapore, and Hong Kong.

Next, "MERRY REPUBLIC DAY" to those in India.

And don't forget "JOYOUS AUSTRALIA DAY" to the ... well ... Australians.

Expectations

2009-01-25T23:11:00.003-05:00

Here's something somewhat curious about me.

When I go to the movies, which isn't that often these days, I feel cheated if there aren't sufficient previews, or if I arrive too late to see them. I'm happiest if there's a good four or five of them. And car commercials or soft-drink promotions do not count. (Those I could do without.)

I do not feel the same way about videos. If they're there, they're there; if they're not, fine. I do, however, insist that they be skippable. I can't stand it when DVDs won't allow you to skip straight to the menu. That's just offensive.

Additionally, I feel a little cheated if I open a new DVD and find no little paper anything inside the case. If it's just a case with a disk, I think that's just plain cheap. Ideally, there would be an interesting little booklet, much like those that come with CDs, but at barest minimum there should be a little listing of chapters/scenes with a copy of the movie poster on the reverse. Come on, people. Is that too much to ask?

International Holiday Greetings #1.5

2009-01-22T00:01:00.001-05:00

To our wonderful New Zealander friends in or from Wellington, I say, "Happy Provincial Anniversary". (If you're from Auckland, you have to wait a few more days.)

Paula, into which celebratory group do you fit?

Enter Wildlife

2009-01-18T20:47:00.003-05:00

Today was another pleasant winter day. If this keeps up, I may have to change my stance on the season.

In any case, after shovelling the sidewalk in front of the house, I decided to to on a wee walk, following my usual postbox route despite not having any mail to post.

A couple of blocks from my house, I was passed by a coyote running in the opposite direction. A coyote. A couple of blocks from my house. In the middle of the city.

No sooner had it passed me and turned down a side street, a van pulled up to the side of the road. I turned to it, expecting it to be someone I knew, but it was a couple of complete strangers.

"Did you just see that coyote run by?" they asked.

I was a bit amused that strangers stopped me just because they wanted to talk to someone who had seen the coyote. I think that, after our brief conversation, they drove off to see if they could find where it had gone.

About a year and a half ago, I looked out my back door window to see a deer behind my house.

Next stop? Gentle Ben.

International Holiday Greetings #1.4

2009-01-14T00:01:00.000-05:00

Today marks the Indian holiday of Makar Sankranti. Have a great one if you celebrate it!

International Holiday Greetings #1.3

2009-01-12T00:01:00.000-05:00

For those of you in Japan, Happy Coming of Age Day! If you're not Japanese or if you're not turning 20 this year, have a great day anyway!

Yay, Yay, Tina Fey!

2009-01-07T21:29:00.000-05:00

I find this very amusing.

International Holiday Greetings #1.2

2009-01-06T00:01:00.002-05:00

Happy Epiphany / Three Kings Day / Ukrainian and Russian Christmas Eve (depending on where you live on this planet of ours.

If anyone wants to give me gifts, I could feel Ukrainian if I wanted to, so feel free.

Parker Lewis Can't Lose

2009-01-05T19:04:00.003-05:00

While I was out walking the neighbourhood (having put something in the mail once again), I saw a parking enforcement officer stop to ticket some rebellious parker (not to be confused with a nosey parker).

Now, to indulge in a little tangent, I wonder how it feels to be a parking enforcement officer. I'm not intending to be insulting, but in the grand scheme of municipal policing, I'm sure that not many kids grow up thinking, "Man! I wanna be a parking enforcement officer!" Do the other officers (such as those who are members of the police force) look down their proverbial noses at the parking enforcement officers? And if so, is that really fair? I mean, is sitting by the side of the highway with a radar gun for a speed trap particularly what police officers envisioned their jobs to be?

Which leads to tangent number two. (A tangent from a tangent is a what? Mathematical types? Anyone?) I have a theory that there's a problem with what the job of policing has become. Although I am well-aware that the police do more than sit in speed traps to catch speeders, my concern is that this has become the "public face" of police officers and their work. What happened to those days, not that long ago since I remember them, when police officers were to be found in our neighbourhoods and communities, interacting with citizens on a one-to-one basis, engaging in casual "we're here for you" types of dialogue? If there was more of that going on, maybe (a) there would be a renewed trust in our police forces, and (b) there would be a return to the concept of "the police officer is your friend" rather than "the police officer is out to catch you speeding".

But I digress. And digress.

The whole noteable thing about Mr. Parking Enforcement Officer is that he stopped on the side of the street, got out of his car, and walked back the half-block to give the offending vehicle on a side street its ticket. Wait. Let me rephrase that. He parked on the side of the busy main street, in a no-parking zone -- engine off, headlights off, no hazard lights blinking -- and walked the half-block to give the offending vehicle on a side street a ticket.

I was tempted to say, "I'm glad you're ticketing parking violations. You should probably give that guy one, too. Pardon? Oh. That's your car? How silly of me."

One More Project for 2009

2009-01-04T00:01:00.000-05:00

As promised, I have one more project for the year. 52 Pages is a once-a-week book recommendation. Children's literature, "grown-up" fiction, non-fiction, graphic novels ... anything's fair game as long as I've read it and liked it. I'm often asked for book recommendations, so why not do some of it here?

Sorry to disappoint you, Sonya.

(Daily) Climate Change

2009-01-03T21:01:00.002-05:00

The weather in the past month has been ridiculous and today was a prime example of how bad it's become.

Earlier today, it was bright, sunny, and surprisingly warm for January 3. I was out wearing a light jacket / casual blazer thing. And I was plenty comfortable.

About an hour ago, I went out for a walk to the mailbox. This time I was decked out in my winter coat and, if I'd realized just how much the temperature had dropped, I would have worn a hat, as well. By the time I got back home, I was distinctly cold.

What's going on with that? Over the course of a couple of hours, the weather changed that much, and it's not the first time it's happened like that this year.

It giveth one pause to wonder...

Hints of Things to Come

2009-01-02T23:59:00.000-05:00

Because I'm insane, watch for something else new on Sunday....

International Holiday Greetings #1.1

2009-01-01T23:56:00.000-05:00

Incidentally, HAPPY NEW YEAR!

Another Year Begins

2009-01-01T23:36:00.003-05:00

So perhaps this wasn't the best year for consistent dullgloomy posting, but I was quite consistent over at A Year in Haiku.

For the new year, feel free to check out Random Acts of Gratitude, my new 365 project, or The Unnecessary Exploits of Martin G. Melbourne, the not-entirely-true weblog of a 17-Year Old Loser.

Supportive

2008-12-11T23:26:00.002-05:00

This is also well done and thought-provoking. Is it too subtle for North Americans, though?

Who Needs a Demon Barber?

2008-12-11T22:46:00.002-05:00

This gives one cause to pause.

Kinder

2008-11-13T23:01:00.002-05:00

This proves that drug use pervades all levels of society, including advertising professionals and corporate executives who approve such commercials.

Irony?

2008-11-03T21:24:00.002-05:00

I just watched a commercial (yes, I was watching television again) for Home Hardware's Safe Cut package opener. Yes, it will help you open those difficult packages easily and safely. Specifically, it will help you open those stiff plastic capsule-like packages that generally hang on a hook in the store. (Yes, you know the ones I mean; they're like Fort Knox and non-recyclable in most communities.)

What's fun is at the end of the commercial, they show their product. It's in one of those stiff plastic capsule-like packages that generally hang on a hook in the store. (Yes, you know the ones I mean; they're like Fort Knox and non-recyclable in most communities.)

You got it. Their product for easily opening those difficult packages comes in one of those difficult packages. That's just asking your customer to get annoyed, seeing hope right there behind the crystyal-clear plastic but useless while you fight your way inside.

Campaigning

2008-11-02T01:37:00.002-04:00

I was watching a broadcast from Washington State and, naturally, 75% of the commercials were political in nature. The funniest thing, though, there were two ads which ran back-to-back, one for the Republican candidate and one for the Democratic candidate.

But what is so interesting about that, you ask?

Well, since they ran back-to-back, it was quickly evident that the two commercials had something in common.

Something more than their use of phrases involving the word "change".

That's right. They were both narrated by exactly the same woman. The voice was identical. One moment she's telling me about the lies told about so-and-so by the Republicans and then in the next, she is telling the audience to vote for them. Good times in advertising!

Mark of Wonder

2008-10-15T00:05:00.002-04:00

Know what I think?

I think you should start reading Wondermark, because I recently discovered it and quite enjoy it.

Pants

2008-10-08T23:36:00.002-04:00

Dear Bald Pedestrian,

I feel the need to draw to your attention something which bothered me, and, since you otherwise seem like a reasonable and thoughful individual (well, you did from my car, anyway), I thought you would want to know.

Your pants were just wrong. Please do not be confused -- you could be English, after all -- I am referring to your trousers, not to your gitch.

It is my humble opinion that men should avoid pleated pants at the best of times. Large men look puffy; thin men look pear-shaped. They're not advisable, regardless of what the racks in Sears may be telling you. That is, of course, merely my humble opinion.

But where this moves from opinion to hard fact is this:

Pleated jeans are never, ever, acceptable. Never.

I thought you should know.

Sybill

2008-09-13T23:49:00.000-04:00

Alright. I'm now officially convinced that Subway is the greatest untapped resource of quirky exchanges and odd little bits of entertainment around.

Tonight I dropped in for a quick dinner. I ordered my sub and was met by the rather dour demeanor of the sandwich girl, who seemed, for all intents and purposes, to hate her job and to hate me for my role in it.

When it came to sauces, she asked me if I wanted regular or lite (I know, "lite" rather than "light", but that's what's on the bottle) mayo.

"I'll have lite," I replied, trying to be friendly. "I'll pretend I'm eating something healthy."

And suddenly the world shifted out of alignment.

A few moments later she said, and I quote: "When you said 'light', that was funny. The way you said it, almost like you had a pose, too."

Oooookay.

"Well," said I, "it's not like it'll make that big a difference, since the tuna's full of regular mayonnaise, anyway."

"Yeah," she said. "We mix the tuna with regular. Maybe we should make it with lite."

From there, she was complete Chatty Cathy. We discussed the non-functioning touchscreen on the cash register. The big blackout of '93. Hospitalization. And cookies. All in as long as it took for me to pay.

Odd... I still think the sentence, "When you said 'light', that was funny," delivered in a way as dry as a desert will stick in my head for a while.

Summer Reading Spectacular #20

2008-09-01T23:18:00.002-04:00

Well, I finished one last book before the clock chimed the end of Labour Day. And no, I do not have a chiming clock.

A Crime in the Neighborhood by Susanne Berne is a sort of domestic drama set in the early seventies, telling the events of a pivotal summer in the narrator's life as a young girl when a neighbourhood boy was found murdered and the Watergate burglary was all over the news. It was a wonderful, if sometimes rather disturbing, book and earned the author the Orange Prize in 1999. I'd previously read and enjoyed one of her later books, A Perfect Arrangement another "behind the doors" drama.

Summer Reading Spectacular #19

2008-08-31T15:37:00.002-04:00

Well, I thought that, with Labour Day coming up, I should quickly summarize the remaining books which I've finished since returning from my holiday. I'll be upfront about the fact that it's not much, having found myself largely occupied with other pursuits.

On the way back from Lake Huron, I finished listening to Room One by Andrew Clements. This was the first time I listened to a book rather than reading it, and the experience was interesting. Being very visual, I'm not sure that I really should listen to books for long periods while driving, as I find myself picturing the scenes with quite a bit of detail, making me wonder how much of my ocular input is making it to my brain. Obviously a fair amount must be getting there as I did not careen off the road and into a ditch, nor did I rear-end anyone at any point. Still... I also missed the interaction that one has with the printed word, being able to pace, loop and reread, or savour the text at will. The guy reading on the CDs was good at what he did, but I found his "character voices", particularly that of a teenaged Texan girl, a bit grating at first.

But about the book itself, it was alright. I quite like Andrew Clements on the whole, though I feel that he's started grinding out books a bit quickly following the deserved success of Frindle. One of my biggest beefs with Room One was the tendency to overdo the "thinking processes" of its protagonist. Readers, even young readers, are more sophisticated than authors sometimes give them credit for being, and having a writer give a step-by-step, blow-by-blow rundown of every moment in a character's realization of soemething can just be irritating. After all, we often make those realizations in a whirling rush of understanding, not as discreet steps laid out like a mathematical formula. The book's prosocial content was appreciated, though a bit rosey, at times, for me.

I've also read Bone: Volume 4 - The Dragonslayer and Bone: Volume 5 - Rock Jaw: Master of the Eastern Border and will comment after reading all that I've got (now up to Volume 8).

I finished reading the Kidnapped trilogy and enjoyed it well enough for the light adventure for kids that it is. There are, as is to be expected, some rather far-fetched moments and certainly a twist seen a mile off (though I suspect that, were I reading it aloud to a group of kids, at least a few would gasp at the revelation, so the target audience excuses the seeming transparency). As a rule, Gordon Korman knows who his audience is and gives them what they'll enjoy.

Finally, as of this moment, I read another book for kids, Dear Dumb Diary, Let's Pretend This Never Happened (the first in the Dear Dumb Diary series. I read it because I know of some kids who have enjoyed it. Let's be honest; it's nothing special. More middle-school shenanigans written quickly and predictably, overall. Slightly more mean-spirited, perhaps, than Diary of a Wimpy Kid, but I suppose that's to be expected from Jim Benton, creator of that stupid Happy Bunny nonsense.

I sort of have an inkling that I'm missing something that I've read in there, but until I stumble upon a book in my house and think, "Oh yeah! I'd forgotten about that!" I guess I'll have to leave it be.

I'm in the midst of several other reading projects (A Crime in the Neighbourhood, Through Painted Deserts, Watchmen, Interworld, the next Bone book... And will have to decide whether: (a) summer ends with Labour Day, meaning the end of Summer Reading Spectaculars as well; (b) summer ends with the advent of Autumn around September 21; or (c) whether I should just drive Sonya nuts by continuing to log my reading regardless of season. Hmmmmm. Decisions, decisions...

Summer Reading Spectacular #18

2008-08-09T21:41:00.000-04:00

It rained most of the day, complete with thunder and lightning, which definitely cut into my reading routine. Not only could I not set up camp at beach the once it started, but the heavy rainfall on the roof insisted that I cozy on up for a good, long afternoon nap rather than sit outside reading. Who was I to argue?

I did read one book (start to finish) before the rain started, and also read some other things at other times, so it wasn’t a complete washout. I read Marcovaldo (or The seasons of the city) by Italo Calvino, a collection of short stories centred around Marcovaldo, an unskilled labourer in 1950s and 1960s Italy, and his family over the course of twenty seasons. In some ways, the tone of its whimsical adventures reminded me of Puckoon, but with a much gentler sense of absurdity than with Milligan. I’d read The Baron in the Trees by Calvino last year; both books were gifts from my dear friend Linda.

Since I return home tomorrow, I guess that the remaining books that I’m in the midst of will be completed as part of my regular, and more limited, reading schedule. Still, I do think that it was a relatively successful week of reading, having taken at least a small bite out of the pile(s) of books on my “to read” shelves.

Summer Reading Spectacular #17

2008-08-08T21:22:00.000-04:00

Spaghetti Bolognese.

That's what I noticed in two books. Spaghetti Bolognese. In Prison Diary Volume 3, it gets a passing mention but is more prominent in Uglies (see below).

So, on that note, here's what I finished today.

Uglies by Scott Westerfeld is the first in a trilogy about a future when everyone gets extensive surgery at age 16 to become a "Pretty" and about what happens when someone doesn't want to have the surgery. It took me a little while to get into it, but in the end, I quite enjoyed it. I have the other two books on the shelf to read at my leisure.

I also finished reading Anatomy of Fear by Jonathan Santlofer. This is the fourth novel from this artist-writer and I've read them all. His books are crime thrillers centred on art-related crimes, and I've enjoyed them all. For this novel, Santlofer left behind the focal character of his previous three books and started fresh with a new protagonist, a curiously talented sketch artist named Nate Rodriguez. In this book, he also experimented with writing in first-person for scenes featuring the protagonist, while maintaining his usual third-person omniscient narrator for other scenes. I found the transition between the two narrative voices a little jarring, at time, but enjoyed the book nonetheless. Check out The Death Artist, Color Blind, and The Killing Art, too. Plus, I just discovered that he has a new book featuring Nate Rodriguez, The Murder Notebook/span>. I guess I know what I'll be reading next summer.

Summer Reading Spectacular #16

2008-08-07T21:20:00.000-04:00

I confess that today was a less-than-productive day when it comes to reading. For some reason I spent more time than usual napping. Hey. It is my vacation. The wind was up today, and so my time spent reading at the beach was also cut short. In the morning, the wind was rather cool, so I came back early for lunch. In the evening, the wind was quite warm, so I stayed reading for a while, but quite frankly, trying to keep my book open to the correct page was a bit challenging at times.

In any case, I did do some reading and finished one book. I read Jeffrey Archer’s A Prison Diary: Volume 1 – Hell two summers ago while here. Last year, I read Volume 2: Purgatory and now I’ve read Volume 3: Heaven. Being a fan of Archer’s novels, I have also found these rather fascinating. He is very candid about his experiences as well as his treatment while incarcerated. He comes across rather positively about most of the officers whom he encountered while in the big house (ha!) but less positively about the bureaucracy of the system.

At one point, I thought, “Funny how you can be reading completely different books at the same time and notice some little passing detail that they have in common,” but by the end I’d forgotten what it was I’d noticed. Hmmm. I should keep Post-It notes handy for such things.

Summer Reading Spectacular # 15

2008-08-06T21:01:00.001-04:00

[Allow me to apologize. I got part-way through the entries from my week of holiday and got side-tracked. Now, some time later, I am finally finishing the job. I repeatedly thought of the need to finish transferring the entries from word processor into dullgloomy, but never when I was actually at the computer. I apologise. And now I bring you ... the continuation of the job long overdue!]

Today I read two books start to finish, each on completley opposite ends of the spectrum as far as content goes.

The first was Night by Elie Wiesel. The book is essentially the memoirs of the author, recounting his experiences as a teenager in Auschwitz and other death camps.

The book itself has an interesting history. Wiesel wrote a lengthy memoir in Yiddish, then rewrote a shorter version in French (La Nuit) which was translated into English as Night. What I read was a new translation by his wife.

Almost anything I can say about the book will seem trite. Suffice it to say that I recommend the book to help those of us, so far removed in our daily lives from the events and tragedies of World War II, to understand, in some limited way, those realities. 'Nuff said.

Then I read Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Rodrick Rules by Jeff Kinney. You might recall that I have already commented on the first Diary of a Wimpy Kid (see Summer Reading Spectacular # 7.5). This volume is more of the same. While a bit more limited in narrative scope than the first (with a noticeably shallower arc in the plot), it is essentially a mildly amusing little light reading that kids, again, will enjoy.

Summer Reading Spectacular #14

2008-08-05T23:59:00.000-04:00

It was a busy day for reading!

First, I completed the first book in the Kidnapped trilogy, “Abduction”. Those of you of a certain age will likely know Gordon Korman (who has been discussed here before) for his light and amusing novels full of quirky, rambunctious characters up to various goofy shenanigans. (Favourites include No Coins Please, I Want to Go Home, and Go Jump In the Pool!) What you may or may not know is that he has, in recent years, also become known among the junior set for his adventure series, little thrillers just right for that 9 to 14 year-old audience.

The Island trilogy follows a group of kids who get stranded on ... you guessed it, an island.
The Everest trilogy follows a group of kids who have adventures while climbing ... you guessed it, Everest.
The On the Run series (of six books) follows a pair of kids who are ... you guessed it, on the run.
The Dive trilogy follows a group of kids having adventures ... you guessed it, in the ocean.

In any case, Kidnapped, is a follow-up to On the Run, taking the family from the previous series on a new adventure when one of the kids is ... you guessed it! KIDNAPPED!

I won’t comment much until I finish the other two books in the trilogy. Suffice it to say that Korman knows his audience. So far this adventure, like those before it, have enough plot twists and dangerous scenarios to keep the junior audience excited and interested, but not so much complexity that they’ll feel bogged down or overwhelmed by details and content.

Secondly, I finished reading The Ottoman Cage, by Barbara Nadel, an author new to me. A crime thriller type of story set in Istanbul, it actually made me want to visit the city. The author, who apparently has spent plenty of time in Turkey, wove the history, culture, and classes of Istanbul deeply into every page of the story, with characters whose backstories are surprisingly fleshed-out while somehow not feeling like “add-ons” to her plot. The book was previously published as A Chemical Prison, which still appears on the top of every inside page, oddly enough. Although that title does make sense, The Ottoman Cage is, in my humble opinion, a much better title -- both more engaging and more variously applicable to themes and symbols within the book. I believe I will search out her first novel, Belshazzar’s Daughter, which shares setting and characters with this book, to enjoy at a later date.

Later, I started and finished Snap by Alison McGhee, a short novel about a girl who attempts to organize her life with lists and elastic bands and who struggles with her fears and feelings when her closest friend learns that her grandmother is dying. (I do not envy those people who have to encapsulate the story or theme of a book for dust jackets and the like.)

Finally, I read Bone: Book Three – Eyes of the Storm.

Summer Reading Spectacular #13

2008-08-04T23:59:00.000-04:00

Started and finished Bone: Book 2 - The Great Cow Race while continuing some reads and starting another.

Summer Reading Spectacular #12

2008-08-03T23:59:00.000-04:00

Having started it the other day, I finished reading Cynthia Lord’s Rules, a short novel for young people about a girl coping with her own developing identity in the shadow of her autistic brother. The author has an autistic child and portrayed her characters with an authenticity which I could recognize, having worked with children with autism and communication disorders in the past. The book has received both the Newbery Honor and the Schneider Family Book Award. Going in, I worried about the possibility of the protagonist, Catherine, coming across as a self-pitying whiner, and there are elements of that, but she seems as though she comes by it honestly as a girl her age, so to speak, and not as an author’s two-dimensional fabrication. I also thought Lord’s handling of Jason, a wheelchair bound boy who communicates with a binder of word cards, and the development of his complicated friendship with Catherine to be simply and honestly explored.

I also read Bone: Book 1 - Out From Boneville by Jeff Smith. Since this is the first in a series of graphic novels, I won’t comment on each, but will acknowledge each as I finish it. Though there will be nine books in all, seven are currently in my possession, so I will comment on the seven as a whole (unless the eighth is out and I’ve got it by the time I finish).

Summer Reading Spectacular #11

2008-07-29T21:23:00.002-04:00

Alright, it's time to catch up. I've got three things to document, so I'll do each quickly and briefly.

A few days ago I finished reading Waiting for Godot by Samuel Beckett. The story behind my choice to read it is this: Several years ago I was approached to play the part of Lucky in Waiting for Godot, but unfortunately circumstances being what they were (surgery, to be specific), I couldn't make the commitment. The director went off and cast someone else and I never was able to even see it. So now, I've finally read it.

Lucky would have been an interesting challenge to play. He says nary a word for the bulk of the play, save for one three-page monologue. The thing is, it's a huge nonsensical monologue (did I mention that the play falls into the realm of Theatre of the Absurd?) with no punctuation and which rambles in loose cycles through themes and images. Maybe it's good that I couldn't commit, because memorizing that thing must be a killer!

In the end, I enjoyed the reading and would like to see a good prodution of it some day. I say good production because in reading it, it's obvious how wrong it could go without a strong director and cast. It could go off the tracks so easily, but could also be a fascinating bit of theatre, too.

Next, I finished reading Fragile Things. It's a collection of "short fictions and wonders" by Neil Gaiman. As a Neil Gaiman fan (everyone should read Neverwhere), I always enjoy his quirky, sometimes macabre short stories, and just as much enjoy reading his brief author's comments for each in the introduction. Among my favourites from this collection are "The Flints of Memory Lane", "Pages from a Journal Found in a Shoebox Left in a Greyhound Bus Somewhere Between Tulso, Oklahoma, and Louisville, Kentucky", "How to Talk to Girls at Parties", and "The Monarch of the Glen" (which is a short follow-up/companion to his novel American Gods.)

Finally, yesterday I wrapped up a short children's novel, What Jamie Saw, by Carolyn Coman.

When Jamie saw him throw the baby, saw Van throw the little baby, saw Van throw his little sister Nin, when Jamie saw Van throw his little sister Nin, then they moved.

From there, the story, simple and effective in both voice and plot, follows Jamie and his less-than-perfect mother try to cope with uncertainty and fear as they try to settle into a new life in a trailer out on their own with his baby sister in tow. Coman earned a Newbery Honor for What Jamie Sawin 1996.

Summer Reading Spectacular #10

2008-07-24T00:16:00.002-04:00

Owls in the Family is one of those books that everyone seems to have read in school except for me. So I read it.

Now I must admit that Farley Mowat has never been a particular favourite of mine, but I haven't been particularly disdainful of his writing, either, nor am I now.

What I found most interesting was this constant sense of "My, how times have changed" as I read. In the midst of the story, which focuses on a boy and his family affectionately living with two pet owls, there's all of this stuff that might well make more modern animal-lovers cringe just a little. Like the random snaring of gophers for sport. Like stealing incubating eggs from wild birds' nests. Like the mass killing of crows by the boy's father after they upset a fishing trip. It's just so odd by today's (particularly urban) sensibility. It seems such an odd contradiction between seeming animal-loving characters who engage in the activities.

Still, it's easy to be gently amused by the crazy shenanigans of those owls! Oh, that Wol! He doesn't seem to realize he's not a human! Har har!

Random Road Trip Addendum

2008-07-24T00:07:00.002-04:00

I realized that I had intended to discuss one other random observation from my trip and neglected to do so.

On my final day, I stopped for gas at a station in New York State and was a bit off-put by the store there. Call me crazy, but I think having a little cooler by the cash register filled with chilled single cans of beer labeled "Manager's Special: 79 cents each" is perhaps sending a message that is inappropriate. It's a GAS station, giving a person fair reason to assume that visitors are driving. Single cans for 79 cents, cheaper than a Coke, have a certain immediacy to them, don't they?

I was further disturbed by the presence of a display of "Beer Pong Balls". Seriously. They were labelled and signed as Beer Pong Balls, not just regular ping pong balls that buyers could ... um ... figure out a use for.

Summer Reading Spectacular #9

2008-07-22T14:38:00.003-04:00

Having just finished reading Uzodinma Iweala's debut novel, Beasts of No Nation, I find myself at a loss for words which can adequately capture even a hint of its impact. Saying it's a powerful narrative seems trite.

It is the story of a boy, Agu, recruited into child soldiership in some unnamed African country and flung into the horrific, mangled world of war. The voice, first person and in a relentless and haunting present tense, is frank and graphic, always teetering on the edge where the naivety of childhood meets the brutality of Agu's experiences, what he sees and what he does, and how he tries to justify and make sense of the world in which he finds himself.

But they are only screaming like Devil is coming for them. I am not Devil. I am not bad boy. I am not bad boy. Devil is not blessing me and I am not going to hell. But still I am thinking maybe Devil born me and that is why I am doing all of this.

Read this book.

Summer Reading Spectacular #8

2008-07-21T19:05:00.004-04:00

The random road trip cut into my reading time a bit, but I'm verging on completing a few books, so there may be a rush on updates soon enough.

I did finish The One Left Behind, though. This was the last book from Willo Davis Roberts before her death last year. It's a novel for young readers and, though not one of her strongest, is a quick and motivated read. Davis was a three-time Edgar Allen Poe Award winner (in Juvenile and Young Adult categories, though she also wrote for an adult audience) and I know that her mysteries certainly keep youngsters on the edge of their seats wanting to know what happens next. If I have a complaint about some of her later novels, it's simply that she seems to go to great lengths to get her protagonists alone at the wrong time so that adventure can occur. In Hostage, it's an allergy attack that requires nasal spray. Seriously. In this case, it's a big family scattered to the four winds with weekend plans, all assuming that the youngest is with someone else. Still, the set-ups aside, her books tend to have clean, adventurous storylines that appeal to kids who are ready for just a little danger in their reading.

Random Road Trip: Day 3

2008-07-20T23:56:00.004-04:00

Well, it was homeward bound today. (Interpret that as "It was not an interesting day on which to report".)

Upon packing up from my divey motel and heading out, I, in the light of day and without the obscuring factor of torrenial downpours, realized more about the surroundings. What a surprise that my divey motel was located almost across the street from a "Gentleman's Club" and a shop which selled leather fetish-wear. Hahahaha!

Having plotted my route before leaving, I hopped on the highway and went merrily on my way.

I have to say that Pennsylvania and upstate New York remind me a bit of northern Ontario, minus the lakes. So the days spent driving all over the place were quite pleasant, really.

I stopped off the highway for a fast-food lunch and then went back to driving. It started torrentially downpouring once again, slowing things up for a stretch, but then eased off into light drizzle.

Soon I was in Buffalo, hopping over the old Peace Bridge, I was shortly back home safe and sound.

The Random Road Trip was officially over!

Random Road Trip: Day 2

2008-07-19T22:59:00.001-04:00

It’s the end of the day and my legs are POOPED!

It all started by sleeping in. Ahhhh! I set the alarm, but hit snooze for almost an hour. Not bad, not bad.

Then it was up and back to Alvira to see what else I could discover! I drove all the way to the end of the road and what was right in front of me? Another one of those odd little bunkers. This one was quite messed up and was behind a fence topped by barbed wire. What to do, what to do? Go past the fence? Stay where I am? What would you do, little children?

I’m an obedient fellow, so I just took pictures from my side of the fence. No trespassing for me! Not this time, anyway.

Right beside it was another cemetery with big posts at its entrance. It appears that this cemetery was the site of mostly older graves, many of people born in the 1700s who passed away in the 1800s. There were some fascinating stones, and one that had quite an extensive write up about someone’s father, but unfortunately some cracking and general weathering made it impossible for me to decipher the bulk of the message. In the picture, I don't even think you can tell that there is any writing across the bottom, it was so faint.

I went up the road a ways to another bunker I’d noticed when I passed. Its entrance was surrounded by junkety-junk-junk and lots of it. Not one, but TWO broken televisions were the centrepiece to this mess.

After taking a picture of that one, I started exploring some of the paths and roads. The trick, I discovered, was to look for paths that showed signs of having once been proper roads rather than simply short/crushed grass paths. Sometimes there’s not much indication, to be honest.

As I was making a “return trip” down one such road, I saw a mound, practically hidden by the forest growth.

I couldn’t see any entrance on my side, but decided I could probably climb it. If there was a chimney vent in the top, I knew I’d found another. Up I climbed, and sure enough, chimneyville.

I clambered down the other side and found the entrance, partially obscured by growth, unlike the others I had found.

And guess what.

The door was wide open.

I made my first entrance into the domed, igloo-shaped bunker.

I can’t even begin to describe adequately the sound inside one of these bunkers. For a moment, I thought there were bats or birds fluttering around inside, but there were none. The tiniest sounds made by each step were amplified and reverberated almost endlessly. The best way I can describe this strange popping-crackling-twinkling sound is to imaging those weird sonic tube things they sell at dollar stores (you know, with a coil inside to sound all spacey) and multiply that sound and feeling a hundred-fold. It’s so eerie and exciting and strangely electric.

Unlike the open bunker I’d read about from a previous visitor, this one was pristine. Possibly because it was not on the main road, possibly because it was quite hidden, vandals and punks had not damaged it at all. The only evidence that ANYONE had been there, was a single piece of plastic, a wrapper of some sort. I think it was some sort of jerky or meat stick. It was crazy dark once you were past the entrance way, so I had to keep taking pictures, just to see the walls.

The Inside of the Dome

The Wall Opposite the Door (see how clean!)

The Door from Inside

Fairly nearby, I soon discovered three more bunkers, all open, all clean and graffiti-free, though with more signs of visitation in the form of a few cans, candy wrappers, packages from those instant-heat hand warmers (must have been winter visits), and a few ziploc bags. (Hmmm. I wonder what those held! I’m sure with the darkness and eerie acoustics, more than one person has gone there to get stoned...)

I was on a roll! Next up, I walked a long road to nowhere (and turned around long before I got to nowhere) and then up another branch to find ... one of the bunkers I’d found yesterday. Ah, the roads converge, at times!

(Remember, at this point I’ve been hiking madly for about two hours... HOT and SWEATY! Yack!)

Nearby I found the elusive #2 I hadn’t gotten to yesterday (which was good, because I’d already planned how I wanted to display a few of the pictures, and I needed #2). Then I found #4, which the person from whom I’d gotten directions had not found. (Of course, at this point, I was way past the total of four that she’d discovered.) Numbers 8, 10, and 13 followed, requiring a few long walks through long grass. (Of course, I later deduced that the paths in that area of the park likely followed a fairly logical plan or organization.

In any case, I called it quits, not because I’d exhausted my options (rather I suspected I could find all of the missing numbers to 13, at least, if I’d wanted), but because I’d been hiking around the park for too long. I was thirsty, exhausted, thirsty, hungry, thirsty, and a little weak in the legs. I was also a little scratched up, though I didn’t realize that until later.

Having plotted a route to my next intended stop, I hit the road. I stopped for a quick McLunch (and lots of beverage), and continued on my way.

Now, remember how I pointed out how much Pennsylvanians like their signs? Yeah, that’s just road work signs. Their signage in other ways stinks. STU-INKS! After a lengthy jaunt, I came through Frackton and made it as far as Ashland on my way to a place called Centralia. Well, the poor signage coupled with some weirdness regarding North-South-East-West directionality (seriously, there’s a lot of weirdness in Pennsylvania with directions of routes according to their signs), I found myself curiously near my starting point of Frackton and decided that, since time was wasting, I would call it quits on that one. It’s unfortunate because:

#1: Centralia is interesting because it was evacuated years ago because of an underground fire burning which is, reportedly, still burning.

#2: Along my way towards (or so I had thought) Centralia, I passed some interesting places and buildings which I had hoped to photograph on the way back. These sights included the (sort of odd) enormous statue of Whistler’s Mother, the house with the rainbow-coloured roofing, and the derelict Prism theatre.

Zero on both counts.

So it was off to my next intended stop, Eckley Miners Village. (I really wish it were Eckley Miners’ Village.) More sign-trouble delayed me by about ten minutes (the signs to Eckley are sporradic at times, but even worse, change colours at various points along the route). That made me arrive at 5:02. The village “closes” at 5:00.

No matter, though, I walked around anyway.

But what’s weird about Eckley? It’s now a historic village for tourists and history buffs, with original buildings, a gift shop, and whatnot, but SOME of the homes are still inhabited! So I felt a little odd walking up the street of the village while occasionally seeing people at their homes. That’s when I need someone less shy than me, because I would have loved to ask them questions about living in the “village”, but instead just sufficed with sheepish smiles, the occasional “Hey”, and a “Good evening, how are you?”

Finally, it was time to head generally north and find a place to stay. In the end, I crossed over into New York State and stopped in at Binghamton. It was bucketing of rain, pitch black, and I was exhausted. I ended up on a stretch of road and gave up looking for a hotel. I caved and checked into a hotel that looked ... um ... okay.

It’s a dive.

I’m sitting in the dive-y-ist motel I’ve ever been in as an adult. I may sleep sitting in that chair over there...

Goodnight!

Other observations for the day:

Pennsylvania has the worst drivers I’ve ever encountered in North America.

McDonald’s cheeseburgers taste different down here. I think it’s the bun.

I’ve yet to see a population listed on any town, thus you never know if it’s worth pulling off somewhere until it’s too late.

Gas prices vary greatly and in close proximity with one another. Prices such as $4.29 a gallon were spotted just up the road from $3.99.

Random Road Trip: Day 1

2008-07-18T22:41:00.000-04:00

It began with a long, long, long wait at the border. (Okay, it actually began with me mowing the lawn, watering some plants and a tarantula, and tossing some bags in the car, but you get the point.) True to form, I was in a lane that was going nowhere while the lane to my right was moving quickly. I changed lanes, of course, and then watched while my former lane started whipping by. Such is my life...

Incidentally, does the Queenston/Lewiston bridge always smell like garbage? It was rather unpleasant. The customs fellow was quite funny,

Then I was off! I spent more time than I would have liked on Interstates (what’s with them all being similarly numbered? I was on the 190, the 90, the 290, and the 390 today. Of course, the Americans might take exception to our “400-series” highways, I suppose), and had I been more on the ball, I might have plotted a route that took me through more country roads and small towns. Still, along the way, I made some observations and drew some conclusions.

There’s an odd little state law in New York that says that your headlights must be on when you use your windshield wipers. Seriously. Hmmm.

It’s always a bit disconcerting to see emergency vehicles getting roadside assistance. As I drove past a fire truck getting a tow, I couldn’t help but think, “I hope that the truck broke down on the way back from an emergency, not on the way to the emergency.”

At one point, once in Pennsylvania, there were numbers spray painted on the shoulder. They appeared at regular intervals, each ten higher than the previous. 2340. 2350. 2360. Furthermore, they seemed to be more than ten yards apart, so I’m not sure they were counting off measures in that way. Perhaps they were ten yards apart, though. What do I know? To further complicate matters, every other number (those whose “tens” contained an even digit) was preceded by a little triangle. Any explanations? Anyone? Anyone? In any case, they abruptly stopped and were seen no more.

Speaking of Pennsylvanian road signs (sort of), they LOVE their signs! They must believe that Americans either have the world’s worst short-term memories or the world’s least attentive drivers. They sometimes overkill just a little in the sign department. “Right lane ends ahead.” “Right lane ends in ½ mile.” “Right lane ends in 1000 ft.” “Right lane ends.” These signs were on both sides of the road, sometimes close enough to one another that a person could probably spit from one to the other. It was a bit of a bombardment. And since there was a stretch of one highway with lots of closed lanes, they were insanely plentiful between left lanes and right lanes being blocked. (Come to think of it, there was a similar onslaught of signs in New York State, too. “Toll Booths 1 mile.” “Toll Booths ½ mile.” “Toll Booths 1/4 mile.” “Toll Booths ahead.” (And at one point I could read all of the latter three at the same time.)

Finally, on the subject of signs, there was a warning about a 6 3/4 % grade slope in the road. Percent of what? I am assuming they meant a 6 3/4 degree slope. [Edited to add: I saw tonnes of these signs the next day with varying measures, but all with a % sign. Odd.]

Before I get to the good parts of the Random Road Trip, let me point out one last conclusion I’ve drawn. People in “Small-Town America” are not as pure and innocent as they would have us believe. I saw THREE enormous Adult Stores, all in or just outside of teeny-tiny little towns. One was an “Outlet”, one was a “Superstore”, and one was a “Playtime Boutique”. And that boutique looked to be hopping with business when I drove by! Ha!

So, as I drove far too long along Interstates and major highways, I started thinking, “What am I doing? This is so random and an awful long distance to travel with little idea of why or what I’m going to do. Sure, there was at least one place (see below) that I was hoping to visit, but what a long trek to do that on a whim.

But before I did that, I stopped in a tiny place called Sonyea. That’s right, Sonyea. It’s like a very enthusiastic greeting for an old friend. It’s so small that, though there’s a sign for it on the highway, there’s no actual sign to say you’ve arrived there. As far as I can tell, the only reason Sonyea exists is so that a very large corrections facility can have a mailing address. Believe it or not, the sight of extensive chain link and razor wire glinting like chrome in the sunlight ... isn’t really that lovely.

Ah, but just across the road from the prison, there was a small cluster of abandoned farm buildings that I paused and photographed for fun.

There was also a lovely truck which appears to have exploded in its front end. Curious...

Then I arrived in the tiny town of Allenwood, PA. I grabbed the rather vague directions I had for a place called Alvira. (I hope to find out if it’s pronounced in a way that rhymes with Elvira or with Vera. So far I don’t know. I suppose it could also be “AL-vira”.) The directions I have don’t actually give a starting point, but I set out on the given highway just hoping I was heading in the right direction. For that matter, if I did hit my next benchmark road, would it be on the right or the left? And then I saw it, the road for which I was searching, and it was, indeed, on the same side as the directions. I must have started in the right place. I followed it along and found the location of Alvira as described. That’s when the directions get REALLY vague. No mention of where to find the remains of the town.

Did I mention that it’s located in a game park now? You know. Where HUNTERS go to shoot things? So I parked where the directions indicated (although there was no black Chevy or grey Aerostar between which to park) and followed the pathway straight ahead. Into a woodsy/fieldsy thing.

And that’s when I realized how ridiculous it all is. I’m in the middle of a game park in a US state and pretty much nobody knows where I am and I’m alone. If I get shot/fall down and break my neck/whatever, NOBODY will know about it!

Good thing that didn’t happen.

I returned to the road, realizing that wandering aimlessly about the grounds wasn’t going to be fruitful. I wandered up the road and realized that it was all going to be easier than expected, for there, on the left, was BUNKER ONE.

You see, the story of Alvina is that it was evacuated during the second world war, and by evacuated, I mean kicked off when the government took hold of the land to build a TNT factory. They originally said that the residents could buy their land back after the war, but that never happened. The built the factory and a number of bunkers in which to store the munitions, and then closed up shop before the war even ended, having overestimated the need for good old TNT. The bunkers remain, locked up and sealed, and two small cemeteries still remain from the old town. The cemeteries have mostly graves from the days of the village of Alvina, though some if their, um, residents died in the 70s. Some stones have been replaced with newer ones, but mostly original, weathered stones remain. What’s sobering are the number of child and infant graves from the turn of the century. Still more mark the graves of adults around the 20 year old mark.

But even in the midst of a cemetery, humour can be found, though it may well have been unintentional originally. Ah yes, the grave markers of the Canada family...

In the end, I had to give up searching for bunkers as the light of day was fading and I had yet to find a place to sleep. In the end, I found five bunkers (though I was only aware of four being there from my source) labeled 1, 3, 5, and two without visible numbers. None had open doors; one of the unnumbered bunkers appeared to have been newly welded shut. I also gave up the search for the reported church foundations, though there were a few stones “peeking” through the surface of the ground near the larger cemetery, so perhaps that’s where the church foundations now lay buried. Tomorrow I may return to see if I can find anything else before moving on.

On the way out of Alvira, the fireflies (or lightning bugs, as the case may be) were out in full force, blinking here and there as I walked and then drove. Do they blink all day, unseen because of the sunlight, or do they just turn on at night? In any case, it was lovely.

Since there’s pretty much nothing in Allenwood (and certainly no place I wanted to sleep), I went back to a place just up the road (past the Playtime Boutique) and asked at a trusty Quality Inn ... and was told that there were no rooms and probably none in town. Hmmm. It was back up towards Allenwood where I got a room at a tiny little family-run motel which was cheap and clean. Whew! Goodnight!

Summer Reading Spectacular #7.5

2008-07-13T18:09:00.003-04:00

Having just finished Diary of a Wimpy Kid by Jeff Kinney, I thought I should add it right away.

Given that the book is half cartoon illustration and the rest of the text is set in a faux hand-written font, it's not nearly as long as it appears to be on the shelf. It takes about an hour of actual reading, tops.

It's a fun, breezy little read (as can be expected from the title and format of the book) and is rather obviously slated for kids, who are likely to enjoy it. (Hence it becoming a bestseller and spawning a series.) Reluctant readers are likely to pick it up, which is good.

My one complaint would be the unsurprising use of stereotypes which abound. There are times when the author seems to be trying to step outside of the done-to-death stereotypes (the main character admits that he wants to take Home Ec 2 because he was good at Home Ec 1, but won't because being able to sew doesn't help your popularity), but settles comfortably into them the rest of the time (the girls in class want to design a robot that will give dating advice and have ten types of lip gloss on its fingers). I guess the one redeeming factor is that the whole thing is being told through the filter of a grade seven loser, so maybe he's the one creating the stereotypes, not the author. Maybe?

The second book (Roderick Rules) is already in my possession, so I'm sure I'll take an hour to read that one, too, at some point.

Summer Reading Spectacular #7

2008-07-13T17:03:00.003-04:00

Yesterday I finished reading Swindle by good old Canadian Gordon Korman. Like most of his books, it's a breezy, enjoyable little romp for kids. You've got to hand it to Mr. Korman, he is churning out books like mad, and there's a certain formula to many of them, but he does seem to know his audience and can tap into what they find funny. I guess the trick of his is to take the ingredients for his formula (quirky characters with one being the hyper-focused ringleader, add in the immediate subject of the ringleader's focus, develop an obsessive plan or goal, and mix in rather outlandish plot elements which illuminate the character's ingenuity) and shuffle them into various situations from book to book. And it works. Kids are still eating his stuff up, and I can't deny that I'm still reading his stuff (old and new), too.

In this case, you've got a kid who was swindled out of a valuable baseball card and who, with the aid of several schoolmates with specific talents (a rock climber, a computer hacker, a budding actor, and an animal-loving "dog whisperer") hatches a plan a break-and-enter to reclaim what he believes is rightly his.

It takes virtually no time to read and serves as pleasant escapism for the duration. Hey, Mr. Korman knows what he's doing.

Undead Saturday

2008-07-12T20:05:00.003-04:00

Yesterday was two-show day!

First it was Balls! at the Toronto Fringe. A two-hander about testicular cancer (yes, it's also about close friends confronting mortality), it has been working the Fringe circuit for a year or so and continues to do so for the rest of the summer. It was decent, though it could certainly use some continued workshopping. The two actors couldn't seem to quite maintain their commitment, and drifted in and out of being "present" in their roles. The writing has a lot of potential, but needs tweaking, particularly to more solidly define the characters through their language.

Then it was off to enjoy delicious Thai food (Cold Rolls, Mango Chicken, and Honey Fried Banana). Although slightly disappointed that their green tea came from Lipton's, it was still tasty tea.

Have you ever noticed that in many downtown-type restaurants, when you go to the bathroom, you feel suspiciously like you're descending into someone's rec room? Sometimes, as in the restaurant where I was dining, it feels like an abandoned rec room, cleared out for a move, while in other cases it seems like at any minute teenagers might appear and crash on the couch in the corner? In any case, then it was off to ...

Evil Dead: The Musical! It's a hilarious, crass, bloody good time. It's a spoof of musicals, of horror films, and of spoofs of horror films. Although not sitting in the splatter zone, I did get mildly splattered (and given that the blood was a trifle sticky, was sort of glad I didn't sit in the splatter zone). I'm sure that it's great fun to get fake blood all over oneself, but I'm not sure I'm the oneself for it... Ha!

Oh Dear: The Return

2008-07-08T19:11:00.003-04:00

Remember the Airport Plaza Jewelers guy? Well this fellow is his hero. Seriously. According the the Airport Plaza Jewelers myspace page, he really wants to meet Sammy Stephens.

Oh dear. What IS the world coming to. He RAPS about how his furniture place (Flea Market Montgomery) is "just like a mini mall". That's a selling point? "It's just like a mini mall?" Don't they know that there are actually people whom you can pay to create advertising campaigns?